3. Jesus Performs Heart Operation that Brings Death:

While the heart is being connected to the artificial heart-lung machine, the coronary (heart) arteries are infused with a cold potassium solution. The heart beat stops; it grows cold and motionless so the physician can work on it. “The body is preserved by the nutrient flow provided by the heart-lung circuit, while the heart is preserved by the low temperature and other conditions managed by the surgeon.”10  Likewise, placing our life into the hands of the great Physician, Jehovah Tsidkenu, means Jesus performs heart operation that brings death.

Millions of surgeries are performed each year where only a percentage die. All those who trust Jesus to replace their heart must die to self. The heart during surgery is seemingly dead; it is not beating. “The great Physician, who sees in us what we cannot see, knows exactly where to place the knife. He cuts away that which we are most reluctant to give up. And how it hurts! But we must remember that pain is only felt where there is life, and where there is life is just the place where death is needed.”11

Death Springs Forth Life

What a paradox! Death brings life–like a seed has to die before it can spring forth life.

At the very moment Marie chose Jesus, she was crucified with Christ. She no longer lived, but Christ mysteriously started to live His life in her, as the Bible says,

I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not set aside the grace of God, for if righteousness could be gained through the law, Christ died for nothing! -Galatians 2:20-21

Marie’s choice was saying to God, “I’m tired of trying to live this life by myself. I’m miserable and have failed on my own.” Turning her life over to God was no less than placing her own body on an altar.

It was Henry Van Dyuke who said, “Self is the only prison that can bind the soul.” Dying to self means mentally letting-go of my rights-the “i” in the middle of pride. This spiritual death to self is the only thing that brings life–Jesus living His life through us when we are out of the way.

4. Jesus Performs Heart Operation that Brings Life:

The next thing we need to understand about the heart is that it requires energy. It is a muscle with cells that contract in sequence to force blood into every organ and cell in the body. It is a vascular highway taking nutrition to the whole body as well as the heart itself. “A normal heart in an average sized person will pump 4 to 5 liters of blood per minute. The average heart will beat almost 4 million times per year. It is estimated that the energy required to continuously pump blood at these rates is almost 5 watts of power per hour.”12 To show how much energy this is, blood “. . . moves in the principal arteries at the rate of a foot per second and it makes the circuit of the vascular system in about 20 seconds.”13

The arteries of the heart of a patient requiring a CABG are blocked with cholesterol deposits. The surgeon builds substitute passages, with harvested vessels from other parts of the body, to restore blood (energy) to the heart. Only a bypass is erected. Jesus, our substitute, completely annihilated sin–actually removed the blockages–no mere bypass. Consequently, Jesus is the “Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!” (John 1:29).

The energy Jesus restores to our heart takes beyond a lifetime to comprehend. Our hearts are no longer sprinkled with the blood of bulls and goats as Moses did to the people under the Old Covenant. At the moment the tired, blue, lifeless blood, carrying all its impurities, hits the heart-lung machine (the substitute), it is infused with high energy far above any natural oxygen we could ever imagine!

The powerful heavenly energy Jesus infuses into our hearts catapults us all the way to heaven in the blink of an eye! We are immediately translated, just as Hebrew is translated into English (Tsidkenu to “righteousness”)-into the body of Jesus Christ “who delivered us out of the power of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love . . .” (Col.1:13 ASV).

We must comprehend: we are living with Him in heaven right now, “And He raised us up together with Him and made us sit down together-giving us joint seating with Him-in the heavenly sphere [by virtue of our being] in Christ Jesus, the Messiah, the Anointed One” (Eph. 2:6 Amplified). Additionally, heaven’s energy “fills all things” (Eph. 4:10).

This supernatural energy brings life. Jesus said, “The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life and have it to the full” (John 10:10). Marie’s vision of the angels fighting over her–warfare not visible to the naked eye–unmasks this spiritual battle continually being waged for the hearts of humans. Thankfully, Marie confessed her sin and asked Jesus to come in and take over her life, bringing salvation, truth, and life.

Jesus prayed for Marie and for us immediately before he was arrested and crucified. He prayed to His Father, “that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them” (John 17:26). That prayer was answered with His blood actually replacing our own selfish, sin-stained blood at the very moment the Roman soldier pierced His side, “bringing a sudden flow of blood and water” (John 19:34). Jesus purchased salvation for the whole world right then (see John 3:16), but only those who choose to believe and receive this gift are “saved” from sin’s natural punishment. This is a free gift of grace through faith, not of ourselves, not by works we can do; for Jesus paid the price with His blood (see Eph. 2:9).
Hell is sin’s natural punishment. Hell is an “eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels” (Matt. 25:41); God never sends anyone there, but the devil is deceiving many to go there with him.

After her salvation, Marie experienced the cleansing life-blood of Jehovah Tsidkenu. She wanted to feel pure again in regard to her virginity, “While reading my Bible one day, I came across 2 Corinthians 5:17, ‘Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!’ That was the day I gave that sin to Christ and became a born again virgin. Although I didn’t save sex for marriage, God gave me a second chance and a whole new joy-filled life. I changed my goal from living day to day with no direction, to living with my path pointed toward heaven.”

5. Jesus Performs Heart Operation that is Legal:

The first thing a patient does before any surgery is sign a consent form–Conditions of Services–giving the surgeon the legal right to do surgery with consent for medical treatment. It also says, “Should the patient not accept the treatment recommended, or leave the hospital contrary to the doctor’s advice, the patient or his agent will assume full responsibility for such action and will in no way hold the hospital, its employees or the patient’s attending physician responsible for the result.”14

Followers of Jesus Christ are signing a legal contract as well. The Hebrew word for covenant means, “A contract which was accompanied by signs, sacrifices, and a solemn oath which sealed the relationship with promises of blessing for obedience and curses for disobedience.”15 Only when we come to understand this are we able to take advantage of the benefits, like any contract we would sign, such as for a house or a car.

Our spiritual covenant is between two parties: the first, Jesus; the second, us.

First Party: Jesus

The Old Covenant was between Jehovah and Abraham, also called the Abrahamic Covenant. The new contract is between God the Father and Jesus. When we accept Jesus, we enter into the New Covenant.

It is legal because Jesus was a legal Jewish sacrifice. The high priest turned Jesus Christ over to the Romans to be crucified on a cross altar outside the camp (see Luke 23: 13-14). Hebrews 13:12 refers to the Old Testament scapegoat, “And so Jesus also suffered outside the city gate to make the people holy through his own blood.”

Jesus’ final words, “It is finished!”16 while dying on the cross meant He fulfilled (not replaced) the Old Covenant. Jesus ascended into heaven’s tabernacle and “entered the Most Holy Place once for all by his own blood having obtained eternal redemption” (Heb. 9:12).

He later gave us His New Testament– testament meaning “a covenant between God and the human race.”17 Like a last will and testament, it documents his gifts to us.

Jesus was His Father’s firstborn Son, without blemish, whom He sacrificed for the world’s sin, thus, bridging the gap of separation between God and man. Jesus, who paid the only legal price for sin said, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me” (John 14:6).

Just as a patient must give legal consent, we must give Jesus permission to continually perform His  heart operation  before we can truly see Him. By so doing, we enter legally into the New Covenant with Him and receive what the shedding of His blood did for us, as it now courses through our veins.

Second Party: You and Me

What if we later change our mind in allowing Jesus and the Holy Spirit to have their way in our heart and life? We have to accept the consequences of breaking our end of the contract. A patient not accepting treatment may die. A person not paying their mortgage or car payment could possibly no longer live in the house or drive the car. Our spiritual covenant with God is different from a contract in that we may pull away, but God never does–the same as the fact that the hospital is still here and the car is still around, but we no longer have access to their benefits.

The New Testament documents our contract including what is contained in the Old Testament. The whole book of Deuteronomy, written by Moses, is the formal treaty between God and Israel. It holds all the elements contained in treaties from the 2nd millennium B.C.: the introduction of the speaker, historical prologue, stipulations, statements concerning the document; witnesses, curses, and the blessings.18 Chapter 28 of Deuteronomy stipulates the “Conditions of Services,” the blessings for obedience and curses for disobedience.

We are legal heirs to the blessings through Jesus Christ because, “cursed is everyone who is hung on a tree. He redeemed us in order that the blessing given to Abraham might come to the Gentiles through Christ Jesus, so that by faith we might receive the promise of the Spirit” (Gal. 3:13-14).

In a nutshell, God tells us in Deuteronomy 28 He will set those who honor His name and obey Him, high above all nations on earth; He will bless all the work of their hands; they shall lend and not borrow. The curses are blessings withdrawn from those who do not honor His name or obey His commands: confusion, disease (including those yet unnamed), defeat before enemies, unsuccessful endeavors, and indebtedness. Both blessings and curses extend to the next generation. The blessings are detailed in fourteen verses; the curses in fifty-four. Jesus took the curses in His body so we can receive the blessings of the Abrahamic Covenant.

# # #

With her heartfelt prayer, Marie voiced to Jesus legal permission to change her heart, which would change her life. It was just the beginning, but eventually her understanding would grow. We, too, must “sign” our consent form. (An actual signature on paper or in a journal is not a bad idea.)

This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the LORD your God, listen to his voice, and hold fast to him. Deuteronomy 30:19 NIV

ENDNOTES
9. Mark M. Levinson M.D., The Heart Surgery Forum, www.hsforum.com, Hutchinson Hospital, Hutchinson, KS (accessed April 2005).
10. Ibid.
11. Fénelon, Let Go, (Whitaker House New Kensington, PA, 1973), p. 6.
12. Ibid.
13. Clarence W. Taber, Taber’s Cyclopedic Medical Dictionary, 10th Edition (Philadelphia, F. A. Davis Company, 1968), B-28.
14. Mercy Health System of Kansas, Conditions of Services, item 7.
15. Zodiates, Key Word Study Bible, p. 1716.
16. See John 19:30.
17. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary-Eleventh Edition, (Merriam-Webster, Incorporated, Springfield, MA, 2003), p. 1291.
18. Halley, Halley’s Bible Handbook, p. 176.