who himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, in order that, being dead to sins, we may live to righteousness by whose stripes ye have been healed.
Peter has been holding up Christ as the pattern for believers who suffer for doing right. Then the argument turns: at the cross He did what no follower can copy, and two questions follow — when did He bear our sins, and what is the healing He bought?
The verse marks a break in Peter's flow. Until now Peter has held up Christ as a model of patience. Here the subject changes to something we can only receive. Everything at the cross falls on one side: the sins were ours, the judgment was His.
At this point the apostle turns from the more general reference to the Lord's sufferings for us, the peerless example of unrepining love and unswerving yet patient righteousness in a world of evil, to that which stands alone from all before and after in the expiation of our sins, here expressed in terms of extreme simplicity. In atonement Christ had no companions and no followers.
As a believer I had nothing to do with the judgment of my sin on the cross, or with the bearing of my sins there. God's only Son was there alone for me. "For our sake He made Him to be sin," not us with Him; "He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree," not we bore our sins with Him... His alone was the judgment, just as surely as the sin and sins were ours alone.
The words "in His body on the tree" fix both the place and the moment. Writers insist that this was not a burden carried through His lifetime.
He bore our sins in His own body. He was definitely our Substitute. We had sinned in our bodies. He became a true Man, without sin, and He bore our sins in His holy body as a sacrifice for sin. He did this on the tree, for He made atonement only in His death. He did not bear our sins during His life, but in His death.
Some have said He carried our sins through His whole life. Kelly answers from what happened at the cross. The darkness and the cry of abandonment could not fit a life of unbroken closeness to God.
What did that supernatural darkness mean, which covered the cross in broad daylight from a certain point on? And what did the cry mean, from One who had always said "Father" in the full enjoyment of His love, but now cried "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"... His suffering for our guilt, and God's face shining at the same time! If He had been bearing our sins all His life, God must have abandoned Him all His life, for God cannot make the least allowance for sin.
Peter's word "tree" carries the idea of a curse. One writer warns against treating the visible scene as the whole of it.
First, and this should be obvious though some miss it, the hanging on the tree is not itself the curse. It only marks out the one on whom the curse falls. The curse itself is not something outside a person. It is a deep reality in the soul of the one who bears it. This was the wrath against sin that Christ bore for us: God forsaking Him. If He had not borne it, no blessing could ever have come to anyone.
The sentence does not stop at forgiveness. Peter names an aim, and it is a practical one. Older translations read "dead to sins" in the plural here, and the writer below builds on that reading.
The practical aim suited Peter's earnestness: "that, being dead to sins, we should live to righteousness."... Here, as in 1 Peter 2:24, Peter urges death to sins as a practical reality. This is not the Christian privilege of having died with Christ to sin. It is the duty that flows from His death: that we should no longer serve sin, but live righteous lives after Christ's example.
The cost of the cross becomes the argument against going back.
Christ has borne our sins in His own body on the tree. He did this not only so that God would count us righteous and save us from the judgment of sins, but so that we should live to righteousness. His wounds have healed us — can we go on with sin that cost Him so much to remove?
The closing phrase speaks of healing. One writer names the sickness it cures as sin itself.
This is not healing of the body, but healing from the dreadful disease of sin. Those wounds are the wounds of God's judgment, poured out on Him at Calvary.
The image is a lowly one — the mark a lash leaves — and that is where the comfort lies.
A strange contrast, but no less wonderfully true! The word means the welt or swelling left by the lash, which many a slave knew well. How comforting to the Christian, slave or not, who rests with assurance... on what God did for the ungodly through the shameful yet glorious death of His Son!
- Alone — Christ bore our sins alone: the sins were ours, the judgment was His. The example ends where the atonement begins.
- Body — He bore them in His own body, as our Substitute, and only in His death — not through His life.
- Tree — Hanging on the tree marked the One on whom the curse fell; the curse itself was the forsaking He endured within.
- Purpose — The aim was not forgiveness alone but a life done with sins and given to righteousness.
- Healed — The wounds of the lash cure the disease of sin. So why return to what cost Him so much?
For ye were going astray as sheep, but have now returned to the shepherd and overseer of your souls.
Peter has been writing to household servants, and he closes by reminding them where they once were and who holds them now. The verse looks back to a straying flock and forward to a care that never lets go, and it raises the question of who did the returning.
One writer connects the wandering flock to Israel's history, and to the servants Peter is addressing.
It is in the past that we were like sheep going astray, and this was especially true of Israel. Now at least these to whom Peter writes had returned to the Shepherd and Overseer (or bishop) of their souls. This is Christ, of course. So it is Christ who, in the Old Testament, was the true Shepherd — though Israel hardly recognised it. It was Him they had left. How precious for them the truth of Psalm 23: "He restores my soul!" Notice that all of this connects with household servants — the subject Peter began in verse 18.
"Have now returned" sounds like something the sheep managed. One writer places the credit elsewhere.
The Good Shepherd leaves the rest safe, in search of the stray sheep. After it He goes in earnest love, as if He had no other; and having found it, He lays it on His shoulders rejoicing. When He comes home, He calls His friends and neighbours together to rejoice with Him over the lost one found… If we have returned — as we can now say — it is only because the Shepherd and Overseer of souls came to seek and save us.
The second title (older translations render it "Bishop") is a working word, not a rank.
The word bishop means one who looks on. He is one who oversees, one who takes practical care of the spiritual welfare of the saints. The Greek word for bishop is episkopos (epi, on; skopos, look on or consider). It occurs five times in the Scriptures: once referring to our Lord (1 Peter 2:25), three times translated bishop (Philippians 1:1; 1 Timothy 3:2; Titus 1:7), and once translated overseer (Acts 20:28).
Peter names the Shepherd first, then the Overseer — and he ties that second title to our souls. One writer weighs both the order and the wording.
Is the order in which Peter mentions the Shepherd and the Overseer worth noticing? As the Shepherd, the Lord has to do with the sheep before His overseeing care can begin. Besides the order, we should also mark the wording used. He calls the Lord Overseer of our souls. Not merely an overseer, not an overseer in the flock — there were such men on earth, appointed by the Holy Spirit. He calls Him Overseer of our souls, the One who in His grace shows overseeing care for each of His people, one by one. He is the Overseer of our souls, whatever believers think about it, and whether or not they are aware of His personal service to them.
A returned sheep can still wander. One writer turns to Psalm 23 for what happens then.
"He restores my soul." Only Jesus could save us. Only He can make us lie down in green pastures. Only He can lead us beside the still waters. And only He can restore a soul when it has strayed.
Peter himself had gone astray. One writer hears that history behind the verse.
Peter had not been teachable and submissive to his Lord like his friend John, but the Shepherd and Overseer of his soul had not let him go. We can understand his feelings as he wrote these words. The Shepherd dealt with him in grace when he went astray. He had drunk deeply of that grace, and could write, "The Lord is good" — older translations read, "The Lord is gracious." No one knew it better than he. In the end he stood restored and confident among his brothers, and the great and chief Shepherd recommissioned him.
If the return was His work, the keeping is His responsibility too.
As sheep, our security is the responsibility of our Shepherd (1 Peter 2:25)… The struggles of the sheep would not be to keep on, but to get off. We are not saved by our "holding on," for sheep have no hands to hold on by. Now the rejoicing Shepherd carries all His sheep along on His shoulders, and so all are saved alike. The Shepherd will make sure that not one shall slip off His shoulders.
- Straying — the wandering is past and finished. Israel above all had left the very Shepherd who was theirs all along.
- Sought — sheep do not find their way home; we returned only because He came after us and carried us back rejoicing.
- Souls — episkopos means one who looks on and takes practical care. He oversees not a congregation but each person, one by one.
- Restored — only the Shepherd who saved us can bring back a soul that wanders. Peter, who had strayed himself, knew that firsthand.
- Secure — sheep have no hands to hold on with, and they need none. Staying on His shoulders is His work, not ours.