Him Who Knew No Sin

For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.
2 Corinthians 5:21

Babies sin because it’s their nature. No one needs to teach them how to lie, steal, or destroy; they are born with that ability. In fact, one of my son’s first word was a lie. He had recently turned one and still wasn’t walking or talking but he could crawl everywhere, stand up on his own, and understand lots of words.

 As my wife was cleaning one of the bedrooms, she noticed that the house was strangely silent and the toddler was nowhere to be seen. As she moved towards the kitchen, she called out, “Stephen, are you touching the stove?”

There were very few “no-no’s” in the house, but that was definitely one of them. The one year old was defiantly touching the stove and began looking around to see if Mom was around. When he couldn’t see his mother, he assumed that she couldn’t see him so he proudly answered, “No!”

The sin nature might raise a chuckle when seen in a small child, but it gets very ugly, very quickly and it is not a condition that cures itself. That old nature has to die and a new nature has to come in to replace it, if sin is to ever lose its power over us.

Christ never had that addiction to sin. He certainly knew what sin was, but had no desire to do it. He was sinless by nature, so on the cross he swapped rap sheets with humanity. He gave mankind a clean slate and took on Himself trillions of terrible sins which he paid for with His death.

Coming to the Lord Jesus in faith means that the power sin has over sinners is broken and a new desire to live in God’s will is given to those who earlier were habitually self-destructing. They are changed all because of Him who knew no sin.