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Lesson 03 – Our Spiritual Assets – Righteousness

Lesson 03 – Our Spiritual Assets – Righteousness

Lesson for March 29, 2026

Our Spiritual Assets

Lesson 3

Righteousness

II Corinthians 5:21, “He made Him Who knew no sin to be sin in our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.”

The word “righteousness” is translated from the Greek word “dikaiosune,” meaning right standing. Righteousness is an attribute of God that denotes His perfect character. Originally it was spelled “rightwiseness,” which clearly expresses its meaning. It also means “right action,” which in the case of God means that He always does the right thing.

In order to fully understand righteousness, we must go back to the etymology of the word. Interestingly, the meaning of many words evolved into more complex and abstract meanings as the great thinkers of Athens sought to expand their thinking beyond the accepted norm of the day. This is exactly what happened to the Greek word for righteousness.

There were two words originally: one a noun (dike) and the other an adjective (dikaos). Those thinkers of Athens simply added a suffix to change the meaning slightly (-sune). At the time of the writing of the New Testament, “dikaiosune” (righteousness) no longer meant simply being “good,” but rather a principle that would lead one to the correct thought and action based on a standard (God’s integrity or holiness). In other words, righteousness in the New Testament means adjusting to God’s integrity, first in thought, then followed by action.

God’s Righteousness

Romans 3:25-26, “For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption, which is in Christ Jesus, Whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in God’s merciful restraint He let the sins previously committed go unpunished; for the demonstration, that is, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”

Righteousness is one half of God’s holiness and justice is the other half. Many times in the Scriptures God’s righteousness and justice are interchangeable because they are so closely associated. Righteousness is the standard or principle of God’s integrity and justice is the function or action of God’s integrity. Because God is righteous, He must condemn sin wherever it is found. God’s justice carries out that condemnation. And God always does the right thing, whether condemning sin or providing salvation in the Person of Jesus Christ. Justification is the theological term for declaring believers to be righteous before God. Christ was condemned in our place. God’s righteousness was satisfied (propitiated) on the Cross, as His justice carried out the sentence of spiritual death.

Jesus Christ is the personification of God’s perfect righteousness. Prior to Christ becoming a human, God’s perfect standard of righteousness was the Law. Christ fulfilled the Law by keeping it perfectly (the only human being that ever has). By fulfilling the Law, Christ in sinless perfection revealed God’s standard of holiness. Christ is the standard of righteousness to which Church Age believers are to strive to duplicate (though no one can achieve sinless perfection).

Mankind’s Righteousness

Isaiah 64:6, “For all of us have become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment; and all of us wither like a leaf, and our wrongdoings, like the wind, take us away.”

Mankind’s righteous works fall well short of God’s righteousness. Mankind’s own concept of righteousness is relative. For example, one person may think that their sin is not as bad as the next person’s sin. Therefore, they are more righteous (in their opinion). Normally this thinking falls into one of the two trends of the sin nature: self-righteousness (moral) or lasciviousness (immoral). Both, of course, are wrong. Everyone is born without the righteousness necessary to enter Heaven and no amount of human effort can produce this righteousness.

God’s view of the righteousness of humanity is that it does not measure up to the absolute righteousness of God necessary to enter Heaven. We, therefore, need God’s righteousness in order to have a relationship with Him. Christ, a sinless person, willingly became sin for us, taking our place, being judged in our stead. He is now sitting in the place of honor at the right hand of the Father, which signifies that God is satisfied with Christ’s death on our behalf.

The Imputed Righteousness of God

Romans 3:21-22, “But now apart from the Law the righteousness of God has been revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, but it is the the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe; for there is no distinction.”

When a person believes in Jesus Christ as Savior, God the Holy Spirit imputes (credits) God’s own righteousness to that person. The Greek word for impute is “logizomai,” and it means “to reckon” or “credit to one’s account.” God’s righteousness is never achieved as a result of human effort and is completely undeserved. God does not credit His righteousness to believers because they have earned it or because they deserve it. God’s righteousness is a gift. (II Corinthians 5:21)

It was the perfect humanity of Jesus Christ that completely satisfied the righteousness of God, by means of His substitutionary spiritual death on the Cross. In His humanity, under the control of the Holy Spirit, He was able not to sin and fulfill the righteous standard of the Mosaic Law. God’s righteousness is freely offered to anyone who believes in Jesus Christ.

Romans 4:4-5, “Now to the one who works, the wages are not credited as a favor, but as what is due. But to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness.”
Philippians 3:9, “And may be found in Him, not having a righteousness of my own derived from the Law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which comes from God on the basis of faith.”

Practical or Imparted Righteousness

Matthew 6:33, “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be provided to you.”

Practical or imparted righteousness refers to Experiential Sanctification. At salvation, we are declared righteous and we possess God’s righteousness, which is Positional Sanctification. However, we still possess a sin nature, and it must be dealt with on a daily basis by using the Rebound Technique. (I John 1:9)

What is Practical or Imparted Righteousness for the believer? It is aligning your daily living (the Christian Way of Life) with your position in Christ. It is not becoming sinless, though we should begin to “sin less” as a result of our spiritual growth.

Galatians 5:22-23 gives us a list of characteristics that can be produced in our lives by God the Holy Spirit. This list is: love, joy, peace, patience, gentleness, goodness, faithfulness, humility, self-control, and these are the very characteristics of Christ. You can see from this “fruit” that the Christian Way of Life is a life of thinking. It is not merely thinking “just any” thoughts, but thinking divine viewpoint, which is the “mind of Christ” (accurate Bible doctrine). (I Corinthians 2:16) Practical righteousness is a believer exhibiting to the world the righteousness of God under the filling of the Holy Spirit.

The Christian Way of Life is made up of two aspects: our spiritual life and our Christian life. Both require thinking divine viewpoint and both work in concert with the other. A proper understanding of these two doctrinal concepts is essential for the glorification of God. A distortion of either concept leads to emotionalism, legalism, and heresy.

It is impossible to exhibit practical righteousness (your Christian life) until you first develop a relationship with God (your spiritual life). Any attempt to develop a Christian life prior to the development of a spiritual life is a waste of time. Your spiritual life is developed only through the study and application of accurate Bible doctrine.