In the garden, Yahweh’s creatures followed in Satan’s footsteps, and rebelled against Him; they violated the law, and had to be punished. Yah’s righteousness demanded that He carry out the punishment, and the punishment was eternal death. Yahweh faced a “dilemma”. Yahweh is merciful, and so He wanted to pardon man, and not punish him, but He is also righteous, which meant that He had to punish man.
There was no answer to this horrible dilemma, which could be worked out exclusively in the material realm, but thankfully the Godhead had already implemented a solution before laying the foundations of the earth. The Godhead simply needed to bring that eternal solution into the material realm. So, Yeshua stepped out of eternity, into the material realm, and took the sins of man, and suffered his penalty for him. Yeshua, in whom all the fullness of the Godhead dwelt bodily, became sin, and shed His blood to pay for it! (Col 2:9; 2Cor 5:21)
Yahweh Himself, in the person of Yeshua, through the agency of the Holy Spirit, had paid the penalty for man’s sins, so now He could forgive us, and release us from condemnation, and punishment, i.e., He could now justify man, and declare him righteous. (Romans 3:24) Essentially, when Yeshua died on the tree, He was upholding the righteousness of the Godhead, so He could extend mercy to man.
The Godhead incurred the ultimate expense, as He stepped out of eternity, into time, to redeem us. Why did the Godhead do such a thing? Well, the Godhead loves us with a love that we can’t comprehend, and He demonstrated this love for us, while we were yet sinners, as He “fleshed out” His righteousness in the most horrendous way possible, so He could save us from His wrath.
Yah’s righteousness is an extremely costly, and an exceedingly precious attribute of His, and unimaginably, He offers it to us without cost. If we believe the gospel, Yah will give us the most expensive, and most precious gift in the universe, His righteousness! How insulting is it for us to reject this costly, and precious gift of righteousness, and try to add to it, or establish our own righteousness? It is supremely insulting.
Every “Christian” cult rejects Yahweh’s supreme gift, which comes by faith alone, and tries to offer Him their works in its place. They try to be right with Yahweh through their own sufferings, good works, and works of righteousness, and they have set aside His righteousness, which is what He has provided for us so that we can be right with Him. Woe unto them for they have gone the way of Cain! (Jude 1:11)
We approach Yahweh through His own righteousness, not our own righteousness, which is nothing more than filthy rags in His sight. When people reject Yahweh’s righteousness, which comes by faith alone, and offer Him their filthy rags instead, He rejects them, just as He rejected Cain. And they will suffer the same fate as Cain.
Yahweh provided His perfect righteousness for our covering, so we could approach Him in our times of need, and receive grace, without being afraid that He will reject us for being unworthy. We approach Yahweh in the worthiness of Christ Jesus, not in the filthy rags of our own worthiness, which we have supposedly earned through our good conduct, and our religious deeds, and financial offerings.
I hate to admit it, but even though I have been clothed in Yahweh’s extremely costly, and exceedingly precious righteousness, I still sometimes put on my filthy rags, and think that I can approach Him. And it always ends the same way. Like Adam, I end up running from Yahweh, when I sin, because my filthy rags do not cover my shame.
At that point, I have no choice, but to remove my filthy rags.
Am I the only one, who periodically puts on the filthy rags of religion, and has to be shocked back into reality by my own sin, and shame?
Am I the only one, who struggles in his own poverty to understand the riches of God’s grace?
I hope not.
May we all come to know the love of God that surpasses understanding, and experience the riches of God’s grace.
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