Live Dead Joy: 30 Days of Living and Dying with JesusSample

“Under the Blood”

When I was a child, my parents taught me to “plead the blood.” Essentially this meant to resist the forces of oppression and evil that would come against my body, soul, or mind by reminding them (and myself) that I was under the protection of Jesus. In demonic encounters, we pray in the Spirit, we pray with understanding, and we cover ourselves with the blood of Jesus. This sounds strange but what it means is to invoke the protective shield that Jesus offers. When we are “under the precious blood,” we are safe. No weapon formed against us can prosper. The biblical origin of this phrase is, of course, the Exodus Passover. God’s people were told to apply the blood of a lamb or goat to the doorposts and lintels of their homes. God told them, “When I see the blood, I will pass over you” (Ex. 12:13).

It is interesting and still appropriate that, for us, “pleading the blood” has come to mean spiritual warfare and prayer that resists the attacks of the Devil and preserves us from his evil intentions. We forget that the blood of the Passover lamb originally protected the people of God from the wrath of God. The blood of the lamb protects me from God!

Just as truth without mercy kills, mercy without truth corrupts. Let us not forget that God’s holiness and purity demand the death of all who sin, which means all who are born, not just the firstborn of the wicked. I and my sons deserve to die. The blood of Jesus shed on the cross protects us from the justice of God, which demands our death. To “stay under the blood” is to stay protected from the wrath of God. It is the mercy of God that keeps us immovable, rooted in safety (Ps. 21:7).

Let us not be like fools who venture into sin, outside the covering blood of Jesus. We really have only two options: (1) stay broken and humble under the blood of Jesus, conscious that we are sinners who deserve death (Matt. 21:44; falling on the cornerstone), or (2) have the wrath of God fall on us and grind us to powder. It is right to “plead the blood.” It is imperative to “stay under the blood”—not just in resistance and repulsion of evil but in order to be protected from God’s righteous wrath. We’re “under the blood, the precious blood, under the cleansing, healing flood; keep [us], Savior, from day to day; under the precious blood.”

Pray for the Unreached:

Tunisian Muslims of Tunisia

9,969,000

0.0% Evangelical

Pray for the peace that results when men and women are reconciled with God (John 14:27). For men and women of peace (Luke 10:6) among Tunisians.