<p>3:25&nbsp;<i>Whom God set forth</i>&nbsp;-&ldquo;Whom God put forward as a place of atonement by his blood&rdquo; (NRSV margin) seems to be the right sense. The reference is to the mercy seat, not to the sacrificed animal. Vincent comments: &ldquo;The word is used by Herodotus of exposing corpses (v. 8); by Thucydides of exposing the bones of the dead (ii. 34)&rdquo;. The sense of public display is picked up later in the verse in the word &ldquo;declare&rdquo;. Crucifixion is by its very nature a public event. There was once a doctor in Paraguay who spoke out against human rights abuses. Local police took their revenge by torturing his teenage son to death. The local people wanted to stage a huge protest march, but the father disallowed them and chose another means of protest. At the funeral, the father displayed his son&rsquo;s body as it was when retrieved from jail- naked, scarred from electric shocks, cigarette burns and beatings. And the body was displayed not in a coffin but on the blood-soaked prison mattress. This public display of a body was the most powerful witness and incitement possible. And the public nature of the display of God&rsquo;s tortured son was for the same basic reason. &ldquo;He was manifested, that he might put sins away&quot; (1 Jn. 3:5) could suggest that in His atoning death, &lsquo;He&rsquo; was manifested. There God set forth Jesus in His blood, for all to see and respond to (Rom. 3:25 Gk.). There the real essence of Jesus was publicly shown forth. And there we come to know what love is (1 Jn. 3:16).</p><p><i>To be a propitiation</i>- The Greek word doesn&rsquo;t&nbsp;<i>have</i>&nbsp;to mean &ldquo;mercy seat&rdquo; / atonement cover, with reference to the ark, even though this is how it is translated in Hebrews. The idea is essentially a place of atonement or the atonement victim, the sacrificed animal. Instead of that place of blood sprinkling been hidden away on the top of the atonement cover, the ark of the covenant within the Most Holy Place which the High Priest saw only once per year, God through the cross set forth publicly, He declared, the place of atonement to be in the very publicly displayed blood of His Son. The public nature of crucifixion therefore was appropriate. The Son of Man had to be, therefore, &ldquo;lifted up&rdquo; (Jn. 3:14) so that He could and can be believed in. Rom. 3:25 states that the Lord in His death was &quot;set forth to be a propitiation&quot;. Graham Jackman comments: &quot;Though the primary meaning of the word &lsquo;set forth&rsquo; (<i>protithemi</i>) seems to be that of &lsquo;determining&rsquo; or &lsquo;purposing&rsquo;, another sense, albeit not in the New Testament, is said to be that of exposing the bodies of the dead to public view, as in a lying in state&quot;. See on Mk. 15:29.</p><p><i>Through faith in his blood, to show His righteousness in the passing over of the sins done previously</i>- See on &ldquo;set forth&rdquo;. But the word also carries the sense of setting forth evidence, proof. The legal flavour could possibly suggest that the blood of Christ, His death upon the cross, is brought forth as a proof in the court case that actually, we really have been declared in the right. Whilst Christ&rsquo;s death was multifactorial, it would be true to say that God could have saved us any way He chose, without being forced, as it were, to have a begotten Son who was publicly crucified. Maybe He did this because He so wishes us to believe, and He wanted to commend His love in all its depth and costliness as publicly as possible, so that we would indeed perceive and believe it.</p><p>God&rsquo;s method of declaring us right deals with the sins &ldquo;that are past&rdquo;, for which we stand condemned before His judgment seat with no way to make amends; and also &ldquo;at this time&rdquo; (3:26), right now, we are declared righteous by status, declared in the right, if we are believers into Jesus.</p><p><i>In the forbearance of God</i>- We shall all be saved by the forbearance of God, hence we should not deny to others the forbearance of God. Hence in Rom. 2:4 the same word is used, in stating that those who condemn their brethren are despising the forbearance of God, in that they are assuming that His forbearance can&rsquo;t apply to the person whom they have condemned. If we are saved by God&rsquo;s gracious forbearance, it&rsquo;s not for us to deny this to another.</p>