I was recently thinking about justification and the miracle that it is. I couldn’t help but thank God that it was a work of grace alone. When I continued to think about myself, I wrote down the following simple verse about my condition apart from Jesus Christ:
Unwanting of righteousness,
Undeserving of righteousness,
Unable to earn righteousness,
Unable to maintain righteousness;
Doomed apart from Christ!
Unwanting of righteousness. . .
My case, and indeed that of all humanity is that left to our own devices, we do not care for God and his standards. Sin has so utterly blinded us that we have completely turned from God, rejecting even the obvious signs that he has given us as to his existence, work and worthiness of worship (Romans 1:18-21). What results is unrighteousness that deserves God’s right judgement. But even this, we do not care about! We are deceived by the world and have even deceived ourselves into thinking that we are our own gods, needing to answer to no one but ourselves. We are unconcerned about what we really need – in fact, we reject it, so that we cannot escape the anger and judgement of God. We are doomed!
Undeserving of righteousness. . .
But even if we were to want righteousness, it would quickly become apparent to us just how undeserving we are of it. We are those who willfully rebel against God. Ours is a deliberate turning away from God, that deserves God’s right judgement. Also, the sin that has blinded us is not something outside of us but something living inside us, drawing us away from what God wants. It is not something we fight by nature, but that which we turn to so that we do what we want rather than what God wants. It defiles us so that we cannot accommodate any righteousness within us.. In this way we are unqualified for and undeserving of grace.
Unable to earn righteousness. . .
But even if we wanted righteousness, we could never earn it. This is the effect of sin over our weak flesh, that we cannot meet the standard that God demands. Even if we were to want to do it, we would find that we were unable to do it because our flesh is ruled by the sinful nature (Romans 7:14-24). “All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.” (Romans 3:12; Psalm 14:3). The testimony of the Psalmist and of Paul is that all are under sin (Rom. 3:9) and this is seen in the fact that humanity is incapable of doing good, as determined by God. Before God’s eyes, our every action is tainted by sin, even when we attempt to do what He has said. We need another power to cleanse us and enable us to do anything worth pleasing the Lord.
Unable to maintain righteousness. . .
Finally, even if somehow we were able to be counted right before God, it couldn’t last. We are those who always tend towards sin, by nature. By ourselves we are like pigs – no matter how often you clean us, we will return to the mud and filth! We need something outside of us to work so powerfully to guarantee our righteous status. Otherwise, we are stuck in our condition, destined to continue turning from God at every moment in thought, word and deed.
This is why justification is such a glorious miracle! We who didn’t care about what God demands, undeserving, sinners, incapable of any good, can be made right before God. What is impossible with man is made possible by God. He works powerfully to save His enemies and make us what we cannot be by ourselves!
How does he do this? By taking on the likeness of sinful humanity, “For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.” (Romans 8:3-4). Jesus becomes like us, in order that he might fight for us. He takes on our humanity so that he can do what we could not – He lives a sinless life, as the Perfect man! He then dies as an offering for sin, the spotless Lamb of God killed, so that God’s justice at sin is served. He dies for us, so that through Him, through faith in Him, we are made right in God’s sight. He also gives us His Spirit. It is the Spirit who applies to us the work of Christ, connecting us with God. The Spirit also empowers us to live for God, making it possible for us to do what God demands, so that we can please God.
Therefore, we are changed! We are turned from our rebellion to turn back to God. We are given graciously what we could never deserve. Jesus works out that which we could never earn ourselves. And finally, Jesus secures what we can never maintain in ourselves. He changes our status so that even while we live in this flesh, we can be seen before God as those holy and blameless. What a glorious miracle! In response to my depressing verse at the beginning, in Christ we get a new glorious verse:
Served by the Perfect Man,
Made right by His Substitution,
Called holy by His Atonement,
Empowered by His Spirit,
What a gift of Grace,
In Christ.
“For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Cor. 5:21). Hallelujah! Why not join me in responding in praise to God through the CityAlight song, Yet Not I But Through Christ in Me through the link below.
