- Righteousness
by Faith
- Christ and His
Righteousness
- by E. J. Waggoner
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- Chapter 1 How
Shall We Consider Christ
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But how should we consider Christ? Just as
He has revealed Himself to the world, according to the witness
which He bore concerning Himself. In that marvelous discourse
recorded in the fifth chapter of John, Jesus said, "For
as the Father raiseth up the dead, and quickeneth them; even
so the Son quickeneth whom He will. For the Father judgeth no
man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son; that all men
should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He that
honoreth not the Son honoreth not the Father which hath sent
Him." Verses 21-23.
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To Christ is committed the highest prerogative,
that of judging. He must receive the same honor that is due to
God and for the reason that He is God. The beloved disciple bears
this witness, "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word
was with God, and the Word was God." John 1:1. That this
Divine Word is none other than Jesus Christ is shown by verse
14: "And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us (and
we beheld His glory, the glory as of the Only-begotten of the
Father), full of grace and truth."
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- The Word was "in the beginning."
The mind of man cannot grasp the ages that are spanned in this
phrase. It is not given to men to know when or how the Son was
begotten; but we know that he was the Divine Word, not simply
before He came to this earth to die, but even before the world
was created. Just before His crucifixion He prayed, "And
now, O Father, glorify thou Me with Thine own self with the glory
which I had with Thee before the world was." John 17:5.
And more than seven hundred years before His first advent, His
coming was thus foretold by the word of inspiration: "But
thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands
of Judah, yet out of thee shall He come forth unto Me that is
to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old,
from the days of eternity." Micah 5:2, margin. We know that
Christ "proceeded forth and came from God" (John 8:42),
but it was so far back in the ages of eternity as to be far beyond
the grasp of the mind of man.
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