A Sermon by George Whitefield
Jeremiah 23:6. And this is His name whereby He shall be called, The Lord Our Righteousness.
Let me ask you one question: Can you say, “The Lord Our Righteousness?” Were you ever made to see and admire the all-sufficiency of Christ’s righteousness and moved by the Spirit of God to hunger and thirst after it? Have you ever been able to say, My soul is athirst all for Christ, even for the righteousness of Christ. O when shall I come to appear before the presence of my God in the righteousness of Christ? Nothing but Christ! Nothing but Christ! Christ, O God, and I am satisfied? My soul shall praise Thee for ever.
Was this ever the language of your hearts? And, after these inward conflicts, were you ever enabled to reach out the arm of faith, and embrace the blessed Jesus in your souls, so that you could say, “My, beloved is mine, and I am His”? If so, fear not, whoever you are. The Lord, the Lord Christ, the everlasting God, is your righteousness. Christ has justified you; who is he that condemns you? Christ has died for you, yea rather, is risen again, and ever lives to make intercession for you. Being now justified by His grace, you have peace with God and shall before long be with Jesus in glory. For there is no condemnation to those who are really in Christ Jesus. Whether Paul or Apollos, or life or death, all is yours, if you are Christ’s, for Christ is God’s.
O brethren, my heart is enlarged towards you! O think of the love of Christ in dying for you! If the Lord is your righteousness, let the righteousness of your Lord be continually in your mouth. Talk of the righteousness of Christ and recommend it when you lie down, and when you rise up, at your going out and your coming in! Think of the greatness of the gift, as well as of the Giver! Show to all the world in whom you have believed! Let all know by your fruits that the Lord is your righteousness, and that you are waiting for your Lord from heaven! Study to be holy, even as He who has called you and washed you in his blood, is holy!
Think of His dying love! Let that love constrain you to obedience. Having much forgiven, love much. always ask, What shall I do to express my gratitude to the Lord for giving me His righteousness! Let these self-abasing, God-exalting questions be always in your mouths: Why me, Lord, why me? Why
1Taken “from manuscript notes of a sermon” published in the Christian Treasury for 1854 and reprinted with slight editing. The text is not stated but is obvious from the discourse. A much longer sermon on this text appears in the Banner of Truth paperback, Select Sermons of George Whitefield. This is the three-hundredth anniversary of Whitefield’s birth.
am I taken and others left? Why is the Lord my righteousness? Why is He become my salvation, who have so often deserved damnation at His hands?
But I must turn a little from speaking of your blessedness, to invite poor Christless sinners to come to Him and accept of His righteousness so that they may have life. Alas, my heart almost bleeds! What a multitude of precious souls are now before me! How soon must they all be ushered into eternity! And yet – O cutting thought! – if God was now to require all your souls, how few could really say, “The Lord our righteousness”!
And do you think, sinner, that you will be able to stand in the day of judgement, if Christ is not your righteousness? No, that alone is the wedding garment in which you must appear. O Christless sinners, I am distressed for you! The desires of my soul are enlarged! May this be an accepted time! May the Lord be your righteousness! Where would you flee if death should find you naked? Think of death. Think of judgement. Yet a little while and time shall be no more; and then what will become of you if the Lord is not your righteousness? Do you think Christ will spare you? No, He who formed you will have no mercy on you.
If you are not Christ’s, if He is not your righteousness, Christ Himself shall pronounce you damned. And can you bear to think of being damned by Christ? Can you bear to hear the Lord Jesus saying to you, “Depart from Me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels”? Do you think you can live in everlasting burnings? Is your flesh brass? Are your bones iron? What if they are? Hell-fire, that fire prepared for the devil and his angels, will heat them through and through. And can you bear to depart from Christ?
O that heart-piercing thought! Ask those holy souls who are at any time bewailing an absent God, who walk in darkness and see no light, though only for a few days or hours. Ask them what it is to lose the presence of Christ. See how they seek Him sorrowing and go mourning after Him all the day long. And if it be so dreadful to lose the conscious presence of Christ for only a day, what must it be to be banished from him to all eternity?
But this is how it must be if Christ is not your righteousness. For God’s justice must be satisfied; and unless Christ’s righteousness is imputed to you here, you must hereafter be satisfying God’s justice in hell torments eternally. Nay, Christ Himself shall condemn you to that place of torment. And how cutting is that thought! I think I see poor, trembling, Christless wretches standing before the bar of God and crying out, Lord, if we must be damned, let some angel or some archangel pronounce the sentence of condemnation. But all in vain. Christ shall pronounce the irrevocable sentence.
Knowing the terrors of the Lord, let me persuade you to close with Christ
and never rest until you can say, “The Lord our righteousness”. Who knows but the Lord may have mercy on you – nay, abundantly pardon you? You need not fear the greatness or the number of your sins. Are you sinners? So am I. Are you the chief of sinners? So am I. Are you backsliding sinners? So am I. And yet, the Lord (for ever be adored His rich, free and sovereign grace) is my righteousness.
Come then, young men, who (as I once acted myself) are playing the prodigal and wandering away far off from the heavenly Father’s house. Come home, come home, and leave your swine’s trough. Do not feed any longer on the husks of sensual delights. For Christ’s sake, arise and come home. The heavenly Father now calls you. See, yonder the best robe awaits you, even the righteousness of His dear Son. View it again and again. Consider at how dear a rate it was purchased, even by the blood of God. Consider what great need you have of it. You are lost, undone, damned for ever, without it. Come then, poor guilty prodigals, come home. Indeed, I will not be angry, like the elder brother in the gospel; no, I will rejoice with the angels in heaven.
O that God would now bow the heavens and come down! Descend, O Son of God, descend; and, as Thou hast shown such mercy in me, let Thy blessed Spirit apply Thy righteousness to some young prodigals now before Thee, and clothe their naked souls with Thy best robe!
And what shall I say to you of middle age, you busy merchants, you cumbered Marthas who, with all your getting have not yet got the Lord to be your righteousness? Alas, what profit will there be of all your labour under the sun if you do not secure this pearl of invaluable price?
I see, also, many hoary heads here, and perhaps most of them cannot say, The Lord is my righteousness. O grey-headed sinners, I could weep over you. Your grey hairs, which ought to be your crown and in which perhaps you glory, are now your shame. You do not know the Lord as your righteousness. Hasten then, aged sinners, and seek an interest in redeeming love. Alas, you have one foot already in the grave; your hourglass is just running out; your sun is just going down, and it will set and leave you in eternal darkness, unless the Lord is your righteousness. Flee then; flee for your lives. Do not be afraid. All things are possible with God. If you come, though at the eleventh hour, Christ Jesus will in no wise cast you out. Seek then for the Lord to be your righteousness and beseech Him to let you know how a man may be born again when he is old.
But I must not forget the children. To feed the lambs of the flock was one of my Lord’s last commands. I know He will be angry with me if I do not tell them that the Lord may be their righteousness, and that of such is the kingdom of heaven. Come then, little children, come to Christ, and the Lord
shall be your righteousness. Do not think you are too young to be converted. Perhaps many of you are 9 or 10 and yet cannot say, The Lord is our righteousness – which many have said, though younger than you. Come then, while you are young. Perhaps you may not live to be old. Do not wait for other people. If your fathers and mothers will not come to Christ, come without them. Let children lead them and show them how the Lord may be their righteousness. Our Lord Jesus loved little children. You may be His lambs; He bids me feed you. I pray that God may make you willing to take the Lord for your righteousness before it is too late.