The Table of Righteousness

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)

Paul said that Jesus was “made to be sin for us.” He was identified with our sin so thoroughly that it no longer belongs to us. Then He dealt with it at the cross, nailing it in His own body to the tree and cursed the curse of it. “Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree’)” as Paul says in Galatians 3:13. In his letter to the Colossians, he puts it this way:

And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. (Colossians 2:13-14)

The good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ is that a great exchange has taken place: He took our sin upon Himself and gave us His righteousness. This reality changes us, for we not only have our sins taken away, we also receive the righteousness of God. We do not just receive it but, in Paul’s words, we become the righteousness of God.

When we come to the Table of the Lord, we do not come as sinners but as saints. The bread and the cup speak of His body given for us, made to be sin for us, but washed clean by the blood He shed for us. There we fellowship together in His divine righteousness, for the Table of the Lord is the Table of Righteousness.