It’s time to look at another of those churchy words that we use – this week’s is:

2 Corinthians 5:21 (NIV Translation) says this:

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

Okay, let’s unpack that – remember I’ve said a lot about Jesus in previous posts? Well 2 Corinthians is a letter to the church in Corinth. These early churches needed plenty of encouragement and also a certain amount of guidance and correction from the Apostles.

They were still surrounded by other beliefs, just as we are today, and sometimes they needed reminding of who they were and what they believed, just as we do today!

Remember the we talked about the Galatia church that Paul wrote to? Well the church in Corinth is another plant church and once again Paul is sharpening his quill. So this verse is a reminder that God sent Jesus ‘him who had no sin’ into the world to be ‘sin for us’ so that we could become the ‘righteousness of God’.

Wait, we’re the what now? What exactly is the righteousness of God?

Our good friends at dictionary.com describe righteousness as:

The word actually comes from the greek – dikaios (dik’-ah-yos) meaning just, moral, virtuous, perfect, in a word, holy.

Someone said to me once that when God looks at you he sees you through Jesus.

This is what the verse in Corinthians is basically saying – Jesus exchanged his perfection for our sin and died for it so we could be righteous, perfect and holy in the eyes of God.

Almost like God looks at us with his Jesus Ray Bans on and all he can see is perfection through the filter of what Jesus did for us on the cross, he no longer looks at us as sinners, he sees us as holy.

That’s major. More than major, that’s EPIC, INCREDIBLE, INSANE … That’s Grace.

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Dear Jesus,

Thank you for the incredible gift you have given us, thank you that because you died we can live in righteousness. Thank you God that you love me just as I am because of Jesus. Help me to live this amazing gift of life to the fullest. Help me to take every opportunity of pointing people to Jesus.

Amen x