Reading the book of Romans has been adventurous. As a fiber loverI likened
the reading of it to the unraveling of a skein of yarn. One who knits or crochets
may understand this. As the skein draws closer to the end of itself it becomes a little
tougher to just pull yarn and it tends to appear to be knotted up. Though it isn't
knotted up at all. Therefore, trying to undo knots that aren't knots actually
produce knots. Am I knot making sense? Haha. All that needs to be done is to
take a very close look at the yarn to determine where it is simply tight loops arounds
other loops. Realizing that analogies only work to a certain point, unraveling Romans
was similar for me. There are no "knots" that that needed to be untangled rather a close
look at the context. Concepts that appear to be contradictory are, in reality, wrapped
tightly around the heart of the gospel. Untangling is unnecessary. Gentle probing and
fingering does the trick. So it is when reading the Word of God. By taking a full year to
mentally finger and probe I gained the opportunity to begin to appreciate the
continuity. I realized that sin, justification, faith, belief, righteousness, and grace,
to name just a few, are all strung along a single strand. So when I, for unknown reasons,
focused in on the concept of righteousness I found that all of the other concepts
tightly related freely fell upon my understanding as well. And so without further
delay I want to share what I am learning about righteousness.
Righteous means the state of being right. Righteousness is the ongoing state of
being right. I was taught in school not to define a word using parts of it so here
is another definition: the condition of having the perfectly suited response, reaction
or attitude toward a subject or circumstance. In the process of dissecting
the concept of righteousness other elements appear. The first is the element of
defining what is right. The claim of being right holds the claim to know what
"right" looks like. When I say that I am right, I make that statement
according to my definition or someone elses. This is called
the standard. I use a ruler to measure my daughters height. I can either use
an inch ruler or metric ruler. In this instance there are two "standards" in which
to measure.
Secondly, righteousness also contains the element of justification.
Justified means to defend through assurance or certainty. If I am "right" then
I am also justified. Justified also means aligning oneself with a standard and
"measuring up to" said standard. It works in reverse as well. For example, if she
is justified or believes that she has the right to behave in a certain way then she
is convinced or justified of her right thinking and action. Therefore, if one claims
to be right then one is also making the claim of being justified,
just or having the right in their dealings.
Now to put this into into practice concerning an understanding of the righteousness
of God and self righteousness. First a look at the righteousness of God. This should be
simple enough. What an under statment.
God is right in all of His dealings and is therefore just in all of His dealings or
put another way...He has the right to behave how He deems fit. He is always right
therefore He is 100% righteous. He needs not make any excuse or explanation for
what He does because He set it up and He adheres to His own standard accordingly.
And since the standard is defined by God everything that is wrapped up in righteous-
ness is also defined i.e. sin, holiness, grace, mercy, redemption (or the gospel),
love, and judgment. This being an incomplete list. Sin is missing the target of
His defined standard. Grace and mercy are then defined and embossed upon by the
definition of sin. Grace and mercy or the lack thereof are the platforms from
which sin is handled. If sin is not defined by God's standard then neither is
grace and mercy. And so it goes for redemption or a proper understanding of the
gospel and judgment; neither of which can be comprehended without God's
predetermined definition of right and wrong. His love? How can anyone begin to
understand the depth of love He has for us without understanding His character
which is wrapped up in His righteousness or Holiness and consequentially His plan
of redemption through grace, mercy and judgment. Without perceiving His love,
we are left guessing about His just action of judgment. And without understanding
His standard displayed through His love His actions could be interpreted as
tyrannical. So how does anyone recognize, comprehend or understand the
righteousness of God? Through the gospel:
Rom 1:16-17
For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation
to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it
the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, "BUT THE
RIGHTEOUS man SHALL LIVE BY FAITH."
NASU
And through extension, His son, Jesus Christ:
Romans 1:1-5
Paul, a bond- servant of Christ Jesus, called as an apostle, set apart for the
gospel of God, which He promised beforehand through His prophets in the holy
Scriptures, concerning His Son, who was born of a descendant of David according to
the flesh, who was declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the
dead, according to the Spirit of holiness, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we
have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all.
the Gentiles for His name’s sake...
Through the Word of God, or the Holy Scriptures we see the details of righteousness
displayed in the WORK of the cross because this work was declared right by God.
And so, the righteousness and or holiness of God perfectly displayed through Christ.
In conclusion, the righteousness of God and everything that is entailed in it lays down
the foundational standard for us to view and for us to measure ourselves against.
Not only this but it works in reverse as well in that all of these things; grace, mercy,
redemption, judgment reveal the righteousness of God.
Want to know more about the righteousness of God, read Romans!
