Here is the revelation that is shaping my life today – when you use the wrong tool for the job you make a mess. The law is not a tool to be used to be made right.
Romans 3:20 NIV
[20] Therefore no one will be declared righteous in God’s sight by the works of the law; rather, through the law we become conscious of our sin.
Observation
Any form of obedience makes no difference. The law has no power to make me right with God, because obedience and goodness means nothing in the “right with Him” stakes. A mirror does not make me loose weight, it makes me conscious of my need to loose weight. It cannot in anyway contribute to my weight loss, other than to motivate me to engage. In the same way the law does in no way make me right with God. It makes me conscious of my sin, stuff in my life that is not enabling me to live in the fullness of self and God. But it in no way makes me right. It exposes, it brings an awareness, that I am seriously stuffed if my goodness is what brings me into rightness, but the law has no power unto righteousness for obedience and goodness has no measure in the conversation.
We have given ourselves all the credit, robbing God of His goodness and glory for too long. When we make law and obedience the power of rightness, then the only one who deserves glory is the one who obeys. It is so ugly when we claim our goodness as a means of our rightness. But being right with God has nothing, completely and utterly nothing, to do with our performance of obedience to the law. So get off the pedestal, you get no praise for good works. Rightness with God is entirely and fully the work of God who declares you right with Him based on your acceptance of His goodness, forgiveness, mercy and grace. It is faith in Him and nothing you bring that makes you right. The best the law can do is expose that you have no chance of ever making you right. It shows me how much I need God to save me from myself. It exposes to me just how broken and weak I am in making myself right. Don’t obey the law in an effort to get into Gods good books, allow the law to expose you will never be good enough for good book status, and receive His way into His good books. I mean after all we have all already made His good books, He is simply waiting for us to burn the law books and live in His grace book. He has set in motion the “I’m right with God party,” He is just waiting for you to accept the invitation and take your place.
Application
Party! Use the law as an exposure of your need for grace, not as a tool for self rightness. I will always live in the deepest of gratitude and thanks that the law shows me I can’t make it, and points me into the beauty of God’s gracious acceptance and forgiveness of me. I will live in this beautiful gospel.
Response
Thank you for your mercy and grace. Thank you for the law that shows me my deep need. Thank you that you love me into rightness and don’t judge me unto condemnation. I could never fulfil the law in any meaningful way, thank you that you don’t demand that which I can’t do of me. I love living forgiven forever, I love living loved without cause, I love living in the fullness of your grace, these draw me into your presence and motivate and enable me to live in your ways. Thank you, I am a blessed man.
Meditation
Meditate – through the law we become conscious of our sin.
Consider:
Am I trying to be good for God?
Am I living in free of performance for rightness?
JOURNEY DEEPER
