Luke 16:15, “And He said to them, “You are those who justify yourselves in the sight of men, but God knows your hearts; for that which is highly esteemed among men is detestable in the sight of God.”

The Bible is clear, a sinner in the eyes of God will not garner up the perfect righteousness in order to appease or propitiate His wrath on their sin. Adam and Eve found out immediately, there was nothing they could do to rectify what they had done. God laid down the terms, a Redeemer would be needed to remedy this rift now between man and God.

But that doesn’t stop sinful man and world religions. They continue to attempt to reduce the standard set by God, perfection and spotlessness and set their own standards God must comply by.  If He fails to accept these subjective sinful standards, faith in Him cannot be garnered. Who is behind this wicked, wretched mentality? Satan himself, as he continues to influence the depraved nature of man and the attempts to reduce God and His power and His standard.

If we could by our own righteousness save ourselves, Jesus would of never needed to leave His throne and die in our place. There are some wretched false teachers out there who would have you believe that Jesus died as a billboard display or as an example of what we must do. They claim His atonement was not an atonement, but a meaningless display. They would have you believe there was no redemption, as you will redeem yourself. They would have you believe the perfection standard of God’s holiness should be tossed aside, and the subjective relativistic standard they set is the new standard of holiness.

Some believe upon their supposed justification, they can remain sinless in an unglorified body. Paul makes it abundantly CLEAR that while we are in our fallen bodies, we will all fall short of the perfection needed. And that the ONLY way to contain the righteousness NEEDED for salvation is by the person and work of Jesus Christ. A sinner is saved ONLY by faith alone in His righteousness, His perfection, His cleanliness which by Romans 4-5 state THEN is imputed/credited as our own righteousness.

Is salvation a license to sin? No!  It is freedom from its penalty, but gives no such license. However, it also is an acknowledgement of who the saved sinner is NOW a slave to, that is to Christ and His righteousness.  In short, we will stumble, we do not seek to stumble, a new creation in Christ desires NOT to sin but IF we do, we repent, we confess, we give thanks again to Jesus Christ and His payment for that sin.

Being a “good” person will NOT save you! Being better than the worst criminal, will NOT save you!  Those IN Christ, meaning His children are IN His Kingdom now because they have been FORGIVEN once and for all time, which is the Good News!  Jesus died ONCE in our place, believe in this and that He rose so that you too shall rise, and you will be saved from God’s pending wrath and an eternal hell away from Him!