The Righteousness of God

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


21 τὸν μὴ γνόντα ἁμαρτίαν ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν ἁμαρτίαν ἐποίησεν, ἵνα ἡμεῖς γενώμεθα δικαιοσύνη θεοῦ ἐν αὐτῷ.

This is one of those verses that just about everyone has heard at some point. It makes for a great song too. But what does it mean? Paul uses the aorist subjunctive γενώμεθα for this. The subjunctive can be thought of as the mood of possibility. In other words, what Paul is saying is that Christ's death made it possible for us to become the righteousness of God.

Why is this necessary? We are sinners and God is holy. Because He is perfectly holy He cannot stand sin. Sin has no place in His presence; therefore, there must be righteousness instead. The witness of Exodus and Leviticus is that there must be blood as a payment for sin because God's justice must be satisfied. The problem is that even unblemished lambs do not permanently remove the stain of sin.

There had to be a perfect sacrifice for sin that worked once for all time. The most wooden translation of this verse is that "The one who did not know sin on behalf of us was made sin." Obviously the ESV is a lot prettier. The point is that Christ actually became sin for us on the cross.

Let that sink in a bit. There has only ever been one man who lived without sin and that one man had to take on the sin of the world. Imagine if you were to find out that some large debt you have was canceled. If you're a homeowner your mortgage is a great example. Then imagine that you find out that some close friend had actually sold all of his possessions so that he could pay off your debt. That would be unbelievable, right? It would be a gift so incredible that most of us would have a hard time accepting it. Imagine the gratitude we would feel toward that person afterwards.

That only begins to scratch the surface of what Christ endured on the cross. He suffered unbelievable physical and spiritual anguish. If you are in Christ, take a little time to consider this today. I know that I have been blessed by this.

The Folly of the Cross

1 Corinthians 1:18 For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.

18 Ὁ λόγος γὰρ ὁ τοῦ σταυροῦ τοῖς μὲν ἀπολλυμένοις μωρία ἐστίν, τοῖς δὲ σῳζομένοις ἡμῖν δύναμις θεοῦ ἐστιν.

At the risk of committing an exegetical fallacy, I want to point something out in this verse. The word  μωρία is translated as "folly" here. It could also be translated "foolishness." This word seems to be related to the word μωρός, which is where we get our word "moron" from. I normally chafe at this kind of a word association game, but I think it applies here for illustration purposes.


The point is that the cross seems foolish or even moronic to those who don't believe the Gospel. But for those of us who are being saved it is everything. It is the power of God.


This helps to explain the problems we have with evangelism and witnessing. As we talk to people about the cross we get a lot of funny looks and arguments. They don't understand how this works. What does a man dying on a cross have to do with my standing before God? If we believe the gospel we understand that it has everything to do with that. If not, then it is ridiculous. It takes God to open the spiritual eyes so that it makes sense.


This does not remove our obligation for evangelism, but it does provide comfort when a clear presentation of the gospel falls on deaf ears. The cross was folly to me before I was saved and it is folly to anyone else that cannot see with spiritual eyes. Remember that as you evangelize. You are evangelizing, right?

No Accusation

John 18:30 They answered him, "If this man were not doing evil, we would not have delivered him over to you."

30 ἀπεκρίθησαν καὶ εἶπαν αὐτῷ· εἰ μὴ ἦν οὗτος κακὸν ποιῶν, οὐκ ἄν σοι παρεδώκαμεν αὐτόν.

Pilate had just asked the crowd for their accusation against Jesus and this is what they came up with.  If you want to be a bit more wooden and literal you could translate εἰ μὴ as "except" or even "unless."  Either way, you get the idea.  They didn't have a true charge against Jesus, but they wanted Him to die.

On the other hand, God the Father does have a true charge against God the Son.  On the cross He took on the sins of mankind.  Therefore, there was a just reason to kill Him.  The problem is that He did not have any sin on His own, so it was only through God's (the whole Trinity) mercy that He went to the cross.

Sinner, do you marvel at this?  Do you realize that there would be no accusation for Jesus' death but for your sin?  I hope you do.  I know that it is something I need to dwell on more and more.  I take this for granted far too often.

The Law

Matthew 17:24-27
(24) When they came to Capernaum, the collectors of the two-drachma tax went up to Peter and said, "Does your teacher not pay the tax?"
(25) He said, "Yes." And when he came into the house, Jesus spoke to him first, saying, "What do you think, Simon? From whom do kings of the earth take toll or tax? From their sons or from others?"
(26) And when he said, "From others," Jesus said to him, "Then the sons are free.
(27) However, not to give offense to them, go to the sea and cast a hook and take the first fish that comes up, and when you open its mouth you will find a shekel. Take that and give it to them for me and for yourself."

Until today, I tended to see this passage as speaking to the miraculous power of Christ over nature. He did not have the ready means to pay the tax, so He sent Peter off to employ a miracle to get the money. This passage certainly does speak to that.

However, I got a new perspective from the ESV Study Bible today. In the past I tended to read right past verses 25 and 26. What Jesus is saying is that as sons of God He and His followers are free from the demands of the Law. This does not refer to the civil law, but rather to the Law as given by Moses.

This seems to dovetail with some of other Jesus' statements like that in the Sermon on the Mount about how He came to fulfill the Law. What I take this to mean is that we are no longer obligated to jump through all the hoops provided by God to come to Him. The blood for atonement was shed on the cross. Let's rejoice in that and enjoy the fellowship with God that follows!

God Is...

Nahum 2:3

(3) The shield of his mighty men is red; his soldiers are clothed in scarlet. The chariots come with flashing metal on the day he musters them; the cypress spears are brandished.

The Church of Oprah and other vague spiritualities like to emphasize the fact that God is love. It is true that God is loving. As I've written before, we have a hard time imagining just what His hesed is all about. We can get parts of it, but we can't really comprehend it.

This passage tells us that there is a side of God that you don't want to be on. One theory about the color of these shields is that they are red from getting bloody in battle. In other words, they remain red because the blood of God's enemies is regularly splashed on them. I'm not sure how that fits into Oprah's image of her god.

The book of Nahum is a prophecy against Nineveh. While the city did repent in the days of Jonah they turned back to their evil ways and God used Nahum to proclaim a judgment against them. God always takes wickedness seriously.

This is why it is so important to come to the cross and live. Apart from the saving work of Christ we are as doomed as Nineveh was. I'd rather be behind the warriors with the bloody shields than in front of them, wouldn't you?

Having it Both Ways

Ezekiel 18:25-29
(25) "Yet you say, 'The way of the Lord is not just.' Hear now, O house of Israel: Is my way not just? Is it not your ways that are not just?
(26) When a righteous person turns away from his righteousness and does injustice, he shall die for it; for the injustice that he has done he shall die.
(27) Again, when a wicked person turns away from the wickedness he has committed and does what is just and right, he shall save his life.
(28) Because he considered and turned away from all the transgressions that he had committed, he shall surely live; he shall not die.
(29) Yet the house of Israel says, 'The way of the Lord is not just.' O house of Israel, are my ways not just? Is it not your ways that are not just?

This is part of a bigger passage that deals with the need for repentance. The repeated phrases in verses 25 and 29 bracket this section nicely. God is saying that the wicked have second chances if they repent, but the righteous can blow it if he turns to wickedness.

This is a passage that must be handled delicately on this side of the New Covenant. I do not think it means that any sin will thrust the believer back into his old state. However, I do think that it tells us something very important about the human condition. The assumption that the people made was that they were basically good and that they should get a lot of credit for their previous righteousness. This passage turns that upside-down.

I think on this side of the cross we realize that man is not good. Our righteous deeds are as menstrual cloth. Paul described his great devotion to being a Jew as being manure. This is some pretty vivid imagery. Basically, there is nothing we can do to merit salvation. No one is good enough.

Except for one person. Jesus was good enough and His righteousness stands in our place.

My hope is built on nothing less,
Than Jesus' blood and righteousness.

Overcoming Great Sin

Ezekiel 16:62-63
(62) I will establish my covenant with you, and you shall know that I am the LORD,
(63) that you may remember and be confounded, and never open your mouth again because of your shame, when I atone for you for all that you have done, declares the Lord GOD."

Ezekiel 16 is pretty graphic. He compares Jerusalem to a beautiful girl who is even worse than a prostitute. Jerusalem went after other lovers, but instead of receiving payment for her services like prostitutes she actually gave gifts to her lovers. The overall message is that Jerusalem broke her side of the covenant. But then the chapter finishes with this passage.

What is this covenant? I have a hard time seeing it as any of the covenants made up to this because the tense is future, though in Hebrew you have to be careful about being too dogmatic about that. Still, the rest of the sentence indicates that this is something that will happen in the future. So what does this mean?

It seems to me that this points us forward to Christ, which would fulfill the covenant made to David and to Abraham with a new one. The Lord promises to make a new covenant that will atone for all that they have done, which is plenty. They deserved to be cut off forever.

I don't know about you, but that reminds me of me. I deserved death for my sin. I went hard after my sin. I was at least as bad as Jerusalem with my idolatry. Yet God made a way for atonement for my sins. It's at the cross.

Won't you look to the cross today? There is forgiveness there. The blood of Christ washes away the guilt and shame of sin. Ezekiel 16 describes how Jerusalem was unclean in her blood, but in the New Testament we have:

1 John 1:9
(9) If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Oh, how precious is the flow
That makes me white as snow!
No other fount I know,
Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Situational Repentance

Jeremiah 34:15-16
(15) You recently repented and did what was right in my eyes by proclaiming liberty, each to his neighbor, and you made a covenant before me in the house that is called by my name,
(16) but then you turned around and profaned my name when each of you took back his male and female slaves, whom you had set free according to their desire, and you brought them into subjection to be your slaves.

Jerusalem was under siege, so Jeremiah commanded the people to release all their Hebrew slaves from their commitment. Keep in mind that the Hebrew slaves were more like indentured servants. They sold themselves into service to pay for something. At the seventh year they had to be freed, per the Law.

The people obeyed at first. After all, they needed help in defending the city. But when the Babylonians stopped their siege the people changed their minds. They took the Hebrews back into slavery.

This reminds me of my promises "never to drink again" when I was hung over. How many of us have made foxhole prayers that we were sincere about at the time only to repent of our repentance later? I certainly did a lot of that when I was struggling with habitual sexual sin.

God doesn't want our wishy-washy prayers. He wants our hearts. He demands our hearts.

2 Corinthians 7:9-11
(9) As it is, I rejoice, not because you were grieved, but because you were grieved into repenting. For you felt a godly grief, so that you suffered no loss through us.
(10) For godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death.
(11) For see what earnestness this godly grief has produced in you, but also what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what fear, what longing, what zeal, what punishment! At every point you have proved yourselves innocent in the matter.

It all starts at the cross. Consider what your sin did to Christ. Consider how sin grieves our holy God. How can we give Him any less than our whole hearts?

Redeemed

Galatians 3:13-14
(13) Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us--for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree"--
(14) so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.

A few verses earlier we learn that everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the Law is under a curse. Think about that. By default we were under a curse from God. It's one thing to have someone get mad at us and curse us. But I don't want to be under a curse from God.

Yet Christ solved that problem. He hung on the cross to redeem us from that curse. There are so many images used to picture redemption. The bottom line is that because of His sacrifice we are no longer under a curse. He bore the penalty for our sins.

Do you believe that? Are you finding joy in that? Does this fill you with hope for dealing with today? I sure hope so. If not, consider what this means in your relationship with God. Are you under a curse or have you been set free?

An Antidote to Temptation

Isaiah 52:14-15
(14) As many were astonished at you-- his appearance was so marred, beyond human semblance, and his form beyond that of the children of mankind--
(15) so shall he sprinkle many nations; kings shall shut their mouths because of him; for that which has not been told them they see, and that which they have not heard they understand.

Do you follow Christ? If so, think about this verse. Many of us have seen "The Passion of the Christ," and we likely winced a little bit when Jesus was beaten. Think about what you saw and compare it to this passage. I think Gibson went kind of light on the beating.

I met with someone yesterday who is in the early stages of trying to put his life back together after a longtime enslavement to pornography. We talked about what I did when I was pursuing freedom. I mentioned how I would think on Christ's passion when I was tempted to sin. I would remember what He did on the cross for my sins. That reminder would adjust my thinking back to devotion for the one who was so devoted for me.

What are you thinking about? How much time are you spending on vain trivialities? Of course, there is a place for recreation, but there is also a time for serious reflection on what happened at Calvary. Are you going to the cross when tempted?

A Recurring Theme

As I've been blogging through Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel I keep noticing a few things:

1. God is in charge
2. He takes His rules very seriously
3. All three men were commanded to preach faithfully no matter what the response

It's easy to sometimes look at the Old Testament as, well, old. We think that it doesn't have any bearing on our lives today. I agree that it is often an abuse of the text when the Old Testament is used to give us a lot of direct applications, though there are times for that. But what can we get from the stories of these men?

The obvious one that I keep harping on is the call to preach faithfully. They had poor soil to scatter seed in, but they still had to keep scattering the seed. They understood their role and God's role and were faithful to their callings.

The first two are really compelling to me lately. I hate the idea of "Old Testament God" vs. "New Testament God." We know that God doesn't change. Yet we see a lot more wrath in these books than we see in 26 of the New Testament books. What changed?

I would maintain that the cross changed everything. God's wrath on Judah was so severe that people were cooking their children to get through the famine. That is the same wrath that was propitiated at the cross. God hasn't changed, but we now have the cross so that we do not have to suffer from His wrath because of our sin.

It's easy to look down our noses at those idolatrous fools, isn't it? We are no different in our hearts. Yet we have an all-sufficient Savior who took the punishment for us. I hope that gives you some joy.

Christ in the Scriptures

John 5:39-40
(39) You search the Scriptures because you think that in them you have eternal life; and it is they that bear witness about me,
(40) yet you refuse to come to me that you may have life.

I was reading Jeremiah 47-49 and wondered if there was anything in there to write about. That passage contains the curses pronounced against various nations and cities. I figured that at the least I could write about God's justice. It may not always come at the time we think it should, but it will come eventually.

Then when I flipped over to John for my reading in the Gospels I came across these verses. Jesus makes the point that the Scriptures point to Him. This got me wondering how that passage in Jeremiah bears witness about Him.

What occurs to me is that the passage in Jeremiah speaks to our need for the cross. We don't really believe this in our hearts, but we deserve the same punishments that were pronounced against Moab, Edom, etc. Yet God's wrath was satisfied at the cross. What a wonderful gift He gave us at the cross!

The Final Sacrifice

Hebrews 10:4-10
(4) For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.
(5) Consequently, when Christ came into the world, he said, "Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired, but a body have you prepared for me;
(6) in burnt offerings and sin offerings you have taken no pleasure.
(7) Then I said, 'Behold, I have come to do your will, O God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book.'"
(8) When he said above, "You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings" (these are offered according to the law),
(9) then he added, "Behold, I have come to do your will." He abolishes the first in order to establish the second.
(10) And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

Christ came to do His Father's will. As we observe Good Friday today I think it is especially important to contemplate the cross. We should contemplate the cross every day, but on Good Friday it is particularly poignant.

Our sin separates us from God. This was true from the first sin of our father Adam. God then made the first sacrifice for sin when he killed animals to clothe Adam and Eve. Ever since then God has demanded blood in exchange for sin. Through Moses He created a system of sacrifices that the people had to observe. Jews today still observe Yom Kippur, or the Day of Atonement.

But if we are in Christ we no longer have to go through the sacrificial system. Christ died to atone for our sins. He died as a once and for all sacrifice for sin.

Think about that today. Really chew on it. You might consider fasting from food so as to get a deeper sense of your dependence on God for life. Think about the complete faithfulness of Christ in His death on the cross. This has incredible implications for what we believe and how we live.

Hebrews

I just finished reading Hebrews as part of my Bible reading plan. One thing that keeps leaping out at me is how we now have access to God as a result of Christ's sacrifice. If you ever think that there is no value in reading Leviticus, I would say that it definitely makes Hebrews come alive. Contrast what had to happen for atonement in Leviticus to the New Testament description of what our relationship is like with Christ. It really is a night and day difference.

This really intensifies the value of Christ's sacrifice on the cross. Keep dwelling on the cross!

Climbing Hills

I have a couple of fairly hilly routes near my house. There is one that I run fairly regularly (1-2 times/week) that is 3.44 miles and it usually takes me about 28:30 to run it. I'm not sure why, but yesterday was a serious struggle. It may be because I have put on a couple of pounds through careless eating. It may also be because it is now warmer in the mornings.

At any rate, a lot of thoughts go through my head as I fight to climb the hills. I try to make it an act of worship and think about some inspiring praise & worship songs as I climb. But, to be honest, sometimes I think of Rocky training montages. What red-blooded American man isn't inspired to see Rocky doing all kinds of feats of strength as he prepares for the big match?

When I think of running and hills, I tend to think of this:



In particular, the part where he has the log on his shoulders and he is going through two feet of snow. That's how I feel sometimes.

What really struck me yesterday was how much this reminds me of Christ. I think of Him carrying the beam on His back as He climbed Calvary. He couldn't make it because of the beating that He suffered, so someone was called in to help.

John 19:16-17 ESV
(16) So he delivered him over to them to be crucified. So they took Jesus,
(17) and he went out, bearing his own cross, to the place called the place of a skull, which in Aramaic is called Golgotha.

Matthew 27:32 ESV
(32) As they went out, they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name. They compelled this man to carry his cross.

This is a little different than Rocky, isn't it? Rocky always guts it out and succeeds in his training. However, there are usually some stumbles along the way too, right?

One thing is certainly the same. Both are victors at the end. Maybe it's stretching things a bit to call Rocky a messianic figure, but there are certainly parallels.

Anyhow, thinking of Christ climbing that hill for my sake certainly helped me to suck it up and make it up the little hill I had to climb. Thinking about this makes me want to go back to California and take another crack at the fire trails. At the very least, I'm going to get a chance to tackle the beach next week.

Continuing the Journey

I attended Journey to Jerusalem for the third straight week today. Today's text was very simple:

Psa 22:1 KJV
(1) My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? [why art thou so] far from helping me, [and from] the words of my roaring?

I know that I have read this too casually too many times. It is impossible for us to comprehend the perfect fellowship that Jesus had with the Father. Yet on the cross God turned His face from God so that we might have life. He was actually able to forsake His Son so that we could have life in Him. He did this with my sin in mind. If you are in Christ He did this with your sin in mind too.

Think about that for a while. If God the Father had wanted to He could have sent a legion of angels to rescue Jesus, but He didn't do that. Then in the end He had to turn His face from Jesus because He could not bear to look at my sin that was upon Him.

If that doesn't give you a clear picture of Christ's love I don't know what will.