A righteousness found in Christ...

In light of the debate regarding the competing views of the believer's righteousness as presented by Roman Catholics and Protestants, I wanted to highlight two sentences from comment #139, at Green Baggins, by Jeff Cagle who is responding to Jason Stellman.  Rome teaches an infused righteousness defined as agape in the believer.  Reformed Protestants teach a righteousness imputed to the believer in Christ Jesus.

From Jeff's comment:
-Our sins are forgiven on the basis of a righteousness that is not our own, but is had by being ‘in Christ’, by faith (Phil 3)... 
-It is ‘us in Christ’ and not ‘Christ in us’, that is the basis for our acceptance as God’s children. 

When it comes to understanding the argument for imputed righteousness against that of infused righteousness, the above sentences point to a crucial theme of Paul's summed up in the two words 'in Christ.'  That theme is found clearly Romans 6.  Here, it seems to me, Paul is strongly making the case that it is 'in Christ' that the believer receives the benefits of Christ's death and resurrection because His death is our death, His resurrection is our resurrection.  His penalty-paying is accounted to us.  We paid the penalty for sin in Christ.  His vindication/justification in His resurrection is our justification.

Several key phrases that Paul uses in the first part of chapter six of Romans:
- all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death
- buried with Him through baptism into death
- united with Him in the likeness of His death
- we shall also be in the likeness of His resurrection
- our old man was crucified with Him 
- for he who has died is freed from sin.
- For the death that He died, He died to sin once for all

In those phrases, as well as others, imputation and substitution are interwoven into Paul's presentation of the good news of reconciliation to God of sinners in Christ Jesus.  Good news that the penalty for sin is paid in Christ... there is forgiveness of sins in Christ... and sinners are reckoned righteous through faith in Christ.

The righteousness that comes from God is not an infused-righteousness to be found within the believer, as if it were his own.  Rather it is the righteousness of Christ imputed to the believer, when by grace he is "found in Him, not having [his] own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith..." (Phil. 3:9).

- A couple added thoughts from an earlier post in 2010:

And although Christians, as recipients of a new heart and right-will through regeneration by the Holy Spirit, may by His grace exhibit the fruit of godliness on many occasions, yet never in this life do they own inherent godliness within themselves.

Godliness and salvation are in Christ alone, received and held through faith in Christ alone by God's efficacious work of grace in our hearts. No work of merit on our part secures them nor maintains them.

Some thoughts on Romans 6:1-5

^{Romans 6-
1} What shall we say then? Shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound?
² God forbid. We who died to sin, how shall we any longer live therein?
³ Or are ye ignorant that all we who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?
⁴ We were buried therefore with him through baptism unto death: that like as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, so we also might walk in newness of life.
⁵ For if we have become united with him in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection; [ASV]
⁶ knowing this, that our old man was crucified with him, that the body of sin might be done away, that so we should no longer be in bondage to sin
⁷ for he that hath died is justified from sin.

     When speaking of our having "died to sin" and having been "baptized into his death" - this is to be understood, as John Stott writes in his Romans commentary, in a 'legal sense'.  It is self-evident that we did not literally die when Christ was crucified on the cross.  Rather, in that God "chose us in him before the foundation of the world" [Eph. 1:4], our life and destiny, by God's gracious will, are irrevocably connected to Christ our Head.  We have been made party to God's covenant of promise, i.e. salvation in Christ, by God's choosing; a covenant that Christ alone fulfills.  And he, as our representative head, accomplished this through the death he died to sin once for all who are in him (Rom. 5:15-18).  So then it follows that the ultimate death penalty for sin no longer has a claim on us.  We are set free from the reign of sin and death by Jesus' propitiatory sacrifice on the cross.
     Therefore in real time, through baptism and faith, we were united with Christ in the "likeness of his death"; a penalty bearing death that is effectual for us according to God's promise.  So that through Jesus' death on our behalf the "body of sin" (the evidence of our guilt before the Law) has been put away.  It cannot touch us in that the evidence and guilt of our sin was imputed to Christ and borne by him on the cross (2Cor. 5:21a).  God's justice is completely served and satisfied.  Paul speaks of this having been accomplished through baptism, and this is true inasmuch as water baptism is truly an effectual sign and seal of the inward Holy Spirit-powered grace of God through faith in Christ Jesus.
     United to Christ through faith, Jesus is our means or ark (for safe passage through seas of death, 1Pet. 3:20-21) of dying to sin and death, having been buried with him.  Death could not hold him, for in his own person he fully met all the just requirements of God's holy law.  Having died for the sins of his people, he was raised by the Spirit in keeping with the justice of God (Rom. 2:13b).  And also we who are united with him have risen with him out of death into newness of life.  And we have the down payment of that resurrection having been given the blessing of regeneration, a new heart and "right-will" inclined to righteousness and love (Rom. 5:5; 6:17-18).  Jesus Christ rose from the dead fully justified by his law-keeping and by faith in him alone we, for whom he died, are now "justified from sin", declared as righteous before God through Christ's merit only (2Cor. 5:21b; Rom. 4:5).
     This is the ground floor upon which we rest, walk, and stand as Christians.  As Edward Mote, 1797-1874, wrote "All other ground is sinking sand."  So, in a manner of speaking, we look backward to what Jesus accomplished for us helpless sinners through his death and resurrection in order that we may move forward, living for him as we are led by his Spirit.  Any other ground of merit and service before God will see us devolve into the subtle yet deceitful box canyon of attempting to establish a false merit through our works in order to attain some measure self-justification.  For we yet remain helpless inasmuch as being able to truly do anything that is free from the stain of sin.  And we should not deceive ourselves into taking refuge in our good works, our "spiritual" experiences, our epiphanies, or our godly intentions, even as the Holy Spirit faithfully leads us into those good works "which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them." [Eph. 2:10]

"Reckoning ourselves to be..." in the church

An encouragement to find and join a church where the Word of God is rightly preached and the sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper are rightly administered:

Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.

Finally after setting forth all the bad news of man's sinful condition deserving of God's wrath and the wonderful good news of God's grace in Christ, Paul addresses the believers with the indicative of Romans 6:11. "So consider yourselves... reckon yourselves..." We are to consider, reckon, recall, remember, fix our minds, i.e. believe on that which has been accomplished for us by God through Christ's death and resurrection.

Paul has spent the first five and a half chapters of Romans declaring what is true concerning God's moral and written Law, about man's sinful condition and utter lack of righteousness. He has made that case that both Jews and Gentiles are shut up before the Law and are under the sentence of death (2:12, 3:19). For "by the works of the Law no flesh will be justified in His sight; for through the Law comes the knowledge of sin." (3:20) And starting with 3:21 Paul trumpets the good news of justification by faith in Christ:

21-But now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, 22-even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe; for there is no distinction; 23-for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24-being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus;

Paul extends his discourse of righteousness by faith into chapters 4 and 5, showing that our justification and salvation are by grace alone in Christ alone. "'Tis mercy all, immense and free." (And Can It Be That I Should Gain - by Charles Wesley)

John Stott writes in his Romans commentary concerning this new "reign of grace":

“Grace forgives sins through the cross, and bestows on the sinner both righteousness and eternal life. Grace satisfies the thirsty soul and fills the hungry with good things. Grace sanctifies sinners, shaping them into the image of Christ. Grace perseveres even with the recalcitrant, determining to complete what it has begun. And one day grace will destroy death and consummate the kingdom. So when we are convinced that grace reigns’, we will remember that God’s throne is a ‘throne of grace’, and will come to it boldly to receive mercy and to find grace for every need.”

As we are brought to the beginning of chapter 6 Paul once again addresses the charge that hounded his ministry, that his gospel of grace encourages not only a lax attitude to godly living but actually encourages believers to sin in order that grace would abound even more.

2-May it never be! How shall we who died to sin still live in it? 3-Or do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus have been baptized into His death?...
7-for he who has died is freed [justified] from sin.

Chapter 6 teaches that sin no longer has claim upon us, for we died and rose in Him. His death to sin is effectual for us (in the likeness of His death). And His resurrection is effectual for us unto our justification before God. His perfect obedience is accounted to us (in the likeness of His resurrection) and we are now justified through faith in Him and His finished work on our behalf. United with Christ through baptism we come to share in the benefits of His death, burial, and resurrection. "In the likeness of His death.... shall also in the likeness of His resurrection." No longer under the reign of sin which leads to death, we are under grace, creating in us a repentant gratitude which leads to righteousness. So much for the charges leveled by Paul's critics.

So now back to the verse at the start of this post, "even so consider (reckon, recall, remember, bring to mind) yourselves..." Paul is emphatically stating that it is inconceivable, having died to sin i.e. to it's dominion and penalty, that we should return and again submit ourselves as slaves to unrighteousness. And as I ponder this admonition it becomes obvious that this remembering and reckoning of ourselves in light of Christ's cross is the very heart of the work of the church. Together we are to so reckon ourselves through the reminding of each other, the encouraging each other, recalling to each other that which is true. And this, I really think is why there can be no such thing as a lone Christian.

Daily we battle against our sinful-self inclinations, all too often willingly embracing them. We have seen the enemy and the enemy is us, to quote Pogo. So by ourselves we too easily succumb to discouragement and even despair, often losing sight of why the good news is really good... "But to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness." And if not discouragement, we can lapse into the false security of self-righteousness by adhering to a select performance of outward measures, as if those acts could atone for our sin and save us. No we need something more for this life.

We need the preaching and teaching of His Word in Spirit and in truth, which creates and strengthens the eyes of faith beholding Christ. "So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God" (Rom. 10:17). We need nourishment for our hearts and souls by partaking of His body and blood in the Lord's Supper as we remember and recall His death on the cross for our sins. And we need edification, confession, forgiveness through the worship and prayers of the church... singing to one another with "psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs." God gives all this to His people through the visible, locatable church, the communion of saints.

Hebrews 10:
23-Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for He who promised is faithful; 24-and let us consider how to stimulate one another to love and good deeds, 25-not forsaking our own assembling together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another; and all the more as you see the day drawing near.

We are comforted and strengthened, growing into His likeness during this sojourn on earth by these very God instituted ordinary means of grace, Word and Sacrament. And as His people assembling together in the church, we find that that which we indeed deserve, the wages of our sin which is death, we do not receive. Rather we are given what we do not deserve, the free gift of God - eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

Sources:
Romans Commentary by John Stott
NASB
King James Bible

Romans...

I'll be teaching a study on Paul's epistle to the Romans in a couple weeks. In the meantime I am so enjoying reading commentaries by John Stott, Martin Luther, and John Calvin.

Luther writes:
This letter is truly the most important piece in the New Testament. It is purest Gospel. It is well worth a Christian's while not only to memorize it word for word but also to occupy himself with it daily, as though it were the daily bread of the soul. It is impossible to read or to meditate on this letter too much or too well. The more one deals with it, the more precious it becomes and the better it tastes. Therefore I want to carry out my service and, with this preface, provide an introduction to the letter, insofar as God gives me the ability, so that every one can gain the fullest possible understanding of it. Up to now it has been darkened by glosses and by many a useless comment, but it is in itself a bright light, almost bright enough to illumine the entire Scripture.

Also John Calvin opines:
If we gained the true understanding of this Epistle, we have an open door to all the most profound treasures of Scripture.

Me:
What a comfort we have - Justified through faith alone, by grace alone, in Christ alone....