Covenant of Love

Archive for the ‘Righteousness of God’ Category

Here’s another controversal quote by N.T. Wright. Background: the subject of “the Rightousness of God” or “God’s Rightousness” must be seen as God the Judge who judges rightly. Therefore “God’s Rightousness” is his own, so to speak…

“it makes no sense whatever to say that the judge imputes, imparts, bequeaths, conveys or otherwise transfers his righteousness to either the plaintiff or the defendant. Rightousness is not an object, a substance or a gas which can be passed across the courtroom.” – What Saint Paul Really Said, p.98

I cannot see where the bible says that we have been “imputed” God’s rightousness. At least that is not the language which is used. I also don’t see anywhere where the bible says that everyone has been “imputed” Adam’s sin.

When it comes to God’s own Righteousness, he does not pass gas.

It is this bloggers opinion that Kevin Vanhoozer was the most entertaining and illuminating lecturer at the Wheaton Conference (aside, perhaps, from Wright himself). It is for this reason, and also because I have received complaints about the lag time it takes to load and watch the videos, that I decided to directly re-post them here.

If you have read Wright at all you will find this video enjoyable and also challenging as Vanhoozer attempts suggest a way for Wright to improve his paradigm and find a middle road between “new perspectives” and “old reformers”.

Kevin Vanhoozer: Wrighting the Wrongs of the Reformation from Derek Ouellette on Vimeo.

(I was given permission via email from Wheaton College to re-post this video here so long as I link back to Wheaton’s site. To watch the original postings click here. Because of the volume of people watching from Wheaton’s site the lag time to download and watch this may be great.)

I purchased a copy of What Saint Paul Really Said? so that N.T. Wright could autograph it since it was the first book on Paul by him I read.

If memory serves it was Edith Humphrey who brought up and challenged Wright’s interpretation of 2 Corinthians 5:21.

For N.T. Wright, if you are discussing Justification using the law-court metaphor (which has been the case since Calvin or before) it makes no sense at all to say that God’s righteousness is “imputed” on the believer. God as judge simply judges justly thus making him a “righteous Judge”. But when putting the subject of the believers Justification aside and asking the question on its own – giving full weight to the Old Testament use of “righteousness” – N.T. Wright believes that the phrase, “Gods Righteousness” is actually short hand for “the covenant faithfulness of God”. In both cases God’s righteousness is his own, it is not something he gives to anyone else.

If his interpretation is correct then what about 2 Corinthians 5:21 in which the text explicitly reads that “we have become the righteousness of God”?

N.T. Wright believes (as he says very clearly in both What Saint Paul Really Said? and in Justification) that this passage is so contextualized that we must read it as Paul talking about his own Apostolic Ministry and not about believers everywhere being imputed God’s righteousness.

Keep in mind that God’s righteousness is a reference to his faithfulness to his covenant, a faithfulness which came to fruition in the “faithful obedience of Jesus Christ on the cross” (Galatians 2:16, Philippians 2:5-11). So if the message of the Gospel – the birth, life, death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ (1 Corinthians 15:1-5) is the message of God’s covenant faithfulness then, says Wright, when Paul and the Apostles preached that message they actually embodied that message. In that sense they literally became “the righteousness of God”. This, says Wright, is the whole context of 5:11-20 and even going back to chapter 3 and 4.

But I was not satisfied with this interpretation because it seemed to limit the scope of the biblical text. I tried to dance – ever so delicately – the line between the “old” view and the “new” (i.e. Wright’s) view believing that this passage does teach that believers “take on” God’s righteousness as it were, but through the Union With Christ (“In Him” it says) rather than “imputation”. In short, I leaned toward Edith’s understanding of this passage.

In Wright’s response to Edith Humphrey my anxieties were relieved. Wright, in explaining this text at the conference, seemed to go further with it then I think he does in his books. Keeping all of his premises in tact he expanded his interpretation of this passage to include all believers and their mission.

The righteousness of God does in fact refer to God’s faithfulness to his covenant expressed fully in the life, death and resurrection of Christ (i.e. the Gospel). Furthermore, Paul in 2 Corinthians is talking – in context – specifically about his own ministry and that of the other Apostles. But – and this I think is the touch Wright adds which he does not make clear in his previous writings – we believers have a job to do in proclaiming the Kingdom Message of the Gospel to the world and when we do that then we too become, i.e. embody, the Righteousness of God.

And that is how N.T. Wright interprets 2 Corinthians 5:21, it is an interpretation I can live with though I myself need to tease it out a bit more.

At the conference one scholar challenged N.T. Wright’s interpretation of 2 Corinthians 5:21 which reads, “He became sin who knew no sin that in Him we might become the righteousness of God”.

N.T. Wright maintains a distinction between “God’s righteousness” and “our justification” and we should not confuse the two.

The phrase “God’s righteousness” is God’s own righteousness as the Judge. The Judge is a “just” Judge not because he is morally perfect (though obviously God is), but because He judges Rightly, i.e. He is a righteous Judge. So God’s righteousness is his own ability to judge rightly, and in that sense it would be silly to suggest that the Judge (i.e. God) could impute, impart, bequeath et cetera his own “righteousness” onto the defendant.

The phrase “to be justified” is a declaration from the Righteous Judge (assuming He judges rightly). It is not a declaration that someone is morally perfect (“no one is righteous, no not one”), rather the Judge finds the defendant, based on the case and evidence at hand, to be justified. The evidence in a believer’s case that God looks for is whether or not he/she is a follower of Jesus the Messiah.

So God’s righteousness is His own as Judge and refers to His judging rightly. The defendants “justification” is a declaration made by the just Judge that he is acquitted of the crime of which he is accused of in that particular case. So the Judges “righteousness” is distinguished from the defendants “justification”.

So what about 2 Corinthians 5:21 which Paul distinctly writes that in Christ we become the “righteousness of God”. How can the defendant become the Judges own righteousness?

Cannot and does not this text support the traditional view that the believe becomes (i.e. is imputed) God’s own righteousness? I struggled with Wrights interpretation of this text (see my struggle here and read under the heading, “What About God’s Righteous Judgment”) and my struggle came into focus after Wright was challenged on this point and before he responded. I remember talking with a friend after the challenge was made and we bantered around ideas and wondered how Wright will respond.

It is his answer to that challenge which will be the focus of the next post.

CAN YOU GUESS WHERE DEREK IS SITTING IN RELATION TO WHERE N.T WRIGHT IS SITTING?

I read a post by another blogger recently titled “Made Righteous in Christ Jesus“. It is a well written post explaining and defending the traditional Reformed doctrine of the imputation of Christ’ righteousness.

But as the post takes flight the blogger focuses all of his energy on being made righteous by having faith in Jesus. In other words, there is subtle move from understanding being justified as a matter of “Incorporation/Participation” (being in Christ) to being imputed righteousness by having faith in Christ (believing in Christ).

I think this shift happens without thought and I think it is a mistake. I believe we are not made righteous by having faith in Jesus (that is how we are saved – Eph 2:8-9). But we are made righteous by Jesus’ own faithfulness!

Consider Romans 3:22:

This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. – NIV

Notice the NIV reads, “faith in Jesus Christ”. But the Greek reads, “faith of Jesus Christ” (look it up). And since the Greek word for faith can at the same time be translated “faithfulness”, I think the passage should be rendered, “faithfulness of Jesus Christ”.

Think about it for a moment. The passage makes no sense at all if it says “faith in” because Paul would be exercising his right to redundancy: “Through faith [believing] in Jesus Christ to all who believe” – obviously Paul, why add, “to all who believe” if you already said, “through faith [believing]“?

I think the passage makes better sense this way: “Righteousness of God comes through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ to all who believe”. Now doesn’t that make more sense?

When we believe we become participators in Christ, taking on his righteousness, a righteousness he claims by way of his faithfulness to God by being obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross (Philippians 2:6-11).

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God – 2 Corinthians 5:21

The doctrine of imputation is always talked about a part from the doctrine of participation. I think this is a mistake.

The doctrine of imputation should never be talked about a part from the doctrine of participation.

(Note: the article I referenced above is otherwise a great post!)