THE LORD'S RIGHTEOUSNESS.
By I. E. Kimball
UNLESS the Lord open our eyes to perceive his righteousness, all is vain, for we are dead to righteousness, the God of this world having blinded our eyes, to make evil seem good, and good evil. Sin becomes righteousness and righteousness sin. "Woe to them that put darkness for light and light for darkness." How much of the world has gloried in its shame! In this condition, with the eyes thus blinded, the law can do us but little good. But the Lord can speak to the dead, to those who slumber in unconscious transgression. Thus he says: "Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light." "No man can say Jesus is the Lord but by the Holy Ghost." "No man can come to Me except the Father draw him." We are but prisoners; it remains with God to open the prison house; it remains with him to provide us with gold and silver and eyesalve, and this he will do, oh, so freely, "without money, without price"! The Saviour has taken all our transgressions upon himself and expiated them upon the tree; "surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows;" "himself took our infirmities and bore our sicknesses"—all in order that we might be "filled with all the fullness of God." In him we are restored to all the privileges of sonship with God, from which sin and separation from God had excluded us, to the power, the wisdom, and righteousness of the Eternal. The testimony of Christ comes to us: "I can of mine own self do nothing." "I can do all things through Christ, which strengtheneth me." With Christ, the Father freely gives us all things. The Spirit which raised Christ from the dead is freely given us. But not to all; the Lord testifies who are the recipients of his grace: "To this man will I look, even to him that is poor and of a contrite spirit, and trembleth at my word." "I dwell . . . with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones." "If a man love me, he will keep my words; and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him." God dwells with the hidden man of the heart. Therefore he says, "Son, give me thine heart." He desires "truth in the inward parts." This he has always desired, hence he addressed his chosen anciently as, "Ye that know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law;" and, looking forward to the new covenant, the Holy Ghost testified, "I will put my law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts." Then they should all know the Lord, from the least to the greatest, for, saith God, "I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh." "Ye know him, for he dwelleth with you, and shall be in you." Thus God will cast out our enemy. Thus they shall all be taught of God. And the Lord himself shall "feed the flock" and teach "you all things." So the Lord declares against the false shepherds, "They shall cease from feeding the flock, . . . for, behold, I, even I, will both search for my sheep and seek them out," etc. "I will dwell in them and walk in them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people." In the flesh, or sin, that is, in our natural carnal condition, we fulfill the desires of the flesh and of the mind. Hence the law is "weak through the flesh," for "the carnal mind ["the minding of the flesh," margin] is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God; neither indeed can be." Therefore the law cannot give us righteousness. "If there had been a law which could have given righteousness, verily righteousness would have been by the law." It cannot open our eyes; it cannot give us strength; it cannot undeceive us; it cannot enable us to crucify the flesh. "But if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live." So the righteousness of the law—the righteousness which the law calls for—can be fulfilled when we walk not after the flesh but after the Spirit. But merely to hold the law, and not have the Spirit to enable us to keep the law, what spirit will we have? We will be bound under darkness and partakers not of the divine nature, but of the Satanic.