It took me quite a while to realize it wasn’t works that led to righteousness, but righteousness that led to works. My heart’s desire was to be righteous, so I spent most of my time trying to do something to become something. By doing all the right things (reading, studying, praying), I was attempting to regulate my behavior, thinking it would come in line as a result of these efforts. Nevertheless, I had the cart before the horse. Little did I know that there was absolutely nothing I could do that would make me righteous. There were no rules to obey or laws to observe that would result in righteousness. Paul said it like this:
…if a law had been given which was able to impart life, then righteousness would indeed have been based on law. Galatians 3:21
What exactly is a law? A law, by definition, is a system of rules that regulate actions. That was precisely what I had been trying to do….regulate my actions by obeying a system of rules.
What system of rules was I trying to obey? Was it the rules recorded in the Old Testament, known as ‘the Law’? Although in the church today much has been made about our not being ‘under Law’, since most of us are Gentiles, not Jews, then as Gentiles…we were never under the Law! The Law wasn’t given to Gentiles, it was given to Jews. God never held us to that standard or commanded us to obey that ‘system of rules’. This was the reason for the debate, spoken of in Acts 15, between Paul and the elders of the church who wanted to put the new Gentile believers under the Law. We should realize that as Gentiles we were never under the Law. All those New Testament scriptures that speak of being free from the Law were not written to us. They were written to the Jews in order to redirect their thinking from the system of righteousness they had been under for thousands of years. As Gentiles, we would have to first put ourselves under the Law to then be out from under it. But what do we Gentiles do? We put ourselves under a new system of rules. What rules make up this ‘law’? Read, pray, and be sure to obey; be kind, renew your mind, walk in love with mankind; don’t forget tithing, giving, and always forgiving. We might not think of these things as ‘law’, but we are trying to obey this new system of ‘rules’ in order to regulate our actions.
Our focus has to change though….from what we must do to what He has done. He has done the work to make us righteous. We haven’t just been made righteous, we have been made the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus. (II Corinthians 5:21) You can’t improve on the righteousness of God! You can’t get more righteous no matter what rule keeping, law abiding, good works you do.
So don’t put yourself under any system of rules, any law, old or new. Why? Because you’re already righteous, and know this:
… that law is not made for a righteous person… I Timothy 1:9
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