Christ The Sinless

Our discourse thus far has weighed heavily upon the side of ascribing what is good to others. To be left with such one-sided understanding, is most detrimental and totally deceiving. It is detrimental, for without this truth, we would all be forever and hopelessly lost with no hope of salvation. Let’s follow through with what most of us already know. Some of us know it or think we know it, but it is only head knowledge, nothing of the heart. What I mean is that it does not change us and keep changing us daily, to live lives free from sin’s holds.

In writing to the converts in Rome, Paul states many things about living free of sin, in the Risen Lord. This is what he states in Romans 6: 12 – 14 NKJV. Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body, that you should obey it in its lusts. And do not present your members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin, but present yourselves to God as being alive from the dead, and your members as instruments to God. For sin shall not have dominion over you for you are not under law but under grace.

Our Lord’s grace of His atoning Love, ascribes or imputes our sin to Jesus. Jesus never sinned, but in order to save us sinners, every single bit of man’s guilt, shame, wretchedness and wickedness had to be imputed to Him. He had to wear our garb, our clothes and our flesh. God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. 2 Corinthians 5: 21

This truth of having sin imputed to Him, is made perfectly real, true, concrete and flesh, in His death on the cross. It is because sin was imputed to Jesus, that He knew the cross.

Now if this work of grace does nothing for us, to change us, then His death has been in vain. But Jesus never died in vain. You see, just as He who never sinned, was able to take imputed sin in His Body, so too you and I, who have never done anything to warrant righteousness, you and I who are not righteous, are able to have righteousness imputed unto us. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Romans 3: 23

Jesus, the One Righteous, through obedience, was able to take our sin. If by faith, fully believing in the works of Jesus on the cross; if by faith we accept without wavering that Jesus was able to take our sins in His Body; if by faith, we believe that He came truly in sinful flesh which was imputed to Him, then and only then will we be able to die to our sinful selves, give them up to the Lord and receive, in our mortal bodies, the life He gives to us.

• It is His righteousness that He imputes to all who will accept His works in them – minus question or doubt.

• It is His righteousness with which He clothes all who will die to sinful self and receive His words in them – minus fear or favour.

You believe that sin was imputed to Jesus, because you know that He is not a sinner, yet He faced the cross. If the way of the cross is only for sinners, since the wages of sin is death, then surely, the only way Jesus was eligible for the punishment of sin, was because my sin, your sin and the sin of the entire world was put upon Him – no other reason. I tell you truly, unless this is a living, functioning part of your life, and mine, none of us will ever be able to accept the grace of Christ’s Atoning Love.

Do you believe by faith that righteousness has been imputed to you? Do you believe this precisely because you know that you are not righteous, yet you receive the gift of righteousness? The cross is the single evidence that God, the Son, received the imputation of sin in His human Body – He knew death by it. What is the single evidence that you and I, who by faith, have received the imputation of righteousness in our earthly bodies, show? It is the cross - we know life by it and through it.

If the way of justification is only for the righteous, and there is none righteous but Jesus, then surely, the only way you and I are eligible for the gift of righteousness, is because His righteousness was put upon us – no other reason. I tell you truly, unless this is a living, functioning part of your life, and mine, we will never be able to be raised by Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead body He took on. Only through faith will we too be raised from sin, so that we can live, right here and now, in our human bodies, justified in Christ.

When sin was imputed to Jesus, death is what He received on the cross. Why? This is so because the wages of sin is death. 

When righteousness is imputed to me, life is what I receive, in Christ. Why? This is so because the gift of righteousness is life. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. John 3: 16. This is only made possible, because of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, our Lord and Saviour.