What does it mean that God made Jesus to be sin for us?

Recently we've been reconsidering many of the things we thought we understood regarding doctrine and faith. We have begun to question certain beliefs, church structures, and practices of the western church. Too often we have discovered what we think are unbiblical doctrines and activities. This causes us concern. We have deemed this our “Rethink.”

Our questions include, how did we arrive at our doctrines? Does the Bible really teach what we think it teaches? Why do churches do what they do? What is the biblical basis of church leadership structure? Why do certain traditions get entrenched?

It's easy to be spoon fed the conventional wisdom, but it's an entirely separate thing to search these things out for one's self. In the past we have read the Bible with these unexamined understandings and interpreted what we read through those lenses. We were too lazy about our Bible study, assuming that pastors and theologians were telling us the truth, but we rarely checked it out for ourselves.

Therefore, these Rethinks are our attempt to remedy the situation.

We should note that there is more than one way to interpret doctrine, more than one way to think about the faith, and more than one way to read the Scriptures. We would not suggest that our way is the only way, or the right way; we are not Bible scholars. But we believe that one doesn't need to be in order to rightly divide the Word of God.

Here's the verse:

2Co. 5:21 God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

The meaning of  this verse is a point of theology that has been debated for centuries. Did Jesus become a sinner? Was He the representation of all our sins? Did He actually become sin itself? Did the Father impute our sin to Jesus?

"Become" vs. "Made"

Gotquestions says this: 

Perhaps the best way to understand He became sin for us is to begin with what it does not mean.

Well, no, this is not the best way, because He did not "become" sin. The verse says God made Him to be sin. "Made" is the word poieó, which means I make, manufacture, construct. The literal Greek is 

The (one) having not known sin for us sin he made... 

The man Jesus was constructed, made for a purpose. He was "made sin" to reconcile us to God, which is what we read just a couple of verses before:

2Co. 5:19...God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ... 

Further, poieó has many shades of meaning in the Greek. One that caught our eye was this:

to (make i. e.) constitute or appoint one anything...

Poieó (made) is the same word used here:

Ac. 2:36 “Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.”

Jesus was appointed to the position of sin, and he was appointed to the position of Lord and Christ. Nothing about His nature changed. The Father basically said, "Go, here's your position." Therefore, His position on earth was sin.

But that still doesn't get us to what it means to be sin.

Imputed?

 Gotquestions goes on to say: 

On the cross, our sin was imputed to Christ. That is how Christ paid our sin debt to God. He had no sin in Himself, but our sin was imputed (attributed) to Him so, as He suffered, He took the just penalty that our sin deserves.

This is a Calvinist/reformist perspective that the Father punished Jesus instead of us, a doctrine called Penal Substitutionary Atonement. We discuss this problematic doctrine here. We assert that the Father did not punish Jesus for our sin. Nor did Jesus pay for our sin.

Why?

The OT sacrifices were never regarded as sinful. The Jews never punished the animals. They never looked at the animals as substituting for them. The Jews never regarded the sacrificial animals as payment for their sin. Jesus's spilled blood was exactly the same. The OT sacrifices were typology pointing to Christ. He was the sacrificial Lamb of God whose spilled blood washed us of our sin. His blood alone is sufficient to propitiate for us.

Further, he carried our sins to the Cross like one would carry out a sack of garbage. He was our burden-bearer: 

1Pe. 2:24 He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.

So if we rightly regard Jesus as a sacrifice, the One who carried away our sins to the cross (Col. 2:14), we no longer need to think the Father punished Him, because He was not imputed with our sin.

We also need to revisit the verse we quoted previously:

Ac. 2:36 “Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.”

We certainly cannot say that Jesus was imputed with being Lord and Christ. Therefore, He was also not imputed with our sin.

Another Idea

If Jesus was not imputed with our sin, and if He did not substitute for us, then what is the meaning of 2Co. 5:21? He was indeed positionally appointed to be sin, but the verse does not say He was made to be our sin. Many Christians tend to read themselves into Scripture, assuming everything is about them. So Jesus being made sin is assumed to be our sin. 

This might be a mistake.

We think it possible that Paul was actually discussing His incarnation, not His sacrifice. That is, Jesus' position as a man. Here's what we mean:

Ro. 8:3-4 For what the law was powerless to do in that it was weakened by the sinful nature, God did by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering. And so he condemned sin in sinful man, 4 in order that the righteous requirements of the law might be fully met in us, who do not live according to the sinful nature but according to the Spirit.

All the same concepts are here that are also in 2Co. 5:21, expanded with some additional information. One thing leaps out at us: "In the likeness of sinful man to be a sin offering." This is very interesting phrasing. This is where our speculation about Him being made sin led us.

In this scenario it isn't about our sin at all, but rather His position. He was appointed to being incarnated in the likeness of sinful man to offer himself as a ransom for many. Therefore, we think "He was made sin" means "he was made in the form of sinful flesh."

Let's retranslate:

2Co. 5:21 God appointed him who was unacquainted with sin to the position of a sinful man, for our benefit...

Admittedly this is speculation, but we think it solves a lot of doctrinal problems if it's true.