Jesus our sin-bearer

To this you were called, because Christ suffered for you, leaving you an example, that you should follow in his steps. “He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth.” When they hurled their insults at him, he did not retaliate; when he suffered, he made no threats. Instead, he entrusted himself to him who judges justly. “He himself bore our sins” in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; “by his wounds you have been healed.” For “you were like sheep going astray, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Overseer of your souls. 1 Peter 2:20-25

A man in the prime of life dies in torture nailed to a cross.

This was a common event in the days of the Roman empire; the Roman soldiers were expert killers, and they showed no sentiment or pity, so you stepped out of line at your peril. Anyone watching might well shake their head and think, “Oh well, he knew the risks; I’ll just try and make sure the same things doesn’t happen to me”.

But that particular Friday was different. The followers of Jesus saw a profound and world-changing significance in what happened to their teacher. Peter, their leader, wrote about it many years later, inviting his readers to view Jesus from various different angles; and this is what we find in the tightly-packed little passage,1 Peter 2:20-25.

First, says Peter, see Jesus as your example.

At this point in his letter he is giving advice to slaves (many of the first Christians were slaves) about how to conduct themselves. And, amazingly, it’s to Jesus that he points as an example.

Today we feel uncomfortable reading about slaves, and rightly so. But slavery was part of the very texture of life in New Testament days, and Peter felt - especially given that its abolition was still a distant dream - that even when burning with inner rage at the cruelty involved, the best thing to do was… to look at Jesus. No retaliation, no hatred, no returning sin for sin.

No wonder that hard-bitten centurion watched Jesus die and exclaimed “Surely this man was the Son of God!” (Matthew 27:54).

Second, see Jesus as your sinless leader.

Quoting from Isaiah 53:9 Peter writes, “He committed no sin, and no deceit was found in his mouth”. In the Gospels Jesus is portrayed as the ideal, model human being, and he tells his disciples to “be perfect, as your Father in heaven is perfect”. We are likely to reply that perfection is not possible in this world, and that is true. But nothing less than that should be our aim!

Do we easily settle for second best?

Third, see Jesus as your example of trust.

Instead of hitting back - or even talking back - Jesus simply “entrusted himself to him who judges justly”. He believed that God would put all things right, and so he refused to take them into his own hands.

This doesn’t mean we today shouldn’t stand up for justice, especially on behalf of others, but we do so in the confidence that God our Father is more than able to right all wrongs. At the moment of his death Jesus cried out, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit” (Luke 23:46).

This is a prayer we would do well to echo every day - even when there is no risk of death. Oh to learn the skill of trusting implicitly in God, minute by minute and day by day!

Fourth, see Jesus as your sin-bearer.

Still drawing his thoughts from Isaiah 53, Peter tells us, “He bore our sins in his body on the tree”, surely one of the Bible’s greatest declarations.

Human sin, something we are all afflicted with, cannot just be left to fade away, for it won’t; it will only grow and deepen, becoming ever more poisonous. No, it has to be dealt with, and God has decided that the price that has to be paid is that of blood-sacrifice.

If you have ever tried to read your way through the Old Testament books of Leviticus and Numbers you may very well have got rather bogged down in all the detail. That’s understandable. But the overall point is clear: God laid down for the people of Israel an elaborate system of sacrifice to enable their sins to be cleansed.

And what happened on the cross was the ultimate climax of that system. When Jesus walked the path to Calvary he carried not just the cross but also the weight of human sin, and the blood he shed was all that was needed to pay the price.

We do, of course, have it in our power to turn down that offer of the price he paid; he doesn’t force his mercy and kindness upon us. But in this case we continue to carry our load of sin.

And so we need to put to ourselves the question: As I watch Jesus walk to Calvary, do I see him as my sin-bearer? Or am I just a bystander, one of the crowd? Good Friday is simply meaningless if we have never understood it in this light.

Fifth, see Jesus as your doctor, your shepherd and your guardian.

When we confess our sins and put our trust in Jesus we come to the great watershed in our lives – bigger than a first job, or marriage, or parenthood. Everything changes. Peter compares us to sick people made well… to lost sheep restored to their shepherd… to orphans once abandoned but now secure again.

Above all, to use Peter’s exact words, we find ourselves in a place where we “die to sins and live for righteousness”. Taking up our cross to follow Jesus means becoming all that God himself originally intended for us to be. And we grow daily in that new personhood – until one day we will see him face to face.

So… the key question for Good Friday: Are you yet embarked on that journey?

The price is paid,/ Come let us enter in/ To all that Jesus died/ To make our own./ For every sin/ More than enough he gave/ And bought our freedom / From each guilty stain… Lord Jesus, I live to thank you for the price you paid. Amen.