I was in a very spirited debate with a couple ladies on Twitter who said Dr. John MacArthur has denied the necessity of the blood in saving sinners. That could not be further from the truth. I will provide a link to http://www.gty.org where he clarifies what he said. This was from January 1, 1987. How this got started again, Faith Baptist Church(not sure where this church is located) made a documentary called “Calvinism: A Doctrine of Demons”. This brought this to the forefront again and I want to address this here, and post it on Twitter for those ladies, and others, to read. With that, let’s delve into this.
“For some strange reason people have accused me of denying the blood of Christ, which is not so. I affirm that a literal Jesus Christ who was man in every respect, one hundred percent man yet God incarnate, died on the cross, shed His literal blood as a sacrifice for sin. And I believe that, and I believe that it was that sacrificial death of Christ on the cross that atoned for the sins of man, and those who believe appropriate that atonement and receive eternal life through His death and resurrection, and that’s historic Christian theology.“
Now, show me where he’s denied the blood here. He mentioned the necessity of the blood, along with His death and resurrection. A gospel that denies the blood is no gospel at all, yea, is another gospel. Yet, he has not denied it here.
“But in recent months, I have noticed that there is an encroaching heresy on the blood, that there are people who say that the blood of Jesus was not human, it was divine. One pastor said to me, “He had the blood of God.” I said, “What is the blood of God?” He said, “Divine blood.” I said, “God is a spirit, that was the blood of Christ, that was the blood of a man, He was one hundred percent man.” It’s heretical to call the blood of Jesus Christ the blood of God, and it demonstrates a failure to understand what theologians have called the hypostatic union, that is the God-man union in Christ.
There are others who say that there’s something magical in the blood, there’s something in the blood itself that washes sin away, when the Scripture teaches it was the death of Christ that atoned for sin, and He shed His literal blood in sacrificial evidence of the pouring out of His life for sin. But there was nothing magic about that blood itself that could wash sin. And so, this heresy has begun to develop, strangely enough.“
Again, show me where Dr. MacArthur has denied the necessity of the blood of the Christ. What he was addressing were the heresies springing up that had the blood having some sort of mystical properties, some sort of magical power. The blood that flowed through His veins was no different than yours or mine. No one who came into contact with that blood, if He had gotten cut, had their sins atoned for. The Roman soldier who pierced His side and caused blood and water to gush out, that blood would not have saved him if it came into contact with him. The shedding of blood goes way deeper than that my dear reader. It was not the mere bleeding that saves people. Bear with me here a minute. Bleeding alone doesn’t save. Look at the Old Testament sacrifices. The animals sacrificed not only bled, but died. It was the bleeding coinciding with its death that brought the atonement. If the animal bled but did not die, there would have been no atonement. If it had died and there was no bleeding, there would have been no atonement. It took BOTH the bleeding AND the death of that animal to bring atonement. It’s the same way with the Christ’s atonement on the cross. It took the bleeding and death to bring atonement.
Blood also refers to someone’s life. Dr. MacArthur said this Judah, you remember, in Genesis 37 said to his brothers about Joseph, quote: “What profit is it if we slay our brother and conceal his blood?” Well, they didn’t mean collect his blood and hide it in the ground, they meant conceal his death, conceal the violent, murderous death. See, here he is giving proper context to blood. They would be concealing his blood, but hiding his body, the life they took, not his literal blood.
When the Christ said, “This is My blood of the covenant, which is poured out for many,“ [Mark 14:24] was that literally blood He gave them to drink? No. That’s RCC teaching, not mainstream Christian teaching. He was saying that He was shedding His blood, giving His life. The Greek word for shedding is αἱματεκχυσία which means shedding, an effusion. An effusion means the escape of a fluid from anatomical vessels by rupture or exudation. This means He shed His blood and gave His life in the process of shedding His blood.
You remember the words of Jesus – pardon me, the words of Judas about Jesus? He said, “I have betrayed innocent” – what? – “blood.” And what he meant by that is, “I have brought Jesus without cause near violent death.” And the Jews said let His what be on our heads? His blood, the responsibility for His violent death.
Again, another clear example of where blood was synonymous with life. When God told Cain “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to Me from the ground,”[Genesis 4:10] was Abel’s blood literally crying out? I see this along the lines of those who were slain, under the altar saying “How long, O Lord, holy and true, will You refrain from judging and avenging our blood on those who dwell on the earth?”[Revelation 6:10] They we’re talking about the lives they lost lives for the word of God. Their blood here was referring to their lives.
The New Testament says, for example, “He gave His blood.” The New Testament also says, “He gave His soul.” The New Testament says, “He gave His life,” and the New Testament says, “He gave Himself.” It all means the very same thing.
Here it is again. Dr. MacArthur is showing that the word blood did not only mean a red liquid filled with red blood cells, white blood cells, serum, &c., but also referred to His giving of His life. If bleeding was the only necessity, then His death was not necessary. All He would have had to have done was cut Himself and let the blood gush forth. But dear reader, it was the giving of His life, while shedding His blood, that saves us.
You know, I can make a claim, although it’s not biblical, that the Christ’s death reconciled us to God, so the resurrection isn’t necessary. It says His death reconciled us, and to be reconciled means we are no longer His enemies, but friends. Don’t you believe it? Don’t you believe your bible? It right there in Romans 5:10. Yet, it says at the end of that verse we are saved by His life. I can take a portion of scripture and twist it so bad it’s a horrible teaching. Many other places tell us we are saved by His life. That’s what has happened with Dr. MacArthur’s quote that got twisted by some people. All anyone has to do is go back through his FOURTY years in the ministry and find out he has NEVER denied the necessity of the blood of the Christ. But it’s easier to take one statement out of context to ruin someone’s ministry. I know, I almost did that to Dr. MacArthur once. I hurt a dear friend and Brother and he corrected me on it. He showed me I can’t take one quote from him(which I was uncertain of the meaning, but wrote about it anyways…yeah I know, DUMB) and extrapolate it from his ministry of fourty years. Neither should those who say Dr. MacArthur denies the blood extrapolate that twisted quote from his forty years of ministry.
Here is the link to that article that has a message where he goes through several previous sermons preaching in the necessity of the blood.
https://www.gty.org/library/sermons-library/80-44/the-blood-of-christ
Here’s a link to a Radio Free Geneva hosted by Dr. James White, who further expounds on Dr. MacArthur’s belief on this topic. Start at 12:00——>~30:00 to listen to it.
TheCalvinistWatchdog 