Again in the holy Gospel for this week, the Lord Jesus solemnly challenges His foes to find in Hun any fault if they could: “Which of you convinceth Me of sin.” To this challenge there was no reply, and never at any time did His bitterest enemies lay any moral fault to His charge. The most they could do was to attempt to fasten upon Him an accusation of a political nature, and to accuse Him of sedition. But this was obviously so untrue that Pilate refused to entertain it. “I find,” he said, “no fault in Him; no, nor yet Herod.” His only fault, even in the eyes of His accusers, was that He had claimed to be the Son of God and the Messiah of Israel.
It was necessary that the sacrifice for sin should be God, for if He were not God His sacrifice of Himself would not be a sacrifice of sufficient value to atone for the sins of all men. It was necessary that the sacrifice for sin should be man, for God cannot suffer and die. As it was man who had sinned, it was just that man should make atonement for sin.
It was necessary also that the man who would make this atonement should be a sinless man, for otherwise ho would have been among those who needed that that atonement should be made. Moreover, if the Lord Jesus had been guilty of sin, this would have contradicted the truth of His Godhead. So, we see, therefore, that it was necessary that He should be unstained by sin. “The wages of sin is death,” and if He had deserved to die for His own sin His death could not have been an atonement for the sins of oven one other man.
It may be thought that if He was thus sinless His temptation was unreal. On the contrary, this made His temptations so much the more painful to Him. The purer in heart any man may be, the more painful will temptation he to him. To the perfectly holy soul of the Lord Jesus all temptations to sin were more horrible and painful than they are to our sin-stained souls.
Prayer
Lord Jesus, help me to be holy because Thou art the most Holy, and to follow Thee day by day. Amen.
From Lent for Busy People © 2017 Fr. Charles H. Nalls
The Cathedral Close 
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