06-09-13 THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF FAITH

Phil. 3:8 More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish in order that I may gain Christ,

Phil. 3:9 and may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith...

We started something last week

that we didn’t have a chance to finish.

But what we did look at

will provide us with excellent preparation

for what Paul says next in Philippians 3.

And just to help get our minds back into what’s happening here

I’ll give us just a little review of where we’ve been.

We are studying the third chapter

of Paul’s letter to the Philippians.

And we are looking at a passage in which

Paul is telling us

that he has taken everything he could ever have

or ever achieve through his own skills,

and determination,

and talents,

and natural abilities,

and he considers them rubbish

when compared with the value

of “gaining Christ Jesus”.

And then,

in order to help us better understand

what “gaining Christ” actually means

Paul takes that concept

and breaks it down into 7 smaller parts.

Last week we looked at the first of those seven,

where Paul tells us that he is now “IN CHRIST”.

We talked about how God has created

this remarkable relationship

between us and our Lord

a relationship in which our God is not just WITH us,

but that we are IN HIM.

When we receive Christ

we do not just receive FROM Him,

we receive HIM -

we become immersed in Him,

united with Him,

identified with Him

in such a way that from then on

whatever Christ has

we have,

whatever Christ is

we are,

wherever Christ is,

we are too.

We spent much of our morning talking about that truth

and talking about how,

because we are in Him

His victory over sin

becomes our victory over sin.

Now, all of that is true,

but it also runs the very real danger

of becoming just meaningless theoretical doctrine

when it collides with the real-life battles we face each day.

I mean, is Paul actually suggesting

that practical, daily, righteous living

is accessible to every believer?

And if so how in the world does that happen?

Well, it may encourage you to know

that Paul anticipated that very question

and we’ll see that this is exactly where he goes next in his comments.

Listen to the very next piece he offers

in his 7 piece description

of what we gain when we gain Christ.

The next thing Paul talks about

is RIGHTEOUSNESS...doing what is truly right... a righteousness

that can only enter our lives

as a result of our union with Christ.

Now, in order for this to make sense to us

I want to walk us through it

in logical, progressive steps.

If you want a mental outline

of where we’re going to go

let me offer it to you in 5 steps.

#1. I want us to see the importance Paul places on this area.

#2. I want us to see

the two-fold aspects of this righteousness Paul is talking about.

#3. I want us to see the difference

between the righteousness that comes through the law

and the righteousness that comes through faith in Christ.

#4. I want us to see why it was necessary

for God to break the performance base

in our relationship with Him

before practical righteousness

could become a growing reality

in our lives.

#5. I want us to look at the practical tools our Lord uses

to enable the peaceful fruit of righteousness to become

a growing reality in our lives.

We are not going to make it through all of that today,

but we’ll get a good start on it

and probably finish it up next week.

#1. OK, first let me just offer a few words

on the kind of importance

Paul obviously places

on this one element of gaining Christ.

You remember that Paul takes this concept of “gaining Christ”

and breaks it down into 7 distinct aspects.

Those 7 aspects are presented for us

in Philippians 3:9, 10, and 11.

Those 3 verses contain of total of 70 words

in the New American Standard translation of this passage.

OK, now, Paul is covering 7 concepts

in 70 words - logically we would expect him to spend about 10 words on each concept.

But of those 70 words 30 - nearly half of them are used to communicate

this one concept: the righteousness that comes into our lives through our faith in Christ...

Phil. 3:9 ... not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith,...

I’m guessing, now, but I think Paul does that

for the same reason we do - because it touches him so deeply.

You see, this is where Paul lives every day of his life

just like you and me,

and when he sees the practical changes

Christ has made

and is making in him

he can’t help but want to say,

“LOOK! Everybody LOOK at what my God has been able to do in me!”

That’s some of what we were talking about last week -

is God just talking to us about

FORGIVENESS in Christ,

or is He also talking to us

about real, practical changes in our lives?

Do you know how we can tell

when we have finally begun to grasp

the concept of GRACE?

We have finally begun to understand grace

when we understand that grace

makes practical righteousness accessible to us

for the first time in our life.

Until then we may have understood FORGIVENESS,

but we have not understood GRACE.

On Paul’s first missionary journey,

recorded for us in the 13^th chapter of Acts,

Paul delivered a sermon in a synagogue

talking about the work of Christ.

In that sermon, in Acts 13:38-39

he makes this statement:

Acts 13:38 “Therefore let it be known to you, brethren, that through Him forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you, and through Him everyone who believes is freed from all things, from which you could not be freed through the Law of Moses.”

When he described the work of Christ

for those who were listening

he began by telling them

about the forgiveness of sins

that comes to us through Christ.

But he didn’t stop there.

He then went on to say

that not only does Christ remove the PENALTY of our sin,

but he also breaks its POWER.

For the first time in human history

Christ offers us the ability

to be delivered from all those things

that the law could never deliver us from.

Which brings us to the second thing

I want us to see in Paul’s comments

about the righteousness that comes through Christ.

#2. The righteousness Paul is talking about here is a two-fold righteousness.

It is both a positional and a practical righteousness.

Certainly it is a positional righteousness,

in which our faith in Christ’s death

as payment for our sins

cleanses us from all sin,

removing it forever from our ledger,

and transferring it to the account of Christ.

That’s what Paul is talking about in II Cor. 5:21

when he says,

He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

But it is more than that.

It is more than God removing the BARRIER of our sin,

it is also His removing the POWER of sin in our lives.

Rom. 6:14 For sin shall not be master over you, for you are not under law, but under grace.

We’ll come back to that statement latter,

especially to that second half

where Paul says the power of sin is broken in our lives

because we are not under law but under grace.

But for right now it’s that first phrase

I want us to see.

Rom. 6:14 For sin shall not be master over you, ...

It is impossible to read the New Testament

without seeing the repeated calls

God offers the Christian

to righteous living.

Rom. 6:13 and do not go on presenting the members of your body to sin as instruments of unrighteousness; but present yourselves to God as those alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness to God.

Col. 3:5 Therefore consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry.

1 Pet. 2:16 Act as free men, and do not use your freedom as a covering for evil, but use it as bondslaves of God.

...and on and on.

Those calls to righteous living are given

only to Christians,

and they are given to every Christian

because through Christ

righteousness is now accessible to us.

So, my second point - when Paul talks about, “...not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith,...

is that he is talking about a two-fold righteousness -

both the righteousness that comes from having our debt of sin paid in full,

and the growing righteousness

of practical changed behavior.

And PLEASE NOTE it is essential

that you not let your mind run ahead of me here.

I am not saying that God has forgiven our sins

and we should now respond to that forgiveness

by trying to behave better

and be better people.

So far we have not begun to talk

either about HOW or WHY righteousness should become a part of our lives.

All we’ve said is that through Christ

for the first time in our lives it is an option.

The power of sin can be broken.

#3. OK, now the last thing we’ll do this morning

is point #3 in our 5 point outline.

I want us to see the difference between

the righteousness that comes through the law,

and the righteousness that comes through faith in Christ.

And this, of course, is the heart

of what Paul is saying to us in this verse.

This is what he’s waving flags and banners about -

Phil. 3:9 ... not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith...

Clearly he is making a distinction

between two radically different approaches to righteousness -

one that we pursue through the law,

and one the we pursue through faith in Christ.

I really do not want this to get complicated,

but the distinction Paul is making here

is crucial if we are ever to discover

the kind of freedom

not just from the PENALTY of sin

but from the POWER of sin in our lives.

Now, Paul says that he does not have

(and implies that he could never achieve)

the kind of righteousness that comes through the law.

So what is that?

What’s he talking about?

Well, simply stated,

he’s talking about the kind of righteousness that comes from learning the rules

and trying to keep them.

The “law” Paul is talking about

is, of course, the revealed moral law of God.

Think of the 10 commandments

if that helps to clarify it.

It is God saying to us, His creation,

THOU SHALT NOT!!

It is an external list of moral rules

given to us by God

that we attempt to keep

so that we can avoid negative consequences

and reap positive ones.

And Paul tells us that is NOT what he gained when he gained Christ.

His union with Christ

did not simply “empower” him to keep the law.

It was not simply a process by which

God clarified exactly where the lines were

and then supercharged His people with

greater determination

and will power

so that they could then stay within the limits He had established.

Rather, Paul is telling us

that the righteousness Christ brings into our lives

is “that which is through faith in Christ”,

and then, just to make sure we heard correctly

what he had just said,

he repeats in once again, “the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith.”

OK, so what in the world does that mean?

Now, we’re not going to have time to develop this until next week,

but let me go ahead and sketch out the principle,

and then we’ll pick it up right here next Sunday.

When Paul talks about the righteousness

that enters our life through faith in Christ,

he means quite literally exactly what he says.

He is talking about

practical, street-level changes in our lives

that take place at certain points because we are choosing to trust our Jesus -

not just trust what He SAYS,

but trust HIM.

It might be easiest for us to relate to what Paul is saying here

if we recall the way this thing played out

between Jesus and His disciples

in the gospel accounts.

If you trace the account of Jesus and His relationships with His disciples

as it develops in the Gospels

what we see there is not complicated.

We see Jesus building and developing

a growing personal friendship

with each of His disciples.

He talked with them,

ate with them,

lived with them,

loved them in a way that built a tremendous friendship between Himself and each of them.

Then, on the basis of that friendship

He began to make changes in their lives.

Eventually He asked all of them

to make drastic changes in their careers.

He reshaped their thinking,

the way they invested their time,

the way they related to the society around them,

the way they related to one another,

and on and on.

But the underlying motivation for every change they made

was the friendship He had built with them.

Let me give it to you in a single sentence,

and then we’ll stop and develop it more next week.

Christ did not give them an external standard and ask them to obey,

He gave them a relationship with Himself and asked them to trust Him

and follow His leadership.

They did what they did

not because His teaching clarified the issues,

but because His love gave them a reason.

And of course I can’t make a statement like that

and just stop

because the statement itself

raises the most central, most critical question

that every person who enters this world must face -

does my God really love me,

and if so, how can I discover that love?

Obviously, if He has designed it so that His love for me

and my response to that love

is the reason, the motivation for all the changes that take place in my life,

I need to know that love.

And right here, folks, I will admit that I am over my head

because I have no system,

no formula I can give you

that will automatically open you up the reality of God’s love for you.

But I do have a little guidance I can give.

I think of just two major barriers in our lives

that blind us to reality of God’s love for us.

The first one is the absolute assumption we bring to all relationships

that there is an inseparable link between love and performance.

Every human relationship we have ever had

from the day we’re born

has this imbedded in it at the core.

We just know that we are liked, approved, accepted, loved

on the basis of our performance.

If we clean our room

and obey mommy and daddy

and bring home A’s and B’s

then there’s peace between us and them.

But if we don’t clean our room

and bring home C’s or D’s or F’s

darkness and tension fills the home.

Do good and we’re loved,

do bad and we’re tolerated at best.

And why should it be any difference between us and God?

And so, when we come to Him,

the one who knows EVERYTHING,

how can we ever hope to truly be loved by HIM?

And this right here

is the point at which God’s love for us

is unlike any human relationship we will ever know

because with God there is no link between love and performance.

He never loves us BECAUSE...He just loves us.

But it goes way beyond that

because not only is there no link between love and performance,

but He actually takes all of the bad performance, all of our crud,

and then offers to forever remove it from our account,

transferring it onto His own,

and then paying our debt for our sin in full with His own death

SO THAT it can never ever again separate us from Him.

I’ll say it as simply as I can -

whatever it is that you think your God holds against you,

take it ... all of it

and bring it to Him.

If you do, you’ll find His hands wide open to receive it,

and to remove it from you forever,

so that He can then wrap His almighty arms around you and tell you the truth,

“My child, I have loved you with an everlasting love,

always have,

always will,

and nothing will ever again separate Me from you or you from Me.”

And then, finally, let me just mention

the second barrier that I so often blinds us to His love.

And that is what I’ll call “the issue” in our life.

With each of us “the issue” is different,

but its affect on us is always the same.

It is that dominant lie in our life,

that place at which we find ourselves saying to ourselves,

“If I trust Him here

if I listen to what He says and follow His lead here,

there is simply no way my needs can ever be met.”

It could be the we approach money,

or power,

or control issues in our life,

or the way we handle sex in our relationships,

or our attitude toward the authorities He’s placed over us,

or any one of a number of other issues in our life.

But with all of us

there’s one at the top,

the one where we just know

there is no way His way will work.

And for right now I’ll just say that

whatever that is in your life

I will tell you with certainty

that it is the greatest doorway you will ever have

into the deepest discovery of His love you will ever know.

It is at that point in your life

where He calls you to choose to trust Him,

and if you do...as you do

you will find Him with you, in you, for you

and the time will come when you will look back

and wonder how you could ever have doubted His love.

We’ll pick it up here next week.