2Corinthians 5:17-18 (Amplified) says, "Therefore, if any person is (ingrafted) in Christ Jesus (the Messiah) he is a new creation (a new creature altogether); the old (previous moral and spiritual condition) has passed. Behold, the fresh and new has come. But all things are from God, Who through Jesus Christ has reconciled us to Himself (received us into favor, brought us into harmony with Himself) and gave to us the ministry of reconciliation (that by word and deed we might aim to bring others into harmony with Him)."
God has called each of us, to read His Word and to seek His wisdom. You cannot always rely on what someone else "thinks" His Word says or what His wisdom is. When we fail to seek these on our own, then we lose out on so many things our Father has bestowed upon us, through Jesus. So many well-meaning persons has done like the spies in Numbers 13 did, when they returned and told the Israelites that they couldn't take the Promised Land. These people have preached opposition to God's Word, by preaching what they believe God's Word says. The report from the spies, caused nearly three million people to remain in the Wilderness for another forty years, instead of entering the Promised Land. These spies didn't lie about what they saw. They confirmed everything God said about the Land, but they saw themselves (and God) as being unable to overcome the giants who lived there. David didn't deny that Goliath was a giant or that he was just a boy, in 1Samuel 17:26-45 (Amplified). David did what others failed to do though, and saw his God as being BIGGER than the giant saying, "And David said to the men standing by him; What shall be done for the man who kills the Philistine and takes away the reproach from Israel? For who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the Living God?"
Unlike those who went to spy out the land of Canaan, David remembered his covenant with God, which placed him higher than the giant. Verse 45 goes on, "Then David said to the Philistine, You come to me with a sword, a spear, and a javelin, but I come to you in the Name of the Lord of Hosts, the God of the ranks of Israel, Whom you have defied." David remembered who he was in God and not who he was as a shepherd boy. He had covenant with God (as did all those who were in the ranks of Israel's army), but they didn't see God, they only saw the giant.
If you don't have your eyes on God and don't know who you are in Him,then your faith cannot go from faith to faith and disclose the way to more faith. Your faith will stop at "Is God for us or are we on our own?" David knew that his covenant with God, put him in a higher realm than Goliath. Do you know that as a new creation, you've been elevated to a higher realm than those in the world? We truly are a new creation and we've been exalted by God, into a whole different realm than natural man.
We must understand the gift of righteousness we've been given by God, through Jesus and His Sacrifice. When you don't "feel righteous," then go to the Word of God and do like Abraham did in Romans 4:21-22 (Amplified), "Fully satisfied and assured that God was able and mighty to keep His Word and do what He had promised." This is why Abraham's faith was "credited to him as righteousness (right standing with God)."
We should, by faith, understand that God is "able to keep His Word and do what He has promised." Then, we can have faith in His Word and believe we are the righteousness of God, because we are "IN CHRIST JESUS." Someone said, "Don't forget that you are only righteous in Him!" Well, of course you're only righteous in Him. Do you expect to stay in Him and Him in you? If you do, then, you're always in right standing with the Father. We've become one with Christ Jesus and so long as you and Jesus are one, you cannot be anything else, but righteous.
We seem to think we sometimes fade in and out of our righteousness, by being in the flesh. This doesn't mean that we are "sometimes in Christ, and sometimes we are not." This only means that sometimes we still say and do dumb things from an unrenewed mind and soulish realm. You are always in Christ Jesus, even when we do these dumb things. If we heed the words of Paul and "renew our minds by the Word of God," then we will stop doing dumb things.
We learn how to renew our minds and walk in the new creation in 2Timothy 3:16-17 (Amplified) and guess what? It's not by trail or calamity or by God's teaching us something through sickness or hardship, but by His Word. Thus, it says, "Every scripture is God breathed (given by His inspiration) and profitable for instruction, for reproof, and conviction of sin, for correction of error, and discipline in obedience, (and) for training in righteousness (in holy living in conformity to God's will in thought, purpose, and action)."
This is how we renew our mind (our soulish part) and "put on the Mind of Christ." It's not by regressing into guilt and condemnation, but by using God's Word to correct and teach us "training in righteousness." The only thing we can do about righteousness, is train ourselves by God's Word, how to live and walk in what God has already made us to be. You cannot obtain righteousness on your own. You cannot remove it on your own. The only thing you can do with this righteousness, is receive it as a Gift of Grace, through Jesus and His Sacrifice. We must learn how to walk and train ourselves in it, by the Word of God and the revelation of the Holy Spirit.
The Holy Spirit reveals what the scripture is about, in Verse 17 saying, "So that the man of God (new creation man) may be complete and proficient, well fitted and thoroughly equipped for every good work." No one can do any of these things, until he knows already that "God has made you to be the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus." Now that you're born into this new creation being, the Word will reveal to you "who you are" and "how you're to behave," in order to equip you for "every good work."
Man can't teach you how do these things. If must come to you by revelation, while being taught. Teaching can educate your natural mind, but the Holy Spirit will take education to revelation. Then it becomes not just mental ascent, but revelation of the Truth. You will begin seeing yourself like the Father sees you and not as the world or religion teaches you to see yourself.
Until we begin seeing ourselves as being in right standing with God (all the time), we will not go on with our faith into the higher realm of God's calling for our lives. We don't lose our righteousness, every time we do something stupid. Our righteousness is not of ourselves, but is His righteousness. God doesn't take it away and return it as we learn and train up ourselves in it. If was the Gift of God and is ours, as long as God is God. Man didn't give it and man can't take it away. It doesn't depend on whether or not you believe I'm righteous. It only depends on my faith in Him.
The spies unbelief and their not understanding who and what Jesus was, didn't prevent God from doing through Him, everything He said He would do. Having some who don't believe you are what God says you are, doesn't change who God has made you to believe. You are righteous, because He said you are righteous. Now, we must begin to discover how a righteous man or woman lives in God's Presence. We must allow God to be "True and every man a liar."
Through the years, we've tried portraying righteousness by the way we dress, attend church, how we kneel or stand to pray. We've failed to see that righteousness comes from within the born-again spirit of the new creation man and is the very nature of God. We try manifesting these inward attributes of God, on and by, the natural outer-man's rituals. It will never happen that way.
The righteousness is God, just like Love is God. Jesus said, "It's not Me, but the Father in Me" and "When you see Me, you see Him." We must stop trying to be what God has already made us to be and start training up this new you. You will discover that's much easier, than trying to be something you can't be. We've tried to become a new creation, instead of already being a new creation. The outer-man can never teach the inner-man how to function. The best that can come from the outer-man's teaching, is to make one feel "religious," but not "alive to God." YOU ARE A NEW CREATION. You need to go to God's Word and let the Holy Spirit reveal how you are to walk and who the new creation really is.
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