10 False Ideas That Keep The Believer From Understanding Their Righteousness in Christ - Part 1
Many Christians do not know how good God has been through The Gospel. He has made us righteous. The scripture is very clear that you cannot be righteous through works or deeds. It is only by faith in Christ that one can be right with God. Let’s look at some ideas that have kept so many believers from understanding their righteousness in Christ.
The idea that, “God only sees me as righteous, but I am not actually righteous.” 2 Corinthians 5:21 “For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.”
Many believers understand that Christs’ righteousness was applied to their heavenly account, but something else also occurred at salvation. You were reborn with the Spiritual DNA of God. God imparted his nature to you, and then indwells you with the Holy Spirit. Jesus’ death and resurrection gave you the ability to be made the righteousness of God through your belief in Him. He does not have an unrealistic view of you, his view is very realistic. You are not just seen as righteous, it has not just been applied to your account. You have been remade as a righteous new creature from the inside out.
The heart of the believer is wicked. There is an Old Testament scripture that declares the heart of man to be desperately wicked (Jeremiah 17:9-10). Certainly this is true. The heart of the unbeliever is dead in trespasses and sins. They are spiritually dead. However, God re-created you at the core of your being at salvation (which is not an ongoing process), and he does not create wickedness. At salvation the believer receives a new heart with God’s desires written on the inside (Hebrews 10:16). Jesus lives in you and he does not live in wicked places. Your heart and your new spirit which were given to you at salvation are new and are righteous. This is literal and actually happened, giving you new desires. The Holy Spirit does not join Himself to sin. 1 Corinthians 6:17.
The believer’s circumstances are too complicated and therefore they cannot express righteousness. John 16:33 “These things I have spoken unto you, that in me ye might have peace. In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world.” Your righteousness does not come from uncomplicated or clean circumstances, it comes from Christ being right there in the middle of your circumstances and helping you through them. Jesus came to earth and lived a human life to show that his humanity worked with our humanity. Jesus wants to work through us in the midst of our circumstances. Jesus faced anxiety, stress and difficult circumstances, and he proved to us that he can do the same through us, and that he is here with us.
The idea that other believers are righteous, but I am not. Jesus works for you, and for everyone else that accepts him. He is not a respecter of persons. He can do for you what he has done for anyone else that has believed in him, and that is to make you righteous before God. While others may reflect that better in their behavior, this does not make their identity any different than what yours is in Christ. The size of our sins also do not determine our righteousness. God‘s grace is what makes you righteous it is through faith in Jesus Christ and the grace that He gives that declares a person righteous. Quit focusing on the size of your sins and start looking at the size of God‘s grace!
I can’t possibly be righteous because I don’t feel righteous. Righteousness is not an emotion that we feel. It is a spiritual fact because Jesus made it that way. (See the blog post on Facts Over Feelings.) https://www.thegospelperspective.com/post/facts-or-feelings