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Discussion Forum : Articles and Sermons : Do Not Trust In Your Own Righteousness by Zac Poonen

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 Do Not Trust In Your Own Righteousness by Zac Poonen


In Luke 18:9 we read: “He also told this parable to some people who trusted in themselves that they were righteous.”

There is a righteousness of faith, which is a gift from God. And there is a righteousness which we can produce ourselves. The way to find out which one you have is to ask yourself whether you are proud of your righteousness. If so, then you must have produced it yourself. If you had the righteousness of God which was received as a gift from Him, you would be thankful for it, but you could not be proud of it. Pharisees have a righteousness that they are proud of.

You can be proud of a book that you wrote, but you cannot be proud of a book that someone else wrote. So if you are proud of some good quality you have in your life – whether humility, or generosity, or prayerfulness, or whatever it is, you must have produced it yourself. If you are generous and hospitable, and you are proud of it, then those qualities may be just human qualities, and not the divine nature, because if they were part of God’s nature that He had given you freely, how could you boast about them? To be hospitable is a good virtue, but if you are proud of it, then your hospitality stinks before God.

This principle applies to other areas too – that have nothing to do with righteousness. Maybe you can sing better than others, or play an instrument better, or preach better, or perhaps your church is larger than someone else’s church. Anything that you are proud of is the result of your own labour. If it was God’s work, you could not boast about it.

Many boast about the sacrifices they have made for the Lord. That makes it obvious that they have not seen the immensity of Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross for them. Can you see a single star when the sun is shining? No. When the sacrifice of Jesus on Calvary becomes as bright as the sun in our minds, all our petty sacrifices will disappear like the stars in the daytime – and we won’t even call them “sacrifices” any more. If you can remember all your sacrifices, then you must be in the darkness still – for it is only at night that we can see the stars!!

Come in faith and humility and receive the righteousness of God that he offers you in Christ – and give Him all the glory for it, all the days of your life. Then you will never be a Pharisee.


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SI Moderator - Greg Gordon

 2011/12/9 11:04Profile
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 Re: Do Not Trust In Your Own Righteousness by Zac Poonen

Thanks a lot for posting this brother. What I like with Brother Zac's teaching is such wonderful example he gives that illustrates clearly what he likes to say. Even in normal discussions when you question him on some subject he will give an immediate answer with similar illustrations.


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Sreeram

 2011/12/9 14:32Profile









 Re: Do Not Trust In Your Own Righteousness by Zac Poonen

Oh great! First Poonen casts Solomon out of heaven because he looked to God and didn't have a righteousness of his own to trust, then in commanding not to trust in one's own righteousness he tells man to look at what he himself is doing. Can't you see through this Greg?

OJ

 2011/12/10 0:00
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 Re:

Indeed, our high achievements can become objects of pride. Of course there is a flip side to Poonen’s use of human achievement as his illustration: It is possible that mediocrity and slothfulness is also a source of pride - more common today than in the past, I think. When such a person measures himself against those who excel, in his own assessment, he is always the more humble one.

Where pride and excellence become merged in people’s minds, then the mediocre gets favored as the more humble, and the excellent gets marginalized. And so such godly music as Handel’s Messiah falls under the radar completely. After all, the virtuoso soprano singing “Rejoice Greatly” must surely be proud.

I know that is NOT what is Poonen is saying! It is just that in my experience as a musician, this has become a common “logical” line of reasoning among God’s people.

I suspect its best to leave aside the need to judge motives. We don’t even know our own, and trying to do so, merely draws us into self-absorption, inaccurate grades, or faulty efforts at being more humble. God can manage our pride quite well!



Diane



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Diane

 2011/12/10 10:07Profile
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 Re:

Quote:
Oh great! First Poonen casts Solomon out of heaven because he looked to God and didn't have a righteousness of his own to trust, then in commanding not to trust in one's own righteousness he tells man to look at what he himself is doing. Can't you see through this Greg?



Brother,

I see nothing wrong in what brother zac is writing in this article. If we do not have the righteousness from God and are not working "this" righteousness out with fear and trembling then we are not guaranteed security in being "saved" for being saved is not just past-tense but also a present tense working out of that salvation which is a gift from God. But clearly the bible commands our obedience to the Gospel and not just a passive mental assent to it. Anyone who obeys the commands of Jesus Christ by the grace of Jesus Christ has nothing to boast in. Anyone who believes in Jesus Christ but does not obey His commands but pleas that His grace is wonderful for forgiveness does not know the Gospel for who could keep living a life of sin if they knew Christ obtained not just forgiveness but freedom from sins also.

Ephesians 5:5
For of this you can be sure: No immoral, impure or greedy person—such a person is an idolater—has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God.

Galatians 5:21
and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.

1 Corinthians 6:9-10
Or do you not know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

Galatians 6:7
Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.

James 1:16
Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters.


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SI Moderator - Greg Gordon

 2011/12/10 10:18Profile









 Re:

Greg

Unless you are now sinless, you ARE living a life of sin. You may be attempting to moderate it even with a measure of success, but nonetheless if you sin in even the smallest matter you are still guilty of ALL sin, including blasphemy, murder, sodomy and adultery. That is the point that James makes here. ‘For whosoever shall keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.’ And later ‘Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.’

You, like me, in the omission of doing even the smallest good that is possible are guilty of the highest crimes against God possible. Poonen says pride of one’s own righteousness proves that one has no righteousness, thereby causing many to feign humility. The reality is that even if one is NOT proud of some righteousness, that they still have no righteousness of their own. That is the point that Isaiah makes, ‘ALL our righteousnesses are as filthy rags’. Even the very ‘best’ (and I use that word loosely) of saints has NOT ONE righteousness of his own. GG, ZP and OJ whether proud or not are ALTOGETHER (that is, there is not an ounce of inherent righteousness in any of them) miserable rotten sinners.

OJ

 2011/12/10 12:55
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Brother,

Your viewpoint you are expressing is not consistent with the whole of the Scriptures in the New Testament. Yes we are sinners and yes we are saved by grace. But unless that grace is working in us to make us holy in character and conduct we are not saved. That is the truth of the New Testament. The scriptures I shared also in the above post clearly give this opinion and there are hundreds of others.

A full Gospel is one that saved the sinner by grace, forgives him, regenerates him, and then enables him to walk pleasing to God.

Paul the apostle said it was His aim to walk pleasing to God. So we must embrace and accept both extremes of people who believe the Gospel of Forgiveness and the Gospel of Freedom of Sin.

Both are equally true, liberating and both glory God.


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SI Moderator - Greg Gordon

 2011/12/10 13:08Profile
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 Re:

Quote:

Poonen says pride of one’s own righteousness proves that one has no righteousness, thereby causing many to feign humility.



Dear Brother, Brother Zac never said this, please read well before posting. He said if one is pride about his righteousness then, her/her righteousness is not from God, but it is out of one's own definitions. Such a person is self righteous like Pharisees.
Jesus himself said this,
Mathew 5-20:-
For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.

Please blame Jesus for discouraging people like how you blamed Mr Poonan, if at all you can.

Quote:

The reality is that even if one is NOT proud of some righteousness, that they still have no righteousness of their own.



Brother Zac never said if you do not have pride about your righteousness then you are righteous. Only if you think you do not have you will seek. If you think you have something then what you think you have will also be taken away.


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Sreeram

 2011/12/10 13:36Profile









 Re:

Quote:

Your viewpoint you are expressing is not consistent with the whole of the Scriptures in the New Testament.



Like most, you want to measure on a curve, God measures in the absolute. What pleases God is that we trust Him, which trust is an absolute measure. Either my confidence for righteousness is placed ENTIRELY in Christ, or some part of it is placed elsewhere.

Sanctification on the other hand can only be measured in the partial, it is never absolute. This is so that man will not think of himself above that which is written.

Paul rightly sees himself as chief of sinners a title which can ONLY belong to him. Do you know the reason for this? The sin that remained in him after salvation was against the most grace ever shown to a man. None other can claim this title, yet the more grace each of us is shown in relationship with God, the more offense even our "smaller" sins become before God. It is this that is meant to throw us back upon the mercy of Christ.

Quote:
A full Gospel is one that saved the sinner by grace, forgives him, regenerates him, and then enables him to walk pleasing to God.



Do you ever sin? and if so, is your sin pleasing to God? If your sin is not pleasing to God, what do you have that is pleasing to God?


OJ

 2011/12/10 14:08









 Re:

Brother Greg writes........

"Yes we are sinners and yes we are saved by grace. But unless that grace is working in us to make us holy in character and conduct we are not saved. That is the truth of the New Testament."

Brother, words are very important and semantics can lead us down some very strange paths. Your above statement is not clear at all and perhaps you can clear it up? A man is either saved or he is not. If he is genuinly saved, then the righteusness that God sees when He looks at such a man is the righteousness of Christ. The man can add nothing to the righteousness of Christ. This is not a lisense for sin, in fact if anyone used it as such it would be proof that they were not saved in the first place. And as Paul would say " God forbid." Yet, by your above statement, one's salvation, ar standing before God would be in a constant state of flux and their would be no security, in fact great insecurity. Salvation is not a process in the sense that we are trying to be sanctified so as to be justified. This is the Catholic postion and led directly to the heresy of purgatory......... brother Frank

 2011/12/10 14:41





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