«　WEEK 18　DAY 4　»

　　1 John 4:10 Herein is love, not that we have loved God but that He loved us and sent His Son as a propitiation for our sins.

　　Heb. 2:17 Hence He should have been made like His brothers in all things that He might become a merciful and faithful High Priest in the things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.

　　In Luke 18:13 we see that the despised, accused, and condemned tax collector prayed in the way of humbling himself to the uttermost: "But the tax collector, standing at a distance, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, God, be propitiated to me, the sinner!" This word implies the need of a Redeemer and also the need of propitiation. The tax collector realized how his sinfulness offended God. Hence, he asked God to be propitiated, to be appeased toward him by a propitiation, so that God may be merciful and gracious to him.

　　The Lord offered Himself to God as a sacrifice for our sins (Heb. 9:28), not only for our redemption but also for God's satisfaction. In Him as our Substitute, through His vicarious death, God is satisfied and appeased. Hence, He is the propitiation between God and us. (Life-study of Luke, p. 354)

　　Christ is the propitiatory sacrifice, and He is also the propitiation place where God can meet with His redeemed people. The propitiation place is typified in Exodus 25:17 by the sin-covering lid on the Ark. The Ark was the place where God met with people. Underneath the lid of the Ark was the law of the Ten Commandments exposing the sinfulness of the people and condemning them; above the lid of the Ark were the two cherubim representing God's glory and observing every action of the people. The exposing and condemning law signifies the requirements of God's holiness and His righteousness according to the law, and the observing cherubim signify the requirements of God's glory according to the expression of God. Unless these requirements were fulfilled and God was satisfied, there was no way for sinners to contact God and for God to communicate with them. However, by the lid of the Ark with the propitiating blood sprinkled on it on the Day of Expiation, the entire situation on the sinner's side was fully covered. (The Conclusion of the New Testament, p. 3026)

　　In Hebrews 2:17 Paul uses the Greek word hilaskomai, which means to appease, to reconcile one by satisfying the other's demand; hence, it means to propitiate. According to Hebrews 2:17, the Lord Jesus made propitiation for our sins to reconcile us to God by satisfying God's righteous demands on us.

　　Translators sometimes have had difficulty with the words hilasterion, hilasmos, and hilaskomai. Hilasterion denotes the place of propitiation; hilasmos denotes a propitiatory sacrifice; and hilaskomai means to propitiate. Propitiation is needed when one party is indebted to another and unable to meet that party's demands and requirements. Should a third party appear on the scene, he may solve the problem between the first two parties by paying what the first party owes and causing the second party to be satisfied with this payment. This is precisely what the Lord Jesus did in offering Himself as the propitiatory sacrifice to solve our problems with God. (Life-study of Exodus, pp. 1034-1035)

　　Propitiation means to make us one with God because there had been a separation between us and God. The problem that kept us from God, that made it impossible for us to have direct fellowship with Him, was our sins. Our sins kept us away from God's presence and hindered God from coming to us. Therefore, we needed propitiation to appease God's demands. Christ accomplished this on the cross when He made propitiation for our sins in order to reconcile us to God by satisfying God's righteous demands on us (Heb. 2:17). On the cross He offered Himself as the propitiatory sacrifice for our sins to solve our problems with God (1 John 2:2; 4:10). In His death He propitiated for us and brought us back to God, making us one with God. (The Conclusion of the New Testament, pp. 3025-3026)

　　Further Reading: Life-study of Exodus, msgs. 86-87