I am a Jesus pusher!!! “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be filled” (Matthew 5:6). While the definition of righteousness does not change from the Old Covenant to the New Covenant, certainly the contextual experience does. If God is righteousness, any experienced righteousness must require Him. For instance, sin (opposite of righteousness) exists in every attempt I make to be like God apart from Him. This was the experience of the Old Testament. God called us to be holy. The Law was an explanation of what this would consist. If a righteous God became a man, the Law demonstrated the actions of His nature. The Law stated how God would live if He were a human being. Man, without the nature of God, desperately attempted to meet that standard. No wonder Paul shouted, “Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good. Has then what is good become death to me? Certainly not! But sin, that it might appear sin, was producing death in me through what is good, so that sin through the commandment might become exceedingly sinful” (Romans 7:12-13). It was not the Law that was sinful; sin was the attempt to live the law apart from the nature of God. This was the experience of the Old Testament.
Self-sourcing not only produces activities of sin, but is sinful by its existence. The self-sourced individual is sinful in his nature; he is without God who is righteousness. The self-sourced individual is sinful in every activity; he cannot conform to the desire of God. “But we are all like an unclean thing, and all our righteousnesses are like filthy rags;” (Isaiah 64:6). This is not only true in worldly, ungodly living, but it is also true in religious, ceremonial living. Religion in its best performance is still sin when it is self-sourced! The Spirit of Jesus must possess and source us. I am a Jesus pusher!!!