There are some problems that confuse our life of faith. One is them is the problem of ‘achieving righteousness’. People on one side say, “People’s actions cannot achieve God’s righteousness”. People on the other side say, “You need to diligently keep God’s commands if you want to achieve righteousness”. Although these appear to contradict each other, they are really one.
People say that they do God’s work, but they do it for their own sake and in the way they want. This can never achieve God’s righteousness. Therefore, God wants to change our spirits first. We should now open wide our hearts and accept this change. We should let go of our own righteousness and draw near to God’s heart. If we do, we can achieve obedience from the heart, and this will develop into fruits of eternal life.
We should not accept the saying ‘If you only believe in Jesus, you will be saved’ like a mathematical formula and ignore the change you must undertake after you believe in Jesus. God does not consider our merit in regard to us believing in Jesus and being saved, but afterwards, He wants us to live by putting God’s righteousness into practice. Instead of showing our own righteousness like we did in the past, God wants us to show His righteousness by obedience.
When we were baptized, we ended our past lives and began living as those connected to Christ. When we are connected to Christ, we should not think beyond the church. This is because the church is Christ’s body, and we are members of His body. When we became one with Christ, the condition was that we became one with His church, and when we love Christ, we cannot separate this from loving His church.
A young government official came to Jesus and asked Him about good deeds. He was full of confidence. This was because he kept all the commandments and thought God was surely going to accept him. However, the Lord discovered that he only had outward deeds and no heart to love God. To show this, the Lord said, “Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” The young official became troubled and left.
The Lord said to the disciples, “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” The disciples were troubled. This was because they had the desire to become rich. They asked, “Who then can be saved?” The Lord replied, “With man this is impossible, but all things are possible with God.” This is right. You should obey God with all your heart to bear fruits of eternal life, but this is impossible with man’s strength. Yet God makes this possible.
If we honestly acknowledge that we are sinners before God and entrust ourselves to Him, God will change our spirits and enable us to obey with all our hearts. In this way, He helps us bear fruits of righteousness which lead to eternal life. Therefore, let’s completely entrust ourselves to the Lord. Let’s change ourselves as the Lord wants and serve His will in sincerity. Let’s fulfill God’s righteousness by obeying this holy work with joy.
(Lord’s Day Service on October 3, 2021)
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