Innocent! Through Faith in Jesus Christ
Posted by Sandy in Faith, God's Love, God's ways, Gospel Message, Jesus, Reading through the Bible in a Year, Trusting God, tags: RomansA commonly memorized verse is Romans 3:23
“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”
It’s a great verse, confirming that each of us – every person on this earth – has fallen short of God’s glory – we have all sinned. The word “sin” means “to miss the mark.” We have all missed the mark. We all need someone to make up for that shortfall. That someone is Jesus Christ, as the passage in which the verse is found makes so clear. Let’s look at the whole passage.
20Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by
observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious
of sin.21But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been
made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify.
22This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ
to all who believe. There is no difference, 23for all have sinned and
fall short of the glory of God, 24and are justified freely by his grace
through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 25God
presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood.
Romans 3:20 -25a
The passage I’ve included here begins with verse 20, but you’ll notice that the first word is “therefore.” That means it’s worth looking at the previous verses to understand our jumping off point. Verse 20 follows a discussion about how we have all done wrong. We have all cursed or slandered or hurt others. We have all gone our own way instead of God’s way. “Therefore” – in other words, because of that – no one will be declared righteousness in God’s sight. God’s standards haven’t kept us from wrong-doing; rather, they have made us conscious of how far we have missed the mark.
“But now a righteousness from God…has been made known.” (V21) I love it when God says “but now.” Things used to be like this, but God stepped in and now things are different. Hallelujah! In this context, we were a sinful people and none of us could be considered righteous. But God stepped in and has introduced us to a righteousness that is available despite our sinful nature.
Righteousness means “equity of character or act” and “by implication, innocence or holiness.” (Strong’s Hebrew and Greek Dictionaries) In other words, we can read this verse as “a holiness, or innocence, from God has been made known.” The holiness or innocence is from God, not from ourselves. We fall short of the mark; we are guilty. But He has provided an innocence that He wants to give us.
“This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.” (V22) God has provided an innocence, a holiness for us, and it comes through faith in Jesus Christ and is given to all who believe. It does not come by what we do – the discussion prior to verse 20 makes it clear that we haven’t and can’t do it – we can’t keep God’s holy standards. The truth is that we probably don’t even want to.
Let’s think about that. Most of us would like to believe that we’re good people, and by earthly standards we probably are. But God’s standards are so much higher than ours. (Aren’t you glad about that? I am. I would not want to worship a god who is as morally corrupt as I can be!) Again, think about it:
Have you ever hurt another person intentionally? Have you ever said or done anything to hurt someone? Sure, it might have been because they hurt you, but that’s not really relevant. What is relevant is that out of the darkness of your heart you intentionally inflicted pain.
I have. I’m not proud of it, but I know that there have been times when I’ve said things to try to make me seem superior to others. Maybe it was in sarcasm or in debate, but again, that’s pretty irrelevant. What’s relevant is that the other person was hurt by something I did or said. In doing so, I killed something in that person. And so have you. It’s part of who we are in our fallen nature. We seek to build ourselves up, do what’s best for us and think of ourselves first. In doing so, we often put others down, take actions that hurt or hinder them, and ignore their needs and feelings. My friend, that’s missing the mark. Big time.
So we all need this righteousness which comes from God. And in His goodness, He provided it. He has made available to us an innocence – a holiness, a righteousness – to replace our sinfulness. That righteousness comes from God through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.
The words “faith” and “believe” are related in the Greek. They mean a “continued reliance upon.” They don’t mean “intellectual agreement with.” My husband can intellectually agree with the doctors that he should take certain medicines to regulate his heart, but he is not demonstrating faith until he is actually taking the medication – he’s not relying upon the medication by knowing that they will help him; he relies upon them when he makes them a part of his everyday life. The same is true with faith. Placing our faith in Christ means relying upon Him for our righteousness before God and making Him a part of our everyday life.
This point is so important that Paul repeats himself in verses 23 through the first half of 25:
“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. God presented Him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in His blood.”
This passage uses many words that are foreign to our western mind. Words like justified, redemption, sacrifice and atonement don’t bring up the same images as they did for Paul’s audience. But if you’ve been following along with the Resting at the River’s Edge readings, perhaps you’re seeing a shadow in the words that gives them more meaning. The word “justified” is from the same root word as “righteousness,” but it carries with it the act of bestowing that righteousness – that innocence – upon someone else. Being justified means that God has put His righteousness upon us. It is by His grace, looking upon us with favor that he freely chooses to do this.
That righteousness that God bestows upon us comes “through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” The word redemption isn’t used often in today’s language. Sometimes you’ll see the word “redeem” on the bottom of a grocery store coupon. “You may redeem this coupon for…” In other words, you can exchange this coupon for whatever it’s “value” is. Jesus Christ is the “coupon” and God’s righteousness is the value the coupon carries. We don’t cut the coupon out of the newspaper or magazine, we receive it through faith – by relying upon what Christ did for us to close the gap between God’s righteousness and our sinfulness.
You see, “God presented Him (Jesus) as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in His blood.” (V. 25) In the Old Testament, the Israelites sacrificed a bull, goat, lamb or some other animal as an atonement for their sins. Atonement literally means “to cover” or “covering.” To cover their sins, they sacrificed the animal and poured the blood on the altar. God is now saying, that Jesus was sacrificed as a covering for our sins. We receive or accept that sacrifice when we trust in it to make up the difference between God’s standards and our sinfulness.
What a wonderful God! Choosing so great a sacrifice to cover our sins – yours and mine. And having done so, He then makes a phenomenal exchange – our sinfulness for His innocence – He actually bestows upon us His righteousness. And it all happens when we simply decide to rely on Him – to believe that He has done it for us.
20Therefore no one will be declared righteous in his sight by
observing the law; rather, through the law we become conscious
of sin.21But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been
made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify.
22This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ
to all who believe. There is no difference, 23for all have sinned and
fall short of the glory of God, 24and are justified freely by his grace
through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 25God
presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood.
Romans 3:20 -25a
If you haven’t ever decided to rely on Jesus – to believe His blood serves as the covering, atonement, for your sins, you can do so today. Please take a minute to e-mail me at Sandy@ApprehendingGrace.com. I’d love to correspond with you to help you understand what it means to put your faith in Christ and to help get you started off on the right foot.
Entries (RSS)