He is Our Righteousness

Deuteronomy 8:2–5 (ESV) And you shall remember the whole way that the Lord your God has led you these forty years in the wilderness, that he might humble you, testing you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep his commandments or not. 3 And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord. 4 Your clothing did not wear out on you and your foot did not swell these forty years. 5 Know then in your heart that, as a man disciplines his son, the Lord your God disciplines you.

The root of discipleship is discipline. A disciple is one who is disciplined by certain events SO THAT they might do more important certain events. A soldier disciplines his body to run, crawl, hike, aim, shoot and press on in challenging circumstances. A musician practices rudimentary disciplines by repeatedly doing the same thing over and over again so that their hands are trained to do something wonderful when it counts. The same goes for a dancer, a mathematician, a scientists. Those who end up contributing to great causes or ventures in our world are those who have taken the time to be disciplined when it did not matter.

The same is true for those whom the Lord calls. Israel was now being told to REMEMBER that the Lord God had been grooming them for what they are about to embark upon. The forty years of wilderness wanderings were going to train them for the captivity of the promised land. Israel would survive and thrive if it recalled that great disciplinary truth: Man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.

God reminds them of the "whole way" He led them. He fed them the whole way with miraculous bread. They had to obey God's voice to get up every day and receive His promise. Christian, we are called to get up everyday and receive God's Promise. The manna in the wilderness was pointing to the Christ who would come as the bread of life and give food to the masses miraculously. We are to go to Him every day and enjoy His life in our lives. 

What do we find in Christ? We find our righteousness with God. We like Israel failed to trust God int he wilderness. Yet Christ trusted Him and succeeded for us. We are to look to Christ and press onward in our faith knowing that we have a righteousness before God in Him. Every day will bring about spiritual hunger because of our sins and the sinfulness of our world. But Christ has righteousness waiting for us. We come to Him and eat of that which we do not have - a righteousness from God. 


Romans 1:16–17 (ESV) For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.”

Note ti is the "righteousness of God" not the righteousness of people Paul points us toward. This is why the manna is repeatedly referred to as "unknown" by the people of Israel. They did not KNOW it because it did not come from them. It came from a strange place that neither they nor their fathers were familiar with. 

It is so important that we discipline ourselves in personal devotion to Christ - looking to Him for what we do not have in ourselves. Christ's work for us is that clothing that does not wear out and that peace for our feet as we walk forward in faith. But we must come back again and again to the bread of life. Without His righteousness upon us, we will fall either into personal self-righteousness or sinful despondency - never feeling again the right nor the need to come to God. THAT is a dangerous place. 

Thankfully God has provided a safe place through His Son. Let us go to Him.

Amen.