"For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also." – Matt 6:21
Do you desire righteousness?
Righteousness
Legal righteousness: provided by God to believers in the Divine court
Explanation of the imputed righteousness in Christ
Do you know this righteousness covering your sin?
Moral righteousness
Social righteousness
Not talking about legal righteousness – the believer already has this, but moral and social righteousness
Moral Righteousness
In the Scriptures there are different people hungering and thirsting after the righteousness of God
Wanting to be holy, humble, gentle, king, obedient, wise
Wanting to be life Jesus Christ – examples
A desire placed in their hearts
It has replaced the desire for other things – examples
One/a principal desire for Christ and God
Where is your heart/what does it say about you?
"One thing I have desired of the Lord, That will I seek: That I may dwell in the house of the Lord All the days of my life, To behold the beauty of the Lord," Ps 27:4
The Apostle Paul’s one desire was to be in Christ
All else he considered as rubbish
Our true satisfaction is found in Christ alone
Do you sing praises to God?
Are you thankful to Him?
Do you know He satisfies you?
Like the woman at the well
Ps 73:25-26 "Whom have I in heaven but You? And there is none upon earth that I desire besides You. My flesh and my heart fail; But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever."
Partially in this life time – but more in heaven
Ps 17:15
Rev 7:16-17
This convicts us – but is there some of this desire within you?
True happiness is found in Christ
Our Attitudes (v7)
Social righteousness – the merciful
A difference between grace and mercy
Grace – kindness shown to those who not deserve it
Mercy – showing kindness to those in a miserable state suffering the effect of sin
Mercy is an attitude of compassion and pity
Human beings often look out for themselves – examples
Mercy is a rare quality
We have been touched with compassion by God
How can we look down on others with disdain?
Do we display mercy – examples
Those in Scripture showed mercy – example of Abraham, Joseph, Moses, David, Stephen
Are you merciful?
There is a Divine law at work – examples
What you are to others – God will be to you
Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy