Jesus Christ Our Righteousness Versus Justifying Ourselves

Jesus Christ our righteousness offers us His righteousness by grace through faith. It's part of the classic double imputation that takes place at every conversion. Our unrighteousness is imputed to Christ, and His perfect righteousness is imputed to us: "For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God" (2 Corinthians 5:21). This is why we don't need to try to justify ourselves. https://youtu.be/VR0G0Xj_09Q Jesus Christ our righteousness offers us His righteousness by grace through faith. Part of the double imputation occurring at conversion. Table of contentsFamily Worship Guide for Jesus Christ Our Righteousness Versus Justifying OurselvesSermon Notes for Jesus Christ Our Righteousness Versus Justifying OurselvesLesson One: It is tempting to (Part One) reject God’s word when it convicts us.Lesson One: It is tempting to (Part Two) justify ourselves.Lesson Two: Because of Jesus Christ Our Righteousness, we don’t have to justify ourselves. Family Worship Guide for Jesus Christ Our Righteousness Versus Justifying Ourselves Directions: Read the following passages and answer the questions below: Day 1: Read Luke 16:14-15, 1 Corinthians 28:9, Proverbs 24:12 and discuss: what are things people believe to convince themselves that they are good and not sinners? Which of these are you tempted to believe about yourself? What does justified mean? Why did the Pharisees ridicule Jesus’s teaching? What teachings in Scripture might we be tempted to ridicule? Day 2: Read Matthew 5:19, 19:16-17, Luke 10:25-28, 18:9-149, and discuss: why did Jesus tell the lawyer and the rich young ruler that if they obeyed the law (the Ten Commandments) that they would live? Does this mean we can obey the law and live (eternally)? Why or why not? Why wasn’t the Pharisee justified, but why the tax collector was? Day 2: Read Luke 2:21-24, Matthew 3:13-15, 17:24-27, 2 Corinthians 5:21 and discuss: why did Jesus do all of these things even going beyond what the law commanded? For example, why was he willing to experience a baptism of repentance when he didn’t need to repent, and why did he pay the temple tax when he was exempt from it as the King’s Son? Sermon Notes for Jesus Christ Our Righteousness Versus Justifying Ourselves The title of this morning’s message is, “Jesus Christ Our Righteousness.” On Sunday mornings we’re working our way through Luke’s gospel verse by verse, and we find ourselves at Luke 16:14. Something frustrating happened to me on Thursday. I thought I had my sermon finished, but as I was going over it, I was dissatisfied because it was too long and felt like it was going in two different directions: The first half of the sermon was about the Pharisees justifying themselves The second half of the sermon was about the Pharisees loving money It felt like two unrelated sermons to me, so I split them up. This morning we’ll talk about the dangers of justifying ourselves and next week we will talk about the dangers of loving money. Let’s back up to verse thirteen for context… Luke 16:13 No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money.” If you remember the end of our previous sermon on the parable of the unjust steward when I talked about this verse, I told you that it is not an imperative or command. Jesus is not telling us not to do something: he is not telling us not to serve God AND money. Instead, this is an indicative. Jesus is indicating or stating something: He is telling us we can’t serve God and money. To serve God is to choose not to serve money, and to serve money is to choose not to serve God. But there were people who served money, and they heard Jesus say this… Luke 16:14 The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all these things, and they ridiculed him.  Based on verse one, we know Jesus was speaking to the disciples, but the Pharisees heard this and took serious issue with it. And this brings us to lesson one… Lesson One: It is tempting to (Part One) reject God’s word when it convicts us. This is a great example of what it looks like to be confronted by God’s Word: We can humble ourselves and repent Or we can be proud and stubborn The Pharisees were convicted by Jesus’s teaching. They knew it applied to them. They could have humbled themselves and repented. But instead, they gave themselves over to pride, and notice this, it says they ridiculed him. The Greek word for ridiculed literally means “to turn up one’s nose.” And believe it or not, this is exactly what they had to do: They either had to acknowledge the message that Jesus preached and repent Or they had to ridicule it as a means of self-defense to resist any conviction. This happens frequently with God’s Word: We disagree with it because it disagrees with what we are doing. It hits too close to home, so we reject it. Let me give you some examples of how this can happen today, but so we would be on guard against doing this ourselves: People want to marry an unbeliever, so instead of repenting they disagree with what God’s Word says about being unequally yoked People don’t want to attend church regularly, so instead of repenting they disagree with the verses about regularly assembling and worshiping corporately with other believers People don’t want to embrace biblical marriage roles, so they disagree with verses that clearly outline husbands’ and wives’ responsibilities And some people go much further than disagreeing. They do what the Pharisees did and ridicule: People want to engage in homosexuality, so they ridicule what God’s Word says about homosexuality People want to deny eternal punishment, so they ridicule all the verses about hell People don’t want to believe that there is only one way to heaven, so they ridicule all the verses about the exclusiveness of the gospel The list could go on, but you get the point. Now this is important… When we read verse 14, we don’t want to be too quick to start condemning the Pharisees. We want to be quick to examine our hearts and whether it is sensitive to God’s Word, or whether we disagree with when we don’t like what it says. When people ridicule Scripture, it is done for the same reason the Pharisees did it, and that is self-justification…as Jesus goes on to say… Luke 16:15 And he said to them, “You are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts. For what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God. Justify means declared righteous. We normally use this word in the Gospel sense of being justified by grace through faith. But there’s another way Scripture uses this word, such as in this verse, justify ourselves, or declare our own righteousness. And this is part of why I think this sermon is so important. The most common lie unbelievers believe is they are good people, or righteous. Typically, unbelievers do four things to justify themselves, or convince themselves of their righteousness, and I confess that I have done all of them: First, they think about the good they’ve done Second, they compare themselves to others and feel like they’re good because they are better than the people around them…and when we do this, we never really think of good people. Instead, we generally think of the people we consider to be bad and pride ourselves on being better than them. Third, they think about the bad they have NOT done: I’ve never murdered anyone I’ve never committed adultery If the same people read the sermon on the Mount, they would see that they don’t have to commit these sins physically. They can commit them spiritually in their heart. Fourth, even if they’ve done bad things they can explain why they’ve done them: I lied, but it was for a good reason I was mean to those people, but if I didn’t stand up for myself they would’ve kept walking all over me I looked at things I shouldn’t, but if God didn’t want me to look at them, He wouldn’t have given me these desires I left work early before I was supposed to, but there were those other days that I worked hard that make up for it These are all ways we justify ourselves or declare our righteousness, and we see Jesus condemned doing this. The Pharisees were able to justify [themselves] before men or convince people that they were righteous. They had the outward behavior that made them look righteous: They tithed faithfully even counting out one tenth of their spices They walked around in elaborate, religious clothing They attached parts of Scripture to their wrists and foreheads in little boxes called phylacteries But Jesus pointed out the problem for them… God [knew their] hearts. God knew that regardless of how they looked outwardly, they were ugly inwardly: They loved money They served themselves versus serving God They despised repentant sinners They mistreated people, especially the poor and needy They could justify themselves to the people around them, but not to God. The Pharisees aren’t the only ones who can’t justify themselves to God. We can’t either because God also knows our hearts: 1 Chronicles 28:9 The Lord SEARCHES ALL HEARTS and understands every plan and thought. Proverbs 24:12 If you say, “Behold, we did not know this,” does not he WHO WEIGHS THE HEART perceive it? And God knows what comes out of our them… Matthew 5:19 Out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false witness, slander. Again, the best application is not found in reading this and then quickly looking down on the Pharisees. The best application is found in reading this and then ensuring we don’t justify ourselves.