THE ROBE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

Time with Jesus - Tuesday, 04 June 2013

Hi all,

Do you know of anyone who has looked at a new-born baby and seen a full-grown person, complete with the cap and gown of a University Doctorate? Can I do it? No. Can you do it? No. Can God do it? Absolutely yes! 

Perhaps the best Biblical example of this can be seen in Ezekiel 16. God “found” Israel as a new-born baby, covered with blood, kicking and squalling. Not a pretty picture. But God knew what she would become, in and through Jesus Christ. Perhaps we can’t see it. He could and did!

Rahab
Convert from Jericho

Rahab's CV

In a way that’s Biblical Theology. We come to Him covered with all the filth of the world and in the blood of our first birth into this world. It’s not a pretty sight; nothing attractive about us and nothing to draw us to Him or Him to us.

 But through all that disgusting mess, He saw us washed, cleansed and glorified wearing the robe of Righteousness of His Son Jesus. How is this possible? That question has haunted Theologians for the past 2000 years. We don’t know. We don’t need to know how He does it. All we need know is that He does!

Three words are used to describe the various stages of the progress from first meeting with the Saviour, to where we are with Him in glory. The words are, “Justified”, “Sanctified” and “Glorified”. To help us get a feel for this I’ve compiled a list of the definitions of the words taken from Webster’s Dictionary.

Justified	To pardon and clear from guilt; to absolve or acquit from guilt and merited punishment, and to be accepted as righteous on account of the merits of the Saviour, or by the application of Christ's atonement to the offender. To accept as just and treat with favour. James 2.
Sanctified	To be made holy. In an evangelical sense, the act of God's grace by which the affections of men are purified or alienated from sin and the world, and exalted to a supreme love to God. 2 Thess. 2  1 Pet 1
Glorified	God is glorified, when His excellency, above all things, is with due admiration, acknowledged. To be made glorious; to exalt to glory or celestial happiness. “Whom he justified, he also glorified”. Rom 8.

JESUS GLORIFIED

Paul mentions this in Ephesians 2. He wrote, ⁴ But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, ⁵ made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions--it is  grace you have been saved. ⁶ And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, ⁷ in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. Eph 2:4-7 TNIV

Made Holy

From this we conclude, we are already seated with Him in Heavenly places in Christ Jesus. I may not be able to see it, but He does! In other words, we are not going to be with Him, if we are Christians, we are already there! In the meantime we are going through this process so that we can catch up with reality through the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus.

Shalom,

Jim & Phyllida Strickland

Incredible Riches in Christ Jesus

Matt 10:8 Freely you received, Freely give		Time with Jesus – Tuesday, 04 June 2013			Matt 10:8 Freely you received, Freely give
©	These devotionals are the intellectual property of Jim Strickland and copyright protected. You are welcome to copy and distribute them to anyone provided it is for non-commercial Christian purposes					©
	INTRODUCTION		DAILY LIGHT EVENING SCRIPTURES	THE ROBE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS
There are several words used in Theology that were written by theologians for theologians for theological discussion. Mere mortals look at such words as though scalded by boiling water. Three of these words are Justification, Sanctification and Glorification. Why these words are still used, boggles the mind. My suspicion is that in those days, when ordinary men were not given access to the Bible; only the clergy were permitted to read it! Laymen could never understand it anyway! Frankly, I dislike “gob-stoppers” like these. I think they are a carry-over from those evil days. So for my own and other people’s benefit, I’d like to attempt to put what these words mean into plain English. Justification means to be made righteous and thus in right standing with God. An easy way to put it is to look at the word “justify” and its three syllables. - Just; if and I (y) This is not exactly correct, but it’s adequate for our purpose. I’m not looking for a definition which is accurate to twenty decimal places. There is an expression which was popular among the coal miners of the North East of England. When they were asked about a measurement, they would give an answer and say, Aye, that’s nigh enough for pit-work. Translated, it means that the dimension was sufficiently accurate for their purposes. You don’t measure a barn door with a micrometre. All that’s needed is a measuring tape. Look again at the syllables and say; “Just as if I”. So when God looks at me, He sees me “just as if I’d never sinned”! How does that happen? In a way we will never understand. Jesus suffered and died upon that cross in your place and mine. Then we traded places. He took all my sinfulness and gave me all His righteousness. He did so, by covering me with a robe of righteousness. It doesn’t sound “fair” does it? But God never was and never will be “fair”; it was His idea. Now we all know that salvation is a process. It’s not something that happened on a particular date and continues indefinitely. In other words we are all in the process of being “saved”, We have to “overcome”, to “persevere” until the end. It’s a paradox. When we commit our lives to Jesus, we receive His salvation and His righteousness. The only way we can lose it is by deliberate and unrepentant sin. But it can be lost. So from the date of our initial salvation, (justification) it is necessary for us to walk day by day in the power of His Holy Spirit. This too is a process. It’s the process of being sanctified (made holy) by God. Now here’s a paradox. For those who persevere to the end, it will be true to say that they were saved on the day they made that first commitment and were justified. For those who don’t, it will be the same as if they had never started. From the date of being justified until the end of life, we will be going through the sanctification process and becoming more and more like Jesus; growing in grace and the knowledge of God. Glorification will take place when we receive our resurrection bodies. At that point we will be like Him in all His glory. Exactly where God, in His wisdom, wanted us to be, when He began with creation. Now here’s the best part. All this will have been achieved, not by our own ability, but by His love and grace. If we have done anything, it will be nothing more than following the instructions of His Holy Spirit. Thus every bit of the process from justification to glorification will be His doing. I like this enormously. My presence there will be the consequence of all that He has done and none of mine. Jim & Phyllida Strickland			12 The night is far gone; the day is at hand. So then let us cast off the works of darkness and put on the armour of light. 13 Let us walk properly as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and sensuality, not in quarrelling and jealousy. 14 But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires. Romans 13:12-14 ESV 8 Yes, everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For His sake I have discarded everything else, counting it all as garbage, so that I could gain Christ 9 and become one with Him. I no longer count on my own righteousness through obeying the law; rather, I become righteous through faith in Christ. For God's way of making us right with Himself depends on faith. Philippians 3:8-9 NLT 22 Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference: Romans 3:22 KJV 10 I am overwhelmed with joy in the LORD my God! For He has dressed me with the clothing of salvation and draped me in a robe of righteousness. I am like a bridegroom in his wedding suit or a bride with her jewels. Isaiah 61:10 NLT 16 I will come with the mighty deeds of the Lord GOD; I will make mention of Your righteousness, Yours alone. Psalms 71:16 NASB 8 For once you were full of darkness, but now you have light from the Lord. So live as people of light! Ephesians 5:8 NLT 11 Take no part in the worthless deeds of evil and darkness; instead, expose them. Ephesians 5:11 NLT 13 But their evil intentions will be exposed when the light shines on them, 14 for the light makes everything visible. This is why it is said, "Awake, O sleeper, rise up from the dead, and Christ will give you light." 15 So be careful how you live. Don't live like fools, but like those who are wise. Ephesians 5:13-15 NLT	When first I came to Jesus, just after I was “saved”, I started to be bothered about how I behaved. Being “saved” was wonderful. I tried to get things right. I didn’t know how difficult that I would find the fight. “Just give your life to Jesus. He will take care of you. That’s all that is required and all you need to do.” It sounded very simple. I thought it was a breeze. I thought I could be Christian and live a life of ease! It only took a few short weeks for me to realise, That it was far from easy in anybody’s eyes. I don’t know what persuaded me to keep on keeping on. But I had burned my bridges; the former things were gone. There must be a solution. Who else has found this out? My faith began to falter and I began to doubt. That’s when I met a person who’d walked the Christian road. A man whom I could share with to ease this heavy load. And then he told me something I couldn’t understand. He said that I was “righteous” the way the Lord had planned. I thought that he was crazy. He wasn’t meaning me. The thought of being righteous. How could that ever be? He said that being righteous was included in the deal. That’s how the Father saw me, regardless how I feel. I thought that he was joking. I thought it wasn’t true. I felt about as righteous as a monkey in the zoo! He then said that salvation was only just the start. And all of Jesus’ righteousness to me He would impart! I didn’t understand it. He’d saved me from my sin. But what about the ugliness I found deep down within? If He had made me righteous, how come it didn’t show? He said I wear it as a robe into which I must grow. The righteousness He’d given me was draped around my frame. He said that I was wearing it in Christ my Saviour’s Name. The Living God could look at me and see what I’d become. The picture of perfection acquired from Christ His Son. Since He sees the beginning and also sees the end. If He saw me as Righteous, on that I could depend. I don’t know how He does it. I have to theorise And try and have a look at me through God the Father’s eyes. I found I was forgiven for He had paid the price. That He had been the offering, the perfect sacrifice. And we had traded places so when God looked at me, The righteousness of Jesus Christ was all that He could see. I know it sounds incredible and too good to be true. But that is how He looks at me and how He looks at you For when you are a Christian you want that robe to be, The robe of Christ the Saviour and the robe of you and me! Jim Strickland Written 4th June 2012