YouVersion Logo
Search Icon

Righteousness by GraceSample

Righteousness by Grace

DAY 3 OF 4

How Can You Receive God’s Righteousness?

In all religions that exist in this world, you must ‘do’ all kinds of things for a god.

Pray six times a day.

Don’t eat certain things.

Give money.

You can’t do this; you can’t do that.

You must perform and do all kinds of things to be ‘good enough’.

Many millions of people worldwide try this, but nobody can live up to that. The same goes for Christians who want to earn righteousness by keeping themselves to all kinds of rules or by striving after certain works.

If you think: "I haven’t read the Bible today, now God can’t bless me either."

Or: "I have to fast this week, otherwise I will never get what I want to receive from God", or something along those lines, then you are trying to justify yourself.

We simply make mistakes and can never be perfect.

We can do nothing, really absolutely nothing to come to God’s righteousness based on our own goodness and achievements, by our own type of righteousness. Nothing!

So, stop wanting to do it yourself.

The Gospel, the ‘Good News’ of God regarding His Son Jesus, is that now ‘God’s righteousness’ is made available for every person, and that is not by one’s own works, but by grace through faith! You can now be justified with God’s type of righteousness with which you can now come into His presence without guilt, shame or condemnation.

To receive God’s righteousness, all you have to do is believe that Jesus has established this through His death on the cross, by the pouring out of His blood, and by His resurrection from the dead.

You then receive by grace (undeserved favor) God’s righteousness that makes you capable of being in His presence forever.

There is no ‘other way’ by which you and I can be justified before God.

Paul writes in the letter to the Philippians that he considers everything that he has learned and done in his own works as rubbish.

For this self-righteousness ‘prevents’ him from coming into God’s righteousness.

Paul knew very well that what he himself spent his life trying to accomplish by his own works and by keeping the law only removed him from the grace and justification that is through faith. Let’s not try to do the same.

Day 2Day 4