Lent Midweek 5
John 19:30
March 25, 2026
Who is the world’s greatest sinner? Some will immediately go to a person like Hitler or perhaps Ted Bundy. Or, some will try to be all pious and say, “Oh I’m the greatest sinner – the chief of sinners, look at me.”
There may be other candidates. Depending on your political leanings you might consider Donald Trump the greatest sinner or perhaps Obama. Or maybe it’s more personal for you. Maybe you grew up with an abusive parent and that parent, in your heart, is the world’s greatest sinner. Maybe you had an old boyfriend or girlfriend who you might consider the world’s greatest sinner. Maybe your answer is more general like the government or big, greedy corporations and their CEO’s, or Islamists or atheists or unbelievers.
But there is only one right and proper answer to the question, “Who is the world’s greatest sinner.” We know the one true answer, but we don’t want to believe it or certainly say it out loud. Someone might come along and call us heretics or false teachers if we say it.
Jesus is the world’s greatest sinner. And these aren’t my words; these are God’s words. “He who knew no sin became sin for us…”, that’s 2 Corinthians 5. He didn’t just become sin for a few of us or for those of us who aren’t all that sinful, but for all humanity, for Hitler, for Bundy, for an abusive parent or deprived boy or girlfriend – for you, for me, for everyone, even he who brought sin into the world, God’s first man Adam.
Jesus became sin. If sin were determined by tally, then Jesus would have it all, because when He died on the cross, every sin committed was paid for by His death. God judged HIM as He should have judged us. It is as if Jesus committed every sin you’ve committed Himself, and you have never committed any sin yourself. This is how the Lord sees you and it is because He saw Jesus as the sinner.
Think back to the bronze serpent on a pole in the Book of Numbers. The people were being very rebellious and testing the Lord’s patience. So, He sent fiery serpents at them to bite them and poison them. Many died. The Lord told Moses to prop up a bronze serpent on a pole so that whoever looks to it will be saved. In other words, the bronze serpent took the blame for their transgressions, and by their looking to that bronze serpent, they believed the Lord’s words, that he would forgive them and the serpent atone for them.
For all who look to Jesus and His death on the cross, their sins are atoned for by His innocent blood. In reality, Jesus is innocent and we are guilty, but where it matters, in the courtroom of God, Jesus is guilty and we are innocent.
Jesus was “made to be sin,” as Paul writes, so that we might become His righteousness.
This is the Good News and it is what Jesus means when He says, “It is finished.” He was sin for us, and by His death, our sins are atoned for, paid for, covered, and the consequence for our sins has been taken from us east from west. There is no more condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. It doesn’t get any better than that.
But so that we don’t grieve our Lord, we must understand that Jesus did this willingly and joyfully for us. It was His pleasure to die for you, to forgive you, to set you free from death.
And believing this, what changes in us? A heart of thankfulness, right? I am the sinner, Christ died for me and showed mercy to me by taking my sins away, and now, out of response, I am thankful and I live my life as a thankful sinner redeemed by God’s grace. Do you need to be thankful to be saved? No! But the natural, Spirit-driven response to your being saved is thankfulness.
You might say, “Well, I am thankful, but I just don’t have time to be thankful all the time,” or “I am thankful, but I don’t want to be thankful like those churchy people who raise their kids reading the catechism or singing the psalms…that’s just dorky. They gotta live their lives; they gotta experience things; they gotta decide for themselves if they want to be religious.” Well, my godly advice for you is to humbly and repentantly pray to the Lord of your salvation, that He change your thinking a little bit. Because to be redeemed by the blood of Christ necessarily leads to a totally different way of life.
This is what repentance is all about. Repentance comes from faith. And here’s what you must understand. God knows your heart. So, if you are still living your life as if Christ never became sin for you – drinking and partying and fornicating and worrying about money and possessions and popularity, you are hiding nothing from the Lord by avoiding church or confession or honest self-reflection. This is what John means when he writes, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”
We’re not deceiving God by avoiding the sin conversation. And in fact, if we say we have no sin, or don’t care that we do have sin, we are making God out to be a liar and again, as John writes, Christ is not in us.
So, instead of trying to hide your sins from the Lord by your own foolish methods, why not look to Jesus and let Him be your sin-bearer who takes away your sins and gives you His righteousness?
Yes, it means change; yes it means that you come to despise your sinfulness such that you repent daily and seek the mercy of God; yes, it means that church and worship and the Lord’s Supper become more important to you than riches or popularity or whatever worldly thing you hold so dearly, for being clothed in His righteousness means you come to love the righteous things and despise the unrighteous things.
But that’s all good news stuff, isn’t it? For there is nothing evil or horrible or wrong about being clothed in the righteousness of Christ. No bad will come to you, no condemnation for being covered in His mercy shall find you.
Because it is finished! Jesus became the sin of the whole world, and He died the death every human being was supposed to die; He died for your sins. There is no more sacrifice, no more death, no more judgment – but only freedom and eternal life for those who believe and who trust, and who look to Jesus upon the cross.
Therefore, come out from the darkness, rise from the dead, awaken from your slumber, for your salvation is here, poured out for you generously in baptism, given and shed for you in the bread and wine, spoken freely for you by the Word proclaimed. Come, be cleansed, be filled with the food of heaven, and be covered in Jesus. Amen.
