LS021 - Righteous by Association

Hello everyone!

Now that we are into the third month of this quarter, I am finding it of great benefit to have made the changes that I have made. I believe, as I have talked about before, they are building for me a metaphorical house that I will be living in tomorrow. Yes it means I have to do a lot of groundwork at the moment, but it is all ground work that rests in the finished works of Jesus Christ at the cross.

Today, I want to take a look at what it means, to me, to be righteous by association.

Let's go...

Righteous by Association

When we say that someone is "...by association", we are stating that whatever comes before that, whatever is the prefix, is the label that we are putting upon them. Be it a label of belonging (or not!) to a sports team, celebrity fanbase, or whatever, we are saying that there is something linking the two together.

For many believers, something that they struggle with every day is to be able to rest in the knowledge that, from the moment of salvation, they have been made righteous by what Jesus did at the cross. Not of them, or by them, but by Jesus so that no one may boast (Ephesians 2:9) in any works that they do.

We spend too much time being aware of our sin and our mistakes and less time resting in God's grace that has covered us and forgiven us and elevated us past the point where guilt, shame and condemnation should be able to get to us. I say should because I know that this is a battle we all face at some point or other in our lives. There is a distinct difference, however, between the Holy Spirit's conviction and Satan's condemnation because they are saying completely opposite things: -

• A sin-based conscience says "look what I have done" keeping the focus on man's sinful state; whereas
• A God-focused conscience says "thank You, Jesus, for covering my sin" elevating our focus up to begin full recognition and consideration of the finished work done through the cross

Those two can be hard to distinguish between sometimes, especially if we have been living out of the former for so long that it's become second nature to us. The reality is, as I have been looking at as recently as last week's two posts on the finished work of Jesus, it is not that it doesn't matter when we sin, but that we are reminded that every sin is another laceration that was carved upon our Beloved Saviour's back the moment of His willing sacrifice.

Our freedom begins to break out when we start to realise that there is a disconnect that needs to happen between our earthly, sin-conscious state and our heavenly, God-focused one. The former will always be wanting to look at things as they naturally are and how they feel to us. The latter reminds us of Jesus' scars that are still on His body that the Father sees as He stands interceding for our sins every single day as found in 1 John 2: -

My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.

Look at the last part of that verse where it reads "if any man sin". It's accepting the fact that we will all make mistakes and screw up. Some of us bigger than others. Yet, as reading onto the next verse, in no way does it affect our right standing with God: -

And He is the propitiation for our sins: and not only for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world.

I love that "...the propitiation for our sins" because the word propitiation comes from the Greek word "hilasmos", which means an atonement. This, in turn, can be looked at as meaning "at one ment" the moment you start to break it down in the literal sense.

Consider that, for a moment: -

We are at one with Christ and, by association, God.

Final Thought

Let our worries and cares be assuaged by the knowledge that, because we have peace with God (Romans 5:1) the moment we are saved, He promises to care for us (1 Peter 5:7) and we can be assured that He knows our every need, before we even ask.

Peace!

===TLP===