Settled in Righteousness
Holiness is a fruit that comes forth out of our acceptance of a thing called ‘Grace’. Grace is a root= Holiness is the fruit. Some will say being Holy and then these things are able to happen to you. Wrong. Being Righteous by faith and then Holiness will be your faith.
Think about this for a moment … ‘If you don’t believe in what Jesus Christ our Lord has done, you ain’t going to see him. You need to believe in Him, then the by product will be Faith. You should always walk in uprightness, this is why .. You should live a life of holiness, because without Holiness, no-man will see the Lord through your witness.
AMP - V13 “..Sin was [committed] in the world before the Law [was given], but sin is not charged [against anyone] when there is no law [against it]..”
Q: “So what happened to all the people back then, before the law was given”?
A: Can you only transgress against something to transgress?
ie.. your not speeding when there is a speed limit ..
… But we know that without being told, the faster we go the more dangerous/ wrong it is. We have been taught to know it might not be good, like standing at the cliff face, it’s going to hurt if we jump.
An important thing to note, not all that we did has not been put on your record when we stand as a Christian before the Lamb of God, before we were saved, as it has all been washed clean by the blood of Christ, when we accepted Him into our lives.
Romans 5: 14 “..Nevertheless death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those who had not sinned according to the likeness of the transgression of Adam, who is a type of Him who was to come..”
If a free gift given to you, and you turn around and say ‘you don’t deserve it’ OR ‘Your not supposed to deserve it, is this free gift’? V15 “.. much more the grace of God and the gift by the grace of the one Man, Jesus Christ..” in other words the unmerited favour from God, especially this free gift, you feel you don’t deserve it. But instead God is telling us that “I know you did nothing really to deserve it, but this free gift I give to you nevertheless.
V16 “..one offense resulted in condemnation..” We see clearly how Adams actions brought about Gods condemnation, so we can see how sin was brought into being, and how every man was born in to sin.
Then God said I’m going give you a precious gift, even though I know you don’t deserve it, through my Son Jesus Christ you may never ‘earn’ it, but by my graces you can ‘freely’ receive it. V17 .. “..much more those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness will reign in life through the One, Jesus Christ .” If you receive ‘the gift’, called righteousness, you will reign in your life, by the one Jesus Christ. This wonderful gift from Heaven is Gods graces, as we were saved by Gods grace. Now you can receive the gift, that is called ‘righteousness’ though grace.
Amp V17 “..much more surely will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in [eternal] life through the One, Jesus Christ..”
Only when we grasp ‘Righteousness’ fully, in every area of our lives, like ‘Eat/Sleep/Drink', will we see a difference and so will everyone else. Once you realise how good ‘Righteousness’ can be for you in your life, you’ll want to make sure you have it locked down in every area of how you now live. Then everyone will ask you ‘what your on?’ As they now want some, be aware some will be scoffers, and not believe you. All types of crazy things will happen to those who never ‘relinquish’ Gods free gift for you.
V18-19 ...”Consequently, just as one trespass resulted in condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people. 19 For just as through the disobedience of the one man the many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be made righteous..”
Although we did nothing to be righteous, we were all born into sin by the actions of one couple, Adam & Eve. So to counter what they did in the garden of Eden, Jesus Christ came to correct this. The God of Abraham – Jacob & Moses, His favour will always bless even when you feel have done nothing to warrant such kindness.
Q: “Can I sin away my righteousness?”
A: If you can sin away your righteousness, then it would be a foolish act of your own making.
If someone came along and gave you the ‘Euro-lotto’ jackpot, would you just leave it laying around for someone to find it? As sinning away Gods righteousness would be the same. When you could be living out your righteousness, which is by faith, and enjoying the glory and manifestation of God.
Q: Why do we keep sinning?
A: Because it keeps bringing about ’Human’, not Gods, natural consequences like .. shame – condemnation, bad feelings, all things we are used to. Be honest, who really wants to willingly live this way?
Who wants Shame – Guilt – living under the curse, or would you rather be spending you time being happy and rejoicing over the glory of your relationship God? I know which I choose. That’s not giving you cart-blanch to sinning, but the feeling of wanting to sin will go away eventually. I heard it said that ‘if we were to eat the same amount as we read our Bibles each week, we will be skeletons very quickly and die through malnourishment’.
Slowly but surly sinning will erode away …
..Your confidence in God..
..Your beliefs..&
..Your faith in righteousness.
Once your confidence & faith in God goes away, then your going to find it harder to break away from those chains of bondage a second time around, the devil now has you bound down with. So after breaking away from his grasp the first time, would you leave the back door open leaving cookies on the worktop with a personal invite to come back.
How many times whilst growing up, your (Earthly) father would say ‘don’t be doing that as it will make you unhappy’. But you always seem to know better than him, and so go on to make the mistake anyway. Our (Earthly) father now has to sit around and wait, and be there for you. Well surprise the same thing happens with our Heavenly Father.
Then God will say..
God: You know I love you?
You: Yes Heavenly Father
God: You know I ain't mad at you?
You: Yes Father, now what happens? I am truly sorry I let you down like that,
God: You ain’t let me down
You: Yes, but I want my holiness to be a demonstration of my love to you.
Hebrews 12:14 “..Make every effort to live in peace with everyone and to be holy; without holiness no one will see the Lord..”
2 Corinthians 7:1 “..Therefore, since we have these promises, dear friends, let us purify ourselves from everything that contaminates body and spirit, perfecting holiness out of reverence for God..”
We should want Holiness in our lives so bad, so that our hearts can no longer torment us. We should all want to be Holy and pleasing unto God. Everyday we should want God more & more & more, as much as God wants to love us. We should want to be with Him, not looking for Him do something for us, but just because we want to spend time with Him.
If we keep doing this, then there will come a time, that NO matter the temptation, it will go straight on pass, because you will not be tempted or see the temptation.