e help of various metaphors
does St. Paul strive to express the mighty truth that, by the shedding
of Christ's blood, that is to say by His sacrifice of perfected
obedience, the way had been opened for the forgiveness of our sins and
our {107} reconciliation to God in one life, one Spirit. But the
symbols and instruments of that former alienation from God which St.
Paul had experienced so bitterly, were to his mind the 'ordinances' of
the Jewish law. These, he had come to feel, had no other function than
to awaken and deepen the sense of sin which they were powerless to
overcome. They were nothing but 'a bond written against us'; a
continual record of condemnation. To trust in the observance of
ordinances was to remain an unreconciled sinner, alienated in mind and
unpurified in heart. On the other hand, to have faith in Jesus and
receive from Him the unmerited gift of the divine pardon and the Spirit
of sonship was, for a Jew, to cast away all that trust in the
observance of the ordinances of his nation which was so dear to his
heart. It was at once to place himself among the sinners of the
Gentiles. For in Jesus Christ all men were indeed brought near to God,
but not as meritorious Jews; rather as common men and common sinners,
needing and accepting all alike the undeserved mercy of a heavenly
Father. Thus it was that Christ, in breaking down one partition, had
broken down the other also. In opening the way to God by a simple
human trust in a {108} heavenly Father, and not by the complicated
arrangements of a special law, He had put all men on the same level of
need and of acceptance. He had not indeed abolished the covenant or
the covenant people, but He had enlarged its area and altered its
basis: there was still to be one visible body or people of the
covenant, but membership in it was to be open to all, Jew and Gentile
alike, who would feel their need of and put their trust in Jesus. This
is what St. Paul proceeds to express, and little more need be added to
explain his words. In the 'blood' or 'blood-shedding' of Jesus--that
is, His self-sacrifice for men, His obedience carried to the point of
the surrender of His life--a way had been opened to the Father that was
purely human, that belonged to the Gentiles who had been 'far off' as
well as to Jews who were already 'nigh' in the divine covenant. And in
being brought near to God by faith, and not by Jewish ordinances, Jew
and Gentile had been reconciled