Righteousness
This month I have been working through discipleship sessions with my pastor which I look forward to so much every week. Apart from chatting about how the week has been and any areas in our lives we have struggled with, I have really appreciated watching the teaching and going through the book of Philippians together.
Last week’s session was about our righteousness in Christ. Something hit me that I hadn’t really thought of before about how I have viewed righteousness. The teacher in the series asked a question along the lines of Would you feel like a worse Christian if you had a ‘good week’ or ‘bad week’ as a disciple?
Paul teaches us through God’s Word that our righteousness is COMPLETELY founded in Christ. This means that no matter how much we’ve failed this week; no matter how much less than perfect we feel; no matter how badly our words fail to express His truth in our ministry; He is just as close to us as when we feel good.
This was such a comfort to me, in knowing that God through Jesus has given us that freedom so that if we make mistakes He still loves us the same; but also a great challenge as I felt it resonate in my life that I feel ‘things are going well with God’ if I’ve done good things. This is not Jesus’ righteousness! We do because it’s done in Christ; we shouldn’t believe that it’s done because we do.
This month I hope you find encouragement in these verses from Philippians 3:
More than that, I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord.
For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith.
Let’s pray for three things:
- That our righteousness would come from Jesus and not ourselves even in our prayers
- That this week we as SYFC workers would convey this true righteousness in a relevant and clear way to the young people we work with
- We would see transformation in our work through the realisation it is Christ who makes us holy and able to be with God throughout each day
Written by Jamie McNutt, Intern for Swindon Youth for Christ