{"id":1358,"date":"2009-11-18T20:41:20","date_gmt":"2009-11-19T02:41:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ministryofgrace.org\/blog\/?p=1358"},"modified":"2009-11-18T20:41:20","modified_gmt":"2009-11-19T02:41:20","slug":"romans-321-righteousness-without-works","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/romans-321-righteousness-without-works\/","title":{"rendered":"Romans 3:21 – Righteousness Without Works"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Romans 3:21<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets,<\/span><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n

Truth to Learn<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

There is a righteousness, which the Old Testament declared, that does not result from obeying all the rules.<\/p>\n

Behind the Words<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cRighteousness<\/span>\u201d is from the Greek word dikaiosun\u0113<\/span><\/em>, a form of dikaios<\/span><\/em>, which we looked at back in verse ten. Dikaios<\/span><\/em> refers to \u201cmeeting God\u2019s standard of behavior.\u201d The sun\u0113<\/span><\/em> ending means that this is the characteristic of someone who has met that standard. That is, someone who has obtained \u201crighteousness.\u201d<\/p>\n

The word translated \u201crevealed<\/span>\u201d is phanero\u014d<\/span><\/em>, which is derived from the verb phain\u014d<\/span><\/em>, meaning \u201cto shine the light on\u201d or \u201cto cause to appear.\u201d Therefore, phanero\u014d<\/span><\/em> means \u201cto make something apparent\u201d or, as it is translated here, \u201cto reveal.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBeing witnessed<\/span>\u201d is translated from a form of marture\u014d<\/span><\/em>, from which we get our English word \u201cmartyr.\u201d This word means \u201cto be a witness.\u201d Throughout the history of the church, during times of persecution many people have forfeited their lives because of their faith in Christ. We refer to these people as martyrs because their death was the witness of their faith.<\/p>\n

Meaning Explained<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

In the last verse we said that no one is righteous before God by obeying a set of rules, period. This would have come as a major affront to any devout Jew whether they had become a Christian or not. To them, obeying the Law was how anyone became acceptable to God.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now Paul is about to introduce the doctrine of justification by faith, but he had to show first that justification couldn\u2019t come any other way. He says that the only true righteousness, the righteousness of God (or from God), a righteousness not resulting from obeying the Law, has already been revealed. Not only has it already been revealed but it has been witnessed to by the Law and the Prophets.<\/span><\/p>\n

Paul is telling these Jewish Christians that their own Scriptures have testified against them and declared them all to be sinners. Also, he is telling them that the Scriptures have testified about a true type of righteousness which only comes from God.<\/span><\/p>\n

In the next verse Paul is going to tell us that righteousness can only come by faith. He will also show that it\u2019s not just any kind of faith and not faith in just anything.<\/span><\/p>\n

And in the coming chapters of this letter, Paul will illustrate how the Old Testament declared and witnessed to this saving faith apart from the Law. He will use Abraham as his primary example and will show how Abraham was not justified (declared righteous) by God because he was obedient, rather he was declared righteous because he believed the message that God gave to him. Here\u2019s one verse that Paul will quote from:<\/span><\/p>\n

And he believed in the LORD, and He accounted it to him for righteousness.<\/span> (Genesis 15:6<\/span><\/strong>)<\/span><\/p>\n

Abraham was not righteous because of any works he did. He was righteous because God declared him to be so. <\/span><\/p>\n

Application<\/span><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Do you want to stand before God as a righteous person? If so, then God must declare you to be righteous. He will only do that if you believe the truth about Jesus Christ; He is the Son of God and He died on the cross to pay for your sins.<\/span><\/p>\n

In God\u2019s service, for His glory,<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"signature\"<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2009 Will Krause. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –<\/p>\n

<\/span>If this message or this link was forwarded to you by a friend and you wish to receive future verses directly to your inbox, you can call the church phone \"\"(618) 614-3070<\/span><\/span><\/span> and leave a message telling us your name and e-mail address or you can send an e-mail to:\"e-mail<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Romans 3:21 But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, Truth to Learn There is a righteousness, which the Old Testament declared, that does not result from obeying all the rules. Behind the Words \u201cRighteousness\u201d is from the Greek word dikaiosun\u0113, a form […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[504,403,75,125],"class_list":["post-1358","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-law","tag-prophets","tag-righteousness","tag-witness"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pd5geA-lU","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1358","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1358"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1358\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1358"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1358"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ministryofgrace.org\/test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1358"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}