1 Peter 2:24

Mistake is a sin contrary to calculation; and voluntary sin is crime; and crime is voluntary wickedness. Sin, then, is on my part voluntary. Wherefore says the apostle, "Sin shall not have dominion over you; for ye are not under the law, but under grace." Addressing those who have believed, he says, "For by His stripes we were healed." Mistake is the involuntary action of another towards me, while a crime alone is voluntary, whether my act or another's.

Let us then continually persevere in our hope, and the earnest of our righteousness, which is Jesus Christ, "who bore our sins in His own body on the tree," "who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth," but endured all things for us, that we might live in Him. Let us then be imitators of His patience; and if we suffer for His name's sake, let us glorify Him. For He has set us this example in Himself, and we have believed that such is the case.

Perhaps someone will say: "How does the apostle Peter say here that the Lord, when He was reviled, did not revile in return, and when He suffered, did not threaten, when we see that He calls the Jews dogs, deaf, the Pharisees blind (Matt. 15:14), …

He himself bore our sins, etc. Whereas previously he spoke specifically to servants, now he admonishes in general that even masters be reminded of what God and the Lord endured for them. Indeed, he instructs the whole Church on what the Maker endured for its …

When, by Pilate's order, He was scourged, He endured on His body the wounds from the blows as well.

That we being dead to sin - Wholly delivered both from the guilt and power of it: indeed, without an atonement first made for the guilt, we could never have been delivered from the power. Might live to righteousness - Which is one only. The sins we had committed, and he bore, were manifold.

Christ was bruised and crucified as an expiatory sacrifice, and by his stripes we are healed. Learn, First, Jesus Christ bore the sins of all his people, and expiated them by his death upon the cross.

The example of Christ's subjection and patience is here explained and amplified: Christ suffered, (1.) Wrongfully, and without cause; for he did no sin,

Who his own self - Not another in his place, as some anciently supposed, because they thought it impossible that the Christ should suffer. Bare our sins in his own body - Bore the punishment due to our sins. In no other sense could Christ bear them. To say that they were so imputed to him as if they had been his own, and that the Father beheld him as blackened with imputed sin, is monstrous, if not blasphemous.

So the same Greek means in 1Pe 2:5. our sins--In offering or presenting in sacrifice (as the Greek for "bare" implies) His body, Christ offered in it the guilt of our sins upon the cross, as upon the altar of God, that it might be expiated in Him, and so taken away from us.

PETER, in this chapter, exhorted Christians to holiness and dwelt upon that branch of holiness which consists in the patient endurance of wrong. He could find no better argument with which to plead with the saints than the life and example of their Lord, and, indeed, who could find a better? Since the Lord Jesus is all our salvation, He is also all our desire. And to be like He is, is the highest object of our ambition. If, therefore, we find Him patient under wrong, it is to us a conclusive argument that we should be patient, too.

PETER, in this chapter, exhorted Christians to holiness and dwelt upon that branch of holiness which consists in the patient endurance of wrong. He could find no better argument with which to plead with the saints than the life and example of their Lord, and, indeed, who could find a better? Since the Lord Jesus is all our salvation, He is also all our desire. And to be like He is, is the highest object of our ambition. If, therefore, we find Him patient under wrong, it is to us a conclusive argument that we should be patient, too. I admire the Apostle Peter, because in using so good an argument he selected from the life of his Lord that particular portion of it which must have been most vividly written upon his own soul. Judge you, my Brothers and Sisters, if I am not correct in this. Which hour do you think, of the sufferings of the Lord, from Gethsemane to Golgotha, would be most deeply engraved upon the memory of Peter? Surely it would be that space of time in which He was mocked and buffeted in the hall of the High Priest, when Peter sat and warmed his hands at the fire—when he saw his Lord abused and he was afraid to admit that he was His disciple, and by-and-by became so terrified that, with profane language, he declared "I know not the Man." So long as life lingered, the Apostle would remember the meek and quiet bearing of his suffering Lord. He alluded to it in the 23rd verse, "When He was reviled, He reviled not again; when He suffered, He threatened not; but committed Himself to Him that judges righteously." Many a tear had Peter to brush out of his eyes as he wrote that verse.

PETER had almost incidentally mentioned his Master's name and, having done so, he felt that he must enlarge upon that theme, for the name of Christ was very dear to him. He seems to again hear that thrice-repeated question ringing in his ears, "Simon, son of Jonas, do you love Me?" and he can still answer, "Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You." So, having mentioned his Master's name, he feels that he must say something about Him.

PETER had almost incidentally mentioned his Master's name and, having done so, he felt that he must enlarge upon that theme, for the name of Christ was very dear to him. He seems to again hear that thrice-repeated question ringing in his ears, "Simon, son of Jonas, do you love Me?" and he can still answer, "Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You." So, having mentioned his Master's name, he feels that he must say something about Him. Oh, that we, also, may have such love for Christ that a touch of His hand, or a glance of His eyes may suffice to detain us! May we never be weary of hearing about Him! May His name exercise a sacred fascination upon us! May it cheer us in life and in death and be the theme of our song throughout eternity! There is, perhaps, a special reason why Peter wrote, in this place, concerning the vicariousness of Christ's death. He had just been alluding to another aspect of that death. In the 21st verse, he had said, "Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that you should follow His steps." "Ah," thought Peter, "they may, from my mentioning His death by way of example, draw the inference that Christ only died as our Exemplar." They may say—as, alas, so many in modern times have done—"that the death of Christ was merely the completion of His life and that He is simply the Savior of men by setting before them a higher ideal of what men should be than they would otherwise have been." The Holy Spirit forewarned Peter of this danger and taught him how to avert it, in the best possible way, by adding this most significant sentence, "Who Himself bore our sins in His own body on the tree." It is quite true that Christ is our Exemplar, but no man can ever follow Christ's example until he has first believed in Him as his Substitute and Savior.

Who his own self - See the notes at Heb 1:3, on the phrase “when he had by himself purged our sins.” The meaning is, that he did it in his own proper person; he did not make expiation by offering a bloody victim, but was himself the sacrifice. Bare our sins - There is an allusion here undoubtedly to Isa 53:4, Isa 53:12. See the meaning of the phrase “to bear sins” fully considered in the notes at those places. As this cannot mean that Christ so took upon himself the sins of people as to become himself a sinner, it must mean that he put himself in the place of sinners, and bore that which those sins deserved; that is, that he endured in his own person that which, if it had been inflicted on the sinner himself, would have been a proper expression of the divine displeasure against sin, or would have been a proper punishment for sin. See the notes at 2Co 5:21. He was treated as if he had been a sinner, in order that we might be treated as if we had not sinned; that is, as if we were righteous. There is no other way in which we can conceive that one bears the sins of another. They cannot be literally transferred to another; and all that can be meant is, that he should take the consequences on himself, and suffer as if he had committed the transgressions himself. (See also the supplementary notes at 2Co 5:21; Rom. 4; 5; and Gal 3:13, in which the subject of imputation is discussed at large) In his own body - This alludes undoubtedly to his sufferings. The sufferings which he endured on the cross were such as if he had been guilty; that is, he was treated as he would have been if he had been a sinner. […]