Posted on 02/24/2015 3:19:36 PM PST by RnMomof7
“The Lord our Righteousness.” — Jeremiah 23:6.
It will always give a Christian the greatest calm, quiet, ease, and peace, to think of the perfect righteousness of Christ. How often are the saints of God downcast and sad! I do not think they ought to be. I do not think they would be if they could always see their perfection in Christ. There are some who are always talking about corruption, and the depravity of the heart, and the innate evil of the soul. This is quite true, but why not go a little further, and remember that we are “perfect in Christ Jesus.” It is no wonder that those who are dwelling upon their own corruption should wear such downcast looks; but surely if we call to mind that “Christ is made unto us righteousness,” we shall be of good cheer. What though distresses afflict me, though Satan assault me, though there may be many things to be experienced before I get to heaven, those are done for me in the covenant of divine grace; there is nothing wanting in my Lord, Christ hath done it all. On the cross He said, “It is finished!” and if it be finished, then am I complete in Him, and can rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory, “Not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.” You will not find on this side heaven a holier people than those who receive into their hearts the doctrine of Christ’s righteousness. When the believer says, “I live on Christ alone; I rest on Him solely for salvation; and I believe that, however unworthy, I am still saved in Jesus;” then there rises up as a motive of gratitude this thought—”Shall I not live to Christ? Shall I not love Him and serve Him, seeing that I am saved by His merits?” “The love of Christ constraineth us,” “that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves but unto Him which died for them.” If saved by imputed righteousness, we shall greatly value imparted righteousness.
– Charles Spurgeon (1834-1892)
taken from: Morning and Evening, Morning devotion for January 31.
Ping
The peace that passes all understanding! I pray every night that those who read these threads will experience that joy and security in Christ.
Amen! Once I really understood imputation it gave me great comfort because I was aware God demands perfect righteousness to be saved.
Below is a link to Whitefield’s sermon “The Lord Our Righteusness”
http://www.biblebb.com/files/whitefield/GW014.htm
How I wish FR wasn't a place of gotchas and sophistry and petty vindictiveness!
Crisis ministry is very much a matter of “resting.” The chaplain in a hospital (something I did for a year and a quarter, and would do again in a heart beat) is there to ... accompany. This is especially true in a short hospitalization— while the patient and family and friends are just coming to terms with the disorienting fact of the admission.
And so the chaplain discovers himself to be a Pelagian! If you do this deed, think this thought, believe this proposition, feel this feeling ... THEN you will be able to cope.
But of course, the REAL question — or rather the real Gospel, is that God has already coped. So the chaplain, in attentive inaction, bears witness to the absence of a need to DO anything — including the need to CHOOSE to rest in Christ.
So, my prayers focused more and more on resting, on allowing God to work ... even in my resistance to his working!
Lord: What shall I do when there is nothing for me to do?
He says: Abide in me.
I say, “Lord, do you have any idea how HARD it is JUST to abide.”
He says, “Very well, abide in my Love, which persists in your failure to abide.”
I say, “That, my Lord and my God, THAT I can do. But even here I cannot do it if you turn for one second away from me.”
He says, “I do not turn away.”
I say, “Very well, Lord. Like a terrified child I may writhe and scream, because my fears and sorrows are great. Do not thou turn from me, and all will be well.”
He says, “In me, all is very well, and in your bad dreams, I will be here to soothe and to rearrange your blanket.”
I say, “Lord, not for failure of love, but because I am an animal, I would sleep now.”
He says,”I slept in the stern, in the storm. I will sleep here with you, in your storms. In me all your wild waves are stilled.”
I say, “Zzzzzz.”
“Come to ME; for my yoke is easy...”
RESTED ASSURANCE !
Those who put their trust in their own righteousness, works, their own merits pride themselves in which God resists.
Those who pride themselves in their own merits, works, their own righteousness do spite of the spirit of grace and degrade, dishonor the blood of Christ and counted it as profane and common as the blood of bulls and goats.
Those who place their trust, hope, faith, salvation only in Jesus Christ are the sheep on the right hand, and those who place their trust in their own merits, their own works, their own righteousness and not in grace are the goats on the left hand.
Those who are saved by grace have already been made righteious, holy, sanctified by the ever lasting love of God through Jesus Christ.
As the book of Hebrews says, God said that he will not remember our sins and lawless deeds NO MORE, that is ? In Christ through his blood only.
Those who are not saved in Christ ? When they come and say ? “ Lord ! Lord ! .... “ he will say to them “ Depart from me, I never knew you , those workers of iniqulity “ for they have not been washed in the blood of Jesus Christ.
We are not married to the law, but married to another, JESUS CHRIST ! ...
Grace is higher than the law because , well ? The law giver was Grace him self, for Grace and Truth come by Jesus Christ.
When you have Grace ? You have Truth, Truth follows Grace.
We are dead to the law and married to another, GRACE !
Romans chapter 7 verse 4
4. Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ, that ye should be married to another, even to him that is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God.
We have that perfect righteousness, that is ? In another, Jesus Christ, his perfection, and we also have been made perfect in him.
We are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.
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