Righteousness Revealed

Paul said he was not ashamed of the gospel, not only because it is the power of God unto salvation, but also in the gospel message the righteousness of God is revealed.

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God to salvation … For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, ‘The just shall live by faith’” (Romans 1:16-17).

The righteousness of God is what the Lord did in sending His Son, Jesus Christ, to die for our sins, so that we can be made righteous, not by our own good deeds, but through faith in Jesus’s sacrificial death for us. This is the gospel message.

The Apostle Paul succinctly stated it saying, “For He (God) made Him (Jesus) who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2 Corinthians 5:21).

Humanity has a serious problem, the condition known as sin, and one of the biggest sins is thinking that we are righteous, and that we can do enough good deeds to be accepted by God.

The problem is that no one is righteous enough for God. “As it is written: ‘There is none righteous, no, not one’” (Romans 3:10).

If this is so, then no one can enter heaven to be with God, for God is righteousness personified.

But, this is where the righteousness of God is revealed; it is through faith. When a person comes to faith in Jesus Christ, it is then accounted unto him as righteousness.

This was Paul’s whole argument using Abraham as our example.

“Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness … Now it was not written for his sake alone that it was imputed to him, but also for us. It shall be imputed to us who believe in Him who raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead” (Romans 4:3, 23-24).