Apostolic Life ( Prayer Warriors)'s Post

rı̄´chus - nes ( צדּיק , caddı̄ḳ , adjective, "righteous," or occasionally "just" צדק , cedheḳ , noun, occasionally = "riahteousness," occasionally = "justice"; δικαιος , dı́kaios , adjective, δικαιοσύνη , dikaiosúnē , noun, from δίκη , dı́kē , whose first meaning seems to have been "custom"; the general use suggested conformity to a standard: righteousness, "the state of him who is such as he ought to be" (Thayer)):

1. Double Aspect of Righteousness: Changing and Permanent

2. Social Customs and Righteousness

3. Changing Conception of Character of God: Obligations of Power

4. Righteousness as Inner

5. Righteousness as Social

6. Righteousness as Expanding in Content with Growth in Ideals of Human Worth

LITERATURE

1. Double Aspect of Righteousness: Changing and Permanent:

In Christian thought the idea of righteousness contains both a permanent and a changing element. The fixed element is the will to do right; the changing factor is the conception of what may be right at different times and under different circumstances. Throughout the entire course of Christian revelation we discern the emphasis on the first factor. To be sure, in the days of later Pharisaism righteousness came to be so much a matter of externals that the inner intent was often lost sight of altogether (Matthew 23:23 ); but, on the whole and in the main, Christian thought in all ages has recognized as the central element in righteousness the intention to be and do right. This common spirit binds together the first worshippers of God and the latest. Present-day conceptions of what is right differ by vast distances from the conceptions of the earlier Hebrews, but the intentions of the first worshippers are as discernible as are those of the doers of righteousness in the present day.

2. Social Customs and Righteousness:

There seems but little reason to doubt that the content of the idea of righteousness was determined in the first instance by the customs of social groups. There are some, of course, who would have us believe that what we experience as inner moral sanction is nothing but the fear of consequences which come through disobeying the will of the social group, or the feeling of pleasure which results as we know we have acted in accordance with the social demands. At least some thinkers would have us believe that this is all there was in moral feeling in the beginning. If a social group was to survive it must lay upon its individual members the heaviest exactions. Back of the performance of religious rites was the fear of the group that the god of the group would be displeased if certain honors were not rendered to him. Merely to escape the penalties of an angry deity the group demanded ceremonial religious observances. From the basis of fear thus wrought into the individuals of the group have come all our loftier movements toward righteousness.

It is not necessary to deny the measure of truth there may be in this account. To point out its inadequacy, however, a better statement would be that from the beginning the social group utilized the native moral feeling of the individual for the defense of the group. The moral feeling, by which we mean a sense of the difference between right and wrong, would seem to be a part of the native furnishing of the mind. It is very likely that in the beginning this moral feeling was directed toward the performance of the rites which the group looked upon as important. See ALMS .

As we read the earlier parts of the Old Testament we are struck by the fact that much of the early Hebrew morality was of this group kind. The righteous man was the man who performed the rites which had been handed down from the beginning (Deuteronomy 6:25 ). The meaning of some of these rites is lost in obscurity, but from a very early period the characteristic of Hebrew righteousness is that it moves in the direction of what we should call today the enlargement of humanity.
By: via Apostolic Life ( Prayer Warriors)

Apostolic Life ( Prayer Warriors)'s Post

Satan finds it hard to trick most of us into thinking that there is no God above us. The evidence for God is just too strong. So Satan works on changing truth about God. Satan wants God to be made in the image or likeness of man (instead of man being “in the image of God”). Some feel that God may be as weak as they are. They think God has little power to help them or make their lives better. Others, having been treated badly, view God as that kind of person. They think that God hates them and seeks their ruin. Others want a God who will never punish anyone. They make God out to be only soft and gentle, without any anger. Then there are those who think that God shares their dishonest ways. They do not keep their promises, and they feel that God may not keep His word. Although He has promised terrible punishment for sins (Revelation 21:8), they think He may let them off. Many on earth escape justice by hiding or by using gifts and bribes. They think they can also bargain with God, or hide from Him. To such people God has made these replies:

For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who is not partial and takes no bribe (Deuteronomy 10:17).

ERV for Deuteronomy 10:17b: To the LORD every person is the same. The LORD does not accept money to change His mind.

God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind (Numbers 23:19).

You thought that I was one like yourself. But now I rebuke you and lay the charge before you (Psalm 50:21).

When we make God seem like us, we open the way for false worship. The “God” we claim to worship may become quite different from the true God who has shown Himself. Our “God” turns into a lie. Worship given to this lie goes to “the father of lies.”
By: via Apostolic Life ( Prayer Warriors)