Why I Glory In The Imputation Of Christ's Righteousness

I suppose that I could just shorten this article by explaining with the oft quoted words of Dr. J. Gresham Machen, who on his deathbed uttered, "I'm so thankful for the active obedience of Christ. No hope without it." Indeed it is every Christians duty to be thankful, no, "so thankful" for the active obedience of Christ because there is certainly no hope without it.

But we are seeing again a denial of this most precious truth. People seem to deny this truth but be thankful for their "covenant faithfulness" or as it has come to be understood "covenantal nomism." The idea that we are justified by faith in Christ and in our justification includes our faithfulness to the covenant laws. Of course proponents of this view may word it differently. But they insist that Christ did not keep the laws and commands of God to credit to the account of all who belong to Him but to prove and show His sacrifice was and is acceptable to God the Father. As a Lamb without spot or blemish.

But if my hope, in some way by whatever way you wish to word it, is to rest in my "covenant faithfulness" then I should be as Luther before his salvation- miserable, depressed, grieved and without hope. I would have to concur with Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones when preaching on Romans 1:17:

The gospel is the power of God. It does not depend upon me and my faithfulness. If it did we would all be lost. It is God’s power to keep, to justify and to sanctify and to glorify - to take us right into heaven itself. . . nothing can stop it. It is certain. The gospel works and will work, until all that God has purposed by its means shall have been completed.*

No person will ever stand before God and point back to their own faithfulness. Nor, do I believe that anyone claims that. But the assertion that Christ's righteousness is not imputed to anyone, leads to that. Not only does God demand punishment for sinning against Him but he also demands we be clothed and not seen bare (Gen. 3:21). You should note two things about that passage in Gen. 3:21- "And the LORD God made for Adam and for his wife garments of skins and clothed them"- there is a sacrifice for their sin; an animal had to be killed, blood was shed to provide atonement (that's where the animal skins came from) and they were clothed with those skins. Now of course that was all to foreshadow the Christ, the Lamb Of God.  Everyone except the liberals will admit to the sacrifice on Gen. 3. But what of the clothing? What are believers clothed with? "Covenant faithfulness?" That would not be very comforting. If God calls our own righteousness "filthy rags" (Is. 64) do we really think any "covenant faithfulness will fare any better? I'm not staking my salvation it! If you deny the imputation of Christ's righteousness then you must replace it with something else- infusion (Rome), or some sort of law keeping on the Christians part.

Others would simply have us forgiven but naked before an infinitely holy God. Oh, Adam and Eve couldn't endure that madness why would we be any different? The only comfort we have is the imputed righteousness of Christ.

What do we mean "active obedience of Jesus? By that is meant:

When Dr. Machen talked about the active obedience of Christ, he was speaking of the entire and thoroughgoing obedience of Christ to the commands, laws, decrees, and ordinances of his heavenly Father. In short, Jesus obeyed the entire law of God in every respect, doing all that God required. As Scripture reminds us, Jesus Christ fulfilled all righteousness, and did everything that his father had given him to do.*

What is meant by "imputation?" We mean this:

 If the Bible's use of the Word"impute" or "reckon" in the key passages we've been studying means something like "change someone inwardly so that he is pleasing to God," then most everything  we have seen so far is irrelevant, since all the work of salvation falls back upon man and his ability to maintain some state into which justification places him. But if "reckon" means "credit to one's account and treat them accordingly," everything is different. The righteousness of Christ, then imputed to a believer, becomes the basis upon which God can and does treat the believer as just, even though the believer well knows that he continues to experience sin and failure in this life... "Impute" is a small word, but the sin-wearied soul who realizes what it really means finds it to be a true source of hope and constant encouragement.*

The imputation of the righteousness of Christ is the action of the merciful Father who sees the accomplishment of His Son in behalf of His people as sufficient and complete.* 

The glorious and comforting truth of the imputation of Christ's righteousness is that it is a perfect one. One that cannot be revoked, matched or maintained by anyone. It gives assurance to those in Christ that not only are they forgiven but also declared and seen by God as "righteous!" It is how God justifies the ungodly (Ro. 4:5). It is a righteousness with divine fingerprints. As John Murray writes:

It is not, of course, the divine attribute of justice or righteousness, but, nevertheless, it is a righteousness with divine attributes or qualities and therefore a righteousness which is of divine property.

The righteousness of justification is the righteousness and obedience of Christ (Rom. 5:17, 18, 19). Here we have the final consideration which confirms all of the foregoing considerations and sets them in clear focus. This is the final reason why we are pointed away from ourselves to Christ and his accomplished work. And this is the reason why the righteousness of justification is the righteousness of God. It is the righteousness of Christ wrought by him in human nature, the righteousness of his obedience unto death, even the death of the cross. But, as such, it is the righteousness of the God-man, a righteousness which measures up to the requirements of our sinful and sin-cursed situation, a righteousness which meets all the demands of a complete and irrevocable justification, and a righteousness fulfilling all these demands because it is a righteousness of divine property and character, a righteousness undefiled and inviolable.* 

I glory in the imputed righteousness of Christ because it gives believers rest, comfort, consolation and there is, as Machen said, "no hope without it." 

Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith—that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead 

(Php 3:8–11). 

Soli Deo Gloria!

For His Glory,

Fernando

*D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Romans (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1970), pp. 286-287

*What Machen Meant, Banner of Truth article

*James White, The God Who Justifies (Minneapolis: Bethany House, 2001), pp. 111

*Ibid, p. 115

*John Murray, Redemption Accomplished And Applied (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1955), pp. 127-28

The Comfort Of Christ In His Imputed Righteousness

There is nothing so encouraging to a believer as the imputation of Christ's righteousness. It is one thing to know that we are forgiven. That our sins were placed to Christ's account and He bore the full wrath of the Father in the sinners stead. There is such consolation and comfort knowing that all in Christ are forgiven by the thrice holy God. But the work of Christ does is not limited to just forgiveness. All, through repentance and faith in Him, are not only forgiven but credited with His righteousness. That is all Christians are clothed with His perfection. Our standing before God is that of forgiven and righteous. Oh what satisfaction and joy to be "blessed in the Beloved" (Eph. 1:6)!

There is no need to fret when overtaken by sin that we must make up for such sinfulness with more law keeping. No, we rest in the our union with Christ. Always remembering that we are forgiven and declared righteous on the basis of the life death and resurrection of Christ our Savior.

It is rather tragic that some today our attempting to deny the sheep of Christ of the comfort in His imputed righteousness. Richard Phillips writes:

Scholars should always be able to explain theological controversies in terms that regular Christians can understand. With this in mind, a pastor friend of mine was explaining to his mother the recent controversies regarding the doctrine of justification. He explained how some are denying the bicovenantal  system of the covenant of works and the covenant of grace, redefining faith as faithfulness, and casting other important matters into dispute. His mother followed this all perfectly well. But she reacted particularly  strongly, as all Christians should, when my friend explained how purportedly REformed theologians are denying the doctrine of Christ's imputed righteousness. To this, the godly matriarch reacted with a shocked and pained expression. "You know, son," she said, "I have rather been counting on that being true."

My friend's mother was not the only one Christian who has been counting on the imputation of Christ's righteousness. J. Gresham Machen expressed his reliance upon it when he sent a cable to his friend John Murray, on January 1, 1937, the day of Machen's death: "I'm so thankful for the active obedience of Christ. No hope with out it."  Machen  was referring to Jeus' perfect, lived obedience to God's law throughout His earthly life. Jesus lived the life that we should have lived, and He did so on behalf of His people. As Machen sent those final words before he passed into the presence of God, he was relying on Christ not only to pay the penalty for his sins but also to provide a perfect righteousness on his behalf.*

Lest there be any confusion as to what is meant by double imputation- the imputation of our sins to Christ and the imputation of His righteousness to His people- I will defer to Martyn Lloyd-Jones:

Now to "impute" is to put something in a book, in a ldger, and God, you see, has got your name in His ledger. Oh, yes, it is there. I do not care what your nae is; He has na index; your name is there; He opens it at your name and there is the record of everything you have ever committed, is imputed, put to your account in the ledger. It is under your name and you have got to answer for it. But God has taken your account and has put it to His account. That is what imputation means. God has made Jesus Christ "to be sin for us." He dies to bear my punishment. That is what killed Him. So my guilt has been imputed to Him and it has been taken from me and therefore I am freely forgiven.

But then there is another problem, this power of sin, this evil nature. I want to get rid of the thought of sin and the life and desire of sin. Before I can spend eternity with God, I must have a clean and pure heart and a righteous nature. I cannot produce it. What nonsense it is to attempt it! The moment you try you will see your own blackness and darkness; you cannot. You cannot change yourself but. thank God, God can-"...that we might be made the righteousness of God in him."

For when He imputes our sins to Him, He imputes His righteousness to us. This is marvellous! Out of my ledger goes my sin, put to His account; then His goodness, His righteousness, His purity are put into my account under my name! To put it another way, here I am with the black cloak of my sinfulness and I cannot stand, in such a cloak, before God who is light. What God does is to put over my cloak the cloak of the righteousness of Jesus Christ, His perfect spotless life of obedience, His holy nature. I am in Christ, I belong to Him. He is the new man and I am in Him and God sees me in Him clothed with His righteousness...This is Christianity : not your little goodness and mine; not what I am doing and what I am not doing. Not how much better I am than somebody else; not not how much better I am than I once was. No, you forget it all and look to Him. You see His perfect spotless righteousness and you know that if you believe in Him it is given to you and you are clothed with it.* 

"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 Co 5:21).


"Now after John was arrested, Jesus came into Galilee, proclaiming the gospel of God,and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel” (Mk 1:14–15).

Soli Deo Gloria!

For His Glory,
Fernando

* Joel Beeke, The Beauty and Glory of Christ (Grand Rapids, MI.: Reformation Heritage Books, 2011), 121-122
*Martyn Lloyd-Jones, The Kingdom of God (Wheaton, Ill.: Corssway, 1992), 80-81