Tag Archives: Righteousness

NT 19: Atonement and Harmony with God

Posted in Come, Follow Me, New Testament 2019 by

Paul’s letter to the Romans may very well contain the highest concentration of my favorite scriptures. I love Paul’s imagery and his powerful testimony of the divinity of Jesus Christ. Romans 5 offers a beautiful explanation of Christ’s role in the salvation of the human race. As always, my reading of these scriptures is grounded in revealed, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints doctrine.

Paul’s teachings about Christ’s role in salvation rely on the foundational doctrine of the Fall which explains the necessity of a redeemer. The Fall describes Adam and Eve’s decision to partake of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Their choice to disobey the commandment not to eat that fruit resulted in not just their dismissal from Eden but it brought upon mankind the conditions of physical death and spiritual death (separation from God through sin) (see v. 12). Paul describes sin as an ubiquitous condition of mortality: it is taken as granted that humans will sin (v. 19). A divinely ordained law establishes the shape of sin and, by so doing, necessitates consequences.

The consequences, however, are not insurmountable nor are they eternally damning if we follow Jesus Christ. His law requires the performance of specific ordinances and daily behavior in order to qualify for salvation. He will help us keep the law while providing forgiveness if we fall short of the law’s requirements. He justifies us according to our faith (v. 2) and repentance. One of Paul’s beautiful images relates to his conception of salvation as returning to harmony with God. Where mortality and sin put us into conflict and discord with God, Christ brings us back into harmony with God the Father by providing forgiveness of sins as well as resurrection (v. 1, 10). This is the crux of Christ’s Atonement, that He provides redemption from sin and death, the blessings of salvation which “abound unto many” “through our Lord by whom we have now received the atonement” (v. 15, 11). Christ puts as at-one with God.

Where sin is a given condition of mortality, pervasive, and sure to lead to spiritual death, we can find relief in Christ’s grace which does “much more abound” (v. 20). His grace is more ubiquitous than sin. Personal righteousness (i.e. performance of ordinances, keeping commandments, repentance) will insure that grace reigns “unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord” (v. 21).

Day 15: Righteous judgment

Posted in Book of Mormon Insights by

2 Nephi 21:1-5

This prophecy of Jesus Christ describes just some of the attributes that define His divine nature. Wisdom, understanding, counsel, might, knowledge, and the fear of God (respect and obedience) are all hallmarks of a righteous character.

The defining of Christ by what He is not in verse three invites a comparison between divine nature and mortal conditions. The five senses define mortality’s obvious means of interacting with the physical world, gathering information, and more. Indeed humans rely on the five senses as necessary and indispensable to gaining knowledge and making judgments about the world around us.

But Christ “shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears” (v. 3, emphasis added). Rather than relying on the standard mortal means of observing, knowing, and judging, Christ relies on His divine characteristics.

This suggests to me that mortal means of seeing and hearing are not fully sufficient to comprehend truth nor to make the best judgments. Luckily for us humans, we can access the divine part of ourselves and further foster Christ’s divine attributes in order to “see,” “hear,” and understand truth. Righteous judgment requires godliness—the divine parts of ourselves coupled with refined, godly characteristics.