Righteousness by Faith

In the charred landscapes left behind by the Los Angeles wildfires, a persistent sign of life has transfixed locals: trees. On lots where houses have been reduced to piles of rubble and cars to mangled metal husks, trees rise. These surviving oaks, pines and orange trees are often the only remaining landmarks in a neighborhood, bittersweet reminders of a time before so much tragedy.

The trees’ survival was a curiosity to many. Shouldn’t they have burned alongside homes?

The trees survived because they are filled with water: The roots draw moisture from soil and transport it through branches to its leaves. When the fires erupted in January, trees in Los Angeles had been especially nourished after two previous rainy winters. All that water makes burning a living tree akin to trying to start a campfire with wet logs.

Possible Preaching Angles:

The trees’ survival in the aftermath of wildfire is a living parable of biblical truths: resilience through adversity, the life-giving power of being rooted and nourished, and the hope that endures even when all else is lost. 1) Final Judgment; Judgment Day – Only believers will be able to stand in the day of judgment because we have the indwelling Christ and his righteousness; 2) Endurance; Hope; Perseverance - The Bible often uses the imagery of trees enduring through drought to represent steadfastness and life in the midst of hardship (Psa. 1:2-3; Jer. 17:7-8).

For years, Ben Affleck wrestled with alcohol addiction. A consequence, he says, of having an alcoholic father. But the actor shared that he was in a much better place now and doesn't think he will ever return to that way of life.

It is no secret that substance abuse is a pervasive problem in Hollywood. Tragic stories are common. So, how did Affleck escape this fate?

In an interview he credited his Christian faith. Affleck says his Christian faith in later life has allowed him to accept his flaws and imperfections as a man. He said:

The concept that God, through Jesus, embraces and pardons all of us - from those we admire to those we might judge or resent - is powerful. If God can show such boundless love, urging us to love, avoid judgement and offer forgiveness, it serves as a profound model of how we should strive to be.

What I truly appreciate, even as I still grapple with my faith and beliefs, as I think all people do at times, is the profound idea that we all have imperfections . . . It's our journey to seek redemption, embrace divine love, better ourselves, cherish others, refrain from judgement, and extend forgiveness.

Here's one way to look at Jesus' earthly life of obedience to God the Father. Jesus lived approximately 33½ years, or 1,057,157,021 seconds. In every second the average human being's brain has 100 billion neurons all firing around 200 times per second, giving a capacity of 20 million billion firings per second. If we want to know how many conscious decisions Jesus made to obey his Father's will, multiply 20 million billion by the number of seconds he lived: 1,057,157,021. The equation would look like this:

20,000,000,000 x 1,057,157,021 = a very large number!

Jesus Christ never made one decision, consciously or unconsciously, in all those innumerable split seconds that wasn't completely consistent with loving his Father and his neighbor. And his obedience wasn't merely an outward performance. He always did the right thing, and he always did it for the right reason. During his lifetime of constant, unwavering obedience, from infancy all the way to death, he wove a robe righteousness sufficient to cover millions and millions of us. Yes, even you.

In 2009, a new billboard in downtown Chicago got everyone's attention, stirring some controversy. In big letters it asked: "Are you good without God? Millions are." It was put up by an organization called the Chicago Coalition of Reason. According to an article about the billboard in the Chicago Tribune, the Coalition's coordinator said "the billboard aims to hearten humanists, atheists, and agnostics who might feel isolated or misunderstood in their quest for alternatives to religious worldviews."

The billboard's question does beg for answer: Can a person who rejects God's very existence, let alone his authority, do good? Well, of course! They can be honest and kind, pay their taxes, give money to the poor. But from a Christian point of view, that misses the point.

It makes me think of the Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz. Remember him? The Tin Man's quest was to find a heart. When he finally came face-to-face with the Wizard, the Wizard warned the Tin Man that hearts can be broken. The Tin Man replies, "But I still want one." And do you remember what the Wizard said next? "Back where I come from," he said, "there are men who do nothing all day but good deeds. They are called … good-deed-doers. And their hearts are no bigger than yours, but they have one thing you haven't got."

God would say something similar to the "good without God" billboard people. He would say, "When Christians do good deeds properly, their hearts are no bigger than yours, But they have one thing you haven't got." That one thing is found in Ephesians 2:10: "For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do."

The difference between righteousness by works and righteousness by grace is illustrated by a ride on a commuter train.

A train rumbles into the station with warning bell clanging. The doors open, the uniformed conductor steps out, and you climb on board and find your way to a seat. When you look around the car, you see tickets clipped on the top of occupied seats, paid for with hard-earned money. Those tickets displayed at each seat are the special concern of the conductor, who walks through the car to punch tickets and confirm that you paid for the right to take this ride. If the conductor finds you without a ticket, you will either pay on the spot or be escorted off the train at the next stop. To ride this train, what matters is the paid ticket. This is righteousness by works.

Righteousness by grace, on the other hand, works in a very different way. God's train pulls into the station, warning bell clanging. The doors open and the conductor steps out. Masses of people crowd on board and find their seats, for most everyone wants to ride this train to the city where people never die. Eventually the conductor walks through the train to see if everyone belongs on board. But on this train the conductor is not looking for tickets clipped to the top of seats. In fact, anyone who tries to pay for the right to be on the train will be escorted promptly from the train at the very next stop. That's right; no one can earn the right to be on this train. What the conductor looks for as he walks seat by seat through the car is the penniless people he knows by name, the people who are his friends and who completely lack the means to pay. These poverty stricken people climb on board with only one hope: they believe in the generosity of their conductor friend.

This is righteousness by grace. A ride on God's train is a gift. By our standards, it's unfair. It's scandalous. But like it or not, it's heaven's way.

In May of 2006, the Journal of the Air and Waste Management Association published a study conducted by the National Science Foundation on the side effects of several indoor air purifiers. Surprisingly, the study found that certain ionic air purifiers (those using a process called ozonolysis) actually produce pollution.

Here's how it works. Ionic air purifiers function by charging airborne particles through a process called ionization. Once charged, these particles then stick to metal electrodes. Theoretically, the air is cleaner after passing through the purifier because it has fewer particles.

However, the study found that the ionization process itself produces ozone. This gas is helpful when located way up in the atmosphere because it blocks harmful UV rays. However, at the surface of the Earth, ozone is better known as smog. Human exposure to high levels of ozone can cause damaged lungs, shortness of breath, throat irritation, and a worsening of asthma.

Study leader Sergey Nizkorodov, a chemistry professor at the University of California, Irvine, said, "People operating air purifiers indoors are more prone to being exposed to ozone levels in excess of public health standards." Indeed, the study revealed that some homes and cars using indoor air purifiers registered ozone levels exceeding 350 parts per billion, which would trigger a Stage 2 Smog Alert if measured outside.

In 2005, acting chairperson of the California Air Resources Board delivered the following warning about ionic air purifiers using ozonolysis: "These machines are insidious. Marketed as a strong defense against indoor air pollution, they emit ozone, the same chemical that the ARB and U.S. Environmental Protection Agency have been trying to eliminate from our air for decades. More chilling is that some people susceptible to the ill effects of ozone will eagerly bring these Trojan horses home."

In the same way, in our efforts to be pure in God's sight, we can make our problems even worse. If we try to make ourselves clean before God by relying on our own goodness rather than on the cross of Jesus Christ, we make ourselves even more unclean in the sight of God.

What the law tried to do by a restraining power from without, the gospel does by an inspiring power from within.

In Jesus' righteousness the unrighteous are granted, as a gift, relationship with God: a free gift. Mercy took a human face.