A Sermon by David Black
Philippians 3:9. And be found in Him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith.
Paul, who wrote this Epistle, was a remarkable instance of the power of converting grace. His views and dispositions were so entirely changed that he might justly be called a new man after his conversion. Before then, he was a distinguished Pharisee. He was brought up at the feet of Gamaliel and taught according to the perfect manner of the law of the fathers. As a Jew he enjoyed every religious privilege and, as far as others could see, he was blameless – as “touching the righteousness which is in the law”.
Some may think that such a character must have been well-pleasing to God. But with all his boasted privileges and attainments, he was labouring to establish a righteousness of his own, not submitting to the righteousness of God. He was a stranger to the purity and spirituality of God’s law, and was therefore unacquainted with the deceitfulness and desperate wickedness of his own heart. “I was alive without the law once”, he says; “but when the commandment came [when it was brought home to my conscience in all its power and spirituality], sin [which before lay undiscovered] revived, and [as to all hope of acceptance with God, through my own personal righteousness] I died” (v 6). Hence what things were counted gain to him, those he counted loss for Christ (v 7). The religious privileges he had enjoyed were valuable in themselves; his obedience, so far as it went, might be sincere and worthy of commendation from men; but when his mind was enlightened, he was convinced of their utter insufficiency to recommend him to God.
As a Pharisee, his obedience to God’s law must have been very defective. But afterwards he became distinguished for genuine holiness. He laboured more abundantly than the rest of the apostles, and for the sake of Christ, cheerfully underwent a variety of sufferings. But were they, in any measure, the ground of his confidence in the sight of God? No. He renounces them as unworthy to share that honour with Christ’s perfect righteousness, in which alone he gloried as the foundation of all his hopes. “I count all things but loss”, he says, “for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord; for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ; and be found in Him . . . ” (vv 8,9).
I propose, through God’s help, (1) to prove that our righteousness is insufficient to justify us in God’s sight; (2) to explain what is meant by the
1Another discourse from Black’s Sermons on Important Subjects.
righteousness of faith, which Paul opposes to his own personal obedience; (3) to point out the perfection and suitability of this righteousness as the ground of a sinner’s justification before God.
1. Our own righteousness is insufficient to justify us in God’s sight. Most people who profess to take the Scriptures for their guide will be ready to grant this. But many are far from understanding it; at least, they are not suitably impressed with a sense of its truth and importance. Is it possible that anyone who really believes God’s awful threatenings against the transgressors of His law could listen with such indifference to the offers of reconciliation in the gospel? So do not think it unnecessary to prove this fundamental truth. But first let us make two observations:
(1.) The substance of the law of God, delivered from Mount Sinai in the Ten Commandments, was originally given to man, not only as his rule of obedience, but also as the condition of life. This is commonly called the covenant of works. Paul states that the commandment was ordained to life (Rom 7:10), meaning that the law of God, here called the commandment, was originally designed to give life to man, but only if it was obeyed perfectly. The same truth is taken for granted in Paul’s assertion: “What the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God sending His Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin condemned sin in the flesh” (Rom 8:3). Here the insufficiency of the law to confer life on fallen man, is wholly imputed to the weakness of the flesh – through the corruption of human nature he cannot obey the law. Yet before the Fall, man might have secured God’s favour and eternal life by obeying the law.
(2.) Notwithstanding the change in man’s state, God’s law continues the same; its demands are as extensive now as during his state of innocence. To prove this, merely consider that God’s law is a transcript of His moral image. So if God’s perfections are unchangeable, His holy law must be so also. This idea is contradicted by supposing that the demands of God’s law may be accommodated to the weakness of human nature – which is to represent the Most High as inconsistent. It is a blot on His wisdom if He could give His creatures a law that is later set aside. And if the law is holy, just and good, to require from His creatures anything short of a perfect obedience would be as incompatible with the person’s happiness as the Lawgiver’s honour.
Let me now prove that our righteousness is insufficient to justify us in God’s sight. I shall make only a simple, direct appeal to conscience, bringing out the extensive demands of God’s law and the manifold defects in our best obedience. Obedience that meets the demands of God’s law – in other words, a righteousness capable of justifying us in His sight – must be: (1) spiritual in its nature, (2) universal in its extent (3) perpetual in its duration.
(1.) God’s law requires obedience which is spiritual. This is evident from the nature of God, whom Scripture describes as the Searcher of hearts, requiring truth in the inward parts. Man looks on the outward appearance but the Lord on the heart. So only spiritual obedience can satisfy God’s law. It not only demands outward expressions of veneration and gratitude, but also unconstrained, heart homage. It forbids the actual commission of murder and the slightest indulgence of ill-will against our neighbour. It requires, not only chastity of life, but purity of heart. It reaches the secret disposition of covetousness as well as open violations of truth and justice. It is designed to regulate the motives of our actions as well as the actions themselves; and unless God’s law approves these motives, our obedience falls short of the perfection that God will accept.
You are just in your dealings with others; you withhold from no one what you believe is due to him. But do you never take advantage of your neighbour’s ignorance or necessities? Are you as careful not to hurt his reputation as not to damage his property? In other words, do you love your neighbour as yourself, and take care to do to others what you would wish them, in similar circumstances, to do to you? Again, because you are liberal to the poor, you perhaps presume that you must be in favour with God. But examine your motives. Is it a love of praise or, at best, an instinctive kind of benevolence, not God’s command, which moves you to charity?
(2.) The obedience God’s law requires must be universal. It must extend to every part of the law without exception. “Whosoever shall keep the whole law and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all”. The reason is obvious. The same authority that enjoined any part enjoined the whole; so to make any exception in our obedience is, in effect, to call in question the authority or wisdom of the Lawgiver. As the Apostle adds, “He that said, Do not commit adultery, said also, Do not kill. Now, if thou commit no adultery, yet if thou kill, thou art become a transgressor of the law.” Thus it is not sufficient to discharge all the duties we owe to our neighbour if we withhold the love and obedience that are due to God. Nor will the obedience be acceptable to God which is confined entirely to acts of piety and devotion, without an equal regard to the second table of the law.
I shall confine myself to one single, but comprehensive, branch of duty. You believe that there is a God. You acknowledge that this God is the most perfect of all beings, greater than human thought can understand. You also realise your constant, absolute dependance on Him: all you enjoy is the result of His bounty. Now, are you suitably impressed with a sense of God’s perfections? Do you feel gratitude and affection towards Him corresponding to the value of the benefits you receive? Or do you neglect any proper
opportunity of expressing these feelings, in the ways He has appointed? Do you then love God with all your heart and soul and mind and strength?
You must own that all this is due to a Being of such excellence. To deny Him the supreme affection of your soul displays ingratitude. But conscience can charge you with innumerable such failures if, instead of loving God, your heart is alienated from Him who made you, preserves you and daily loads you with benefits. If you draw near to Him with your mouth while your heart is far from Him, then, however strictly you have obeyed God’s law in other ways, your obedience fails in an essential point. And, according to principles already laid down, he that offends in one point is guilty of all.
(3.) The obedience God’s law requires must be perpetual. To be sometimes pious and devout will not bring about your acceptance with God; your piety and devotion must be constant as well as ardent. It is not enough for you to discharge your duties conscientiously during one period of your life unless you persevere throughout your days. If your obedience is broken for the shortest time, its perfection is destroyed, and so it can never be a proper ground of confidence toward God. Ask yourselves if your thoughts are always fixed in the worship of God, and your affections equally lively? Are you never surprised by any temptation, but always watchful and vigorous in your opposition to sin? Do the inward feelings of your soul uniformly keep pace with the outward performance of duty?
These are the demands of God’s righteous law. These are the terms on which you must expect to be justified if you seek salvation by the works of the law. Do not think that these demands can possibly be relaxed, for it is written, “Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things that are written in the book of the law to do them”. You must either obey the law of God completely, or else submit to the righteousness of God revealed in the gospel and be willing to be absolute debtors to His grace. There is no middle way. There is no possibility of joining the two in your justification before God; for “if by grace, then it is no more of works, otherwise grace is no more grace”.
2. What is meant by the righteousness of faith. Note that the righteousness which Paul declares to be the ground of his confidence before God is not faith itself. This is evident when he calls it the righteousness which is by the faith of Christ, and the righteousness of God by faith. Nor could faith be with any propriety opposed to our personal obedience, since faith is as much our act as any other act of obedience to the moral law.
Yet many who profess to believe the gospel make a mistake which arises from not properly grasping the distinction between the covenant of works and the covenant of grace. They seem to think that the only difference is that one required perfect obedience, which we cannot now perform, but that the
other promises salvation on easier terms and accepts faith and sincere obedience to the law instead of perfect obedience. If we do our best, they assume, we may hope to be saved at last through the merits of Christ. But this opinion takes away from His honour. The gospel reveals a righteousness which strictly conforms to the justice of God; the difference between the covenants of works and of grace is: in the first, the perfect obedience must be performed in our own person and by our own strength; in the other, it is received as what a surety has already wrought in our stead.
By the righteousness of faith we understand the obedience and sufferings of Christ, which the gospel reveals as the object of faith, the sole ground of confidence towards God. When man by apostasy transgressed God’s law, he needed the gracious interposition of a Mediator, for these two reasons:
- (1.) As man had incurred the penalty attached to transgression of the law, someone equal to the mighty undertaking must undergo the punishment instead, if man was to be re-instated in God’s favour.
- (2.) As man had brought weakness and corruption into his nature, that substitute must also yield perfect obedience to the law.
In both these respects Christ completely fulfilled what was assigned to Him as Mediator between God and man. He endured the penalty; “He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him, and with His stripes we are healed”; “He bore our sins in His own body on the tree”. To redeem sinners from the curse of the law, He was made a curse for them, and became obedient unto the death of the cross. And He is said to have fulfilled all righteousness, and to have become “the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth”. Thus the whole humiliation of Christ – taking human nature, obeying in that nature all the demands of the law, submitting to unparalleled sufferings, and continuing in that course of obedience till He could say, “It is finished” – must be viewed as constituting that righteousness by which a sinner is justified in the sight of God.
3. This righteousness is perfectly suitable as the ground of justification.
Paul in our text calls it the righteousness of God. This is appropriate:
- (1.) Because it is a righteousness that God Himself appointed. Human wisdom could never devise this method of obtaining God’s favour but, when fully understood, it must appear the brightest display of His wisdom and grace. It is so opposite to our natural prejudices that the person not enlightened by the Spirit of God esteems it foolishness. In opposition to all human methods, the Lord says, “Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste”. This is the only way God has appointed for the salvation of sinners.
The gospel was revealed, as early as the Fall, in the promise that the seed of the woman would bruise the head of the serpent. It was often the subject of prophecy, and the Levitical system was chiefly designed to exhibit, under types and shadows, the nature and blessings of the salvation which was afterwards to be accomplished.
Abraham, the Father of the faithful, obtained salvation in this way; he “believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness”. David looked for God’s mercy in the same way; he “describeth the blessedness of the man unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works, saying, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered”. And Isaiah exults in the same glorious truth: “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for He hath clothed me with the garments of salvation, He hath covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments, and as a bride adorneth herself with jewels”. Jeremiah also declares the same truth, “Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgement and justice in the earth. In His days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely; and this is the name whereby He shall be called, The Lord Our Righteousness.”
(2.) Because it was wrought out by Him who was God as well as man. “Without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh.” “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” Not even the righteousness of the most exalted creature could justify a sinner in God’s sight. Obedience is due from every creature to his Creator; so it cannot procure blessings for others. But in God’s wisdom and goodness, the Son of God took our nature, obeyed the divine law, suffered the threatened penalty, removed the curse, and obtained a title to God’s favour for all who believe. Hence we read of being purchased with the blood of God – with the blood of Him who was God as well as man, Immanuel, God with us. Only as man did He suffer and die, but His human nature was so united to the Godhead as to constitute one person. From this union, His atonement and righteousness have infinite efficacy.
(3.) Because God the Father has accepted it. The resurrection of Christ from the dead is undoubted evidence of this. Christ suffered on the cross instead of the guilty; the Lord had “laid on Him the iniquity of us all”. And the Father exacted of Him the punishment which His people’s sins deserved. He shed His precious blood for the remission of their sins; He was brought down to the dust of death to purchase their redemption. But the grave could not hold Him. Soon He burst the bands of death and led captivity captive. His resurrection was the visible pledge of His victory; by it the Father declared
His complete satisfaction in the finished work of Christ. The Father declared that He was well pleased with believing sinners for the sake of Christ’s righteousness – that the debt which they owed to divine justice was now completely discharged; that the honour of His law was vindicated, and the reign of grace firmly established on the basis of equity.
This glorious truth is thus the foundation of the believer’s confidence before God. When the apostles preached the doctrine of salvation through a crucified Redeemer, they principally insisted on this fact. “Be it known unto you all”, said Peter to the people of Israel, “that by the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye crucified, whom God raised from the dead, even by Him, doth this man stand here before you whole. This is the stone which was set at nought of you builders, which is become the head of the corner. Neither is there salvation in any other, for there is none other name given under heaven among men whereby we must be saved.” Likewise after Paul had established the truth of Christ’s resurrection, he said, “Be it known unto you, therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins. And by Him, all that believe are justified from all things, from which they could not be justified by the law of Moses.”
Must that righteousness not be perfect, and exactly suited to the wants of a sinner, which was appointed and accepted by God the Father, wrought out by One who is His equal, the only begotten Son of God? Must that righteousness not suit our dreadful circumstances when multitudes are indebted to it for their eternal salvation, and its efficacy remains the same to the last generations? “Where sin abounded, grace did much more abound. That as sin hath reigned unto death, even so might grace reign through righteousness unto eternal life, by Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Application. (1.) Let me beseech all who hear me to inquire seriously, What is the ground of your confidence toward God? I have tried to show you that our own righteousness is insufficient, and that the way of salvation revealed in the gospel is perfectly suitable and sufficient. Is Christ’s righteousness the only foundation on which you build your hopes for eternity? Do not be hasty to answer this question. It is not enough to say that you trust in Christ for salvation, for the conduct of many who say so shows plainly that they have never known the grace of God in truth. If you are built on the foundation which God has laid in Zion, you must have previously discovered your lost and ruined circumstances as sinners in God’s sight. You must have seen yourselves justly condemned by the sentence of His righteous law. You must have perceived in the gospel an excellence and glory infinitely superior to everything that the world calls good or great.
Are these things so with you, or are you still ignorant of the glory of the
gospel and your own pressing need of it? Then let me beseech you, as you value your own souls, not to remain in this dreadfully-dangerous situation. Perhaps you have never questioned the safety of your state. Then it is high time to awake out of sleep and ask your conscience this most important of all questions: Am I in Christ, or not? If I were to be called into the presence of God this moment, what could I plead before Him? Would I plead the righteousness of Christ? Let me ask myself, Was I ever convinced of my need of this righteousness? Was I ever brought to renounce all my self-righteous and to depend on this alone as the ground of my confidence?
It is to be feared that many live in a state of awful security, with a presumptuous confidence in their own righteousness. If their conscience is ever awakened under God’s afflicting hand, or under the ministry of the Word, how soon their fears are dispelled by reflecting on what they reckon a well-spent life or good dispositions? But such refuges will prove miserable comforters when death, the king of terrors, begins His approach. Then it shall be found, to the everlasting confusion of all despisers of the gospel, that “other foundation can no man lay, than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ”.
(2.) Beware of striving to obtain God’s favour by your own doings. You must first receive spiritual life from Christ, before you can obey acceptably. Go, search the Scriptures, for in them are the words of eternal life; they testify of Christ. Examine attentively, without prejudice, the gospel way of salvation. As in God’s presence, compare your actions with the perfect standard of His law. Let your heart be affected with a deep sense of your guilt and misery. Pay attention to the gospel plan. Ponder the precious truths of the Word of God. Pray over them. Seek to apply them. You will find that no qualifications are required to prepare you for the gospel, unless guilt is so accounted. Go and cast yourself at the feet of sovereign mercy. Confess your unworthiness. Pray that God would effectually open your eyes to see His glory in Jesus Christ. Believe; plead the promise of His grace, taking encouragement from such assurances as: “If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink”; “Him that cometh unto Me, I will in no wise cast out”.
(3) Let true believers, who are looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life, be careful to adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things. “This is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works; for these things are good and profitable unto men.” Only in this way can we make clear the sincerity of our faith and the truth of our Christian profession. And thus we may hope to advance the glory of our Redeemer and put to silence the mouths of gainsayers, while we “show out of a good conversation [our] works with meekness of wisdom”.