Once For All

On a hot August day, I traipsed out to my garden to check on my rose bushes. Between the heat and black spot disease most of the leaves were gone, leaving scrawny-looking and thorny canes stretching their bony hands to the sky.



Though I couldn't help the soaring temperatures, I had to take responsibility for the roses' demise. When I purchased the bushes, I'd been offered the opportunity to buy a fertilizer to help protect the plant from black spot. The product was called Once. (I remember that trivial detail because it struck me as odd that it had to be applied every six weeks instead of once as the name suggested.)



Anyway, the point is this: Had I not been so eager to save money and been more diligent about providing what the plants needed, my rose bushes would most likely have fared better.



As plants lovingly tended by the Gardener of our Souls, we too have the tendency toward the black spot of sin. Thankfully, He knows what we need and has done all that is necessary to wipe away that black spot once and for all!



Unlike the other high priests, He (Jesus) does not need to offer sacrifices day after day, first for His own sins, and then for the sins of the people. He sacrificed for their sins once for all when He offered Himself. ~Hebrews 7:27 (NIV)



He did not enter by means of the blood of goats and calves;but He entered the Most Holy Place once for all by His own blood, having obtained eternal redemption. ~Hebrews 9:12 (NIV)



But now He has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to do away with sin by the sacrifice of Himself. ~Hebrews 9:26b (NIV)



Thank You, Jesus, for being our great High Priest once for all! Thank You that You did for us what we could never do for ourselves--finding away to do away with our sin by becoming the perfect sacrifice on our behalf. Thank You for loving us that much, when there is nothing in us deserving of so great a salvation. In Jesus' precious and holy name, Amen.