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RIGHTEOUSNESS IS LIFE

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Apr 18, 1906

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 32, No. 16

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RIGHTEOUSNESS IS LIFE.

By S.

SINCE the day that sin entered this world man has been in need of a Saviour. From that day to this, loyalty and disloyalty, obedience and disobedience, happiness and sorrow, tranquillity and turmoil, peace and war, self-denial and self-service, good and evil, life and death, have striven for mastery in the soul of man.
It is against the purpose of God that the sins of this present life and the miseries they bring should have permanent habitation in His realm. So all the purposes of God are aimed toward their eradication.
On the other hand, it is the unchanging purpose of God that obedience and righteousness should be perpetual in His universe; and so every agency of the Infinite is now employed to establish righteousness and perpetuate it in the lives of His loyal children.
The bewildered soul cries out: “Where is life? I will give all I have to attain unto it.” The Word of God answered the cry long ago. “In the way of righteousness is life; and in the pathway thereof there is no death.” Prov. 12: 28. In the very nature of the case it must be so; for our God, who is Himself righteousness, can not permit that death, the enemy of His creation, should triumph over one of His vital attributes.
The man who seeks to shape his character in harmony with God’s will; whose motto is, What God desires I will seek to do; who looks to Jesus Christ for that righteousness which Christ Himself has promised him—that man has placed himself in the very channel of life. God will not permit death to triumph over such a soul. He may die; but death can not hold him. It has lost its power; it has been deprived of its sting in his case; whereas, had he chosen the other course, it would have held him in its embrace forever.
Knowing it to be true that “in the way of righteousness is life,” man naturally inquires, “How may I find the way? How shall I know it when I find it? What is the standard of righteousness?” We are not left to our own devisings in finding and knowing that way; we are not required—nor permitted—to set up a standard of our own. The way of righteousness is through the precepts of the law of God in Christ Jesus. That law is God’s standard of righteousness. He says:
“Let my tongue sing of Thy Word; For all Thy commandments are righteousness.”
The life that is conformed to that law is a life of righteousness. The life of righteousness is a complete triumph over sin. It is only sin that is bringing death. So righteousness is a triumph over death.
Because the law of God is the standard of righteousness, and because “in the way of righteousness is life,” the psalmist exclaims, “O, how love I Thy law.” Christ, speaking of Himself, says: “I delight to do Thy will, O My God; yea, Thy law is within My heart.” Ps. 40: 8. That standard of righteousness being in His heart, and His life conforming wholly to that standard, made it possible for Jesus Christ to become the Saviour of men; made it possible for Him to bring life with Him to a race sold under sin. “The carnal mind,” says Inspiration, “is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can it be.” Rom. 8: 7.
There are the two opposites: The Son of God conforming to every requirement of the law, delighting to do it, and so putting Himself “in the way of righteousness and life;” and on the other hand, the man who opposes the law of God, reproaching that standard of righteousness, placing himself at enmity with God, refusing obedience to His law, and so necessarily calling down upon himself death instead of life.
Righteousness is life; the standard of that righteousness is the law of God. As long as righteousness exists, the standard by which it is measured must exist. To abolish the law would be to abolish the standard of righteousness and therefore abolish righteousness itself. That can not be as long as God is God; for that righteousness is the very character of God. “Thy righteousness,” says the psalmist, “is an everlasting righteousness, and thy law is truth.” “Thou art nigh, O Jehovah; and all Thy commandments are truth. Of old have I known from Thy testimonies, that Thou hast founded them forever.” “Every one of Thy righteous ordinances endureth forever.” Ps. 119: 142, 151, 152, 160. That law stands; that standard of righteousness will always be the standard; and they who conform thereto will always be in that path wherein is life.
The law of God embraces all righteousness. Christ kept it. It was the standard of His righteousness. All that there is for man to become Christ already embodies because of His perfect conformity to the law of God, the expression of His Father’s character. Now, says the apostle John, “God gave unto us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He that hath the Son hath the life; he that hath not the Son of God hath not the life.” 1 John 5: 11, 12. In harmony with this is Christ’s own declaration: “I am the resurrection, and the life.” John 11: 25. Again: “In Him was life, and the life was the light of men.” John 1: 4. Inspiration, through Paul, declares that the promise of life is through Christ. See 2 Tim. 1: 1. “When Christ, who is our life, shall be manifested, then shall ye also with Him be manifested in glory.” Col. 3: 4. Christ became all that to us because of His own righteous character, His unswerving conformity to the standard of righteousness, Hisobedience to the expressed will of God. But He can not do that for us unless we also have a heart to do God’s will, a spirit of loyalty to the standard of righteousness. We will never be able to save ourselves by our own righteous deeds. We will always need the robe of Christ’s righteousness to cover our failures. But that gracious covering will never be thrown over us while there remains in us a spirit of antagonism to the law of God which it was Christ’s great purpose to teach us to reverence. Said Jesus: “If thou wouldst enter into life, keep the commandments.” Matt. 19: 17. “He that is steadfast in righteousness shall attain unto life.” Prov. 11: 19.
Righteousness is the badge of implicit loyalty to the everlasting kingdom of righteousness. “Righteousness delivereth from death;” Righteousness is life. Jesus Christ was and is righteous; and through His righteousness and our loyalty to Him and dependence upon Him, we may attain unto life eternal.
S.