Righteousness is one of the three cardinal gifts that we receive as Christians. The others are eternal life and the Holy Spirit. Righteousness is the nature of God or the rightness of God. The righteousness of God is also God’s opinion, will and position on any subject. As Christians, God’s position becomes our position in any subject. Abraham believed God, and God credited righteousness to him. The righteousness of God is about the goodness and right judgment of God. It is the expression of the will and nature of the Father.
God’s righteousness enables us to stand before God without guilt or condemnation. Jesus—who is righteousness Himself came and made God’s righteousness accessible to all mankind who believe. We were given this gift; it can never be earned, neither can you grow righteousness. We cannot be extra righteous today than when we were born again. There are three types of righteousness: inherited or imputed, vital, and self-righteous. The last one takes you nowhere (as nice as that is), as it is based on personal works. The righteousness that we have is legal because of the payment and substitution made on the cross.
It is vital when we accept Jesus and live by his Word. It is also inherited from Jesus because on the cross he substituted our unrighteousness with His righteousness. His righteousness in us and not our works makes us acceptable before God. It is our awareness of His righteousness that propels us to act righteously. When you are conscious of God’s goodness and grace in you, you become a vent for God’s love, grace, mercy, charity and favor towards all men. When you know that sin shall not have dominion over you, you live like one who is the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.
There are people who think they can, by their actions or inactions, obtain righteousness. They are wrong! They base their position on the natural laws like the Law of Moses. Recall that Moses did not give only the Ten Commandments but also about 613 others. Jesus reduced it, yet the standard was still too high. For example, Jesus on the sermon on the mount said if you hate a man you have already killed him and if you look at a woman lustfully, you have already committed adultery. His statements did not set aside the law but raised the bar higher. Indeed, the Law of Moses was given as a schoolmaster, a teacher, and a mirror. It was to inform and educate but could never change the human heart or spirit of men. Visualize this: normally when you want to wash your face, you go to the water faucet and not the mirror. The mirror only shows you that your face is dirty. To wash your face, you need water. To know how dirty your face is you need the mirror. The Law of Moses was to demonstrate adequately that sin exist (the mirror) and to prepare us for the washing of our sin by the blood of Jesus Christ (the water). In the law we could not be justified but in Christ we are justified by his blood (Romans 5:9-21).
In Christ, you have rightness to stand before God because you do not stand in your own righteousness but in His. His alone can truly be righteous. Who has kept all 613 laws and all their ramifications, 7 days a week, and 365 days in a year during their lifetime? Who has kept even the two commandments Jesus reduced the law to and all their ramifications, 7 days a week, and 365 days in a year during their lifetime? Honestly, I do not think anybody has and I have not even mentioned the sin we inherited from Adam. So true right living is humanly unattainable. Right living can only be possible because of righteousness. The natural man can never be righteous by living right because they cannot give what they do not have. God gave us righteousness so that we can live right— living out the Word of God. Individual righteousness is subjective, selfish and spiritually myopic. Jesus is the biblical standard for righteousness and righteousness is the antithesis of lawlessness which He was not. Can ordinary people be nice and sweet? Yes. However, can they be like Jesus 100%, 365 days in a year during their lifetime without the outworking of God’s righteousness and ability in them? No!
In Colossians 1:22, we are informed of the result of Christ’s vicarious death. His death presented us guiltless, holy, un-blamable, and unreproveable in the sight of God. This is who we are today: holy, justified, glorified, and acceptable before God. Maintain this consciousness and take advantage of it. When a man stands in the rightness of God, that man thinks differently and is immune to base reactions like malice, jealousy, and pride. The goodness of God radiates through the Christian. This is at the core of Christianity. It separates a thriving Christian from one who is struggling. Focusing on His righteousness in us and not on the mistakes, we made or are making. It is about practicing and bringing the goodness of God to wherever we are. In Christianity, those who receive (not those who reject) an abundance of grace and the gift of righteousness reign as kings in this life. In God’s divine plan we get everything.
“But it is from Him that you have your life in Christ Jesus, Whom God made our Wisdom from God, [revealed to us a knowledge of the divine plan of salvation previously hidden, manifesting itself as] our Righteousness [thus making us upright and putting us in right standing with God], and our Consecration [making us pure and holy], and our Redemption [providing our ransom from eternal penalty for sin].” (1 Corinthians 1:30 AMPC)
To put everything in context, please see the diagram below. In this diagram, the different gifts and the salvation ‘process’ is illustrated. Please understand that my goal is to illustrate the interplay of the different aspects of our salvation and not to reduce its veracity.
The Gift of Eternal Life (GOEL), Gift of Righteousness (GOR) and Gift of the Holy Spirit (GOHS), though promised to all men, can only be received based on Romans 10:9-10. These gifts and more are possible because of the Gospel ticket of Grace to all men. This ticket is based on the redemptive work at Calvary (on the cross) that made salvation possible. Importantly, only the sinner who believes and repents enters the Kingdom of God though all men get this ticket of salvation because of the grace of God. The believer having entered the kingdom by Grace through Faith in Jesus Christ gets the life of God, the righteousness of God and becomes the temple of the Holy Spirit. This amazing path of righteousness was sanctioned by God the Father, executed by Jesus and made vital by the Holy Spirit. All a sinner needs to do is to collect the ticket, believe and work the Faith walk of righteous living. Remarkable! Compare this with other religious belief and you see why we say Christianity is not a religion.
Culled from the book Being BornAgain 101: called to inherit a blessing
First image credit:unsplash
