How is a Man Made Right With God?

How is a man made right with God?

This is a fundamental question that most religions attempt to answer.

Our authority is God’s Word, the Bible. How does Scripture answer the question?

There is some debate.

One answer many have given over the years: “Keep the commandments.”

Another answer is similar, with a twist: “Depend on God’s power to enable you to keep the commandments.”

We will see that both of those answers are wrong. Keeping the commandments – by God’s power – is important. But that never saves us. That never puts us right with God.

The biblical answer is: Look away from yourself, admit you are in desperate need of a Savior, and look to our crucified and risen Savior with childlike faith.

Luke shows us in chapter 18 of His gospel that the first two answers are wrong and the last answer is right. Let’s delve into that passage.

 

Made Right with God by Keeping Commandments? Luke 18:18-27

A ruler asks Jesus, “Good Teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

There are two assumptions behind this question: “I don’t have eternal life now” and “There’s something I can do to inherit it.”

Most likely this man had been taught that a man is made right with God by keeping the commandments. But something has shaken his confidence – perhaps even something Jesus has said.

Jesus responds in Luke 18:19: “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.”

Jesus is questioning his standard of good. Is this ruler comparing himself to other men? It’s possible to look good by that comparison. But if instead we compare ourselves to God – we can never call ourselves good! So realize, Jesus is not saying He Himself falls short of the standard. Instead, he is helping the man to get his standard right.

Jesus then lists several biblical commandments the ruler knows – and he responds that he has kept them all.

Now, realize: These listed commandments all reflect God’s character directly. Implicitly Jesus says, “To inherit eternal life, you must be credited with Godlike character.” In that light, the man’s claim to have obeyed them all is audacious. He is saying He has acted like God!

Rather than simply telling him he is wrong, or detailing the implications of the Law as He does in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus goes directly to the way to eternal life: “One thing you still lack. Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me” (Luke 18:22).

What is that “one thing”? “Follow me!” Jesus says, “I’m not just a good teacher who gives advice. I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me (John 14:6). You are not going to earn eternal life by living up to a set of rules, trying to become like God via your efforts. That’s hopeless! The only way to eternal life is by following Me! And your wealth is keeping you from doing that.”

Luke then tells us the ruler “became very sad, for he was extremely rich” (Luke 18:23). Note: He goes away sad – because he was rich!

Thus Jesus says to His disciples, “How difficult it is for those who have wealth to enter the kingdom of God! For it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God” (Luke 18:24-25).

Those of us who have wealth frequently think we are accomplished, we are important, we are blessed – and so think we deserve or can achieve or can buy eternal life. Jesus says: “Not so!”

The disciples, thinking of riches as a sign of God’s favor, are astounded, asking, “Then who can be saved?” Jesus says, “What is impossible with men is possible with God” (Luke 18:27). That is: God saves us. We can never save ourselves. For God’s standard is perfect righteousness. We fall short of that standard before we are born (Romans 5:18-19), and every day we live we fall further short.

We can never be right with God by keeping commandments.

But what if we depend on God to keep those commandments? Will that save us?

 

Made Right by Keeping Commandments by God’s Power?

Luke answers that question in the story of the Pharisee and the tax collector, Luke 18:9-14. The Pharisee prays, “God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get” (Luke 18:11-12).

We need to see how good this man is. Like the ruler, he avoids obvious sins, he prays, he fasts, and he gives tithes. But there is one difference with the ruler: He thanks God for this, rather than claiming that he has done this on his own. Effectively he says, “Thank you, God, for working in me the desire and ability to keep Your commands. I could not have done it otherwise.”

That’s a very good statement. I hope you make similar statements.

So he’s a good, moral, religious man who recognizes that there is nothing he can do on his own to inherit eternal life.

What then is the problem?

Jesus contrasts him with the tax collector in Luke 18:13:

The tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’

And Jesus then says, “This man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted” (Luke 18:14).

The tax collector is not a good, moral man; he probably hasn’t been fasting or tithing. Those differences obviously don’t lead to his salvation.

What does?

He admits he is a sinner. And he asks God for mercy.

The Pharisee says, “God, enable me to do righteous deeds, and then declare me righteous on basis of those God-enabled righteous deeds.” The tax collector says, “I am a sinner. I am without hope. Have mercy on me!”

All the good the Pharisee does not earn eternal life. Instead, they can be a trap, making him think he is right with God when he is not.

The Pharisee thinks he knows the answer to our question: How is man made right with God? His answer: “By God enabling him to keep the commandments.” Jesus says that never works.

The tax collector points us in the right direction; other vignettes in this passage clarify the answer further.

Made Right by Childlike Faith in the Crucified and Risen Savior

When people bring infants to Jesus, He says, “To such belongs the kingdom of God. Truly, I say to you, whoever does not receive the kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it” (Luke 18:16-17).

Elsewhere, Scripture wans us not to be like children in some ways (for example, Ephesians 4:14). How are we to imitate children?

We are to trust God the way a child trusts his parents. He frequently will not understand how his parents lead him, or what his parents tell him to do. But a good child will follow his parents, knowing he is helpless without them.

Return, then, to the ruler. His fundamental issues is that he does not trust Jesus. He did not believe in Him like a child looking to his parents. He did not believe that in following Jesus he would gain – even if that meant giving away all his possessions.

And that type of faith is necessary if one is to be made right with God.

Jesus expands on the object of such saving faith in Luke 18:31-33, as He prophesies about his death and resurrection. But the disciples understand nothing (Luke 18:34). Why not?

They surely understand the words themselves. But they don’t understand how this can happen to the long-promised Messiah. Thus, they don’t understand saving faith! They don’t understand how their sins can be paid for, or how they can be righteous!

We must understand what they do not.

Above, we paraphrased Jesus’ words to the ruler as: “To inherit eternal life, you must be credited with Godlike character.”

How does this happen?

Tax collector simply calls out: “Have mercy on me, a sinner!”

Why does this man go down justified, declared righteous? How is he credited with Godlike character? Only on the basis of the perfect life, the atoning death, and the glorious resurrection of Lord Jesus Christ.

As the Apostle Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:21 (NIV): “God made [Jesus] who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

Jesus paid the penalty for all our sins, all our transgressions; Jesus fulfilled the Law, perfectly displaying the character of God. Through childlike faith in Him, God places all our sins on Him; He unites us with Him, and credits us with His righteous life. He therefore declares us righteous before Him – not on the basis of our efforts at obedience, nor on the basis of God-enabled obedience, but only on the basis of the death and resurrection of His Son.

 

So where are you?

Do you believe in Jesus? That is, do you believe that you are without hope apart from Him? Do you believe that even God-wrought obedience will never save you? Do you believe that humbly following Jesus with childlike faith is the only path to eternal life – indeed, the only path to fulfillment and joy?

Give up everything that hinders your following Him. Humble yourself before Him. Come, follow Him. And then know: You are right with God.

[This devotion is based on a sermon preached November 12, 2006 on Luke 18:9-34. You can listen to that sermon via this link.]

Humbling Human Arrogance

Humbling Human Arrogance by Coty Pinckney

[This devotion is taken primarily from the third section of the July 21 sermon, “The Reasonable Foolishness of Christ Crucified.” Audio of that sermon will be available soon at this link.]

The haughty looks of man shall be brought low,
and the lofty pride of men shall be humbled,
and the LORD alone will be exalted in that day.
Isaiah 2:11

“Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children,
you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
Whoever humbles himself like this child
is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.”
Matthew 18:3-4

God promises to humble all human arrogance. He will show Himself to be the only Being worthy of praise, as the Father exalts the Son, the Son exalts the Father, and the Spirit exalts both Father and Son. We must humble ourselves, therefore, if we are to be part of the summing up of all things in Christ (Ephesians 1:10), when every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord to the glory of the Father (Philippians 2:10-11).

In 1 Corinthians 1:26-2:5, the Apostle Paul shows how God’s humbling purposes have been manifested in his readers’ experience. He asks:  Who is part of this church? Who has come to faith in Christ crucified?

If coming to faith were dependent on our being able to figure God out on our own, then you would have to be at least reasonably bright to be saved. Indeed, those who are of high intelligence would then be over-represented in the church.

Alternately, if you were able to get into the family of God the way many get employment – through connections, networking, and influence – then you would expect to find that most saved people come from prominent backgrounds.

In either of those cases, there would be some basis for our boasting:

  • “We are in the church because we’re smarter than those folks outside!”
  • Or, “We are here because of our ancestry, because of how important our families are!”

But Paul tells the Corinthians (and us): Look around. What do you see? Are the believers especially intelligent? Are they predominantly from prominent families?

No. Not many of the Corinthian believers were wise by the world’s standards; not many were born to privileged positions. Instead, God chose and called predominantly those who seem foolish, those who seem weak, those who are not honored, even those who may seem deplorable – to humble the supposedly wise and strong and influential. This is in accord with what Jesus prays in Luke 10:21:

“I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children; yes, Father, for such was your gracious will.”

God is the active agent in salvation. And He chooses not primarily the most intelligent, not primarily the most prominent – why? 1 Corinthians 1:29: “So that no human being might boast in the presence of God.” That’s the bottom line. God humbles us – who, sinful as we are, need to be humbled. And He exalts Himself, He exalts Jesus the Son – the One worthy of all exaltation.

So rather than boast in ourselves, we are (1 Corinthians 1:31) to boast in Jesus, in the cross. For it is because of God and His great plan that we are in Christ Jesus and therefore receive God’s wisdom in the Gospel – righteousness, holiness, and redemption through Jesus’ death on the cross.

Then in 1 Corinthians 2:1-5, the Apostle Paul tells us that even he – capable as he was of wowing folks with his intellect – did not do that. He didn’t think, “Ok, I’ll get their attention with my rhetoric, draw them in with my learning, then convince them with my powerful arguments.” Why not? He tells us in verse 5: “So that your faith might not be based on the wisdom of men” – not even on the wisdom of the Apostle Paul!  – “but on the power of God.”

Paul did not want to make disciples of Paul. He wanted God to make disciples of Jesus as he preached and lived out the Gospel. If he was drawing attention to himself, he was undercutting the Gospel, not faithfully proclaiming it.

So as the Holy Spirit performed that mighty miracle in Corinth – the same miracle He has performed in so many of our hearts:

  • removing our hearts of stone and replacing them with hearts of flesh
  • circumcising our hearts
  • opening blind eyes to see the beauty of Jesus
  • granting faith and making of each changed person a new creation

God the Father was glorified. God the Son was honored. And these new believers could see: Paul was just a messenger. He was just an ambassador. The honor, praise, and thanks goes to the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Human arrogance was humbled. God was shown to be all in all.

That is our goal and desire within Desiring God Community Church:

  • To humble our own natural arrogance
  • To stifle our own inclination to boast
  • To honor the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit as worthy of all praise and glory

Yes, the cross, the Gospel, God’s entire plan seems foolishness in the eyes of those who are perishing (1 Corinthians 1:18). But when we behold our God,

  • When we see Him for Who He is
  • When we see Him as the only being worthy of worship
  • When we see the goal of the Father to exalt the Son He loves
  • When we see Jesus dying for the glory of the Father
  • When we glimpse the coming marriage supper of the Lamb, and our own joint role as Bride of Christ

Then we see: This all makes sense. This is all perfectly reasonable. I was blind, thinking the cross was foolishness. I was arrogant, thinking I could figure God out. But now I see: He alone is to be exalted. I bow before Him and gladly give Him the worship and honor He deserves.