» R. J. Campbell, A Faith for To-day, 277.
2 COR. V. 21 233
1. As Christ has identified Himself with us in our sinfulness, so we are identified with Him in His righteousness. Not, again, by any legal fiction ; but as, by the purity and love and sorrow of a true mother, a wandering son may be rescued, broken down in penitence and led to trust in God and in his mother, when he cannot trust himself, so the cross of Jesus has ever beeu the supreme agency whereby God comes close to men, breaks down their pride, heals their self-distrust, and assures them that the love and self-sacrifice and obedience of Christ are all for them.
^ One day, as I was passing in the field, and that too with some dashes on my conscience, fearing lest yet all was not right, suddenly this sentence fell upon my soul, " Thy righteousness is in heaven " ; and methought withal, I saw with the eyes of my soul Jesus Christ at God's right hand. There, I say, was my righteous- ness ; so that wherever I was, or whatever I was doing, God could not say of me, " He wants my righteousness," for that was just before Him. I also saw, moreover, that it was not my good frame of heart that made my righteousness better, nor my bad frame that made my righteousness worse: for my righteousness was Jesus Christ Himself, " the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever." Now did my chains fall off my legs indeed. I was loosed from my afflictions and irons, my temptations also fled away ; so that from that time those dreadful Scriptui-es of God left off to trouble me.^
2. In whatever way our Lord was made sin, we are made righteousness. As sin was placed on Him, and He was reckoned with as though it were His own, so His righteousness is reckoned to us, who are in Him by faith, as though it were indeed ours. Christ's identification with us in our sin filled Him with untold anguish ; so let our identification with Him in His glorious right- eousness fill us with unspeakable joy. And if it is indeed ours, let us dismiss our fears ; let us dare to stand in the very light of God's holiness, accepted in the Beloved ; let us greatly rejoice in the Lord, and our souls be joyful in the Lord, since He has covered us with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments, and a bride adorneth herself with jewels.
^ An error of mysterious and alarming sound was charged upon Dr. Crisp — namely, the permutation of persons, or commuta- tion of persons. If the perplexed reader inquires with wonder
* Bunyan, Grace Aboimding.
234 THE SINLESS MADE SIN
what this heresy can be, a historian tells him, it is " actually to make a Saviour of the sinner, and a sinner of the Saviour." I have read Dr. Crisp's sermons and there is no declaration in them which is as strong as the following by Luther : " Faith without adulteration must be taught, because by it thou mayest be 83 cemented with Christ that out of thee and Him there may be made one person that cannot be separated, but eternally coheres ; that with confidence thou mayest be able to say, I am Christ — that is, Christ's righteousness is mine, His victory is mine, His existence is mine, etc. And, conversely, Christ may say, I am that sinner — that is, his sins are Mine, his death is Mine, etc., because he adheres to Me, and I to him. We have been joined by faith into one flesh and bone (Eph. v. 30), we are members of Christ's body, of His flesh and of His bones. This faith unites me to Christ more closely than a husband is joined to his wife. So this faith is not a trifling quality, but its magnitude is such that it obscures and entirely sweeps away those most senseless dreams of sophistical charity, concerning merits, concerning worth or qualities of our own, etc." Crisp's alleged heresy is thus the Apostle's doctrine that " Christ was made sin," and that believers are " the righteousness of God " — the old scriptural doctrine taught by the Reformers, by "judicious Hooker," and others.^
3. The identification is always in Christ. " In him," says the Apostle. These striking and original words show that St. Paul means much more than the imputation of human sin to Christ, and the imputation of Divine righteousness to men; the sin is not merely regarded as laid on Him, nor the righteousness as conferred on us, but there is in both cases an inner identification, as it were — of Him with sin, and of us with righteousness. This, then, is the heart of the gospel, according to St. Paul : this explains the recon- ciliation on which throughout the paragraph he has so frequently and earnestly insisted. We are acquitted, justified, in Christ; but, in order to this, He had to be made sin. We could never have been identified with Him and His righteousness, had He not first been identified with us and our sin. We climb the heights because He descended to the depths.
We can conceive a vast society of men wholly obedient to the will of God, living in reverent adoration, working with lowly love ; we can conceive this society composed of those who have made a sorrowful trial of what life out of harmony with God is,