Devotion #3: Right and Wrong

From the time we are starting to take our first steps, say our first words, and make our own decisions, we are told what is right and what is wrong. From simple things such as Michigan football is good and Ohio State football is bad (in my household), to more advanced things such as lying is bad and telling the truth is good. We learn from a young age what is right and wrong depending on what kind of house we grew up in.  

1. What was right and what was wrong in your household? 

2. How have these things affected your life now? 

The truth with human nature is that the moment we are presented with a choice to do good or do bad we tend to side with the bad. The bad can make us feel good. It makes us feel we are in control. Yet, the good can also make us feel good like we did something right. 

Romans 3:21-26 says, “But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it - the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.” 

Romans 3:23 paints a very vivid picture that every single person that has ever lived (or will live) has done wrong, and that wrong makes us “fall short” of the righteousness of God.  

3. After reading these verses, what is the “righteousness of God”?  

4. Why is this something we cannot acquire on our own? 

5. Why is God qualified to say what is right and wrong? 

Because we sin or do wrong, we are unable to be righteous. The prophet Isaiah says in Isaiah 64:6, “All our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment.”  

6. What do you think Isaiah means by this? 

The point of this entire passage is that we are only made righteous through the work of Jesus Christ. It does not matter if we have done a lot of good things. It does not matter that we know what is right and wrong or bad and good. As I stated before, those things can be different based on what we were taught. Christ is the only One who makes us righteous because of the work He did on the cross.