"As Real As It Gets", by Pastor Kevin Lynch

There are things in life that we do that leave little margin for error. Finances, health, relationships, career, parenting, to name a few.

We are not always going to nail it perfectly. We will make mistakes. That's not an excuse. That's a fact.

Many of us will get from the cradle to the grave with some relative success in having left a favorable mark upon the society we lived in. Many will simply live their lives in quiet desperation and will quietly come and go. Still many will have lived in utter travail and hardship perhaps leaving a bitter memory in the minds of those who knew them.

That's life (if you want to call any of that, successful or otherwise, as living).

It really is so much more than that.

God will want to know that you were "righteous".

Not self-righteous. Truly righteous.

Isaiah 64:6 - "For we have all become like one who is unclean [ceremonially, like a leper], and all our righteousness (our best deeds of rightness and justice) is like filthy rags or a polluted garment; we all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away [far from God's favor, hurrying us toward destruction].

That's what happens to a person living in a self-proclaimed righteousness rather than a God recognized righteousness.

God says several times in His Word "The JUST (righteous) shall live by faith". Faith in Christ.

Conversely, the unjust shall live by faith in themselves. This is root selfishness.

The world is a very selfish place and that's the reason why.

John says:

1 John 1:29 "If you know (perceive and are sure) that He [Christ] is [absolutely] righteous [conforming to the Father's will in purpose, thought, and action], you may also know (be sure) that everyone who does righteously [and is therefore in like manner conformed to the divine will] is born (begotten) of Him [[God]."

Righteousness is rooted in Christ. A person cannot achieve it apart from Him.

First we must know that Jesus is righteous. In other words, we must believe, trust, and conform to Him fully. We must accept Him as Lord and Savior, confess Him, and recognize His place as the resurrected Second Person of the Trinity, the Son of God.

That for us is what it means to be born-again. Born again people are righteous in God's eyes.

The greatest proof of your salvation is in the fruit of "doing rightly".

Now, remember this: you are not righteous BECAUSE you DO right things.

You DO right things because you are righteous.

You are righteous because you have believed in the Lord Jesus Christ and what He did upon the Cross, and have been translated from darkness and wrong doing, to the Light of righteousness.

That my friend is the bottom line.

That my friend is...

...Keepin' it Real.

Pastor Kevin <><