As believers, we have at some point heard a song honoring the blood. In past generations, people truly loved blood and what it meant. Today, we fail to honor the blood because it is a two-edged sword. The blood provides our reconciliation, our redemption, and our access to the Father. But the blood also speaks of the judgment on sin, so to enjoy the blessings of the blood, we must recognize the offense of sin and need to repent.
Most people hate the person they see when they look in the mirror. They see all its imperfections and the fact that the person in the mirror has caused all their problems. Consequently, we walk in self-hatred, which means we can never really be loved or love someone else.
We are told in the Word that life is in the blood. If we could go back and watch the slaughter of all those lambs for a covering the people for the year, it would be overwhelming for the world and, even worse, outrageous. Yet, if we had eyes to see, the shedding of the blood of Jesus truly would go beyond words. Jesus paid a price we can’t fully comprehend, and we will spend eternity seeking to understand. His blood should mean everything to you, and because of the blood, you should never be the same.
We must understand the radical and outrageous price of His blood and just how far He went for us to satisfy the demands of His holiness, the requirements of His justice, and the requisition of His love.
“And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony, and they did not love their lives to the death.”
Revelation 12: 11
This verse can be summoned up as one who walks with a revelation of His blood. On this earth, we will experience persecution, and the key to overcoming it is walking with the revelation of His blood in your life.
Smith Wigglesworth explained:
“The Lord Jesus gives you peace, but soon after you get peace within, you get persecution without. If you remain stationary, the Devil and his agents will not disturb you much. But when you press on and go the length with God, the Enemy has you as a target. But God will vindicate you in the midst of the whole thing.”
It is one of the greatest honors to be considered a threat, and he seeks to stop you. Now, the enemy will use people, especially those close to us, to attack and hopefully injure the heart. The enemy operates in absolute hate, but the Lord walks in absolute love, and His blood is the greatest expression of His love. It was through His blood that death was defeated and love truly won.
“O death, where is your sting? O hades, where is your victory? The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law. But thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the works of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in the Lord.”
1 Corinthians 15: 55- 58
The enemy wants to hold you in the sting of death and condemnation, but thanks be to God, through the blood of Jesus, we have been redeemed. Further, if we walk under the blood of Jesus our labor is not in vain. No matter what you are going through, if you walk under blood, you will always gain victory. Smith explained:
He met the most difficult problems; one of the hardest conditions to meet was leprosy. The moment that leprosy was pronounced upon a person, it meant that he was doomed. Just as there was no remedy at that time for a leper there is no earthly power that can deliver us from sin. Leprosy was the disease that had a death sentence, and sin means death to the spiritual man unless it is cleansed by the blood of Jesus.
Many of us walk in spiritual leprosy, abiding in a place of condemnation, rejection, and bitterness. Every day is just another day of pain and suffering. But as Smith explained.
God’s power cannot come out of you unless it is within you. We must have all inward confidence and knowledge that we are God’s property, bought and paid for by the precious blood of Jesus. God wants you to know how to claim the victory and shout in the face of the Devil and say, ‘Lord, it is done.”
The Lord wants us free, and His heart was so moved by love for us that he paid the highest price and shed His blood for our redemption and reconciliation. If we understand the blood and what it means to us and apply the blood to our lives, we can stand up against our true enemy and declare, ‘Lord, it is done!” Redemption means we were bought from our captivity and bondage to sin, and reconciliation means we have been restored into intimate fellowship with the Lord. We are to have His blood on the doorposts of our hearts and lives.
But all too often we walk with areas of our lives not under the blood because of sin or unforgiveness. Smith explained it this way:
“I believe a great man people want to be healed, but they are harboring things in their hearts that are like a blight. Let these things go. Forgive and the Lord will forgive you. There are many people, people who mean well, but they have no power to do anything for God. Some little thing came in their hearts years ago, and their faith has been paralyzed ever since. Bring everything to the light. God will sweep it all away if you will let Him. Let the precious blood of Christ cleanse you from all sin. If you will only believe, God will meet you and bring into your lives the sunshine of His love.
When we get persecuted by loved ones or friends, the injury to the heart can cause us to refuse to forgive. But the blood speaks of forgiveness and demands that we forgive. Jesus, in His most painful moment as He was dying on the Cross, called out, “Father, forgive them for they do not know what they do.” In that moment, Heaven could have responded and destroyed everything. But His love was too great, and His blood offered forgiveness to us even when we were enemies of the Cross. We must remember the spiritual law that Jesus explained if we don’t forgive, we are not forgiven.
Smith explained:
But God has forgiven and forgotten. Do you believe self or the Devil or God? Which are you going to believe? Believe God. I know the past is under the blood of Christ and that God has forgiven, for when He forgives, He forgets, Praise the Lord! Hallelujah! We are baptized to believe and to receive.”
We need a revelation of who we are because of the blood and the true value of the blood. Smith explained of the blood:
God wants you to know that He has redemption for you through the blood of Jesus, a new birth unto righteousness, a change from darkness into light, from the power of Satan unto God. This blessed salvation through the blood of Jesus will free you from all the power of Satan and make you a joint-heir with Christ. Oh, this is a glorious inheritance that we have in Jesus Christ
As we enter the Holy Place of His Presence, we must see the blood because access is only through His blood. As we see His blood, we must recognize the price He paid, yet He was perfectly innocent and justified in refusing to pay such a price. But His love would not let Him leave us in our sins. We must recognize sin in our lives and be quick to repent. Smith said:
The soul, covered with the blood, has moved from a natural to an eternal union with the Lord. Instead of death will be the fullness of life divine.
He also added:
Always be in tune with God, and then the music will come out as sweetly as possible.
We need the Holy Spirit to open our eyes to the true power and wonder of the blood. We are the blood bought church. No longer are we defined by sin or the world, but by blood.
You will enter into a realm of illumination, a realm of revelation by the power of the Holy Spirit. He reveals the preciousness and the power of the blood of Christ. I find by the revelation of the Spirit that there is not one thing in me that the blood does not cleanse (1 John 1: 9). I find that God sanctifies me by the blood and reveals the effectiveness of His work by the Spirit.
To enter into His Presence beyond the veil demands that we have clean hands and a pure heart. But how? By the cleansing power of the blood, we can stand with such boldness before the Lord our God. Smith explained:
In order to understand His fullness, we must be filled with the Holy Spirit. God has a measure for us that cannot be measured. When you are in this relationship, sin is dethroned, but you cannot purify yourself. It is by the blood of Jesus Christ, God’s Son, that you are cleansed from all sin. We are His life; we are members of His body. The Spirit is in us, and there is no way to abide in the Secret Place of the Lord except by holiness.
When we stand pure, washed by the blood, the enemy has no access to our lives. I now see the man in the mirror through His blood-washed eyes. Sure, I see my imperfections, but I am learning to see the person He sees and the person He is making me. The blood breaks me, and His love makes me. Now, through the same blood-washed eyes, I see believers differently and the world through His mercy. Smith said it this way:
“I want to tell you that the Devil never knows your thoughts, and if you won’t let your thoughts out in public, you will be safe. He can suggest a thought; he can suggest thoughts of evil. But that is not sin; all these things are from outside of you. The Devil can suggest evil things for you to receive, but if you are pure, it is like water off a duck’s back.
To stay pure, we must examine ourselves and be quick to repent and get cleansed by the blood. Yes, our hearts must be soft and receptive to the conviction and correction of the Holy Spirit because we, too, hate evil, understand the power of purity, and just how precious blood is. Also, I am daily washed by His Word so that now my thoughts and words also become pure.
Smith said:
“God wants us to be holy pure, and perfect the whole way through. The inheritance is an incorruptible inheritance; it is undefiled, and it does not fade away (1 Peter 1: 4). Those who are entering in are judging themselves so that they will not be condemned with the world (1 Cor. 11: 32). Many people have fallen asleep. Why? Because they did not listen to the correction of the Word of the Lord. Some have been ill, and God dealt with them, they would not heed, and then God put them to sleep.”
We must remember, as Smith said:
“If therefore your eye is good, your whole body will be full of light’ (Matt. 6: 22). What is it? It is loyalty to the Word by the power of the blood. You know your inheritance within you is more powerful than all that is without. How may have gone to the stake and through fiery persecution? Did they desire it? Faith, tried by the fire, had the power to stand all ridicule, all slander. We need to have the faith of the Son of God, ‘Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the Cross’ (Heb. 12: 2). Oh, the joy of pleasing Him.”
No wonder Smith called us to partake of communion, and as we do appreciate the blood as he explained:
The very attitude of giving thanks for His shed blood, giving thanks for His broken body, overwhelms the heart. To think that my Lord could give thanks for His own shed blood! To think that my Lord could give thanks for His own broken body! Only divinity can reveal this sublime act to the heart.”
