What Determines Our Righteousness?

Hello everyone,

Yesterday we understood that Jesus became our sin and we got His righteousness, thus making us the righteousness in Christ Jesus. I also explained that sin has no effect on us because Jesus destroyed its power, apart from that, we were made the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. Then the question then came which was that if we have been made the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus, then why do we still see acts of sin in some cases in our lives? And this is what I intend to address today.

Romans 6:14 says, “For sin shall not have dominion over you, for you are not under law but under grace”, verse 15 and 16 further says, “What then? Shall we sin because we are not under law but under grace? Certainly not! Do you not know that to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey, you are that one’s slaves whom you obey, whether of sin leading to death, or of obedience leading to righteousness? We were slaves to sin before, that was why the law was created to control us, but now that we have been set free from the power of sin, we are above the law and to be above the law implies that we are above sin! To be above sin means that it was power replaced with another power which is the power of grace.

Now, grace is not just a word, everything Jesus has become right now, that is who we have become, in the fullness of His resurrection. Colossians 1:21-22 says, “Aand you, who once were alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now He has reconciled in the body of His flesh through death, to present you holy, and blameless, and above reproach in His sight—if indeed you continue in the faith, grounded and steadfast, and are not moved away from the hope of the gospel which you heard, which was preached to every creature under heaven, of which I, Paul, became a minister.” Now that this is clear, why do we still find ourselves doing what is wrong?

The first thing we need to understand in answering this question is that many of us are still conscious of sin, and to be conscious of sin means being conscious of the law. The truth is that when we were made the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, it wasn’t through what we’ve done. Our righteousness to God is like a filthy rag [ref. Isaiah 64:6], it is only in Christ that our His righteousness being our righteousness what is acceptable to God. It has nothing to do with our effort, only our faith in Him.

As we believed in Jesus we becamebrand new by confessing with our mouth and believing with our heart the Lord Jesus [ref. John 3:16; Romans 10:9], our physical attitude didn’t become perfect instantly, although physically our focus changed because we weren’t focused on the ways of the world but on Jesus who is our perfection. We became righteous the moment we accepted Jesus because we now have His Spirit, our old spirit died. So, as we keep focusing on perfection, we would become perfect in our actions.

The truth is that our perfection has nothing to do with our actions, just the way I explained yesterday that our sins had nothing to do with our action. Sin came into the world through the first Adam, so everyone who was born under him carried his nature of sin, it had nothing to do with our action. The action was just the result of the sin itself and not the sin, likewise, we became righteous because of the last Adam who is Jesus Christ, so everyone that is born of Him carries His nature which is the nature of righteousness, perfection. Our action which looks like the works of sin was just because of our old nature, so as we keep focusing on who we are who is Jesus Christ, we find out that we get cleansed from our old ways or actions. But do not focus on the old nature that is, being conscious of it or else you won’t move forward in Christ [ref. Romans 5:12-21; Hebrews 12:2]

May the LORD bless you and keep you, make His face shine upon you. May the LORD be gracious to you and lift up His countenance upon you, and give you peace. AMEN.

                    

Why not accept Jesus today if you haven’t. Pray out loud, “Jesus, I confess that You are my Lord and Saviour. I believe in my heart that God raised You from the dead. By faith in Your Word, I receive salvation now. Thank You for saving me!” Congratulations, you’re born again, you are now brand new!

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GOD BLESS YOU.

Unless otherwise stated, the following scriptures are gotten from New King James Version (NKJV)