Having addressed the necessity of Christ’s death in the previous question, our present question now considers the sufficiency of Christ’s sacrificial and atoning death. Does Christ’s death mean all our sins can be forgiven? The answer to this question is what makes the gospel good news. Yes, because Christ’s death on the cross fully paid the penalty for our sin, God graciously imputes Christ’s righteousness to us as if it were our own and will remember our sins no more.

The New City Catechism cites 2 Corinthians 5:21 and does so for good reason.

That is the very crux of the issue. Christ took our sin upon Himself, so that we can be imputed with His righteousness. That is the marvelous means by which we are made righteous so that God will remember our sins no more. However, that verse does not explicitly address the question itself. Can all of our sins be forgiven? Therefore, how can we know scripturally that Christ’s death on the cross fully paid the penalty for our sins? Hebrews 7-10 is one of the greatest explanations in all of Scripture of the complete sufficiency of Christ’s death to cleanse us of all our sins. Indeed, while the whole thing could simply be read in answer to this question, consider Hebrews 9:24-26:

For Christ has entered, not into holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true things, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf. Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the holy places every year with blood not his own, for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the ages to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

In these verses, the author of Hebrews tells us that Jesus’ priestly ministry was not performed in the earthly tabernacle or temple, “which are copies of the true things;” instead, our Lord worked the true Day of Atonement before the actual heavenly throne of God. Nor did Christ make His sacrifice repeatedly as the Levites did, which was a sign of their insufficiency to truly forgive sins (see 10:1-3).

Instead, Christ’s death was “once for all.” Christ’s one-time sacrifice is wholly sufficient for all in two senses: all of God’s people and all of their sins.

Although Jesus died two-thousand years ago, His sacrificial death applies to all who have trusted in Him since then. But His atoning death also applied retroactively, reaching back even to the very first humans. Thus, any faith that the Old Testament saints had of salvation was ultimately looking forward to Christ’s coming. Although they knew not Jesus’ name, they had faith in God’s plan to rescue them fully and finally from their sins. Thus, Christ’s one-time sacrifice was sufficient for all of God’s people.

Christ’s one-time sacrifice is also sufficient for all our sins. Christ put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. Jesus did, by His own blood, what the blood of animals could never do: He put away sin. Of course, this is not saying that His death fully eliminated all sin. Sadly, each day we testify that that is not so. Instead, He put away sin by dealing fully and finally with its consequences. He has paid the debt, and it no longer stands against us. Thus, as we saw last week, He has purified our consciences by dealing fully with the guilt that our sins have accumulated.

Again, Jesus has done this by the sacrifice of himself. As both truly man and truly God, Christ alone was worthy to work our salvation, to purchase the forgiveness of our sins. This is why we confess the forgiveness of sins as a doctrine within the Apostles’ Creed. It is a truth to be believed, not a work to be accomplished. Christ has already accomplished the work; all that now stands is for us to believe in its truth.