THE GIFT OF RIGHTEOUSNESS #15

The result of being justified by faith ' of being credited with righteousness through faith in Christ ' is that we have peace with God.

This peace with God is an incredible assurance: not only assurance of the removal of guilt and condemnation that we have already seen, but a certain hope and joy that encompasses all of this life and the next.

Because we have peace with God, Paul says, we rejoice in the hope of the glory of God. What does he mean? Certainly he means that, being justified by faith and having peace with God we can be certain of seeing and being accepted by the Lord of glory when we die or when he returns, which ever comes first.

But he also means this: that even now, while we are still on this earth, we have this hope, and we see this hope being actualized: that Christ, by his indwelling Spirit, is gradually transforming us into the image of God for which we were originally created, but which we forfeited in Genesis 3: that we should reflect, or image, his glory.

And this is not all. Paul states that 'we also rejoice in our sufferings'. This amazing concept stands in the context of a worldview which then, as now, is determined to make a punitive link between sin and suffering. This worldview adds to every instance of suffering a sense of guilt and of judgment, and adds to the whole of life an unease and a despair, because we know that in ourselves we are sinners who sin, worthy of judgment.

But Paul says, being justified by faith, and having peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, we rejoice in sufferings. They are no longer the evidence of our guilt. They are no longer to be understood as God's hand of judgment heavy upon us. They are no longer permitted to send us into a despairing spiral of morbid, self-flagellating introspection.

We can rejoice, even in our sufferings, for they are not the evidence of God's anger, God's punishment or God's rejection. They can never bring accusation against us; they can never cut us off from his love. Rather, in his great and sovereign love, he takes them, and uses them for his grand and glorious purposes for us.

Scriptures: Romans 5:1-5; 2 Corinthians 3:16-18; Genesis 1:26,27; Romans 8: 28-39.