#4 - Righteous

Do you remember the last Who is God? study?  We looked at the holiness of God and saw how the prophet Isaiah trembled in His holy presence. Well, now we are going to return to God’s holy throne room and will remain there for the next three studies.  So, are you ready to go before the King of the universe?!

As we look for the core attributes of God, three words are often listed together when describing Him.  We already studied the first one, holy, and now we’ll look at the second:  God is RIGHTEOUS.

“For the LORD is righteous; he loves righteous deeds; the upright shall behold his face.”
~Psalm 11:7

“But the LORD of hosts is exalted in justice, and the Holy God shows himself holy in righteousness.”
~Isaiah 5:16

These two words, holy and righteous, are used together so often when depicting the God of Israel that it can be easy to mix them up and think they mean the same thing.  But they don’t!  Each are different and describe a unique characteristic of the God we worship.  So the question is what does righteous mean?  The literally meaning of the word righteous is just and lawful.  It basically means right standing in the eyes of the law. But this raises another question, doesn’t it?  And that is, which law are we talking about and who laid down that law?  In order to answer this question, we must go back to some of the previous attributes of God we already discussed.  We learned, in our first study, that God is the perfect Creator of all things and that He made everything in the entire universe with reason and purpose.  And in our last study, we delved into the holiness of God and discovered that He is perfect, unmarked by sin, without error, and full of pure goodness.  So in light of all these things, do you think it beyond God’s power to lay down a perfect and just law?  No!  He is God the Creator, perfect, and holy, and He did decree a perfect Law which is summed up in Leviticus 11:44:

“Consecrate yourselves therefore, and be holy, for I am holy.”

Wow!  Be holy, just as God is holy!  That’s the requirement set before us! Are we able to achieve this level of perfection and spotlessness?  No, of course not!!!  No one can fulfill the “righteous requirement of the law”.  We all fall short of God’s glory and are, therefore, not righteous or right in the eyes of the law.  As Romans 3:10 says:

“None is righteous, no, not one.” 

However, God alone meets His requirement of perfect holiness and, therefore, is altogether righteous.

So we see a contrast between a perfect, holy, righteous God and sinful, corrupt, guilty man.  We cannot keep the royal law set down, and are, therefore, guilty of breaking God’s holy law.  So how can we—blemished, impure sinners—stand before the pure holiness and righteousness of God? The answer is found in the life and ministry of Jesus Christ.

Jesus lived a perfect life, one without sin.  Therefore, He alone is spotless, blameless, and righteous.  And through His work on the cross, He has robed us in His righteousness so that we may stand blameless before the throne of God.  It is Christ’s blood that cleanses us from the filthiness of our sin, and covers us with His purity, so that when God looks on us He no longer sees our failures but rather the righteousness of His Son.

“For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”     ~II Corinthians 5:21

What an amazing gift this is!  We cannot earn it and do not deserve it, and yet without it we are lost.  The magnitude and meaning of Christ’s imputed righteousness is difficult to put into words; however, the stanza of this song eloquently summarizes it and so beautifully conveys its power:

Because the sinless Savior died
My sinful soul is counted free
For God, the Just, is satisfied 
 To look on Him and pardon me
To look on Him to pardon me
(“Before the Throne of God Above”)

Dear brothers and sisters, do you not see and grasp the enormity and power of Christ’s love?!  Man’s first sin was wanting to be like God—an act that eternally separated us from our Creator—and in order to bring restoration and reconciliation, Christ became like us and took our sins upon Himself so that we could once again attain right standing before God.  We would be hopeless without this priceless gift He offers, and so our heartfelt response ought to be:

“Jehovah-Tsidkunu (the Lord our Righteousness), I accept your gift and offer of forgiveness knowing that it cost you everything.  And in putting on your righteous, I acknowledge you as Lord of my life and surrender all I am into your sovereign hands.  Thank you for your sacrifice and unfathomable love poured out for us!”