“The
Search For Significance –
Seeing
your true worth through God's eyes”
Robert
S. McGee
Chapter 4 – God's Answer to the
Performance Trap: Justification
- When God thinks about you, does he deceive himself in some way, or does he know who you truly are?
- If he knows who we truly are, then why do we say, “In God's eyes I am truly righteous”, “forgiven”, “loved”, “pleasing” and so on? Are we trying to say that God is not living in reality? Or that he overlooks our faults?
- Eiother he knows who you are, or he doesn't. Playing with words like this dishonors God, and it stops us from experiencing the reality of who we are
- Now, here is another question. If you see yourself differently than God, who is mistaken, you or God?
- Yet often we allow our minds to overrule what God says is true
- We were made by God for God
- He created needs in us that only he can fill
- One of these is the need for self-worth
- When we try to meet that need by other people, we will end up frustrated
- In our minds, we are constantly talking to ourselves
- What are we talking about? Often it is about how well we are doing, based on our performance, and others' opinions about us
- We so often fall into the trap of using the formula:
- Self-worth = Performance + Others' Opinions
- This is a lie from Satan, designed to lock us into the performance trap
- God cancelled this equation totally
- He has given us a secure self-worth totally apart from our ability to performance
- When Christ died on the cross more happened than just our forgiveness
- 2 Cor 5:21 “God made him who had no sin, to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God”
- So God placed our sin upon Jesus, and gave us his righteousness. What an exchange!
- We have been justified – made just
- Justification carries no guilt with it and has no memory of past transgressions
- Christ paid for all our sins at the cross, past, present and future
- Hebrews 10:17 “Their sins and lawless acts I will remember no more” - quote from Jer 31:34
- We are completely forgiven by God
- In the same act of love through which God forgave our sins, he also provided for our righteousness, the worthiness to stand in God's presence
- By imputing righteousness to us, God attributes Christ's worth to us
- We are no longer condemned sinners
- Instead, we are fully forgiven, righteous and are now fully pleasing to God
- God wants his redeemed to experience the reality of that redemption
- We are forgiven and righteous by Christ's sacrifice, not by our performance
- So we are pleasing to God in spite of our failures
- This reality can replace our fear of failure with peace, hope and joy
- Failure need not be a millstone around our neck
- Neither success nor failure is the proper pasis for our self-worth
- Christ alone is the source of our forgiveness, freedom, joy and purpose
- This does not mean that our actions are irrelevant
- Our sinful actions, words and attitudes griev e the Lord, but our staus as holy beloved children remsains intact
- Addiction to the approval of others
- We look for other people's approval whren we succeed
- We love it. This can become an addiction
- Sometimes we enjoy success so much we leave God to one side
- We may judge those who fail, and consider ourselves better than them
- Then when we fail we judge ourselves mercilessly
- Sense of hopelessness
- This can either drive us toward depending on God, or into passivity
- Psassoivity will never achieve victory
- God wants our active cooperation
- Desire to live life by some formula
- In order to receive justification and its results, we must receive it through our relationship with Jesus, not by performing some ritual
- Need to control
- If we base our worth on what Christ did for us, we will feel a loss of control
- Christ's love motivates us to live for him
- Sin is destructive and should be avoided
- The Father lovingly disciplines us for wrongdoing
- Not the same as punishment
Punishment : Discipline
Source - God's
wrath : God's love
Purpose - To
avenge a wrong : To correct a wrong
Results
in - Alienation : Reconciliation
Personal
result - Guilt : A righteous lifestyle
Directed
toward - Non-believers : His children
- His commands for us are good
- We will receive eternal rewards for obedience
- Christ is worthy of our obedience
Discussion Questions
- What does it mean to be justified? Rom 3:19-28, 4:4-5, 5:1-11
- Are we as righteous as Christ? 2 Cor 5:21, Col 1:22, 3:12, Heb 10:14
- Are you remembering sins God has forgotten? Rom 4:6-8, Heb 10:17
- If your good works don't make you more pleasing to God, why should you be involved in good works?
