TEXT: Philippians 3:9

SUBJECT: The Passion of Jesus Christ #12: Righteousness

Tonight, with the Lord’s blessing, we’ll move on in our study of John Piper’s little book, The Passion of Jesus Christ. The book was not written to capitalize on the Mel Gibson film, but to explain it. The movie—I’ve been told—may be the bloodiest and most violent picture ever made. If it is, it has spoken some of the truth about our Savior.

But not all of it. Behind His visible sufferings, there was another pain far worse. I call it a ‘spiritual’ suffering, only because I don’t have a better word for it. It tormented His mind and His emotions, but it went deeper than these. What made it so appalling is its source. The pain did not come from His enemies or false friends, not even demons, or Satan. Where did it come from? It came from…His God and Father.

The prophet said, It pleased the Lord to bruise Him—He has put Him to open shame…

Why would God do this? The full answer to this cannot be known and must not be an object of speculation. But the Bible provides some partial answers, not enough to satisfy idle curiosity, but all we need to put our faith in Christ and to love God with all our hearts, and souls, and minds.

This is what the book is about: Why God sent our Lord to the cross. Thus far, we’ve noted ten reasons; now we move on to number 11. The title of the short chapter is,

The title has two parts, the first of which Piper skips over entirely. I don’t blame him because he only has two pages to develop a theme that might take a thousand pages to introduce! But I’ve got a little more time, and so let’s have a look-see at the part he leaves out,

Two words need underlining. The first is ‘obedience’. In going to the cross, our Lord was doing what His Father wanted Him to do. Three places in the Bible come to mind. The first is

John 12:27-28,

Our Lord does not try to wiggle out of His Father’s will, but He is eager to do it, to do it all, even when there’s a cross at the end of it! And note, too, the Father is not surprised by the cross and He’s not just ‘permitting’ it to occur. No, the cross is His idea, the way He wants to glorify Himself.

Matthew 16:23 is a second place. In the verses just before it, Peter has identified Jesus as The Christ, the Son of the Living God. Our Lord then praises Peter for getting it right and promises to build His Church on his confession. But then He ‘ruins’ the spiritual high Peter is on by telling him that He (the Lord) had to first go to Jerusalem, suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed.

Peter is very upset with the Lord, pulls Him aside and begins chewing Him out for these morbid thoughts. But what does the Lord do? Listen patiently? Clarify a word or two? Go home and pray about it? No. He tears into Peter,

I’m not sure if Satan should be capitalized or not. Is the Lord calling him the devil or just ‘an adversary’ (which the word, ‘satan’, means)? I don’t know. But in either event, Peter is committing a very great sin because he’s trying to keep our Lord from suffering and dying, which is another way of saying, he wants Him to be doing what men want Him to do instead of what God wants Him to do!

Escaping the cross is man’s will (Peter’s for example), but going to the cross is God’s will for His Son.

The third place also involves Peter. A mob has come to the Garden to arrest our Lord. As an officer moves to take Him, Peter draws a sword and tries to take the man’s head off (he only got his ear). What does the Lord say to Him? Matthew heard him say, He who lives by the sword shall also perish by the sword. But John, remember, was closer to Him than the other man. He heard Him say something else, John 18:11,

‘Don’t defend Me, Peter, for this is what My Father has told Me to do’.

Going to the cross was an act of ‘obedience’. That’s the first word, the second word is, ‘complete’—to complete the obedience, Piper says.

This was not the first time our Lord obeyed His Father’s will. In fact, He had obeyed every day of His life. His first recorded words are to this effect. When scolded for not leaving Jerusalem when His mother and her husband wanted Him to, He replied,

The Lord’s whole life was lived in obedience to God; He never did a bad thing or left a good thing undone. He has a perfect righteousness.

He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, does not mean that He died in obedience to God (though that’s true), but that He was always obedient to God.

I know this is a lot to say on what Piper doesn’t say, but as we move on you’ll see why I have labored the point as I have.

…that becomes our righteousness.

If the first part makes you admire the Lord Jesus Christ, part two makes you love Him. The obedience He offered to God was accepted in heaven, both for Him…and for us. Piper says,

He’s right. As far as I know, John’s a good man, sincere, and zealous for the Lord and His people. But his sincerity and zeal do not make him acceptable to God. And neither does yours—or mine.

If we’re going to pay our debt of obedience to God, it will have to be on Somebody Else’s card. And that Somebody Else is our Lord Jesus Christ. Piper explains,

This means believers in Christ are more than forgiven! We often feel less than forgiven, as though we’re on probation. God has let us off for now, but if we do it again, He’ll throw the book at us. Parents are sometimes this way; they peg their pardon to the performance of their children. But God is not this way! He does far more than pardon our sins! He transfers the righteousness of Christ to our accounts!

This means—Piper says—

What sort of people go to heaven? Good people go to heaven. But how good have they got to be? Is 1% good good enough? How about 51%? Maybe a two-thirds majority? Surely, the Lord wouldn’t demand 90% good, would He? No, He doesn’t require 90% to get into heaven! Psalm 15 tells us how good we’ve got to be to live with God,

Allowing for the exaggeration of poetry, the man in our Psalm seems a trifle better than good, or even very good. He looks like a perfect man to me. He can abide in God’s Tabernacle and he can dwell in His Holy Hill.

But not I.

Only one Man is righteous enough to live with God. Everyone else, therefore, is excluded from heaven. Unless, somehow or other, he becomes as righteous as that one man.

And that’s what the Gospel promises! The moment you put your faith in Christ, His righteousness becomes your own. He achieved it Himself your help, but you share it with Him.

Equally.

This is what Paul is getting at in the verse that began our sermon: he did not want a righteousness that came by way of obeying the Law. He wanted God’s Righteousness! Which our Lord earned for Paul (and us) by becoming obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.

Piper closes the chapter with a short sentence that could fill a lifetime of meditation,

Admire the Lord’s obedience. It’s a lot easier to cut corners in obeying God than to do all of what He wants and when He wants you to do it. We leave many things undone, and what we do is often half-hearted and put off as long as possible.

But look at Christ! No compromise and no hesitation. What the Psalmist wanted, our Lord had,

If you admire others for doing God’s will, respect our Lord even more.

But don’t leave it there—with admiring Him. Go on to treasure Him. It’s the middle of February and you’ve had a head cold all week. You tossed and turned till three in the morning and the medicine you took has you bleary-eyed and fuzzy-headed. But you’ve got to go to work.

At the dynamite factory.

As you’re stumbling out the door, the phone rings. A man at the plant got home early from vacation and wants to know if he can fill in for you today. What would you say to him? Well, I guess so? I bet you wouldn’t put it that way! You’d say more something like, Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you!

Our Lord has done far more for you than the helpful man did for his sick friend. For we are not sick in our sins, but dead. And we’re not exposed to dynamite, but to the wrath of God. And Christ did not do a day’s work for you, but all of your work. If the man in our story should be treasured, how much more should we treasure Jesus Christ?

The hardest thing to do is also the most important: trust Him. John Calvin said man’s heart is a factory of idols. It’s easier to live by sight than by faith. While we cannot see our Lord, we can see our works. And some of them—if you don’t check too closely—look pretty good. Subtly, without meaning to, we begin trusting our works. Without using his ugly words, we think the Pharisee’s ugly thoughts,

If you asked the Pharisee why he didn’t believe in grace, he’d say, ‘Are you deaf?" He wasn’t praising himself for being a holy man, but thanking God for the grace that made him a holy man!

But we know better. About him. But what about us? Do we secretly congratulate ourselves for what we do or don’t do, or maybe what we know?

If we do, we are not trusting Christ and His righteousness, but hanging onto our own, hoping it will do. But it won’t do. Not yours or mine, not Paul’s or Mary’s. The only righteousness that wins God’s favor is the righteousness of Christ.

Which He’s glad to give you when you put your faith in His Son. So why don’t you? And, from now on, why don’t you do good works in a good way: not to win God’s favor but because you already have it. Because