"For Us"

Isaiah 53:6

For whom was Christ made to be sin? We know that the words "for us" do not refer to all men in general, because some men yet bear their own sins and will be punished for sin forever. "For us" refers to a specific people, for whom Christ was made sin, whose sins were effectually born and put away by him. Isaiah tells us exactly who they are. Christ was made to be sin "for us" who believe the gospel (v. 1), to whom the arm of the Lord is revealed (v. 1), who are healed by his stripes (v. 5), who are his generation (v. 8), who are his people (v. 8), who are his seed (v. 9), who give satisfaction to his soul's travail (v. 11), who are justified by the knowledge of him (v. 11) for whom he makes intercession (v. 12). In other words, the Lord Jesus Christ was made to be sin for God's elect, those who are saved by his almighty grace through the merits of his atonement. And his being made sin for us has effectually secured our eternal inheritance in heaven.

All the glory, bliss and reward of heaven is our rightful, lawful, purchased possession. It was purchased for us by Christ's sin atoning blood. The inheritance laid up for God's saints in glory was made to be ours by the laying of our sins upon Christ. Nothing in heaven is won, earned, or merited by the works of man. Those who suggest otherwise do not know the gospel of substitution and grace. Tobias Crisp wrote, "No unclean thing can enter into the kingdom of heaven. When we attain to the height of sanctification, we remain yet unclean, for there is pollution in the best of it. When we die, suppose we are more holy in life than any that went before us. Yet, there is not so much holiness of life in us, but that there remains still some uncleanness and unmortification of life in thoughts and practice, some deadness and indisposition in our hearts and affections to holiness. And with this unholiness we lie down in the dust, if all our uncleanness were not laid upon Christ, that so we might enter into rest as perfect and complete in him."

Don Fortner