Grace Notes - Romans 5 v 17

Romans 5:17 - "For if by the trespass of the one man Adam, death reigned through the one man how much more will those who receive God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ".

Rob Rufus shows us that the free gift of righteousness through Jesus sacrifice at the cross, is exactly that, a free gift. This seems too good to be true. It is all through Jesus and has nothing to do with our performance or good works.

The most amazing fact with this free gift is the more we live in the fullness of it the closer we get to God and the greater he works through us.

I'll let Rob explain: -

"How do you reign in life? Through having faith in the gift of righteousness. Romans 5:17 - "For if by the tresspass of the one man Adam, death reigned through the one man how much more will those who receive God's abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ". So here is the biggest contradiction to the brainwashing of the religious community in the world. The religious world says if you want to reign and rule in life and have success in life then you have got to do a whole lot of things, perform, keep laws and rules and regulations - you have got to live holy and act righteous all the time. The Bible contradicts that in the New Testament. It says if you want to reign in life, it is not through what you do but through what you receive. You receive the abundant provision of grace as a gift of righteousness. A gift is something you don't pay for.

Now if someone gives you a gift and tells you it is free but a week later they invite you to do something with them and you say no I haven't got time and they say; "Yes but I was generous to you last week" - then it was not a gift - it was a setup! It was a demonic ambush to manipulate you with guilt to do something for them. Now that is why when we hear that God gives righteousness as a gift, we struggle to believe that because we think He is like a human being giving you something that is not really free but is obligating you to do something for Him. But this is a gift from a God who is absolutely pure, holy and righteous and would never manipulate you. He means it is a GIFT and when you get this GIFT you are not obligated to do ANYTHING for God! It is a gift of righteousness and righteousness means "right standing with God!".

It means that God looks at you in exactly the same way as He looks at Jesus! All the time - every second of every moment of all day! It is a gift and you reign in life through receiving this gift and raising your faith by the hearing about this gift to higher levels!

You see Jesus Christ's perfect faith before the Father is what causes you to stand in righteousness before the Father. So you don't even need perfect faith! Your imperfect faith is represented by Jesus's perfect faith before the Father so that all the time you are righteous even when your faith is very weak. But here's the deal. The benefits here on the earth go up as your faith increases. In other words in heaven, you are righteous all the time but if your faith in His gift of righteousness is at a very low level and you walk around going; "Oh I am so unworthy, I am so guilty, I am so condemned" but in heaven, all heaven is saying; "No you are not! You are worthy! You are the righteousness of God - perfect faith in heaven!".

But you see if your faith is low then you don't walk in the reality and experience of the fact. We are positioned in Christ Jesus in heaven in righteousness but how we live it out in experience and enjoy the benefits of that is according to the level of faith that we are the righteousness of God in Christ Jesus.

So the reason why some people struggle to that we are the righteousness of God is simply because their faith in that gift is low. But the more your faith grows that you are righteous, the more authority in your life, the more victory over sin, the more joy and the more blessings - which we are going to see in a moment. But let's say God we need a fool-proof righteousness because we act like a fool sometimes. We need a devil-proof righteousness because we hear about this and then the devil comes along and says; "Yes but you have sinned so you are not righteousness anymore". We need a failure-proof righteousness because none of us are walking perfectly in this life ... yet.

What is the foundation for that? The basis of our righteousness has to be taken away from our performance and put on the performance of Some one who is always perfect. So here is the basis of a fool-proof, devil-proof, failure-proof righteousness that we have as a gift because it is not based on your obedience, but the obedience of the one Man Jesus Christ. For all human beings death reined through Adam's disobedience now in Christ we all reign in life through one Man Jesus Christ and His obedience."