"The Lord Our Righteousness" and other holy mysteries

Today is a special Sunday because it is Christ the King Sunday, the last Sunday in the Church year. Next Sunday begins Advent Season where we will not only look forward to the coming of Christ but also to his coming again. The first Advent prepares us for the second Advent. To look forward to the coming of Jesus is to look forward to the promises of Jesus. The Old Testament lesson for today teaches us that Jesus came in his Advent to communicate His righteousness to us.

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 judgment and justice in the earth. 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: 5-6)

Shakespeare asked, “What’s in a name?” Well, when it comes to the name of the Messiah, quite a lot! Who is the righteous one in this passage? The Lord is righteous. He is God, the Holy One of Israel. God is righteousness itself, and the source of all righteousness. God is righteous, but what has this to do with us? With the Fall of Adam, mankind was cast out from the presence of God. God the righteous One could not dwell with man who is unrighteous. We see this theme being manifest throughout the Old Testament.

We see this first manifest in Adam's expulsion from the garden. When Adam fell in the garden, all his offspring fell with him — that includes you and me. By eating the forbidden fruit from the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, they committed sin against God. They fell and had to be removed from the garden. Cherubim were placed at the entrance to the garden to remind Adam and his offspring that he was not allowed to enter because of his unrighteousness. These Cherubim show up again in the Tabernacle and the Temple. Here, the cherubim are woven into the veil to remind us that God's holy presence is still inaccessible because of our unrighteousness.

We see our unrighteousness manifest again in the law. The law is God’s standard of righteousness, but now condemns us because we are utterly incapable to meet those requirements. The story of our unrighteousness continues throughout the Bible.

“There is none righteous, no, not one; There is none who understands; There is none who seeks after God. They have all turned aside; They have together become unprofitable. There is none who does good, no, not one.” (Rom 3:10-11)

“All of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous acts are like filthy rags; we all shrivel up like a leaf, and like the wind our sins sweep us away.” (Isaiah 64:6)

This is unfortunate. God is righteousness itself and is incapable of dwelling among an unrighteous people. So, there exists a great chasm between God and us, between God’s righteousness and our fallen sinfulness. We cannot work our way across this chasm, we cannot bridge the gap. Never can we build up enough good works or do enough great deeds to satisfy the righteous requirements of the law.

Yet, there is good news: Christ is not only the Righteous One, but He became OUR righteousness. Athanasius said that Jesus became man so that we might become God. The idea is not that we can achieve some sort of divine, supernatural state, but rather that God must become that which he wants to save, and those who are saved share in Jesus’ righteousness. St. Paul names this the Mystery of Godliness.

“And without controversy great is the mystery of godliness: God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached to the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory.” (1 Tim 3:16)

This mystery of God manifesting Himself in the flesh is the mystery of Jesus’ first Advent. He entered into creation to save creation, and he became a human so he could save humanity. Once he put on humanity, he never took it off, nor will he never take it off. By Jesus becoming flesh and blood we are to understand that flesh and blood now can inherit the Kingdom of God. In the very person of Christ the chasm is overcome. God’s divine righteousness and mankind’s flesh become one.

If this great chasm between God and us has been overcome in the person of Jesus, then how do we partake of His righteousness? How is Jesus’ righteousness communicated to us? All of God’s grace doesn’t help us if it is not given to us. The answer is quite astonishing. We receive Christ's righteousness through holy baptism. Through water we are baptized into the death and resurrection of Jesus.

"Or don’t you know that all of us who were baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were therefore buried with him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we will certainly also be united with him in a resurrection like his. For we know that our old self was crucified with him so that the body ruled by sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves to sin— because anyone who has died has been set free from sin." (Rom 6:3-7)

Baptism is two fold:

A. Judgement. Our unrighteous old man dies with Christ; we are crucified with him. Remember the curse pronounced over man in the garden — If man ate the forbidden fruit, he would die. Yet, Jesus came and died in our place. In holy baptism we participate in that death.

B. Resurrection to new life. Just as Christ was resurrected in glory, we are also resurrected to walk in newness of life. In Christ, The curse has been broken! We have been united to Christ and have been made a part of his Church.

 “If anyone is in Christ he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” (2 Cor. 5:17)

A little further down Paul explains how this happened: 

“God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.” (2 Cor 5:21)

In Advent we discover the mystery of righteous Jesus being made bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. It is through his humanity, joined inseparably to his divinity, that allows us to be partakers of his righteousness! Baptism grants us access and makes us fit vessels to live the righteous life of Christ. Holy Communion nourishes this new life.

We were by nature alien and hostile to the righteousness of God, yet by grace through faith in Jesus Christ we now become righteous.

“I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead.” (Phil 3:8-11)

We have been united to Jesus. We are a new creation. We have died unto sin through faith and are now able to walk in newness of life.

Now, we ought to walk worthy of this new life granted to us in the name of Jesus Christ our Lord.