Who is the assurance of our hope?  Who is the one who made our hope possible in the first place?  Who allows us to have a confident expectation that our hope will come to fruition?  The answer to all three questions is the same—Christ Jesus.

1 Timothy 1:1 (ESV)
¹Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by command of God our Savior and of Christ Jesus our hope,

If our hope were founded upon ourselves, it would be doubtful at best.  In fact, let me change that.  If that were the case, we would have no hope at all.  Why?  Simply because we are all sinners, incapable of saving ourselves from sin once we commit it.  Only one who lived a sinless life could become the Saviour of the world and rescue us from our transgressions.  Jesus is that one.

2 Corinthians 5:21 (ESV)
²¹ For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

When Paul says that Jesus was made to be sin, he is not saying that He literally became a sinner.  If Jesus became a sinner, there would be no difference between Him dying for our sins and us dying for our own sins.  Besides that, that would result in a scenario where Jesus died a sinner and would be eternally separated from His Father.  If not, why not?  Jesus could die for our sins precisely because He was not a sinner.

What did Paul mean, then, when he said that Jesus was made to be sin?  He meant that Jesus became the sin-offering for mankind.  In the Bible, the Greek word for sin (hamartia) is translated “sin-offering” in the Septuagint (Greek translation of the Old Testament (Leviticus 4:25, 29).  While the word is never translated sin-offering in the New Testament, we are told repeatedly that Jesus is our “propitiation,” which refers to a sin-offering (Romans 3:25; 1 John 2:2; 4:10).  This appears to be what Paul meant in 2 Corinthians 5:21.   Jesus became the sacrifice that man so desperately needed, and in doing so, He condemned sin.

Romans 8:3–4 (ESV)
³ For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, ⁴ in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.

What was the righteous requirement of the law?  It was perfection, and now that requirement is fulfilled in us, as long as we walk according to the Spirit.  This is what gives us confident expectation.  We know that we appear before God as if we have not sinned because Jesus condemned sin in the flesh.

This is the basis for our hope.  It is not our sinlessness, but the sinlessness of Jesus, along with His willingness to die in our place.  Our hope is realized in Christ.

1 Thessalonians 1:3 (ESV)
³ Remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ.

We can find hope in no one else but Jesus.  He is the “Who” of our hope, and for that we should rejoice (Romans 12:12). 

As you wind down for the night, think about these things.