THE RIGHTEOUSNESS OF GOD
David A Smith
Romans 3: 21-25 (to “in his blood”)
I seek help to convey a simple impression as to the righteousness of God. The scripture in Isaiah 32 has come before me this week. It speaks of the working of righteousness and the effect of righteousness. I was thinking a little of all that we have had in the past week or so as to the increase in our knowledge of God, the peace of God and the God of peace. It led my thoughts to that scripture in Isaiah which, speaking of certain persons, says, “the way of peace they know not”, Isa 59: 8. There are many like that today, who do not know the way of peace. That things are wrong in the world is manifest. I have no doubt many people would not hesitate to give you a long list of things that they think are wrong, because there is no righteousness of God in the world. Many may even acknowledge that they are wrong themselves, but “the way of peace they know not”. It is a very blessed thing that that way is revealed to us in God’s glad tidings, the way of peace and, above all, peace with God in relation to the welfare of your eternal soul; that is a wonderful thing to speak about. In the glad tidings we can speak about persons having peace with God; and that we all too might have peace in our souls. The way God has secured that for us and manifested it to us in the glad tidings is the way of righteousness. That has been established and God has established it Himself. It is a divine righteousness. No doubt many would desire to walk uprightly, especially as conscious of sins, seeking to do what is right as far as they feel able, but that is only trying to establish a self-righteousness.
I read this scripture in Romans 1, because Paul speaks of not being ashamed of God’s glad tidings - he speaks of it as “God’s power to salvation”. What a wonderful thing that is to lay hold of as we come to the preaching, as guilty sinners and helpless to help ourselves, that we can say about God’s glad tidings that it is power. God’s arm is not shortened that He cannot save. There is power in God’s glad tidings; it says, “God’s power to salvation”. How Paul had proved that. If there is one instance of “God’s power to salvation”, you could see it in Paul himself . Think of all that man after the flesh is, in his willfulness and his obdurateness and his path of self-will, lost and mired in sin. In God’s glad tidings there is power to bring in salvation. It is “to every one that believes, both to Jew first and to Greek: for righteousness of God is revealed therein, on the principle of faith”. What is the link between the power in God’s word and the guilty sinner, my friend? It is repentance and faith. That is the link between the sinner and what God proposes in the glad tidings.
God is righteous. He is righteous in all that He has done, He is righteous Himself, everything He does is right. God proposes that men, women and children should avail themselves of the righteousness that is of God through the precious work of our Lord Jesus Christ. That is a wonderful thing for a sinner to apprehend. It involves our salvation, that we should be saved, saved from our sins and all that attaches to us as sinners. How we as sinners are cast upon God for mercy! We have no claim. We have no claim to mercy - it would be presumptuous even to think it, such sinners as we are. “God commends his love to us, in that, we being still sinners, Christ has died for us”, Rom 5: 8. What a precious thing that is to lay hold of by faith.
What does it mean to receive it by faith? It means that works have no place at all. There is nothing you or I can do that would ever justify us in the sight of a holy God. As guilty sinners, what could we bring? We are wholly cast upon God and His mercy. God in His grace has come in, in the Person of His beloved Son, and has accomplished the mighty work of salvation on the cross. The scripture speaks here of wrath being revealed from heaven and that affected me as I read it. Where was it revealed? Was it on the guilty sinner? It was his due as guilty before God; but that judgment, my friend, fell upon Jesus. It fell on His head, that awful “wrath of God from heaven”, all that was due to sinful man. The wrath of God is a very solemn thing to think of, and yet it did not fall on men, it did not fall on the Romans, it did not fall upon Pilate or even the Jews, guilty as they were. Nor will it ever fall on the soul who puts their faith in Christ and in His precious atoning work. The penalty that was due to the guilty sinner fell upon the head of Jesus. He bore it in those three hours of darkness, when the judgment of a holy God against sin, fell upon the head of the Saviour.
I wonder if everyone here has their faith and trust in Him. The way of salvation is through faith – “repentance towards God, and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ”, Acts 20: 21. The work has been accomplished and has been finished to God’s full satisfaction so that what can be proclaimed now is the righteousness that is of God, “towards all, and upon all those who believe”. What a wonderful thing, that, as the scripture says, “God commends his love to us, in that, we being still sinners, Christ has died for us”. It affects the heart as well as the conscience that He should take that place for me and bear my sins in His body on the tree. Based on the virtue of that precious shed blood, the sinner is accounted righteous before a holy God - a righteousness which is of God. Nothing of me: it is all in Him. He has secured it all in His suffering, in His shed blood and His rising again.
In chapter 5, it says, “Therefore having been justified on the principle of faith”. God is a just God. You can be absolutely certain of that. He is “a just God and a Saviour.” Isa 45: 21. It is an absolute rock in the soul of a believer, knowing that God is perfectly righteous, and is perfectly righteous through the work of Christ in justifying the sinner. He is perfectly right in doing that. The judgment that was due has been borne by another, so that I might be justified in the sight of God. He justifies “him that is of the faith of Jesus”. How simple the gospel is, but how glorious: “justified on the principle of faith, we have peace”. That is the effect of it. The “work of righteousness shall be peace; and the effect of righteousness quietness and assurance for ever”. On the basis of all that God has done in the precious work of our Lord Jesus Christ we can have peace with God. No qualms, no doubts, no questions, no fears, all gone - we can have peace with God. The conscience alerts us to our sinfulness. It is an uncomfortable thing living with a guilty conscience, but God proclaims His glad tidings to us that through repentance and faith in Christ we might have peace with God. We have a holy God on one hand and a guilty sinner on the other. However could there be reconciliation? Job asked as to that: “how can man be just with God?”, Job 9: 2. It meant that God Himself in the Person of His only beloved Son should come into this world and Himself willingly take up the cause of lost guilty sinners such as ourselves: there is one Mediator of God and men, “the man Christ Jesus”, 1 Tim 2: 5. He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree so that we might have peace with God. The question is, does everybody have it? God is offering it today in the gospel. The work has been completed; everything has been done.
The scripture goes on to say that “we have peace towards God through our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom we have also access by faith”. “But now without law righteousness of God is manifested, borne witness to by the law and the prophets; righteousness of God by faith of Jesus Christ towards all, and upon all those who believe”. That brings stability to my soul, when I put my faith in Him. God has raised Him and glorified Him and set Him at His right hand, fully attesting His satisfaction with the work that He has done and I have faith in that Man, that blessed Man. I see Him there in all His perfection, raised at God’s right hand in glory. I have faith in that blessed One: have you? Do you think there is a flaw in Jesus? Do you think there is any possible shadow or fault in Him? He has borne our sins in His body on the tree and removed them forever, and God has raised Him from among the dead and set Him at His right hand and glorified Him; and the call in the preaching is that you should put your faith in that blessed One. God has glorified the blessed Man who bore our sins and has set Him at His right hand. I see Him there in all His glory and all His perfection, all His moral beauty, all His attractiveness; and my faith and righteousness is in Him. I trust that is so for everybody here.
I read in our earlier scripture as to “wrath of God”. For the believer, we know that Jesus has borne it. For the unbeliever, it is a most solemn thing to reject such glad tidings, to reject the righteousness that God is offering in the gospel, that anyone should ever say, ‘It is not for me’. What a solemn position such a person is in! The wrath of God awaits impenitent persons who refuse the offer of divine grace. It is not God’s mind that any should perish, but “that all men should be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth”, 1 Tim 2: 4. Romans 3: 22, 23 reads: “for there is no difference; for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God”. We all have to confess that we have come short of the glory of God. Our faith is to be in One who has not come short, who fully glorified God in His pathway here and in the work that He has done, a blessed Saviour in whom we can put our faith and be at peace in our souls.
Then it reads, “justified freely by his grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; whom God has set forth a mercy-seat”. Christ has been set forth a mercy-seat. You will remember that in the tabernacle system it was made all of gold which speaks of His glory, the glory of Christ. On the mercy seat was the blood and “we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of offences, according to the riches of his grace.” Eph 1: 7. We proclaim Him as a precious Saviour for those who will put their faith and trust in Him. I would like to give a greater impression of the personal worth of Jesus and all that He has accomplished in a divine righteousness that is now available to guilty sinners.
I just want to touch again on chapter 5. It says, “Therefore having been justified on the principle of faith, we have peace towards God through our Lord Jesus Christ”. God has set Him forth as a mercy seat through faith in His blood and on that principle, on the principle of faith - that is looking alone to God - “we have peace towards God through our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom we have also access by faith into this favour in which we stand”. What is that favour? The believer in Jesus stands before God as a justified person, justified by faith in Christ. He can come into the very presence of God Himself in perfect restfulness and in the whole area of divine favour that is shed upon him. What a blessed place that is. I think we have some experience of it (especially as we assemble at the Lord’s supper), of the divine favour by which we can come into the presence of God and “we boast in hope of the glory of God”. That is, some appreciation at the present time, of His glory. God has set before us a blessed hope that is centred in our Lord Jesus Christ, the blessed realm of His glory opened up to us now in the power of the Holy Spirit. We are not justified for this world. He is not here anymore. He has been raised and glorified, the Centre of another world. We are justified as in Christ for another world. I believe that all enters into the hope of glory. That world where Christ is the Centre, where God’s glory shines and where He is going to have those who He has redeemed with Him eternally. We shall know in blessed fulness then what the work of righteousness has secured for God and the effect of it will be a universe of glory and a universe of praise into which we shall enter eternally.
These are blessed truths, and they are open to all. God would not have anybody left out. We would pray as this gospel concludes that all may fully put their faith in that blessed One who has secured a divine righteousness and peace for us.
May it be so, for His Name’s sake.
Sidcup
27th April 2025