It’s interesting the dictionary’s definition of righteousness is simply to be morally upright. What usually comes to mind is the standard of following the Ten Commandments, or as Jesus put it, do unto others as you would have them do unto you, referring to the golden rule. Our sense of justice is based on the law and is often correlated to the degree that it’s fulfilled. The Apostle Paul in Galatians three reminds us the Abrahamic covenant is not part and parcel to when the Lord gave His people the Commandments through Moses. Because Christ had not yet come, and the Old Testament’s parallels prophesying about Him seemed abstract without the luxury of having 20/20 hindsight, Paul in verse 16 makes the important point that God’s promise made to Abraham in Gen 22:18 does not say “your seeds” but reads “In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed, because you have obeyed My voice.”
The seed wasn’t referring to the generations to come but to Christ who would come through the generations. You may have a tendency to remember that Abraham was called the friend of God because he was obedient, somehow inadvertently relating this to obeying God’s law. But actually Abraham’s obedience had to do with his willingness to sacrifice his only son Isaac at God’s command. Paul continues to stress our inheritance into the Kingdom of God is a result of God’s righteousness and the sacrifice of a pure and spotless lamb who is Jesus, who is the true definition of righteousness, as opposed to simply following the law.
Christ’s righteousness in you manifests holiness producing the ability to follow the Ten Commandants. But the law cannot save. Only the ability to perfectly follow it produces righteousness. Revelation five reminds us there’s only One who’s worthy to be called the Savior of the world and He is Jesus Christ, the very lamb of God. I encourage you to not stress living so much by the letter of law for its own sake, but by the Spirit of the law where love and forgiveness resides in the character of Christ in you.
Read more articles by Ken Hammer or search for articles on the same topic or others.
