You would agree with
me that righteousness springs from the
nature of God and speaks of His judgments
and standards. God is righteous and therefore everything He does is right. He
cannot be faulted because righteousness is found in the core of his being!
Righteousness also is a product of faith because it is revealed when faith is in operation (Rom 1:16). THERE WILL BE NO RIGHTEOUSNESS WHEN THERE IS NO FAITH. However, man lost righteousness through the fall and God wanted man restored and to do so, God has only option was to train man to walk in the path of righteousness – strictly by faith!
When God visited Abraham,
man had degenerated far into disobedience (death) as evidenced by the fact that Abraham’s ancestors were idol worshippers (Assyrians) Deut.
26:4. Abraham however found mercy to journey with God
into a kind of righteousness which actually is THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF A
LIVING SOUL (1Cor. 15:45). Through Adam’s disobedience, man’s spirit (including that of Abraham and posterity) was not alive unto God, so God had to start
by training his soul to attain a kind of righteousness that could earn him a blessing for the genealogy of
mankind.
Abraham responded in faith (Gen 12:1), because he could never have pleased God of himself. As God was showing Abraham “how He wanted to be pleased”,
Abraham received grace to respond and righteousness was
imputed (credited) to his account (Gal.
3:6). This same principle applies
to us in the New Testament; it is also by faith – though a superior kind of God which was unveiled in
Christ Jesus. At new birth, we believed in the Son of God and were
quickened because righteousness was imputed to our human spirit (Eph. 2:1). Our spirit has been made the Righteousness of God (Rom. 8:10)
Although Abraham was commended for believing God (Rom 4:3), his journey
did not end there. He went ahead to
complete the full count of righteouness allocated for him and his seed to come.
God placed a demand upon Him not only to
BELIEVE but to take steps of OBEDIENCE (revealed righteousness – Rom. 1:16). Abraham was led along an unfamiliar path and as he hoped against hope, he demonstrated an unshakable trust in God. HE OBEYED GOD THOUGH
THAT WAS AN UNINTERESTING ADVENTURE TO HIS HUMAN FRAME. He obeyed God until he came to a
place of oath. God ratified his
earlier promise with an oath – i.e. two immutable
thing (Heb. 6:17-18)
In Christ, that oath is
fulfilled, and we are made partakers of the righteousness of God in Christ
Jesus. Our righteousness in the New Testament is after the order of the
quickening spirit, Christ Jesus (1Cor. 15:45). Thereby is our spirit born anew and
fully clothed with that righteousness! The
next programme is for our souls to LEARN THE PATH OF
RIGHTEOUSNESS by OBEYING ITS PRINCIPLES so that we can be made PERFECT (QUICKENED) IN GOD’S JUDGMENT.
So when we believe Jesus
and confess Him, His Righteousness is imputed to us (our spirit). But the whole essence of faith is for our souls
to come into obedience (Rom. 16:26). FAITH THEREFORE
BEGINS WITH
BELIEVING BUT ENDS IN OBEDIENCE (Rom. 16:26d/). After God has imputed His righteousness in us, we are required to obey the principles of that righteousness which is
an art of faith. IT IS ONE THING
FOR US TO BE IN HIM AND ANOTHER THING FOR HIM TO BE FULLY
FORMED IN US AS OUR VERY OWN RIGHTEOUSNESS
- A RIGHTEOUSNESS THAT SHOULD BECOME PRIMARY PRINCIPLE BY WHICH WE LIVE. Here it is not just faith without my works, but
faith demonstrated by walking in the path of
righteousness.
So after our spirit has received God’s righteousness, it stands on that ground while the soul journeys into becoming the righteousness of
God (Rom. 1:16). While on this adventuring to God, the soul gets to a
place of obedience where it would be clothed with fine white linen, which
is the righteousness of the saints (Rev. 19:8) . If we are unable to
obey faith, we will not have the Righteousness of Jesus as personal experience or inheritance. Righteousness here
is not attained by confession but by LOVING or WALKING in its path (Heb 1:9).
Blessings!
