In his preface, Dr Rajan remarks that many children of God lead defeated lives even though Christ has given His people the victory through His death and resurrection. This book, therefore, is for the children of God as well as for those who don't yet know the salvation He has provided, he says. Both, he says, need to be exposed to greater knowledge of what the great exchange accomplished for the human race.
Dr Rajan decries the trend in today's church not to teach on the cross and the blood of Christ. Without this teaching God's people have a limited understanding of what actually happened on the Cross of Calvary, he says.
The word "gospel" means "good news", Dr Rajan says, but there is no good news except for the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ. He quotes 1 Corinthians 1:17-18:
For Christ sent me not to baptize, but to preach the gospel: not with wisdom of words, lest the cross of Christ should be made of none effect. For the preaching of the cross is to them that perish foolishness; but unto us which are saved it is the power of God.
In this age when many Christians glory in the comforts of salvation through Jesus, Dr Rajan points to the injunction from the Word of God that it is the cross of Christ in which one ought to glory, seeing that all that we rejoice in comes to us because of the finished work of the cross.
But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world. (Galatians 6:14)
Dr Rajan calls the cross of Calvary the key to receive all God's blessings. He talks of it as God's act of love. "He did not just say, 'I love you' but He acted on it and went to the cross for you," Dr Rajan says. He points out that Jesus said to Nicodemus, in an allusion to the method by which God saved those who would trust him when they had been bitten by poisonous snakes in the desert:
And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: that whoseoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life. (John 3:14)
In addition to being the power of God that effects salvation though causing offense to some, bringing persecution and yet being something to glory in, the cross of Jesus Christ is that which reconciles all things to God, Dr Rajan says, quoting Colossians 1:20:
And, having made peace through the blood of his cross, by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth, or things in heaven.
Dr Rajan points out that right from the beginning the preaching of the cross had enemies.
For many walk, of whom I have told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that they are the enemies of the cross of Christ. (Philippians 3:18)
"The devil hates the cross because that was where he was defeated," Dr Rajan says. "This was where the great exchange took place. Jesus became poor so we could become rich, He was wounded so we would be healed, He was rejected so we would be accepted, He took our shame so we can partake in His glory, and He bore our curse so we would be blessed with the blessings of heaven."
There were things that were against each individual, things said against them, but God blotted them all out at the cross, Dr Rajan says. He adds that the devil has no legal authority over the people of God any longer, and that when the enemy brings accusation against one, one should remind him that there is no record against one because it has been cancelled.
"The demons know their legal rights very well – they are like lawyers. That is why the scriptures speak of 'legal decrees' that have been removed by nailing them to the cross," Dr Rajan says.
Having cancelled and blotted out and wiped away the handwriting of the note (bond) with its legal decrees and demands which was in force and stood against us (hostile to us). This [note with its regulations, decrees and demands] He set aside and cleared completely out of our way by nailing it to [His] cross. [God] disarmed the principalities and powers that were ranged against us and made a bold display and public example of them, in triumphing over them in Him and in it [the cross]. (Colossians 2:14-15 AMP)
When Pilate asked, "What shall I do... with Jesus that is called Christ?" he was asking a question all need to ask themselves, Dr Rajan says. "Your destiny, future and eternity depend on your answer," he says.
Chapter after chapter explore the many facets of what happened on the cross, bringing rich understanding. Chapter after chapter explore the multivarious aspects of Christ's supernatural glory and the sacrifice He made in laying it down to take upon Himself, as the only perfect human, the punishment for sin that Satan was demanding be meted on the failed human race. And chapter after chapter explore the lavishness of the redemption for mankind that was the result of that exchange.
The book also explores every aspect of man's deliverance regardless of the state he is in when he meets and bows to His Saviour, receiving the great exchange; and every teaching that provides a clear path of discipleship and sonship-to-God, no matter what role in society one holds.
"We have a Saviour who loves and cares for us," Dr Rajan says. "He who was and is the Son of God became the Son of man that we the sons of man, will become the sons of God. What a glorious exchange we have."
Read Part II: here
The Great Xchange is published by Westbow Press, a division of Thomas Nelson USA, and can be purchased on www.amazon.com and www.koorong.com
Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are taken from the King James Version.