What does the expression, “the righteousness of God,” mean? It is evidently of the very essence of the gospel; yet the common explanations are to me the most unsatisfactory. The obedience of Christ in his life (blessed and perfect as it was) could not have saved sinners from the wrath of God. Will you, Mr. Editor, kindly give your thoughts upon the subject? “Beta.”
“The righteousness of God” embraces the entire display in God's ways in Christ, one of the least of which, if we are to compare things which are all perfect in their place, was His accomplishment of the law here below. For the law was not intended to express fully and absolutely God's nature and character. It stated, if we may so say, the lowest terms on which man could live before Him. It was the demand of what God could not but require, even from a sinful Israelite, if he pretended to obey God. Whereas, though the Lord Jesus was made under the law, and submitted in His grace to all its claims, He went much farther, even in His living obedience, and infinitely beyond it in His death. For the righteousness of the law threatens no death to the righteous, but necessarily proclaims life for his portion, who magnified and made it honorable. But God's righteousness goes immeasurably deeper as well as higher. It is a justifying righteousness, not a condemning one, as that of the law must be to the sinner who has it not. Hence the Lord Himself established the sanctions of the law in the most solemn way by suffering unto death under its curse: He bore the penalty of the ungodly, of which substitution the Ten words knew nothing, because they are law, and so to die is grace. There was no mitigation, much less annulling of the law's authority. Divine righteousness provided One who could and would settle the whole question for the sinner with God. Nor this only; for God raised Christ from the dead. He was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification. He was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father; His moral being, His purposes, His truth, His love, His relationship, His glory, in short, was at stake in the grave of Christ. But God raised him up, and set Him at His own right hand in heaven, as a part of His divine righteousness; for no seat, no reward inferior to that, could suit the One who had vindicated God in all His majesty, holiness, grace, and truth, who had, so to speak, enabled God to carry out His precious design of justifying the ungodly, Himself just all the while. Thenceforward, to him who has faith, it is no longer a question of the law or of legal righteousness, which rested on the responsibility of man, but Christ having gone down into death in atonement, and thus glorified God to the uttermost, the ground is changed, and it becomes a question of God's righteousness. If man has been proved by the law to have brought forth wrongs, and only wrongs, God must have His rights, the very first of which is raising up Christ from the dead, and giving Him glory. Hence the Holy Spirit is said, in John 16 to convince the world of righteousness; and this, not because Christ fulfilled that which we violated, but because He is gone to the Father, and is seen no more till He return in judgment. It is not righteousness on earth, but its heavenly course and character, in the ascension of Christ, which is here spoken of. So, again, in 2 Cor. 5, it is in Christ glorified in heaven that we are made, or become, divine righteousness. It is plain, then, that the phrase, though no doubt embracing what Christians mean when they speak of Christ's righteousness imputed to us, is a far larger and more glorious thing. It includes not only that which glorified God on earth in living obedience, but the death of the cross, which if it met the deepest need of the sinner, broke the power of Satan in his last stronghold, and laid the immutable foundation for God's grace to reign through righteousness. Thus in Rom. 1:17,17For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith. (Romans 1:17) God's righteousness is said to be revealed in the gospel in contrast with man's righteousness claimed in the law; and being revealed, it is “from faith,” not from law-works: that is, it is a revelation on the principle of faith, not a work to be rendered on the ground of human responsibility. Therefore it is to be “faith.” He that believes gets the blessing. In Rom. 3:21, 22,21But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; 22Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference: (Romans 3:21‑22) it is formally contrasted with anything under the law, though the law and the prophets witnessed respecting it. It is “God's righteousness without law,” by faith of Jesus Christ, and hence “towards all men” in native tendency, but taking effect only “upon all them that believe.” It is here in special connection with redemption, and therefore it is added that God has set forth Christ a propitiation (or mercy-seat) through faith in His blood. See verses 24-26. In Rom. 1, it is shown to be incompatible with seeking to establish one's own righteousness, God's righteousness being complete, and the object of faith in Christ has to be submitted to, or we have no part or lot in it. 2 Cor. 5 rises higher, and shows what the saint is, according to the gospel of the glory of Christ made divine righteousness in Him risen and glorified. Hence in the latter epistle to the Philippians, that ripe sample and development of Christian experience, Paul, transported even to the last with this new and divine righteousness, shows us that, compared with it, he would not have the righteousness of the law if he could For what was of the law had no glory longer in his eyes because of the glory that excelled—that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness of God through faith. (Phil. 3) Far from superseding practical godliness, this righteousness of God in Christ strikes deep roots in the heart, and springs up in a harvest of kindred fruit, which is by Jesus Christ to God's glory and praise. (Phil. 1:1111Being filled with the fruits of righteousness, which are by Jesus Christ, unto the glory and praise of God. (Philippians 1:11))
It is a singular fact that, while God used Rom. 1:1717For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith. (Romans 1:17) to Luther's conversion, and we may say to the Reformation, neither he nor his companions, or their followers, ever apprehended the full truth conveyed by this blessed expression— “righteousness of God.” Hence it is habitually mistranslated in Luther's German Bible, where δικαιοσύνη θεοῦ is rendered “the righteousness which is available before God.” This, evidently, is far short of the truth; for a legal righteousness, if accomplished by man, would have availed before God. But God, in His grace, has accomplished in Christ and given an incomparably higher (i.e., a divine) righteousness; and nothing less than this are we made in Christ. Perhaps the imperfect view entertained by the great German Reformer may account in large measure for the fluctuations in his enjoyment of peace. The same thing applies to most Protestants up to our day, even where they are devoted Christians, and perhaps from a similar cause; for they have advanced little, if at all, beyond the light on this head possessed by Luther. May the children be led to search into the testimony of His Word as to this grave and deeply interesting theme! It is a humiliating circumstance that the professed comments on Scripture are so barren as to it.