What God's Righteousness Looks Like...
- White Stone
- 8 hours ago
- 12 min read
God’s righteousness looks like Jesus on the cross. He is Himself right, just, and true. Righteousness is essential to His very being and characterizes all that He does: God is morally and ethically right, and He acts only in keeping with what is right and just. This theme is common throughout all scripture: the judge of all the earth shall do righteousness. Righteousness is what God is. Every expected obligation of God is dimensionally heightened, lengthened, and widened above every physical quality: the backgrounds and foregrounds are rendered in beautiful lifelikeness to His mode of holiness. It is this aspect of holiness that distinguishes God infinitely beyond anything and everything that can be conceived of except that He is God! And this is the consistency that He wants His people to have. By faith to know that our God’s righteousness is not bound to anything that is not perfect. The word affirms that God is righteous and it assures us that God always conforms to Himself - He faithfully adheres to His own perfections. He acts only and always according to the very highest principle of justice: Himself. God is His own self-existent principle of moral equity, and when He rewards the righteous, He simply acts like Himself from within, uninfluenced by anything that is not Himself. Always in prayer the thoughts of God are so mysterious as I think to come to Him that they seem to turn around and walk away from me. It is understood by me that from my vantage point God is so sovereign, and as such it is His nature and will that constitute the very essence of righteousness to allow me to spiritually envision the absolute moral distance between God and His human creatures.
This is His amazing, extraordinary ability to create whatever humbleness I am to be made like Jesus to come boldly before Him in prayer. To encounter God in His holiness is the expression of His righteousness that makes it possible for us to see ourselves as we really are. God’s holiness is His complete and utter uniqueness distinct from all other beings in His infinite and absolute worth and beauty. This overlaps with His righteousness - His unwavering commitment to the highest standard imaginable - namely, His glory. This view is to leave an individual with a deep sense of awe at the greatness of His actions toward us that are in perfect agreement with His holy nature. To be indifferent is impossible for the true believer when confronted by the righteousness of God. He desires from this that our practical lives flow from the vision of the God of righteousness. He opens the veil of heaven to offer a glimpse of how the whole earth is full of His glory. The truth is that there is not and can never be anything outside of the nature of God which can move Him in the least degree. All God’s reasons come from within His uncreated being. Nothing has entered the being of God from eternity, nothing has been removed, and nothing has been changed. It is by God’s righteousness that we come to understand the “amen” response of His people. It is us saying, “now hear this”!
God’s righteousness is of such a superlative degree that there is only one attribute ever raised to the third degree of repetition in scripture. The bible doesn’t simply say that God is holy, or even that He’s holy, holy, but that He is holy, holy, holy. The bible doesn’t say that God is mercy, mercy, mercy or love, love, love or justice, justice, justice or wrath, wrath, wrath, but that He is holy, holy, holy. This is a dimension of God that consumes His very essence, and when it is manifest to us we must have the good sense to be moved. How can we, made in His image, be indifferent to His righteousness? God’s righteousness is His unswerving faithfulness always to preserve and display the glory of His name. God is ever concerned to glorify Himself in all that He does, and His righteousness tells us just that. It is for this reason man’s “unrighteousness” is described in terms of “not glorifying God as God”. Righteousness consists in glorifying God and nothing less. The law to which men are bound is God’s law – not a law that is “above Him” but a law that is “within Him.” And this standard, being nothing other than the nature and will of God, is the standard to which the immutable God has bound Himself: He acts always in a way that is consistent with His own perfection. This is a truth about God which we are glad to know. It is one thing to know that God is sovereign and so rules the world by His own will. But it is something more indeed to know that He rules in righteousness. For all the apparent inequities of life, for all the patient favors He shows the wicked, and for all the afflictions that fall upon the righteous, it is necessary indeed that we know that God is just and that He will always do what is right – however difficult it may be for us to see it at a given moment. Or again, it is one thing to know that He is the judge of all the world; it is something much more to know that He judges according to what is right and in a way that is consistent with Himself, that He will not condemn the innocent or clear the guilty. Our God is not whimsical or capricious. He is righteous – immutably righteous.
For God to be God, and for us to be God’s election, God must demand of us righteousness. In virtue of this He institutes a moral government in creation, and imposes a just law upon His creatures, with promises of reward for the obedient. And God’s law is the very expression of His own Being. The divine righteousness of God is of such satisfaction as to offer a reformative function – repentance that we may avoid the vindicatory effect - the punishment of sin. God redeeming us will only be so as He can do so righteously. He cannot side-step justice. This is that aspect of God’s righteousness by which He provides righteousness for His offending creatures and Himself makes satisfaction for our unrighteousness. The gospel is a revelation of God’s righteousness. The gospel is a revelation of God’s love and grace, and it is also necessarily a message of His righteousness. Amazingly, God is righteous in forgiving sin. This is the beauty of His righteousness. God has not surrendered His just demands. Rather, God sent His son to be the propitiation for our sins. In the Lord Jesus we have all that God’s righteousness requires of us. In Jesus, we are righteously forgiven. This is grace whereby through faith his righteous record became ours, and we are justified. And with all that God’s righteousness is, there is yet this one aspect that overwhelms me. God’s “remunerative” righteousness as was spoken in the parable of the pounds. Him knowing that whatever good thing any man doeth, that man shall receive of the Lord. He does not overlook our work and labor of love. It is a curious thing that with God it is a matter of righteousness that He rewards His servants for their faithful service. It is not simply a matter of goodness or kindness but of justice. When we have obeyed and served Him, we have only done what is our purpose. All that we are, we are only “by the grace of God”, and our faithfulness is due only to His working in us. It seems strange that God would view our rewards as a function of His righteous justice. The point here is not that God is obligated to us, simply, but that He has obligated Himself to us by promise. It is in His righteousness to make good His word; by promise God hath made Himself a debtor. It is just with God to pay what He owes, and God owes what He hath
promised; and so it is a crown of life which God the righteous Judge will give us at that day. Now, so as not to conflict understanding, God owes us nothing. No primary and original obligation rests upon the Creator, to reward a creature made from nothing, yet He can constitute a secondary and relative obligation. He can promise to reward the creature’s service; and having bound Himself to reward obedience, His own word establishes a species of claim…God by His promise, has made Himself a debtor to men. Our obedience and service that He righteously demands of us and that He graciously enables us to give Him put otherwise, is God rewarding us, His servants, for the very thing that He has purchased and freely provided. The truth of God’s righteousness is a startling one for us. But when this righteousness is wedded to His grace, it is a joyful truth indeed. Even the heavens declare His righteousness. And by His Son we might become the righteousness of God right now as Jesus stands before Him. This very moment if we are in Christ, we are righteous, meaning we are seen by God as just, innocent, and right. There is no measurement to God’s righteousness.
The cross of Calvary accomplished a just salvation, for all who will receive it. But we also know that only those whom God has chosen—the “elect”—will repent and trust in the death of Christ on their behalf. This raises another question related to divine righteousness. After understanding the teaching of the doctrine of divine election, how does God’s righteousness and His justice reconcile. Should God stand before the bar of human judgment? God is righteous in that He has condemned all, and in Christ, those who are justified have been punished and then raised to newness of life. God is also righteous for judging all those who refuse to accept His offer of salvation in Christ. God would be unjust only if He set aside justice rather than fulfilling it in Christ, whether by His sacrificial death at His first coming or by His judging the unbelieving world at His second coming. Divine grace, the grace by which God reaches out to save men from their sins, is meted out not on the basis of men’s merits but in spite of men’s sin. Grace is sovereignly bestowed. God would be unjust only if He withheld blessings from men which they deserved. Since God is free to bestow unmerited blessings on any sinner He may choose, God is not unrighteous in saving some of the worst sinners, while choosing not to save other sinners. God does not owe salvation to anyone, and thus He is not unjust in saving some and choosing not to save others. If sin is the manifestation of our unrighteousness and we can be saved only through a righteousness not our own—the righteousness of Christ—then the ultimate sin is self-righteousness. Jesus did not reject sinners who came to him for mercy and salvation; he rejects those who were too righteous in their own eyes to need grace. No one is too lost to save; there are only those too good to save. If we are among those who have acknowledged our sin and trusted in the righteousness of Christ for our salvation, the righteousness of God is one of the great and comforting truths we should embrace.
By the law is the knowledge of sin, and thus every mouth is stopped, and the whole world is brought in guilty before God. But notwithstanding this, there is a righteousness; a righteousness which meets the case of the unrighteous in every part; a righteousness which can reverse even the verdict of the law against the unrighteous; a righteousness on the footing of which we can stand with boldness in the presence of the holy God without either shame or fear. It is the righteousness of God. It is divine. It is called the righteousness of God because it is a righteousness provided by Him; a righteousness which was conceived by Him, set on foot, and carried out in every part by Him entirely, and by Him alone; a righteousness in the providing of which we had nothing to do, even in thought or in desire, far less in execution; a righteousness the origin and accomplishment of which are wholly and purely God’s, not man’s at all. Again, it is called the righteousness of God because it is a righteousness founded on the sufferings of the Son of God. What God’s righteousness looks like…it is the only begotten flesh that has suffered and provided such a compensation for our unrighteousness. God’s righteousness is so divinely situated that it pushes our faith to a divinely accepted blessing. A faith which can leave no room for doubt on our part at all. Yet it is not our faith that is our righteousness. It is a righteousness which passes over to us, and becomes available for us, by believing in Him whose righteousness it is; that is, by receiving the Father’s testimony concerning Jesus Christ. It is by believing that we are identified with Him, so that His doing becomes our doing in in the eye of God and in the eye of the law;
His suffering becomes our suffering; His fulfilling of the law becomes our fulfilling of the law; His obedience to the Father’s will is our obedience to the Father’s will. Such is the position into which we are brought, by being made, in believing, one with Him. Thus “the righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ,” is presented to us, that in believing on Him He may become ours. Righteousness is here laid down at our feet. It is there, whether we receive it or not. It is there, whether we believe it or not—whether we reject it or receive it.
A righteousness that is most amply sufficient to meet our case were we the very guiltiest on whom the sun has ever shone. This is God’s righteousness. On this righteousness the feet of every faithful from the beginning have stood; of this righteousness every prophet has spoken; to this righteousness every type has borne witness; and this righteousness every sacrifice has set forth. It is even the righteousness of God, which is by the faith of Jesus Christ unto all, and upon all them that believe; for there is no difference. If we be lost, it will be not that there was no righteousness, not that we refused to complete a righteousness which had been begun, but that we rejected the righteousness which was completed, and which was so presented to us by God Himself.
Here is what the essence of a blessing is concerning what God’s righteousness looks like: the fitness of the righteousness for the sinner, and the fitness of the sinner for the righteousness have no difference. This is God’s righteous declaration of not guilty. All are equally fit or equally unfit, equally qualified or equally unqualified, for “all have sinned;” and it is this that brings down all to the same level, and down to this level it is that the righteousness comes. God’s righteousness is an effective work of God that cannot be limited to a mere declaration, for it includes the entire creation and not just the individual. What God declares becomes a reality as represents the unleashing of His power in an active way. God’s declaration of righteousness over us is not temporary – it is eternal. The effective work of the Spirit is part and parcel of the righteousness of God. Righteousness is the manner by which the promise of inheritance is acquired and put into practice. Righteousness is a journey of increasing maturity in godliness that enables access to resources of God which we haven’t experienced as yet. Righteousness opens up for us a lifestyle of awesome deeds that will touch the ends of the earth. This is the outcome of righteousness we are waiting for and eagerly expecting. God’s righteousness, therefore, is both just and holy. The righteousness of God, Himself, is the righteousness that saves, and in salvation God freely extends, to sinful humanity, both justice and holiness—the justice and holiness of our very God. However, this righteousness must be explained, as well as proclaimed, must be seen as well as heard, and must be demonstrated as well as argued. It must be revealed and understood before it can be received. Let’s enlarge upon this truth.
The righteousness of God is embodied in Christ. We receive righteousness by receiving him. The question, however, is how? How is the righteousness of God revealed in Jesus? Christ’s redeeming death was the glorious manifestation of God’s own righteousness.
God revealed His justice through the propitiatory act of the cross by which we are reclaimed from sin and death. Christ’s shed blood, his substitutionary, sacrificial death, deals with human sin, guilt, and condemnation. The cross reveals the justice of God by meeting the demands or requirements of the broken law. And this revelation of righteousness at the cross is fundamental. It is a demonstration of the inherent justice of God. Also, the equally fundamental truth that the life that Jesus lived also reveals God’s righteousness. Christ was obedient not only “unto death” but throughout his life. He revealed the righteousness, the holiness, the very character of God, in his everyday living. His obedience in its totality reveals God’s righteousness and, therefore, is the source of human righteousness. The righteousness of God is both judicial and moral. Justice and holiness are revealed in Jesus, through His life and His death.
Note the kind of faith that enables sinful human beings to receive God’s saving righteousness. A constant faith, from faith to faith, a faith from first to last, through faith from beginning to end. We are learning of a faith that includes much more than intellectual assent. We are learning of a faith that goes beyond knowledge. A faith that is submissive, dependent, trusting. This faith transcends knowledge, evidence, argument, and understanding, but yet it does not dispense with any of these. Do not be deceived…this righteousness does not change the nature…it changes the status. Imputed righteousness gives justification, imparted righteousness initializes sanctification. There is a future element in our experience of righteousness that will set the final seal on God’s people. It is the third angel’s message becoming in reality the message of righteousness by faith.
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