Like most young boys growing up we reenacted what we saw on our favorite TV shows. I loved the old westerns and therefore played with my brother and friends dressed in cowboy hats and chaps. I remember just as we saw on an episode, we would make a blood covenant by pricking our fingers and letting our blood mingle. Though we were just young boys playing and having fun, the message that we were reenacting was a realistic method of coming into a strong commitment and sealing it with your own blood. It implied a person was serious about making an agreement and becoming a faithful friend. In Deut 12:23, it says that the blood is the life in the body. Therefore spilling of blood in a covenant represented a commitment of your life.

Paul writes to the Christians in Rome letting them know that when we were all in the valley of hopelessness Christ intervened and rescued us. In verse eight of Rom 5, it reads, “God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.” In other words when you and I were on our journey in life doing our own thing, not even desiring a change, God sent His Son to purchase and pluck us out of the bondage of sin. He illustrated His love for us through His actions.

Jesus’ ultimate gift to mankind… “His love written in His blood!”   (tweet)

Verse nine signifies we are saved and made just in the sight of God through the payment with the blood of Jesus. This was a fulfillment to the Levitical Law concerning the payment for sin with the shedding of the blood of animal sacrifice.

Let me remind you of a story that played out on January 26th, 2005 when a California train derailed. Sadly to say it killed 11 people and injured over 200. One of those 200 was a 44 year old man named John Phipps and his story which….echoed across the news wires. In the midst of a mangled train John was pinned under his seat bleeding and not sure if he was dying or not. Spontaneously he wrote a message to his wife and daughters with his own blood. One of his rescuers was recorded saying, “I’ve seen some gruesome things on this job, but that moved me. My only thought was, I have to get that seat to his wife and kids.” The message that John had written was, “I (heart symbol) my kids. I (heart symbol) Leslie.” His wife later said as she thought over her husbands possible last message, to her and her children, “Hallmark is never going to top that. It’s moving, it’s thoughtful and it’s chilling all at the same time.” John Phipp’s story and message thunders love and commitment to everyone that hears it.

In confronting Cain after he had killed his brother Abel, God says in Genesis 4:10, “the voice of your brother’s blood cries out to Me from the ground.” There was a message for justice in the blood of Abel, just as there was a moving message of love written by John as he was laying in his own blood.

The apostle John writes in his first letter that Jesus’ actions of going to the cross, demonstrated God’s love. (1 John 4:10) During the last supper Jesus shares with His disciples in Luke 22:20, “This cup is the new covenant in My blood, which is shed for you.”   Jesus foretells His ultimate gift to mankind…”His love written in His blood!