Righteousness That Exceeds

 

What does righteousness look like? What does it mean to have a Righteousness that exceeds? How do I exceed?

INTRO

In the days of Jesus, the Pharisees were the visible standard of righteousness. You could find them by the way they looked. They wore long robes made from fine linen with fringes. The clothes had bells on the bottom of their robes, to attract attention. They would not be seen in public without their phylactery on their forehead. A phylactery is a small leather box containing verses from the first five books of the Bible. Their turban or cap was to show how pious they were. And they had full, untrimmed beards. They appeared to be the standard of devotion and authority. Few looked more righteous than they did.

Open your Bibles to Matthew 5. While you are looking it up, remember they looked so righteous and were considered to have authority. Over the years they developed their own interpretation of the Law of Moses. It was different from those wealthy, political Sadducees.

Jesus said in Matthew 5:21  “You have heard that it was said to those of old, ‘You shall not murder; and whoever murders will be liable to judgment.’ That is a statement of how they interpreted anger and its possible penalty.

Jesus said in Matthew 5:27  “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ The verse is a statement of how they dealt with lust.

Their righteous authority talked about Divorce in verse 31, and about swearing or taking oaths in verse 33. They defined how to get revenge in verse 38, and who you should love and hate in verse 43.

But in each case, Jesus was correcting their authority and their misguided kind of righteousness. He said, Mat 5:20  For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Their kind of showy righteousness that drew attention to themselves was not going to get them into heaven. And Jesus is telling us that our righteousness must be better than theirs. It must exceed. It must excel.

Our righteousness must be without hypocrisy. Peter wrote, 1 Peter 2:1  So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander.

Our righteousness must NOT be for show, to draw attention to ourselves. We don’t put pictures or videos on Facebook or TicToc that shows us doing good deeds. That brings us glory, and nothing for God. Jesus said, “Matthew 6:1  “Beware of practicing your righteousness before other people in order to be seen by them, for then you will have no reward from your Father who is in heaven.”

Our righteousness must be Obedient. Jesus evaluated the actions of the self-righteous chief priests and elders. Speaking to them he said, “Matthew 21:32  For John came to you in the way of righteousness, and you did not believe him, but the tax collectors and the prostitutes believed him. And even when you saw it, you did not afterward change your minds and believe him.” They could have believed and obeyed, but their pompous, showy, righteousness kept them from obeying.

Our simple, obedient right actions must be based on belief (Rom 3:22). It should be that of following the one who loved me enough to die in my place. The one who is Lord and Christ. The one who is the boss of my life. In the first sermon ever preached by Peter, he said, “Acts 2:36  Let all the house of Israel therefore know for certain that God has made him both Lord and Christ, this Jesus whom you crucified.”

Are your right actions obedient, quiet, faith-based, sincere, and excelling?

Some people don’t know what good right living is. Are you one of them. Do you need more information on righteousness, or living right? How can you learn to follow Jesus? You can get the answers for free by sending a text to the number you see here. Or you could call it and leave a voice message. You could use the contact page here at TimelessTalks.Net or the prayer request page. We respond quickly.  And we will give you Bible-center answers to whatever your need may be. God has the answers you need. So, act now.

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