For the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God. ~James 1.20
The Word of truth works the Righteousness of God in a sinner causing us to look nowhere else but to the Lord Jesus Christ our Righteousness. The natural man, in the filthiness and naughtiness of the flesh, never has, nor ever will, produce the Righteousness of God.
By the Word of truth the believer knows that even though we were elected unto salvation in Christ before the world began, we were born into bondage to our own spiritually dead flesh and spirit. The Word of truth will not let the believer forget, that in the deadness of our flesh all our righteous works were only dead fruit (Ro 7: 4-6.) Sin, having dominion over us, would not allow us to deny the flesh by looking to Christ alone but made us constantly defend the flesh--dead fruit. By the dominion of sin, all we could do was think evil, say evil and do evil by thinking, saying and doing everything for the cause of our dead flesh--dead fruit. In this dead state, when our guilty conscious got the best of us, the dominion of sin caused us to look to that same dead flesh in an attempt to make self more acceptable to God--dead fruit. We attempted to clean a dirty floor with a dirty mop. The dominion of sin would not allow us to look to the Lord our Righteousness and confess that in our flesh is no good thing (Ro 8: 5-14.)
Through the Spirit of God, the Word was engrafted within us and gave us spiritual life (v18, 21.) By the Word of truth, God's holy law threw a spotlight on our persons (our old man--our flesh and our old dead spirit) and said, "Behold, sin!" (Ro 7: 7-13.) In the new spirit of meekness given by God, we put our hands over our mouths and became swift to hear. Christ our King entered in shedding his love abroad in our hearts so that the hatred for God in our old man no longer reigns within (Ro 8: 1-4; Col 1: 11-14.) With new eyes we discovered that when Christ was made sin and died in the flesh, we died in the flesh. Our body of sin was buried in the ground. The Holy Law of God released all claim on us. Therefore, being raised to newness of life with Christ, we regard our old man as dead and buried. We no longer worship God in the flesh but in spirit and in truth (Jn 4: 23, 24; Col 1: 21, 22; 2: 8-14; 3: 1-4.) We are still in this dead flesh, (and too often still look to it) but sin has no more dominion over us to keep us from trusting Christ our all. Before the all-seeing eye of God, our life is hid in Christ. Therefore we no longer look to our dead body for proof of righteousness or for proof of liberty as do the legalist, the antinomian and all dead religionists tittering somewhere between the two. Instead, BELIEVERS LOOK TO CHRIST FOR ALL.
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