The Heart Of The Gospel

(2 Corinthians 5:21) "For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." (ESV)


The background for this verse is from Isaiah 53, an Old Testament prophecy of the Messiah.  This one verse offers an excellent summary of the gospel.  It tells us how to be reconciled to God.  It also provides us with understanding of the atonement and justification.  

God the Father made Jesus to be sin, that is he was treated as sin.  Jesus of course was without sin.  He did not actually become sinful but took the sin of all believers on himself.  It became as if our sin belonged to Christ an not to us.  And this was done for our sake.  Christ became our substitute, taking the punishment we deserved on himself.  He endured the wrath of God for us.  Through Christ the just requirements of God's law were met.  This is known as substitutionary atonement.  Jesus made atonement for all those who believe in him.  

In the second part of the verse we read that we become the righteousness of God.  The righteousness of God is the same as the righteousness of Christ.  Just as our sin is imputed to Christ, his righteousness is imputed to all who believe in him.  The word imputed means counted as ours or credited to us.  We receive what theologians sometimes refer to as an alien righteousness.  A righteousness that is not our own.  Contrary to popular opinion we cannot get to heaven by our own righteousness.  We fall short of God's standard and are not truly righteous. But Jesus lived a perfect life without sin allowing him to become our perfect substitute.  We receive Christ's righteousness and he takes our sin.  Believers stand before God as righteous and forgiven.   This is known as justification, which means to declare righteous.  This is the heart of the gospel.