Over in the book of Proverbs
chapter 10, I have three texts of Scripture if you want to follow
me. This morning, Proverbs chapter 10, all of these texts are in
the book of Proverbs close together. Proverbs chapter 10 and look
in verse 2. If you have a few Bibles, you'll
find it on page 726. Proverbs chapter 10 and verse
2. Treasures of wickedness profit
nothing, but righteousness delivereth from death. Then in chapter 11
in verse 4. Riches profit not in the day
of wrath, but righteousness delivereth from death. And one more in the
12th chapter of Proverbs in verse 28. The 12th chapter in verse
28. In the way of righteousness is
life, and in the pathway thereof there is no death. And that's
my subject this morning, a righteousness that delivers from death. A righteousness that delivers
from death. When we look at the first part
of this text, the treasures of wickedness, I don't know what
all. column and what all the things that you could put in
this column, this category, under the heading of treasures of wickedness. Certainly money would fit there,
wouldn't it? At least the love of money, not money. Nothing
wrong with money. Nothing wrong with wealth. It's
the love of it, isn't it? The love of money is the root
of all evil. You could put power. You could put influence. You
could put property, you could put things. A lot of things would
be under the heading as treasures of wickedness. John says it like
this, all that's in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust
of the eyes, and the pride of the life. And when these things
are entertained in the life, and they influence the person,
then that would be treasures of wickedness. Treasures of wickedness. I have a friend of mine and his
son was in the military when Iraq fell. He was there in Iraq
and he said that he went into Saddam Hussein's palaces and
went all through his palaces and he said he was astounded
at how beautiful and elegant those palaces were. The stone and the furniture the
floors, the rocks, the marble. He said it was just absolutely
astounding. And that's treasures of wickedness. Treasures of wickedness. He got that treasure by wicked
means, and he kept those treasures by wicked means. But what Ryder
says here that these riches, these treasures of wickedness,
they don't profit. They don't profit. I remember
when Saddam Hussein fell, I was watching a video when they finally
caught him, but later on when they finally gave him up to his
own people and they hanged him. He was fighting them and he was
mad at them. They hanged him and decapitated
him. They hanged him so roughly that
they decapitated him. Remember Qaddafi? Some of you
may remember another violent despot there that ruled over
Libya. He was rich too. They had riches
of kings. They kept alive whom they would
and killed whom they would. But when it come time for Gaddafi
to die, I remember his own people beat him. And he was dead and
he was still standing there. They were holding him up and
finally shot him. And that's what our text here
is saying here in verse 4. Riches profit not, in the dead
wrath. Boy, in the dead wrath. They
wouldn't turn the violence of His own people, their own people,
away from them even though they have all this treasure, all this
power and prestige. When it came down to die, the
treasures of wickedness profit nothing. And you know it's not
just so in their case, it's so in every case, isn't it? Treasures
of wickedness may seem for a while to bring a lot of pleasure. The
pleasures of sin for a season. But you know when it comes time
to die, He'll not turn away the face of death. When it comes
time to the judgment, the treasures of wickedness, the text here
said, will profit nothing. Profit nothing. But you know
you compare that to men who have been rich? Believers who have
been rich in this world, or they've not been rich, they've had some
kind of treasures, and they use that treasure for God's glory.
And instead of being treasures of wickedness, the Bible says
it's a sweet-smelling Savior. Paul was writing to the Philippian
church, and he says, you sent unto me, I don't know what they
sent, I don't know if it was money, I don't know if it was
something he needed, but he said, when you sent that to me, He
said it was like a sweet-smelling savor, not just to Paul, but
to God, a sacrifice well-pleasing to God. So there are treasures
of wickedness. People use their money for wicked
devices. They use their influence, their
power, or whatever they have for wicked devices. And in the
end, it won't profit. It'll never profit a thing. But
there are those too that use what they have, their influence,
their position in life, their wealth, they use it all for God's
glory and the good of His people, and that's a sacrifice well-pleasing
to God. But when we think here of the
treasures of wickedness, I want to use it in a different sense,
and I think probably the true sense, really, which Solomon
uses it, and it's used in other places. It goes beyond the natural
realm. and it enters into the spiritual
realm. It goes beyond the abuse of money
or the abuse of power and position and influence, and it extends
to the whole concept of false religion. And you know that's
mainly what the Bible is about. It's a religious book. It's a
spiritual book. Some people have a false hope
of heaven. They have a false hope of being
accepted with God at last. And that hope to them is great
treasure. Great treasure. Let me give you
one or two examples of this. Let me give you the Apostle Paul
before the Lord converted him. What did he say about his religious
activities? His praying and his fasting?
He said those were treasures to him. Listen to what he said,
I profited in the Jews religion above many of my equal. Now he
wasn't talking about profiting financially, he may have done
that, but he was talking about this vain confidence. He had
all of this confidence built up and to him it was a treasure. I profited, he said, in the Jews
religion above many of my equal. He had a lot of confidence in
his religious privileges and his religious duties. And there's
religious people today who can tell you everything that they've
ever given. Ain't that amazing? They keep
it down. Some of them keeps it down in
their mind. They can tell you almost every chapter in the Bible
they've read, how many prayers they've prayed, and how long,
and how many services they've attended. I used to read after
one of the old Puritans, and he set his clock and kept track
of how long he prayed. I don't know why he did that.
I'm glad I don't do that, aren't you? That wouldn't give me any
treasure to confidence. Paul's religion started from
his birth. Boy, I tell you, he built up
a vault of treasure. He said, I was circumcised the
eighth day. That's early to start religion.
He traced his lineage all the way back to the tribe of Benjamin.
His daddy and his mommy were religious people. They were Hebrew
of the Hebrews. He was brought up in the Jewish
religion at the feet of Gamaliel. He was brought up in Jerusalem,
that favorite city. And he said, the manner that
I lived was after the Pharisees. And you know what a Pharisee
was? Of all the religions, They were the most strictest religion. The word concerning the Pharisee
was this, if anybody makes it all the way, they will. If anybody
goes to heaven, they will. I wonder if the Lord Jesus was
speaking to the Apostle Paul before his conversion when he
spoke that parable about certain which trusted in themselves that
they were righteous and despised others You know Paul talked about
before his conversion how he despised other people, didn't
he? I was hateful, he said, and hated one another. And the Lord
told about this first. See, he went up to the temple
to pray and he said, God, I thank you that I'm not as other men
are. I abstain from extortion. I'm
not an unjust man. I abstain from adultery. I'm
not as this publican. You know what happens to these
men. You know what James said about rich men. Don't rich men
oppress you? They oppress the poor. Well,
you know it's the same thing in the religious realm. You take
a self-righteous man that's got all this treasure built up in
his heart. He despises broken-hearted Christians. And here this rich publican was,
rich in himself, rich in his own righteousness, and he looked
over at that publican and he said, I ain't like him. I'm a
better man than he is. I've abstained from all these
things and I fast twice a week. I pay tithes of all that I possess. This man had built up a chest
of human merit and that was his treasure, Wayne. That was his
treasure. But what did the Lord Jesus say? When he looked upon it, it wasn't
a treasure, was it? Treasure, yes, but of what? Look
at that in just a minute. The Apostle Paul had built up
this treasure. Yet what did he say about it?
What things were gained to me. I have all these treasures. But he found out they were treasures
of wickedness. And he said all of these treasures
I count lost for Christ. And I've suffered the loss of
all things and count them done that I may win And what did he
say about his treasures? He said, they're dumb. They're
treasures of wickedness. Brothers and sisters, I cannot
understand, and this is something I wouldn't offend anybody, if
I was going to offend anybody, it wouldn't be any of you today.
But I cannot understand, and Wayne's a perfect example of
this. Used to be in the Worldwide Church of God, deceived in that
mess, but when he came out of that mess, he said, I was wrong. And not only I was wrong, but
that was wickedness reign. When I was a kid, I was raised
up in the Free Will Baptist Church. My dad was a Free Will Baptist
preacher. I was baptized at least twice that I remember. But you
know what? I look back on that life and
you know what I say about that life? That was treasures of wickedness. That was treasures of wickedness.
And that's what the Apostle Paul said about his former religious
life. He said, I count it done, it's
treasures of wickedness. Now that's the first example
I want to give you. Here's another example of treasures of wickedness.
You know when a man's got treasures, he's got a lot of treasures and
he knows it, he loves to talk about them, don't he? He loves
to think about them. He can't get them off of his
mind, they're his treasures. And I tell you when he gets in
a pinch, He'll trust them, too. He'll trust them. Let me give
you an example of that. On the Day of Judgment, the Lord
Jesus said in Matthew 7, Many will say to me in that day, in
that day. What day is that? That's the
Day of Judgment, ain't it? Boy, that's the last day. That's
the very last hour. This is when men's eternal destinies
are being revealed. Either come ye blessed or depart
ye cursed. Boy, that's a solemn day. And
the Lord Jesus said, Many will say to me in that day, Lord,
have we not done many wonderful works in your name? Were they
not wonderful, Lord? Were they not treasures in your
eyes? They were in our eyes. We prophesied
in your name. We cast out devils in your name.
What did the Lord say to them? Depart from me, ye who work not. You mean to tell me preaching
in His name was work of iniquity? Casting out devils was works
of iniquity? Giving was works of praying,
reading, going to worship? That's what the Lord said. It
was treasures of wickedness. And He exposed them in that day.
But it shows you that that was their treasure because they started
pleading those things. When push came to shove, Lord,
look what we've done. We've got all these treasures.
And he said they're works of iniquity. They're treasures of
wickedness. Isaiah chapter 57 and verse 12,
listen to this. I will declare thy righteousness
and thy works for they shall not profit thee. I tell you one of the saddest
things and the most shocking thing is to stand before the
Lord on the day of judgment. and have all of these things
that you trusted in, whatever it is, religious activities and
religious duties that you trusted in, and have them exposed as
treasures of wickedness. Wouldn't that be shocking? It
will be shocking. It'll be shocking. These things
cannot deliver in the day of death. So that's my first point.
Some people, what they count as religious treasures, what they put their confidence
in will not profit them in the day of judgment and the day of
wrath. It will not profit them. But we see here in our text that
if one is delivered from death, then righteousness is required. But righteousness delivers from
death. Well, there's several deaths.
When you look in the Scripture, there's several deaths. And you
and I are concerned about these deaths. There's one dead in trespasses
and sin. I'm concerned about that, aren't
you? For myself and you. I don't want to be dead in trespasses
and sin. That's one death, Ephesians 2.1.
Physical death. It's appointed unto men once
to die. In Adam, all die. The Lord took
us from the dust and we're going back to the dust. Every one of
us is going to die. We're not going to escape death.
Religious death. And I tell you, there's another
death that's the most fearful death that anybody could think
about. And the scripture calls it the second death. And that's
the last death. That's eternal death. Listen
to this. Death and hell were cast into
the lake of fire. This is the second death. And from that death, there's
no deliverance. There's a deliverance from being
dead in trespasses and sin if the Spirit will quicken us and
give us life. There's certainly a resurrection
of the dead bodies. But I tell you, when a man goes
off into this second death, hell and death were cast into the
lake of fire. That's the second death. There's
no remedy. There's no deliverance. There's
no redemption from that death. And if there's a righteousness
that delivers from these deaths, Boy, I want it, don't you? I
want it. Well, he said there is. Righteousness
delivers from death. Now, the Bible says the unrighteous
shall not inherit the kingdom of God. So it's obvious that
God requires righteousness to enter the kingdom of heaven.
It's obvious that if you go to heaven, that if you're accepted
at last, then you've got to have a righteousness. If the unrighteous
shall not inherit the kingdom, then that tells us you've got
to have a righteousness to go. What kind of righteousness? What kind of righteousness do
we have to have? Well, let's look at this like this. If righteousness
is required, then boy, that eliminates the open and profane people,
doesn't it? Right off the bat, you can eliminate them. They're
not going into the kingdom of heaven. Fornicators, adulterers,
and drunkards, and liars, they have no part in the Kingdom of
Heaven. They don't even profess a righteousness.
Many of them do. Some fellow come up to you and
said, I'm not a religious person. I wouldn't brag too much about
that. You're just saying you're of all people most hopeless.
You're of all people most hopeless. Jeremiah asked the Lord to do
this. He said, Pour out your fury upon
the heathen that know thee not. and upon the families that call
not upon your name." There's people that never pray. They
spend their whole life in sin. Their families don't pray. If
you live with them a year, you'll never hear the Lord's name mentioned,
except it's in vain. They don't call upon the name
of the Lord. There are Bibles that sits on somebody's shelf
but never open, and they die and go to hell under God's wrath.
Because they don't have a righteousness that God requires. Secondly,
this cuts off the mere religious people who have a form of godliness,
but deny the power of God. They have a righteousness, but
it's a futile righteousness. It's not one God will accept.
They profess to know God, but in works they deny Him, being
abominable and disobedient, and to every good work reprobate.
And the Lord Jesus identifies these people this way, listen.
These people draw near to Me with their mouths, but their
heart is far from Me. They speak of Me with their lips,
but their heart is far from Me. How many people do we hear talking
about God? They talk about Jesus. They talk
about heaven. But he said, their heart is far
from me. It's easy to deceive me with
a man's mouth. There's people that sometimes,
and I listen to them talk, and I know they're lying to me. And
they can convince me they're telling me the truth. I'll stand
and listen to them. I'll think, well, is that right?
I've got a dear family member. Boy, I'm going to tell you, she
can convince me that black is white right in front of my eyes
and be looking at me. But you know you can't deceive the Lord. We can speak well of Him with
our lips, talk of Him and flatter Him, but you know He won't hear
it. You can't deceive Him. You can deceive yourself, you
can deceive others, but boy, you can't flatter Him, can you?
You can't flatter him. I remember when Nicodemus came
to him that one night, slipped and came to him in the darkness.
And he started out to flatter the Lord Jesus. He said, we know,
we know that your teacher come from God. Oh man, a lot. When
somebody says that about me, Bruce, I know you've been with
God. I know you come from God. Boy, I can tell you've been with
God. You come from God. Boy, that's flattering isn't
it? No man can do these miracles. You're doing miracles. You're
doing miracles. We know you're doing these miracles.
I appreciate you recognizing that. I really do. No man can
do these miracles except God be with him. God is with you. God is with you. And if that
would have been me, you know what I'd have said? Boy, I appreciate
that, Nicodemus. I'm glad you recognize me for
who I am. I've been with God. I'm from God. Yes, I did a lot
of great things. I just thank you. The Lord Jesus
didn't say that, did He? He saw through that man. And
he said, Nicodemus, except you're born again, I'm not here to listen
to your flattery. I know you're drawn near to me
with your lips. It's your heart that's far from
me. And if you're not born again, you can't enter, and you can't
see the kingdom of heaven. There's some folks that come
to the Lord Jesus one day, and they were these self-righteous
fellows, and they were going to teach him about the judgment
of God. Pilate had sinned up in Galilee and shed a bunch of
people's blood while they were worshiping. And they came to
the Lord Jesus and they said, boy, those were wicked people.
For a strange thing like that to happen, they were wicked people.
You know, you've got some people, and they know just exactly how
God judges people. If they hear that some poor saints
got sick, they say, boy, they've sinned against God. They hear
somebody's killed in an accident. Boy, the wrath of God fell on
them. They must have been wicked people. And that's what they
came to the Lord Jesus and told Him. Boy, we know these were
wicked people to suffer such judgment. And you know what the
Lord Jesus said to them? Except you repent, you shall
all likewise perish. You suppose those were sinners
above all men? They were more wicked than you?
Except you repent. So see, you can't flatter Him,
can you? You can't say, well, boy, I've got this righteousness
because I speak highly of Him and I talk about religion. He
can see through that, can't He? When you're talking about a righteousness
that delivers from death, it's not that kind. It's not that
kind. And thirdly, there's another
righteousness. There's another righteousness. We just talked
about this group of people, these scribes and Pharisees. Boy, they
had a righteousness. The Lord Jesus said they had
a righteousness. They live the strictest set of the Jewish religion. If you could think this morning
who you've got somebody in your family or some denomination and
you could put your finger on and you say, boy, that person
in their life, they're as strict as they can be. They're clean.
They live, if anybody ever wasn't an example of living like I think
you should live, that's that person, that's that denomination.
If you think who that is, Then you think of the Pharisees? The
Pharisees would put them to shame. Nobody in here this morning lives
the strict lifestyle and the clean lifestyle as these scribes
and Pharisees. And you know what the Lord Jesus
said? Except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness
of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall in no wise enter into
the kingdom of heaven. The Lord Jesus was saying a righteousness
is required. You've got to have it or you
can't enter in the kingdom of heaven. But he said that's not
it. That's not it. I imagine the majority of the
people give no thought to this very thing that we're looking
at this morning. Very, very few people give any thought of when
they talk about going to heaven. what's required to get there
and to be accepted when you get there. Very few people think
about that. A righteousness is required. That's why Peter said,
give a reason of the hope that's within you. And somebody says,
I'm going to heaven. You say, give me a reason. Give
me a reason why God's going to accept you at last and let you
into His house. And they can't give you a reason.
Hope without reason is presumption. His presumption is, it's like
faith without a foundation. It's vain. There was a king that
made a marriage feast for his son and sent his servant out
to bid people to come to the marriage. And he said, everything's
prepared. My dinner's, my fat one's being killed. Come to the
wedding. Come to the wedding. Some of them made light of it,
went to their farms and the merchandise to die. We're not interested.
Some of them got real mean and abused his servant. So he sent
an army and destroyed them. And then they furnished the guests,
good and bad. Everybody was there at the wedding.
And here come the king in! And the first thing he saw was
a man at that wedding without a wedding garment on. Now that tells us something,
doesn't it? It tells us it's not just going
to the wedding. It's not just going to heaven.
You've got to find out what's required of you when you get
there. And the king came in and looked at that man and he said,
how come you in here? Not having a wedding garment.
Not having a wedding garment. You'd have thought that man would
have said to himself, now I'm going to this wedding. And this
is the king's son getting married. And I better dress appropriately. But for some reason or another,
he didn't even think about that. And when the king confronted
him with it, the Bible says he was speechless. What are you
doing in here without a wedding garment? I don't know. I never
even thought about it. Well, you bind him hand and foot
and take him away. He's not welcome in here. He's
not qualified to be in here. Why? He don't have a wedding
garment on. And that's the righteousness
that you and I must have. Now, thirdly, what is this righteousness?
said a lot about getting to this point, but what is this righteousness,
quickly? And I'll be quick on this point. I want to be quick
because I want to impress what this really is upon you. Four simple things. Our text says here, this righteousness
delivers from death, but the third text I read said even more
than that. And the way of this righteousness
is life. eternal everlasting life. And
listen to this, and in the pathway thereof, there is no death. If you've got this righteousness,
then you've got eternal life. With this righteousness comes
eternal life. And if you have this righteousness, you're not
subject to death. No death can gobble you up if
you have this righteousness. four simple things about this
righteousness. I want you to turn, you can leave
our text, and go to Isaiah chapter 45 right quickly. Isaiah chapter
45. And look in verse 21. Isaiah
chapter 45 and verse 21. It's on page 803 in your pew
bible. Isaiah 45 and verse 21, Tell
ye, and bring them near, yea, let them take counsel together.
Who hath declared this from ancient time? Who hath told it from that
time? Have not I the Lord? And there
is no God else besides Me? A just God and a Savior, there
is none beside Me. Look unto Me, and be ye saved,
all the ends of the earth, for I am God, and there is none else.
I have sworn by myself the word is gone out of my mouth in righteousness,
and shall not return, that unto me every knee shall bow, and
every tongue shall swear." Now, if we compare that to Philippians
2, we know who this is, don't we? This is Jesus Christ, the
Son of God speaking. Because the Bible says He was
obedient to death, the death of the cross, and God has highly
exalted Him, given Him a name that's above every name, and
at His name, Every knee shall bow, and every tongue shall swerve.
So this is the Lord Jesus Christ saying here, unto me every knee
shall bow. Well, look what He says in verse
24. Surely shall one say, in the Lord have I righteousness
and strength. So who is this saying this? This
is the Lord Jesus Christ. And here is what He is saying.
Somebody is going to say, In the Lord Jesus Christ, I have
righteousness. So what's the first point about
this righteousness that's required, that delivers from death? It
resides in a single person. The Lord Jesus Christ is my righteousness. Isn't this a wonderful thing?
This is the most wonderful thing that I can imagine that there's
a person in heaven. He's the Lord of glory, the King
of kings. He's seated there at the right
hand of God. He'll never change. He'll never
be moved. His righteousness will never
be diminished. And I have that man's righteousness. That's the righteousness that's
required. The Lord our righteousness. You find this righteousness all
through the Scriptures. It's called the robe of righteousness. It's called the garments of salvation. It's called the skirts of the
Lord that He spreads over our nakedness. It's called the best
robe, His comeliness, His beauty. It's called pure linen, clean
and white. Whatever name it goes under,
He is that righteousness. Righteousness resides in the
Lord Jesus. Christ. Why is it His? Because He worked it out. When
He was here below, He worked it out by His own obedience from
the cradle to the grave. He perfectly obeyed His Father's
will. He satisfied justice. He did
everything that God required of Him, and He did it perfectly. Listen to Romans 5.19. As by
one man's disobedience, Adam's disobedience, many were made
sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous."
It's his obedience. Have you ever heard of this before?
Are you here this morning and you've never heard that you need
a righteousness? And this righteousness that you
need and must have to enter the kingdom of heaven resides in
this single person, the Son of God. Have you ever heard that
before? Well, here it is, isn't it? This is the name wherewith
He shall be called the Lord our righteousness. And how many times
do some of you bow in prayer and you say, Lord, You're my
righteousness. You're my righteousness. And Paul said, I don't want to
be found having my own righteousness, did he? No, I don't want a righteousness
of another. Jesus Christ. Secondly, the second
thing about this is this. This righteousness comes by a
look. Look what He said up in verse
22 again. Look unto Me, and be you saved, all the ends of the
earth, for I am God, and there is none else. It comes by a look. Look unto Me. You want righteousness? You can't work it up. You can't
work it out. You can't earn it. You can't
merit it. It comes by a look. You can't pray enough. You can't
read enough. You can't be faithful enough.
And you want to do all these things if you're a believer.
But righteousness don't come that way. It comes by a look. It comes by a look to this God-man. who has already accomplished
righteousness and is seated there in heaven to give this righteousness
to everybody that looks to Him for it. Old Charles Spurgeon,
when he was just a teenager, you remember this story. When
he was just a teenager and got stuck in the snow storm at that
little Methodist church and the fellow was up preaching from
this text right here, looking to me. I am God. A just God and
a Savior. I'm the God-man. Look unto me,
and be ye saved." And Spurgeon said, I've been trying to save
myself. He said, I was so confused, my mind was in darkness. But
he said, at that very instant, I looked out of myself. I looked
out of my guilt, away from my sin, and I looked to Jesus Christ,
this God-man. And he said, just like that,
I was saved. That's the way we're saved. We
got into this mess by a look. We'll get out of it by luck.
Look unto Me and be ye saved. What do you look to Him for?
Righteousness. Righteousness. By one man's offense, death reigned
by one, much more they which received abundance of grace,
and listen to this, and of the gift of righteousness. It's a gift. It's a gift. You say, well, if I work hard
enough, will He give it to me? If you start working, you're
going the opposite direction. That's just what I'm saying. We're praying people. We're giving
people. We're reading people. That's
not why we have this righteousness. Some people say, well, if I'll
be faithful enough, finally. No, it starts at the beginning. Before you do anything, you've
got to look. You've got to look for this righteousness.
It's a gift of God. A gift of God. Abraham believed
in the Lord, and it was counted to him for righteousness. And it wasn't written for Abraham's
sake alone that it was counted to him, but for you also. to
whom it shall be counted, if you believe on Him, that raised
Jesus the Lord from the dead, that was delivered for our offenses,
and raised again for our justification." It's a look, isn't it? A look
of faith, the eye of faith. I went out the other day robbing,
wanted to know if I could come out and see our daughter, Missy,
there in the hospital. And we had a little short prayer with
her. And while I was praying, that's what I was thinking in
my heart, Lord, give Missy eyes. If she wants to be forgiven,
give her eyes to look to You. If she wants eternal life, give
her eyes to look to You. Because that's where forgiveness
is. That's where life is. Looking
to Him. And if you're here this morning
and you're lost, I hope you don't leave here until you look. Look
out of yourself to Jesus Christ. That's the way this righteousness
comes. And if you don't, I don't care what other righteousness
you have, it won't deliver in the day of death. It just won't.
Only one righteousness will deliver, and that's His. Ain't but one
way to get it, and that's looking through the eye of faith for
this gift. Something else he says here in
verse 25 about this righteousness. Look here what else it does.
And the Lord shall all the seed of Israel be justified, and they
shall glory. This righteousness, it justifies
us from everything. How can God be just and justify
people like us? Disrighteousness. Somebody's
obeyed for us. Somebody's worked for us. Somebody's
pleased God for us. And now when He gives us this
righteousness, He not only gives us this righteousness, He said
all your sins are forgiven now. They're all forgiven. Nobody
can lay anything to your charge because God has justified you.
On what grounds? Disrighteousness. God just can't
come to us and say, I'm a God of love, so I'm just going to
forgive you. I'm a God of mercy, so I'm just going to say it.
He can't do that. He's a just God as well as a Savior. So justification
comes through this righteousness of another man. I read a story
years ago, and I probably told you about it. You probably know
as well as I do by now. This young guy, this teenage
fellow that went up in the mountains in the wintertime and got caught
in the snowstorm. And when they found his frozen
dead body, he scribbled out a little note, My greatest fear, will
God forgive my sins? Will God forgive? That's my greatest
fear. Wouldn't it be awful to die like
that? How can God forgive a man's sins?
How can God justify us from all the evil that we've done through
this righteousness? When you look to Him, this righteousness
is given to you, and it justifies you. Blessed is the man to whom
the Lord imputeth righteousness without works. That's what David
said. Blessed are those whose sins
are forgiven and whose iniquities are covered. I tell you, when
you stand at death and when you stand before God on the Day of
Judgment, this righteousness, This righteousness will deliver
you. There will be no condemnation to you then. Lastly is this. Those who have this righteousness
will never die. They'll never die. Our text said,
In the pathway thereof there is no death. You say, Bruce, we're going to
die, aren't we? We're going to die physically. But listen to
what the Lord Jesus said about that. I am the resurrection and
the life. He that believeth in me, though
he were dead, yet shall he live. There is not even a permanent
death, physically speaking, in this righteousness. In the way
of this righteousness is life and there is no death. And then
he said in the very next verse, And whosoever liveth and believeth
in me shall never die. Your soul will never die. Boy,
if you die outside of Christ, death will swallow you up. Death
will gobble you up and you can't get out of it. Boy, but this
righteousness, this righteousness, Blessed and holy is he that hath
part in the first resurrection, on such the second death hath
No power. They'll reign in life by this
righteousness. They'll reign in life. They'll
sit on crowns. They'll put crowns on their heads
and they'll sit with the Lord Jesus in His throne. They'll
reign. They'll reign. Oh, I want that
righteousness, don't you? I want it. You say, Bruce, how
are we supposed to live? You know something? If you've
got this righteousness, it'll teach you how to live. It will
teach you how to live. Because with this righteousness
comes forgiveness. With this righteousness comes
life eternal. With this righteousness comes a new creature. But you
start out with it. You start out with it. Look,
look, and be his save. Good preaching. That's good preaching. Now that will stand, brother
and sister, when this world is on fire. The old hymn writer
said, Jesus, thy blood and thy righteousness, my beauty are,
my glorious dress, misflaming worlds in these arrayed, with
joy shall I lift up my head. Give some thought to this. Give
some thought to this. Make sure the righteousness that
you have resides in Jesus Christ alone. Make sure it's that which
He's accomplished in the days of His flesh. Make sure He's
given it to you by looking to Him, a gift through the eye of
faith. Make certain of that. Don't go
through this life saying, well, I think I may make it. I hope
to make it without any reason. This is your reason. This righteousness
that He gives you, will open heaven's door for you. And He'll
run death away from you. He'll never touch you. He'll
never touch you. Lord bless this Word. Let's pray.