Grace Gives Righteousness
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Jeremiah 23:5-65.
"Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord, when I will raise up for David a righteous Branch, and he shall reign as king and deal wisely, and shall execute justice and righteousness in the land. 6. In his days Judah will be saved, and Israel will dwell securely. And this is the name by which he will be called: `The Lord is our righteousness.'
2 Corinthians 5:20-21
20. So we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We beseech you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 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.
I looked up the word righteousness at dictionary.com. For the word righteous I found, “morally upright; without guilt or sin; adhering to moral principles.” For moral I found, “founded on the fundamental principles of right conduct rather than on legalities” Synonyms or the word moral include upright, honest, straightforward, open, virtuous and honorable. If my admittedly limited grammar recall is correct, righteousness is the embodiment of all of these qualities. It is the state of being morally upright, adhering to moral principles, honest, straightforward, open, virtuous and honorable.
Becoming the righteousness of God, then, seems like a pretty tall order. Actually, it is as tall order! I don’t know about any of you, but I struggle with any individual quality listed, let alone living is a way that is all-encompassing. Fortunately for us, The Lord is our righteousness. Christ is righteousness on our behalf, in our stead. God’s grace made that provision for us over 2000 years ago. Christ also serves as the example for us. Since he was righteousness itself, we only need to read the Bible to discover the qualities God demands of his children.
It would be so easy to become discouraged or dismayed at the prospect of trying to achieve this state of being. I’m more prone to “righteous indignation” that I am to righteousness! But we have hope! Freegrace.net states, “In the matter of justification Christ is all (Acts 13:38-39). His work, only his work, without any contribution whatsoever from us, makes us righteous in the sight of God. God looks upon all who believe as though the life which Christ lived had been lived by us. He graciously accepts, blesses, and rewards us as though all that Christ has done had been done by us, his believing people. God so perfectly imputes the righteousness of Christ to us that we are called by this very name (Jer. 33:15-16).”
As ambassadors for Christ we are to attempt to live righteously. Even though at first glance the world is far from moral, virtuous, honorable, upright and Christ-like, our faith tells us otherwise. We are to reconcile ourselves to God by admitting, accepting, acknowledging our sinfulness. In that way we allow the Holy Spirit to enter us and aid us in our effort to live righteously. We all have a long way to go—some of us have farther than others. We need not live without hope though, because Christ has already done the hard work to achieve perfection on our behalf.
Clearly grace is tied intricately and inseparably with righteousness.
My prayer today is that you make one small change in your life that moves you closer to true righteousness through Christ. And that you rejoice in God’s grace, which saves us in our failed efforts to do so.
Mary
Labels: grace, righteous, righteousness
