The Righteousness of God

Behold, his soul which is lifted up is not upright in him: but the just shall live by his faith. HABAKKUK 2:4

Everything in Luther begins with a single phrase in a single verse, and with a man who was afraid of it. The phrase is the righteousness of God. The verse is Romans 1:17. For years the young professor at Wittenberg could not read it without anger, and when at last he understood it, it opened the whole Bible to him. If you want to understand Luther, you must stand where he stood, in front of that verse, and feel why it frightened him before you can feel why it set him free.

A word he hated

Luther had been taught, as most of his generation were, to hear the righteousness of God as God’s justice: the perfect standard by which He measures every human life and punishes every failure. That is not a false idea. God is just, and Scripture says so on almost every page. But for a conscience like Luther’s, it was a sentence of death. He was trying with all his strength to love God perfectly and to be sorry for his sins perfectly, and he knew that he was doing neither. How could he stand before a righteousness like that?

And enter not into judgment with thy servant: for in thy sight shall no man living be justified. PSALM 143:2

What made it worse was that Paul seemed to say the gospel itself revealed this righteousness. It was bad enough, Luther thought, that the law should crush sinners with God’s justice. Must the gospel do it too? Many years later, in the preface he wrote in 1545 to the collected edition of his Latin writings, he confessed that he had come to hate the phrase, and to be angry with God. It is a startling admission from an old man looking back, and a comforting one. The greatest teacher of grace in his century did not begin as a serene believer. He began as a terrified one.

The whole verse

The key, Luther said, was to read the whole verse and not just the frightening phrase. In the gospel is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith; and Paul immediately explains what he means: as it is written, The just shall live by faith. If the righteous person lives by faith, then the righteousness of God in this verse cannot be only a standard to be reached. It must be something given and received — a righteousness by which a merciful God makes the sinner righteous through faith.

But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe. ROMANS 3:21–22

When he saw this, Luther said, he felt as though he had been born again. The whole of Scripture looked different. He went through the Bible in his memory and found the same pattern everywhere: the work of God is what God works in us; the power of God is the power by which He makes us strong; the wisdom of God is the wisdom by which He makes us wise. And the righteousness of God is the righteousness by which He makes us righteous. What had been the most hateful word to him became the sweetest.

A righteousness from outside

In a sermon of 1519 on two kinds of righteousness, Luther called this an alien righteousness — not in the sense of strange, but in the sense of belonging to someone else. It is Christ’s own righteousness, given to us, reckoned to us, laid upon us like a garment. We do not produce it; we receive it. It is not a quality we grow into so that God can then approve of us. It is Christ’s obedience, counted as ours from the moment we believe.

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

This is why he could be so bold in his preaching about sin. In his Easter sermon on Christ’s resurrection, he says that Paul’s words about Christ being raised for our justification do something very simple:

“Here Paul turns my eyes away from my sins and directs them to Christ, for if I look at my sins, they will destroy me.”

That is exactly the turn Luther himself had made. For years he had looked inward, examining his heart for enough love and enough sorrow, and found only more sin. The righteousness of God in the gospel told him to look outward, to Christ, and to find there a righteousness that was complete, perfect and his.

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. PHILIPPIANS 3:9

Not a new idea

Luther did not think he had invented anything. He found the same teaching in Augustine’s book On the Spirit and the Letter, and he found it throughout the Psalms, which he had lectured on first. He loved the prayers of David that appeal to God’s righteousness not as a threat but as a refuge.

In thee, O LORD, do I put my trust; let me never be ashamed: deliver me in thy righteousness. PSALM 31:1

How could David ask to be delivered by God’s righteousness, if God’s righteousness were only the standard that condemned him? Only if God’s righteousness is also His faithfulness to His promises, His saving justice, the righteousness that puts things right. That is what the prophets meant when they gave the coming King His name.

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

Reading the story with care

Two cautions belong here. First, Luther told the story of his discovery decades after the event, and he told it as a single moment of breakthrough. Historians have argued for a century about when it happened, and it is likely that his understanding grew over several years of lecturing rather than arriving in one afternoon. That does not make the discovery less real. Most of God’s great mercies to us are slow before they are sudden.

Second, Luther sometimes painted the teachers who went before him more darkly than they deserved. Not every medieval preacher taught that sinners must earn their righteousness; Staupitz, his own superior, pointed him to Christ, and Bernard of Clairvaux, whom Luther loved, had preached grace warmly. The problem Luther faced was real, and the practice of the church around him was often worse than its best theology. But it is fair to say that he recovered something that had been obscured, not something that had been wholly lost.

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

That last verse names the danger in every age, including our own. We are always going about to establish our own righteousness — by religious effort, by moral achievement, by comparing ourselves favourably with others. The gospel asks us to stop, and submit to a righteousness we did not make. It is the hardest thing in the world for a proud heart, and the sweetest thing in the world for a broken one.

FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION

1. Read Romans 1:16–17 slowly three times. Underline the word faith each time it appears, and ask what the verse says God gives.

2. Where are you still going about to establish your own righteousness? Name one habit of self-justification and confess it.

3. When you next feel condemned by your sins, practise Luther’s turn: say aloud, “My sins are real, but my righteousness is in Christ,” and look to Him.

4. Pray Psalm 31:1 each morning this week, asking God to deliver you in His righteousness.

5. If you have been slow to understand grace, take heart from Luther’s long years of struggle, and keep reading Scripture until it opens.

A PRAYER

Holy God, I cannot stand before Your righteousness in my own name, for in Your sight no one living is justified.

Thank You that in the gospel Your righteousness is revealed as a gift, and that Christ, who knew no sin, was made sin for me.

Turn my eyes from my sins to my Saviour, and let me find in Him a righteousness that is complete.

Deliver me in Your righteousness, and teach me to live by faith, through Jesus Christ, the Lord our Righteousness. Amen.