https://youtu.be/p9hw1wSjLsk
In our verse by verse study of Romans we are part way through Rom 3; 25; with the expanded translation "Whom the God (the Father) has publicly displayed the propitiation or mercy seat through faith in His blood ... "
We see here that God's solution for mankind's problem is called the "blood of Christ" that is the only source of salvation but to understand it properly we have to know what the phrase "his blood" refers to and what it means
Remember that the "blood of Christ" refers to the entire work of Jesus in being judged for our sins on the cross that includes expiation, propitiation, redemption and reconciliation.
The last half of verse 25 is a prepositional phrase that explains why God the Father did what He did. We will get to that after we take a quick look at the "doctrine of the blood" because that is a very misunderstood doctrine.
The predicate for the doctrine of blood is the literal blood of the animal sacrifices. The literal blood in the scripture always refers to animals because blood is the essence of animal life.
In Lev 17:10-14; where it says that the life of the flesh is in the blood it never refers to human beings, it always refers to the animal creation. The life of human beings is in the soul but the life of animals is in the blood because animals do not have a soul.
The Bible talks about the life of the animal but never about the soul of the animal. From the coats of skins in Gen 3:21; through the Levitical offerings described in chapters 1-5 of Leviticus animal blood was used to represent the sacrifice of Jesus Christ through ritual before Jesus Christ fulfilled that sacrifice in reality.
In other words, animal blood is literal blood and when the animal is sacrificed on the altar that animal blood is the basis of its literal physical death. But that animal blood that is real and literal represents the spiritual sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ.
The animal blood represents something figurative. So the animal blood of the Old Testament portrays the redemptive work of Christ on the cross as described in Heb 9:22.
The blood of Christ is therefore what is in focus for our definition. The doctrine of the blood deals with the passages in the New Testament that refer to "the blood or " the blood of Christ".
The blood of Christ is not literal physical blood; it is a metonymy for his spiritual death so it refers to expiation, redemption, reconciliation, and propitiation.
The blood of Christ is the saving work of Jesus Christ on the cross, and the reason it is referred to as "blood" is because the predicate for it was all of the animal sacrifices of the Old Testament that involved the shedding of blood, and God wanted to make it very clear to the human race that while Christ did not die in Old Testament times every time an animal sacrifice was offered it portrayed expiation, redemption, reconciliation, and propitiation.
Every time God permitted an animal sacrifice and even ordered it, as He did under the Levitical code, it was a reference to God's promise that the seed of the woman who would eventually enter the world as Jesus Christ would bear the sins of the world. John 1:14;
So the phrase "blood of Christ" links the historical sacrifices to the historical death of Jesus Christ on the cross while He was bearing our sins during His substitutionary spiritual death.
The phrase "the blood of Christ" is therefore a representative analogy or a metonymy. Under this concept there are several things that we must understand. The animal blood of the Old Testament sacrifices was real and literal.
The animal literally bled it out and died when his throat was cut with the sacrificial knife. However, that real and literal animal blood represented the spiritual death of Jesus Christ on the cross that is described in Col 1:20; Heb 10:19; Heb 13:20; 1Pet 1:2;
A real analogy would be a literal physical death compared with a literal physical death. If we had a real analogy it would be a real physical death of an animal compared to the real physical death of Jesus.
But we do not have a literal or a real analogy we have a representative analogy where one thing represents another, and in this case we have the physical death of the animal on the alter representing the spiritual death of Jesus Christ on the cross.
When He did die physically He did not die by bleeding to death. This is taught in John 19:30-34; in where we find that the physical death of Christ on the occurred when He dismissed His spirit from His own volition, not from bleeding to death.
He had the option that when His work was finished He could dismiss His spirit to the Father. He said that this was how He said He would die physically in John 10:18.
The blood of the animal sacrifice was a shadow that was used to represent the substitutionary spiritual death of Christ to every generation before Christ went to the cross. It was the shadow pointing to the reality Heb 9:12-14.
Therefore the phrase the blood of Christ describes His saving work on the cross. Four doctrines of salvation are used to express this. Expiation describes the entire blood of Christ in His spiritual death as in Rev 1:5.
The blood of Christ in expiation is the basis for confession of sins in rebound 1John 1:7 cf. 1John 1:9.
Redemption, reconciliation and propitiation describe the applications of the blood of Christ.
The blood of Jesus Christ is the means of propitiation because God the Father is satisfied with Jesus Christ bearing our sins and the person who believes.
Reconciliation removes the barrier between man and God because Christ bore our sins as our substitute.
Redemption refers to our being freed from the slave market of sin into which we were born Jesus was judged for our sins.
So the blood of Christ is redemption: sinward; reconciliation: manward; propitiation: God ward. The blood of Christ is all three of these, and the blood of Christ handles known sins and unknown sins.
The true meaning of the blood of Christ is found in the directions of the doctrines of salvation. Jesus Christ is the mediator because He brings God and man together by His "blood" aka substitutionary spiritual death on the cross.
This brings us back to our verse in Rom 3:25; where the verse continues with why God the Father did this.
"to demonstrate His righteousness" there is no verb in the original the NASB has one in italics there is only the preposition "eis" (to) plus the accusative singular noun "endeiknum" (demonstrate or for a demonstration) followed by the subjective genitive of "dikaiosune" (righteousness) one half of God's integrity followed by "autos" (His).
"through the passing over of the previous sins" "dia" (through) plus the accusative singular of the noun "paresis" (pass over). Then the articular perfect active participle from the verb "proginomai" (previous).
The participle is used here is an ascriptive sense as an adjective that means, "previously committed." Plus the subjective genitive plural from "harmartema" (transgressions or sins) referring to sins committed before the cross. God passed over the judgment for those sins until they could all be judged in Jesus on the cross
"through the forbearance of the God" "eis" (through) plus the instrumental of "anoche" (clemency, holding back, or delay in judgment). Then the ablative of source from "o Theos" (God the Father)
The ablative of source implies the origin of God the Father's clemency or delay in judgment of all sins prior to the cross. God's justice held up judgment until Christ could die as the substitute on the cross. This means that there was a delay in the judgment of all the sins in the human race until Jesus Christ could be judged for them on the cross.
Expanded Translation Rom 3:25; "Whom the God (the Father) has publicly displayed the propitiation or mercy seat through faith in His blood (Jesus' spiritual death on the cross) to demonstrate his righteousness because of the passing over of previously committed sins, because of the delay in judgment of the God (God the Father)."
We see in this verse that God is immutable so His integrity must be consistent. This consistency demands function and interrelationship between His righteousness and His justice.
There must be no compromise or inconsistency in the function of God's integrity. To avoid compromise and inconsistency a principle develops that becomes axiomatic. God's justice can only bless God's righteousness.