Jesus, Our Righteousness (2)

 

“I will not speak much more with you, for the ruler of the world is coming, and he has nothing in me.” John 14:30.

 

We concluded our previous reflection by asking, “Why is the righteousness of Jesus Christ critical to us?” The answer, simply put, is that our entire existence is dependent upon the character of God and the efficacy of the sacrifice and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The efficacy of the sacrifice of Jesus and His resurrection rests upon His sinlessness, His righteousness. The character of God, the essence of God, speaks to us of perfect righteousness, holiness, love, justice, and so much more. God is God and we are not and we are more dependent upon God than a newborn baby is upon his or her mother – whether we will acknowledge it or not.

 

Jesus expressed the essence of our existence when He said, “Without Me you can do nothing” (John 15:5b).

 

Paul expressed another element of the essence of our existence when, parading a litany of Old Testament texts, he drives home the point that we “are all under sin” and that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (see Romans 3:9 – 31).

 

We are all born sinners, yet because of Jesus Christ we need not live as sinners, we need not live in guilt and condemnation – for when we confess our sins and repent of them and believe and trust in Jesus Christ, placing our lives in His hands and acknowledging Him as our Lord and Savior, He will forgive our sins and give us eternal life – which is the very life of God – we will pass from death to life. (See Ephesians 2:1 – 10; Mark 8:34 – 38; John 3:1 – 16; 2 Cor. 5:14 – 21; Romans 5:1 – 11).

 

But now let’s return to what Jesus says in John 14:30, “…for the ruler of the world is coming, and he has nothing in Me..." What does this have to do with us?

 

The first element, as we saw in our previous reflection and as we touched upon above, is that Jesus Christ was (and of course is) perfectly holy and sinless – He is the pure and spotless Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. This means that His sacrifice for us, for you and for me, is prefect and complete – when we trust in Jesus Christ and enter into His life, and His life enters into us – our sins are completely and totally and perfectly forgiven, and we are justified before God.

 

The world justification in the Bible means that when God looks at us He not only sees us, in Christ, as having never sinned, but He also sees us as having always been holy, as having always kept His holy Law and commandments – God sees us perfect and complete in Jesus Christ.

 

When we begin to see this and live in its reality we come to experience freedom in Jesus Christ; freedom from fear, freedom from the fear of death, freedom to live, to love, to give to others, to stop thinking about ourselves all the time, freedom to rejoice in things that really matter, in things that will exist beyond the grace.

 

And may I gently say, that all of the above elements are essential elements of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, that the Gospel of Jesus is not only about what we are saved from (sin and death), it is also about why we are saved and what we are saved to – and that is to become and live as the sons and daughters of the living God, living without condemnation and sin consciousness in our Lord Jesus Christ, and enjoying life in the Spirit of God every moment of every day as we are transformed into the image of the Firstborn Son and, as His People, display His likeness to the world and the universe.

 

Biblical salvation is holistic, it is comprehensive, it is about so much more than our sins being forgiven – and it is a tragedy that many of us (most of us?) never move beyond that idea – we are called to live as the saints of God, not as sinners…when will we ever “get” this? This is like playing baseball with only first base, first base is all we are ever allowed to reach, every Sunday we focus on first base…never realizing that there is second base and third base and that we can actually learn to round the bases and get to home plate – but it is a new home plate, not the home plate that we left, but the Home Plate that God our Father has prepared for us for this life and beyond. This Home Plate is living in the fulness of Jesus Christ.

 

As Saint Athanasius said of the Incarnation, “He became as we were, so that we might become as He is.”

 

Well, I find that I have not yet arrived at where I want to go with John 14:30, so we’ll pick this up again in our next reflection…the Lord willing.