Many years ago, I was someone who thought that unless I could be just like Jesus; I wouldn’t be loved by the Father.   I was often discouraged because I knew how much I wasn’t like Jesus.  Thankfully the Holy Spirit revealed the truth of the good news of His kingdom to me.

Jesus came because we were nothing like Him; we still miss the mark even on our best days. I am still developing in my being transformed into His image.  I have yet to arrive. Thankfully we are told in,

Romans 5:8 But God demonstrates His own love toward us, in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

God loved us even when we were unaware of Him and living in rebellion against Him.  That doesn’t mean He condoned our rebellious behavior against Him or our denial of Him.  His love set out to change us.

The Bible teaches us that Jesus came to give us a righteousness we could never earn.  A righteousness the Father would approve of and welcome.  God’s own righteousness.  This reality is our security.  Jesus is the reason we have a relationship with God, and He remains the reason we are kept in that relationship.

The Bible says that God cannot deny Himself, and since it is His Own Righteousness we now possess in Christ, He will not deny us.

The law of Moses was never intended to be a way of being made righteous before God. It revealed righteousness very clearly and, as a result, condemned us.  That is why the Scriptures refer to it as the ministry of death.

2Corinthians 3:7 But if the ministry of death, written and engraved on stones, was glorious, so that the children of Israel could not look steadily at the face of Moses because of the glory of his countenance, which glory was passing away, 8 how will the ministry of the Spirit not be more glorious?

Regular sacrifices were required when the Law was in force because no one fulfilled its demands.  If the standard of holiness it required could have been attained, there would have been no need to repeatedly shed blood for the remission of sins.

The righteousness God desired from before the foundation of the world and in the law of Moses is the righteousness we now possess in Christ.  Jesus fulfilled the righteous demands of the Law fully.  At the cross, Jesus took our sins and gave us His righteousness in exchange.

You see, God planned to make us righteous by grace through faith in Christ Jesus.

This glorious hope and promise cannot be found in any other person or method.  We need not add anything to Jesus to have a relationship with the Father and maintain it.  Jesus completed the work at the cross, He rose from the dead, proving God authorized him, and then He ascended on high to sprinkle His blood on the real mercy seat of heaven, forever cleansing our sin.  Then as the baptizer with the Holy Spirit, Jesus released the Holy Spirit to come those who would believe and receive.  Even the gift of the Holy Spirit is received by faith and not according to works.  When God provides a solution, He makes sure the problem is solved.  God made a perfect way!