The Lord Our Righteousness

In his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely: and this is his name whereby he shall be called, THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS. JEREMIAH 23:6

If the new birth was the doctrine Whitefield preached most often, the righteousness of Christ was the one he defended most fiercely. He preached on it again and again — in The Lord Our Righteousness, The Righteousness of Christ an Everlasting Righteousness, Of Justification by Christ, and Christ the Believer’s Wisdom, Righteousness, Sanctification and Redemption. For him the two belonged together. The new birth changes the sinner; the righteousness of Christ covers him. Without the first he cannot enjoy God. Without the second he cannot stand before Him.

The last idol

The sermon The Lord Our Righteousness opens with a sentence that every preacher should memorise: “self-righteousness is the last idol that is rooted out of the heart.” We are born under a covenant of works, says Whitefield, and so it is natural for all of us to go back to a covenant of works for our salvation. Pride runs so deep that we want, if not wholly, at least in part, to be the cause of our own acceptance.

For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. ROMANS 10:3

He then says something that must have startled his Protestant hearers. We all cry out against popery, he says, and rightly; but by nature we are all papists at heart, because we all want to add something of our own to what Christ has done. He did not mean that everyone was a Roman Catholic. He meant that the instinct to mix our works with Christ’s is universal, and that it lurks in the most Protestant of hearts.

What righteousness means

Whitefield explains the doctrine carefully. God made man upright and entered into a covenant with him: perfect obedience, and life would follow. Adam broke it, and all his children fell with him. Christ, the second Adam, came to do what the first failed to do. And the word that describes how His work becomes ours is, in Whitefield’s phrase, one word: imputation.

For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous. ROMANS 5:19

Here he makes a point often neglected. When we speak of the merits of Christ, he says, we usually mean His death. But His life of obedience is just as necessary. “Christ not only died, but lived, not only suffered, but obeyed for, or instead of, poor sinners.” His death pays the penalty of our disobedience; His life supplies the obedience we never gave. Both together make up the complete righteousness that is reckoned to the believer, as Adam’s disobedience was reckoned to us.

For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. 2 CORINTHIANS 5:21

The objections answered

Whitefield knew the objections, and he met them head on.

The first was that imputed righteousness destroys good works: if Christ has obeyed for me, why should I obey? He answers that the doctrine cuts off the occasion for boasting, not for holiness. Those who have truly received Christ’s righteousness are the very ones who love His law. Paul himself raised this objection in Romans and answered it: shall we continue in sin, that grace may abound? God forbid.

The second was that Christ in the Sermon on the Mount taught only morality. Whitefield points out that the Sermon begins not with works but with poverty of spirit, mourning, meekness and hunger and thirst after righteousness — the marks of those who have nothing and must receive everything.

The third came from the rich young ruler, to whom Christ spoke of the commandments. Whitefield replies that Christ was showing the young man the law to expose his self-righteousness, not to teach him to be saved by it. Had he known himself, he would have said not all these have I kept, but all these have I broken.

The fourth, and the most plausible, came from the judgement scene in Matthew 25, where the righteous are rewarded for feeding the hungry and clothing the naked. Whitefield answers with the Church of England’s own articles: good works do not justify, but they follow justification as its fruit, and God graciously rewards them, of grace and not of debt.

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works. EPHESIANS 2:8–10

A rock to stand on

The sermon ends in pleading. Whitefield recommends a book by Solomon Stoddard of Northampton, which he calls The Safety of Appearing in the Righteousness of Christ, and then asks, “why should I lean upon a broken reed, when I can have the rock of ages to stand upon, that never can be moved?” He speaks in turn to the old, the young, the busy merchant and the servant. Can you say, the Lord our righteousness? Without it, he says, the fig leaves of our own righteousness will not cover us on the day when God calls us to stand before Him.

Where care is needed

Whitefield was a controversialist, and in this sermon he is sometimes unfair. He speaks of those who reject imputed righteousness as men of corrupt minds and profane moralists, and links Arminians with papists and infidels. Many who disagreed with him on the precise shape of the doctrine, John Wesley among them, loved Christ and preached justification by faith. The doctrine is precious; the polemic around it is not always so. Readers should hold fast to the first and let the second go.

It is also worth saying that Whitefield did not think the doctrine made holiness unnecessary. His sermon On Regeneration insists that whom Christ justifies He also sanctifies. The robe of righteousness and the new heart are given together.

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. ISAIAH 61:10

The wedding garment

The heart of this teaching is freedom. The believer does not stand before God in his own righteousness, which is never enough, but in Christ’s, which is perfect and everlasting. That is why Whitefield could preach so boldly to the vilest sinners and so searchingly to the most respectable. Neither could bring anything. Both could receive everything. The only question is whether we will come without our fig leaves.

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. Ask where the idol of self-righteousness is still standing in your heart. On what good qualities do you secretly rely before God?

2. Meditate on the fact that Christ not only died for you but lived for you. Thank Him this week for His obedience as well as His sacrifice.

3. If you have ever used grace as an excuse for careless living, confess it, and ask God to make His righteousness the root of a holy life.

4. Be generous to Christians who explain justification differently from you but trust Christ alone. Hold the doctrine firmly and the quarrel lightly.

5. Read The Lord Our Righteousness in the Ochorus library and note how Whitefield answers each objection.

A PRAYER

Lord Jesus, You are the Lord our righteousness. I have nothing of my own to bring, and I confess that I still want to bring something.

Root out the last idol of self-righteousness from my heart. Let me stand before God in Your obedience and Your sacrifice alone.

Thank You that You lived for me as well as died for me, and that Your righteousness is everlasting.

Let the robe You have given me be the ground of a new and grateful life. Amen.