2 Corinthians 5:21 - Exposition

He hath made him to be sin for us; rather, he made; he speaks with definite reference to the cross. The expression is closely analogous to that in Galatians 3:13 , where it is said that Christ has been "made a curse for us." He was, as St. Augustine says, "delictorum susceptor, non commissor." He knew no sin; nay, he was the very righteousness, holiness itself ( Jeremiah 23:6 ), and yet, for our benefit, God made him to be "sin" for us, in that he "sent him in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin" ( Romans 8:3 ). Many have understood the word "sin" in the sense of sin offering (Le Galatians 5:9 , LXX .); but that is a precarious application of the word, which is not justified by any other passage in the New Testament. We cannot, as Dean Plumptre says, get beyond the simple statement, which St. Paul is content to leave in its unexplicable mystery, "Christ identified with man's sin; man identified with Christ's righteousness." And thus, in Christ, God becomes Jehovah-Tsidkenu, "the Lord our Righteousness" ( Jeremiah 23:6 ). That we might be made the righteousness of God in him; rather, that we might become . The best comment on the pregnant significance of this verse is Romans 1:16 , Romans 1:17 , which is developed and explained in so large a section of that great Epistle (see Romans 3:22-25 ; Romans 4:5-8 ; Romans 5:19 , etc.). In him In his blood is a means of propitiation by which the righteousness of God becomes the righteousness of man ( 1 Corinthians 1:30 ), so that man is justified. The truth which St. Paul thus develops and expresses is stated by St. Peter and St. John in a simpler and less theological form ( 1 Peter 2:22-24 ; 1 John 3:5 ).