Affirmation Monday – Romans 5: 8

But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Whose Rules?

Yesterday, Psalm Sunday’s post generated some interesting discussion on what it means to be wicked and righteous. From God’s point of view, we are all unrighteous in a practical sense.

What I mean by that is that a practical righteousness would be sufficient to allow a person into heaven without any help from God. In effect, such a person would be as good as God himself. The Pharisees in Jesus’ time measured their righteousness by their compliance with the laws of Moses. Unbeknownst to them, there was a little flaw in their measurement system. Because they wrote most of the rules, they were a bit blind to how well they fulfilled them.

Imagine that you want to play baseball. You make the rules so that the pitcher can only pitch balls to you that you can hit. Then you demand that the umpire is a member of your team. Better yet, the umpire has to be a relative and a member of your team. When you hit the ball nobody on the other team is allowed to touch it until you have made it safely to home plate. Sound like a fun game? It is if you are on the right team.

God is not impressed with people who make their own rules. Especially when the bar is set so low it doesn’t even cast a shadow. To impress God you have to be perfect. All the time. In every aspect of life. Every thought in your mind and every impulse of your heart must be tied to God’s perfect will. Hmmm…. I guess by that standard the line for righteous people waiting to get into heaven would be pretty short.

So while Jesus gets to use the short line for the Truly Righteous, the rest of us fall short of God’s standard for perfection. How short? Well, if the standard measure for righteousness was the distance from the earth to the moon, Jesus would nail it. The rest of us would be about as righteous as the distance we can jump straight up off of the ground. In my case, that is an embarrassingly short distance!

Since not one single person that has ever lived (aside from Jesus) will ever qualify for heaven on our own merit, God made a way for us to be with Him forever. Jesus had to die a horrible death to make that happen, but that is how much he loves us.

Application: Meditate on God’s righteousness and His love for you. See if you find that experience affirming.

Food for Thought: What is the difference between thinking you are righteous and being righteous?