What did God accomplish in and through Jesus blood?
Are believers individually covered or sprinkled with His blood; or by virtue of our being placed into Christ Jesus, as members of His body [the Church], are we covered with His blood because He is (or was) covered?
I politely suggest that your second sentence suggests that you are
perhaps assuming that the important aspect of Jesus' death was the shedding of His Blood, and our need to somehow be "covered" with that blood. First of all, I think I understand why you think this - we have (I believe) Paul using such an image and we also have the Old Testament model of animal sacrifice involving the shedding of blood for the remission of sins. So I am not
necessarily taking issue with this idea.
Let me tell me you my present take on the nature of the atonement:
1. I do not accept the widely held concept that Jesus was
punished in our place - it seems incoherent and "dishonest" to me to have God punishing
Himself for the sins of humanity. And I think this idea that God needs to punish someone is at odds with Jesus' admonition to
forgive sins; in other words, if God expects us to simply
forgive sin (i.e. without demanding that someone "pay"), then why would God not hold Himself to such a high standard as well?; The standard model cast God in too much of a
vengeful mode for my liking.
2. I think a better metaphor for thinking about the atonement is to think of sin as a destructive
virus that has infected humanity and that Jesus draws this virus into Himself. When Jesus then dies on the cross, the virus dies with him (in the same way the virus particles will soon die in the body of a host that has died). So by Jesus's stripes we are indeed healed. Note the difference between this metaphor and the widely accepted metaphor of the lawcourt where Jesus "takes our punishment". Again, this idea that God needs to inflict violent death to satisfy a need for justice strikes me as the behaviour of a petulant, immature "god".
3. I also believe that Jesus' death on the cross effected a damaging blow against Satan (or "the power of evil", if you would rather). Paul certainly writes about sin as if it were a malevolent force that works in the world and he argues that it was dealt a damaging blow on the cross. On this view, which I think can be integrated with what I have written in point 2, sin is "lured" into attacking Jesus on the cross. But then it is
localized in one place and is therefore vulnerable - God then "blasts" sin and Jesus dies as "collateral" damage. So the real target is "sin", not Jesus, even though Jesus has to die in the process. I got this idea from theologian NT Wright. Note that Romans 8:3 clearly states that it was
sin (and therefore not Jesus) that was "condemned" on the cross.
I realize what I have written requires much more explanation, but I want to keep this post reasonably short.
