You may be correct, but semantics is how we communicate, and as Paul says, “For if the trumpet give an uncertain voice, who shall prepare himself for war?” 1 Cor. 14:8. At the very least John is making an uncertain sound.

It really is not a matter of how we juggle words and try to fit the square peg of our reasoning into the round hole of truth, it is a matter of God’s revelation to us and our ability to believe it, period.

We are all susceptible to Satan’s trick of plugging in our own human rational formulations in an attempt to understand a Book that is wholly spiritual. We think God is like us and that He must surely think the same things as us, and come to the same conclusions. The Bible says for a reason that we are not to add to, or take from what is written.

Glenn, I am not chiding you for the conclusion you have reached, because it makes so much sense, even to me, but it is not Biblical; God does not agree. This has been the plague of men from the very beginning. “Lean not unto your own understanding” is the advise of Scripture, which means that we must trust God when we find our human faculty of “reason” under assault by truth.

Of course Jesus had to die. Let’s not muddy the waters with the idea of atonement by way of a cut finger; He is “the Lamb of God slain from the foundation of the world,” and His perfect life was in His perfect blood, of which a perfect God, in His perfect justice, required. Why does God even require blood? Now there’s a good question. But, He does, and we can conjecture all we want, but the fact remains, He requires blood, and only the literal blood of Christ would do.

Is this semantics or faith in the revelation of God?

Let’s look at Paul in regards to some semantic juggling going on in the Corinthian Church.

1Cor. 15:12-17 12But if it is preached that Christ has been raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? 13If there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. 14And if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. 15More than that, we are then found to be false witnesses about God, for we have testified about God that he raised Christ from the dead. But he did not raise him if in fact the dead are not raised. 16For if the dead are not raised, then Christ has not been raised either. 17And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.

This argument could be equally applied to the argument of Christ’s atonement, the conclusion being that if Christ’s blood was only symbolic, a metaphor pointing to His death only then , “your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.”

If Christ be preached that He shed His blood as an atonement for our sins, how say some among you that Christ’s blood can not save, that it was only symbolic, but if there be no literal blood atonement, then there is no forgiveness of sins, and if Christ’s blood has not atoned, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain, and we are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified of God that He has accepted Christ’s blood, of whom He did not accept, if so be the blood is only a metaphor, for if the blood atone not, then is not Christ our atonement, and if Christ’s blood is only symbolic, then is your faith vain; ye are yet in your sins.

I have taken some liberty here, but I see no difference in the conclusion.

That tree of the knowledge of good and evil has totally ruined our ability to use our own “reason” to understand God. We must accept what is written as the foundation, it is our only way out of the deep dark woods of this world. We must reject the intelligence of men in favor of revealed truth.

If the words quoted in the above article our indeed the words of John MacArthur then he is speaking plainly.

It was His death that was efficacious. . not His blood. . . Christ did not bleed to death. The shedding of blood had nothing to do with bleeding. . . it simply means death. . . Nothing in His human blood saves…It is not His blood that I love. . . it is Him. It is not His bleeding that saved me, but His dying.

I appreciate your willingness to, at least, sense the potential danger of the position John MacArthur takes; a close study of the issue is a prudent approach.

I wrestled with this issue for some time before writing the article, and decided to crawl out on this limb, even though JM is held in high esteem by very many.

A few of the questions I asked myself are:
1. If this position were taken by a teacher of less esteem would the issue have lain virtually dormant for thirty years?
2. Just because it has been thirty years since the article was written, is that reason to let it go?
3. Why does JM take such a position that differs with the overwhelmingly vast majority of Christendom?
4. Could you or I take this position without receiving a scathing rebuke from fellow Christians?
5. From where does such a position originate?
6. What would be the advantage of fostering such a notion? Is there any benefit to the body of Christ?
7. If this were not JM would we tolerate for a minute someone mis-appropriating and mis-using the precious blood of Jesus to simply sound intelligent or make a point?

I too have bought John’s books and still regard him as a person of great Biblical understanding intelligence, but this issue has stopped me in my tracks. I looked in vain for a retraction and found none.

As far as locating the article from which the quote comes, I could not locate it. I don’t know where you can find that article. It was published by Bob Jones University in their publication called Faith for the Family in 1986. It originally showed up as

“remarks MacArthur had originally made in a live Q&A session at Grace Community Church sometime in the early 1970s. MacArthur’s comments had been transcribed and published in the May 1976 issue of the Grace Church newsletter ‘Grace Today,’”

Phil Johnson

attested to by Phil Johnson in his defense letter mentioned below. So if they don’t have a copy somewhere, then it will be very hard to find. But I don’t think it is at all necessary to produce this article because we have MacArthur’s own testimony in a video in which he says things like “We don’t want to get caught into this bizarre notion that somehow in the actual fluid that came out of the body of Jesus there is saving power or saving efficacy.” And, “There is nothing in the fluid in His body that in any way in itself could save us.” This corroborates the 1976 article. At this location there is an article by Phil Johnson defending JM’s position. JM does not deny having said these things that are quoted, he make his position plain in the video, and reinforced by Phil Johnson. Also, JM’s study Bible makes the same claims wherever the blood is mentioned.

Am I over reacting? Maybe, but I don’t think so, and without a retraction or apology JM will have to take his place along side of a growing number of undesirables who have chosen to trample under foot the precious blood of Christ.

Just as the resurrection is the central evidence for the deity of Jesus, so is the “blood” the central testimony of the forgiveness of our sins. To trivialize, change, or symbolize either of these two things is to do great harm, not only to the doctrine, but to the Hope in which we draw comfort. I would expect for these words of John to be coming from the apostate church of today. JM’s words appear to be harmless to his followers, but they only remind me of those words spoken so long ago in the Garden of Eden, “Has God really said. . . .”

To state that the blood is only symbolic is both spiritually and philosophically irresponsible, and both on the same grounds, that no one below the status of god could know, a priori, what He means or what He demands by the term “the blood.” John MacArthur has derived through logic and reasoning, disregarding the facts of Scripture, and in the face of the plain words of God, that the blood of Jesus was only a metaphor and has no power in and of itself to save.

With the death of Christ, He not only conquered the most basic of human enemies, death, by His resurrection, but He likewise turned our most formidable enemy, God, into our friend, through His literal blood atonement.

For JM to succeed in propagating this myth would be to destroy the very foundation on which the salvation of the human race rest. Where are his critics?

If Christ did in fact conquer death and satisfy the just requirements of a perfect God, by His resurrection and atonement, and deliver unto us eternal life and “peace that passes all knowledge” (for those who believe), it would be sheer madness not to take with all seriousness the Biblical claim that the literal blood of Jesus was that very element that achieved for us the peace that our souls so desire. Through the blood of Jesus we have peace with God.

We as Christians must maintain an unshakable conviction that the blood of Jesus, regardless that the world calls it foolish, has accomplished what the Bible says it has accomplished, the way the Bible says it was accomplished, and by the means the Bible says it used, in the face of all unbelievers, and in the face of John MacArthur.