The Narrow Path Ministries

I am still working through my views on the atonement and I was wondering how this verse fits into the paradigm of those who do not hold a substitutionary atonement view (or who don't think it is primary). Thanks!

2 Cor 5:21 "He made Him who knew no sin {to be} sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him."

How about the second half? "That we might become the righteousness of God in him"? In what sense do we become the righteousness of God?

Clearly we ( our human forms) have not been changed into "the righteousness of God", nor was Christ transformed into "sin".

So what sense do believers in the substitutionary atonement understand when they read that "He became sin on our behalf"?

We find a number of statements in the NT which state that "A is B" where it does not mean that A and B are one and the same, nor that A was transformed into B. Sometimes it seems to mean "A is the source of B" as in "God is love".

I can think of two possibilities concerning the verse in question:

1. "God made Him to be sin that we might become the righteousness of God" means that God made Jesus the object of sin so that we might become the object of God's righteousness. In other words, the sin was in His killers, and Jesus was the object of their murderous sin. But we read that he died so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. [1 Peter 2:24]. So the purpose of His being made the object of sin, was that through His death, we might become the object of God's righteousness, that is the medium through which God displays His righteousness. I'm talking about a real righteousness, which shows in our actions --- not through self-effort, but through the enabling grace of God, with which we must coöperate in order that it might become a reality.

2. "God made Him to be sin" in the sense that His murderers thought He was one of the most sinful of all people, that He was guilty of blasphemy against God by calling Him His Father. So God allowed Him to be "sin" in their eyes, and put Him to death. Likewise, because of Christ's death, when people look at us who live righteously by His grace, they see God's righteousness in us.

How about the second half? "That we might become the righteousness of God in him"? In what sense do we become the righteousness of God?

In the sense of the new birth.

Clearly we ( our human forms) have not been changed into "the righteousness of God", nor was Christ transformed into "sin".

Yes, we have been changed into the righteousness of God. To put it in better terms, we, through the finished work of Christ can recieve the abundance of grace and gift of righteousness so that we may reign in life through the One Man Christ Jesus. When we recieved Christ, we became born of God where we became a new creation/man, and part of a new humanity in Christ. Thus, when we were born again, we were born/made righteous. For as by the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience the many will be made righteous. In Christ, we recieved a new spiritual identity where we are now righteous in God's sight. This is how we've became the righteousness of God.

Eph. 4:24...put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.