But, would the death of Christ also deal with the sin question in such a way as to bring satisfaction to God? God has an unalterable, irrevocable attitude toward sin, which is most clearly revealed in His judgment upon it. ” The wages of sin is death.” Death is the expression of God’s implacable condemnation of sin. “Death is the man’s liability in relation to sin.” Did the death of Christ deal with this divine judgment upon sin in a way that was satisfactory to God? God says it did.

2 Corinthians 5:14-15

^14 “For the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that one died for all, therefore all died; ¹⁵ and he died for all, that they that live should no longer live unto themselves, but unto him who for their sakes died and rose again.”

The sinner’s twofold relationship to God, the divine Judge, and God, the gracious Savior, may be stated as follows,

“The wages of sin is death,” “All have sinned,” “So death passed upon all men.” BUT “One died for all,” “Therefore all died.”

Death is the racial doom. In Adam, all die because, in Adam, all sinned. Death is God’s judgment upon sin and rests equally upon all men. From the execution of this divine judgment, there is no escape because it is the decree of a holy God and is, therefore, unalterable. Sin and death are inextricably interwoven: the sinner must die.

But the holy God is also a loving God. While He cannot change His attitude toward sin and His judgment upon it without denying His own nature, His love, with perfect consistency, can make some escape for the sinner, providing whatever He does maintains unity in His own divine being. This necessitates meeting in full the requirements of His holy law. What, then, would that requirement be? That an adequate Substitute, able to meet the full penalty of the law, should voluntarily offer to take the sinner’s place and die the sinner’s death.

But where could such an adequate substitute be found? Only “a lamb without spot and blemish” could be accepted as an offering for sin. Only an absolutely sinless one could be the sinner’s Substitute. It would require one who himself had fulfilled every demand of God’s holy law to pay the sinner’s penalty for a broken law. There was but one who had ever lived such a life on earth, and He was the incarnate Son of God.

Would He voluntarily offer Himself as the sinner’s Substitute and thereby assume all responsibility for the removal of the penalty, the power, and the presence of sin in man, knowing as He did that the penalty of sin was death, that the power of sin meant anguish of suffering consummating in crucifixion, and that the presence of sin involved even separation from God? Would He, who never knew sin, willingly be made sin on the sinner’s behalf, knowing full well that all the wrath of a holy God against sin would be spent on Him? (A very helpful treatment of this to which I am indebted is found in Armour, Atonement and Law).

Yes, He would do it. For the very purpose of becoming the sinner’s Substitute, the eternal Son had become the incarnate Son. But have we not discovered in this truth the secret of His dread of that “hour,” His shrinking from the “cup”? It was not death He dreaded but the death of the cross, which was “the wages of sin.” What else could the thrice repeated pleading to the Father to remove “the cup” mean but that, in the death He was about to die as the sinner’s Substitute, all the sin of the whole race of sinners, with all its stain and stench, would be upon Him? It is no wonder that the soul of the sinless Son of God cried out in an agony of suffering at the thought.

Source: “Life on the Highest Plane” by Ruth Paxson

Lord, I bow my head and weep!