The cross is one of the most widely recognized symbols of Christianity in the world, but the depth of its significance is often overlooked… even among Christians.
If you were to ask 10 people what the cross of Christ represents, my suspicion is that at least 8 of them would say it shows how much God loves us. After all, John 3:16 says “For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son…”
And while that is a correct answer, it’s not a complete answer. It is missing a very significant and essential aspect of the message of the cross – the outpouring of God’s righteous anger against the collective sin of all mankind.
Nothing reveals the gravity of sin like the cross, since the only way an infinitely righteous God could justly forgive our infinite guiltiness was to bear it himself in Christ. God ordained the most heinous murder in human history – that of His own Son – in order to purchase our redemption, as the Spotless Lamb was the only sufficient sacrificial substitute for the depth of mankind’s muck and mire.
On the cross Christ became sin… Why? So that “we might be made the righteousness of God in Him!” (2 Cor. 5:21) Think of that – the righteousness of God!
Christ fully accomplished what he came into the world to do. He endured God’s wrath in our place, procuring salvation for our souls and establishing a new covenant between God and humankind. And three days later God publicly vindicated his death by the resurrection – the Father’s seal of approval that Christ had not died in vain.
As such, Christ not only satisfied the payment for our sin to a righteous and holy God, he also sealed the believer’s destiny to live forever with him in heaven when he conquered death!
So the cross of Christ is not only the ultimate depiction of unconditional love… it is equally the ultimate expression of the wrath of a just God against sin. You see, the cross had just as much to do with God’s righteous indignation against our wickedness as it did His amazing love for man and woman whom He created. Equally as much. Infinitely as much.
The message of the cross that we should never overlook is that God is serious about sin, evidenced by the fact that the cross represents the very dear price He paid to redeem lost souls. Keeping this truth close to our heart will cause us to live holy before the Father, with thankfulness and adoration for His priceless gift of grace and redemption!
My Redeemer God,
When I gaze upon your sinless Lamb, bruised and beaten, pierced and bloody, mocked and abandoned even by You for a time, I am grieved of soul knowing Christ suffered this all on my account. May I never forget the price You paid to purchase my redemption.
Who his own self bare our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, being dead to sins, should live unto righteousness: by whose stripes ye were healed. (1 Pet. 2:24)
The Old Testament slaying of the sacrificial lamb, and the application of innocent blood on the alter, was only a temporary solution for a permanent problem. But the blood of Your Spotless Lamb was sufficient to – once and for all – satisfy the sin debt that was dead against me. Those whom You choose, those who put their faith in You and have the blood of Christ applied to their account, escape Your wrath and are made righteous in Christ. I receive your priceless gift, Lord, knowing I have nothing of my own to bring… simply to the cross I cling.
For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin;
that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. (2 Cor. 5:21)
I am in awe of Your master plan to redeem sinners, established with ultimate precision before You even laid the foundations of the earth we live on. At just the right moment in history Christ became sin for me, died in my place, and then rose victorious over death… so I can live free from the power of both sin and death! In response, I join in singing with the hymnist: “My sin, not in part but the whole, is nailed to the cross and I bear it no more, praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!”
And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him…
the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. (Rev 13:8)
- Lord, how was Your Son made sin for me? Not inherently, for He had no sin in Him. He was holy, harmless, and undefiled, separate from sinners. But He was made sin for me by imputation. Christ’s righteousness is imputed to me in the same way in which my sin was imputed to Him when He took the guilt of all my sin on Himself.
- Lord, what did I gain from Christ’s imputation to me? The righteousness of Your Son has become mine. The Lord Jesus, having fulfilled the law as a second Adam, has reckoned that wonderful work to my soul as if I had done it in my own person. Knowing how sinful and wicked I am in my mind and heart, this is a grace and love beyond expression.
- Lord, You impute Christ’s righteousness to me as one who believes in Jesus, which is why my Lord Jesus is called “the Lord our Righteousness,” (Jer. 23:6). The Lord is my righteousness, so how can I consider sinning against Him?
Further References for 2 Cor. 5:21
Exod. 12:13; Lev. 23:19; Prov. 17:15; Matt. 1:21; Rom. 4:25; 1 Peter 2:24, 3:18.
