The Holy Spirit is taking the righteousness of Jesus and applying it to you every single opportunity He can. God isn’t dealing with your sin; He’s dealt with it. He’s dealing with your righteousness.
~ Graham Cooke
For the love of Christ controls us, because we have concluded this: that One has died for all, therefore all have died; and He died for all, that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for Him who for their sake died and was raised. From now on, therefore, we regard no one according to the flesh. Even though we once regarded Christ according to the flesh, we regard Him thus no longer. Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come. All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to Himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; that is, in Christ God was reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. Therefore, we are ambassadors for Christ, God making His appeal through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.
~ from 2 Corinthians 5
Oh beloved, it is true. Behold one of the deepest mysteries of the Gospel.
You have died.
You are a new creation. You are alive in Him – for all of your past, your present, and forever – now. You are one with Christ. Utterly.
Why? Why would He do this? Did He really have to die for us? This writer will not tread any deeper into the mystery, except to say that yeah, G_d really did have to do this for us because He Himself deemed us lovable. And, in the deeming, He set about to redeem us from the deep pit into which we had fallen.
And it does get better. He redeemed us not just that we might be saved from the horrible putridity of our sin and failure, though He surely did this. He did save us in His very own might that we might become the very substance and foundation material of His Kingdom. Paul says it best in the Spirit: “For our sake He made Him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.”
What?
Yeah, you (who have cast yourself on Christ alone for everything) are the very righteousness of G_d. There is no old you any more. There is no old, foul, yucky being who only wants its own, and who cares not a whit about another. You now, by His violence on your person, are now a totally other person who can begin to actually do the right thing in this fallen world.
He has (as Jars of Clay sing about) taken our world apart, broken us and put us on our knees that we might begin to move forward with actual power and right action based on His goodness working in and through our lives.
But, I sure don’t feel like this is true. In fact, I still make a tremendous number of mistakes. I still manifest selfishness in my life. I still lose my patience. What is the deal?
Enter Grace.
This body we inhabit is dead because of the sin we have committed and sin impregnating the world we inhabit. It does still have the capacity to sin. The difference is that we no longer have the propensity, or even the true desire to do things that are displeasing to the Lover of our souls; and when we do transgress it is like we are disappointing our spouse (we are).
This writer has been going through this part of the rhythm of life over the past few weeks. The cares of this world, the opinions of others, the disobedience of a child, the disappointment of circumstances, and the disillusionment of relationships have hammered my existence. And there have been a number of days where i have simply not “felt” like the righteousness of G_d as i have failed and faltered my way through the testing of this moment.
Enter Grace again.
Grace is the very power of Christ to do G_d’s will. It is, in its infinite goodness, a powerful – and active – aspect of Him at work in our lives. And there will be times where, as a rough cutting tool is applied to the stock on a lathe, large chunks of the old deadness in us will be shaved off in rapid fashion. And these times are painful. So, as we manifest some of our old behaviors or thoughts, G_d will in His Grace, take those opportunities to teach us and build our character into something more like Him.
However, beyond the pain of the suffering He guarantees we will endure, there is this great reminder that we are greatly valuable to Him. He did not just die for us, He ever Lives now for us – and is doing whatever is necessary in our lives to best prepare us for the very best which is surely to come in the Kingdom.
He is making us into the very righteousness of Himself. We are to be so like Him that our actions will indeed be the very actions He Himself would take in all situations and at all times. Would that we might truly believe this truth tonight. For true it is, and it is the true path to the righteous behavior we rightly crave.
This, beloved, is very good news!
