Spirit is a new life, a new opportu- nity to live righteously in a corrupt- ible body, the one Paul speaks of: “How shall we who died to sin [by believing] still live in it?” (Rom. 6:2). We can still sin because we are not dead yet! Our righteousness, then, is a work in progress. Therefore, the labor of those who are charged with instruction in righteousness need to focus on showing the faithful how to identify their own particular sins, plural, so that, by recognizing them specifically, they can work to slough them off. What, for example, as a be- ginning, are the seven deadly sins? How do we recognize them: pride, envy, gluttony, greed, lust, sloth, and wrath? And then there are those that Paul lists in Gal. 5:19–21. Jesus even favors us with a list in Mark 7:21–22. And there is more to instruction
in righteousness than the recogni- tion and avoidance of the sins of the flesh. We need to know what the works of righteousness are. Jesus gives us guidance in that respect. In the Sermon on the Mount, he says, “You are the light of the world…. Let your light shine before others so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven” (Matt. 5:14, 16). The light spoken of here is a clear reference to the knowledge we have of God that is acted out as righteous deeds (2 Cor. 4:6). The same deeds of righ- teousness are referenced in vineyard imagery. As we know, the branches of a vine produce fruit that is char- acteristic of the vine. What could be clearer? A branch on a grapevine produces grapes. Hence, righteous- ness produces righteous deeds like itself. “I am the vine; you are the branches,” Jesus says. “Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit” (John 15:5). Those deeds of righteousness are
not the imputed righteousness of Je- sus. They are the righteous deeds of
8
the Holy Spirit-empowered believ- ers who are given “the power to be- come the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: which were born, not of blood, nor the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God” (John 1:12–13). It is deeds that constitute the true nature of private and public worship as opposed to assembled public worship! Deeds, but deeds based on the knowledge we have of the character of God made known in the laws of the Old Testament. Deeds that are not imita- tions of the works of God in Christ Jesus, but deeds that are indeed of the very nature of the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus as conveyed by the Holy Spirit. Deeds that are the fine linen of the Bride of Christ, who is “granted to clothe herself with fine linen, bright and pure — for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints” (Rev. 19:8). It is striking that she is “granted to” be actively engaged in becoming by her own deeds the pure-as-Jesus Bride of Je- sus himself, who is the exact image of God (2 Cor. 4:4). And it is a sign that the Holy Spirit’s mission has been transferred — with his guid- ance, help, and power — to the elect. The creation of the Bride of Christ, then, is a cooperative achievement envisioned from the Sermon on the Mount to the Bride of Christ. When the Church Universal is
finally brought to perfection, Jesus will return, bringing with him his Bride, and, as we learn from the High Priestly Prayer, the Bride, hav- ing received the glory given to the Bridegroom so that they may be perfected in unity, just as the Father and the Son are perfectly one, will be perfectly one with the Father and the Son so that the world may know that the Father sent the Son and loved them even as the Father loved the Son (John 17:22–23). We know, then, from the revela-
tion provided principally in the New Testament, how God is glorifying himself and what the final outcome will be. Let us now look beyond that at
what God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, working together as one God in cooperation with the elect,
plished at the end time. In the beginning, God created
from nothing something that was not himself and formed it into a hu- man creature who possessed shared qualities, yet became inimical to him. He then refashioned that which was not himself and made it exactly like himself, elevating it to divinity!!! In doing so — note this — God demonstrated the fullness of both his power and his love, for there is nothing more that God can do to show his love for his people than to make them exactly like himself in perfect union for all eternity! Consequently, until the righteous-
ness of the Bride of Christ is brought to perfection, the undeniable and primary effort of the Church in the world must be, with all urgency in season and out of season, to prepare herself for the return of Christ Jesus by growing in righteousness, which is growing in grace, growing in Christ likeness. To that end, may the hunger and thirst of the elect be such that our prayer beyond all prayers is for Jesus’ promised return: “Even so, come, Lord Jesus! (Rev. 22:20) Amen.?
Rev. McGregor, a retired ARP min-
ister, is Professor Emeritus of French and Latin at Clemson University. In Retirement, he has translated the extant sermons of John Calvin on Genesis, Acts, and Job (Banner of Truth Trust), and, with Dr. Donald Fairbairn (GCTS), Fulgentius and the Scythian Monks: Correspondence on Christology and Grace (Catholic University of America Press).
The Associate Reformed Presbyterian
will have accom-
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