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A fair amount of that pre-marital conversation deals with
expectations. Problems arise when the expectations of the man
and the expectations of the woman do not match. For example, if
the bride figures that her new husband will help with the cooking
and cleaning and other household chores but he figures, "Not on
your life - that's WOMAN's work," there will be problems. If she
figures that Christmas will be spent with her parents in Michigan
and he figures on their spending Christmas fishing in the Florida
Keys, there will be problems. If he expects to spend Friday
nights playing poker with the boys but she expects Friday
evenings to be spent at the ballet, there will be "trouble in
River City." You get the idea. Expectations.
I bring that up this morning because of this summer search
for spiritual excellence we began last week and our focus on the
Apostle Paul's metaphor about the equipment Christians need for
faithful discipleship, the "whole armor of God." Last week we
talked about the belt of truth; this week we consider the
breastplate of righteousness. Of the half dozen pieces of armor
Paul mentions, this is the one that most rattles my cage. I hear
that word "righteousness" and suddenly my whole body puckers up.
I think "Uh oh. I get off at this stop. There are expectations
here that I cannot fulfill. Perhaps this is one wedding that
ought not take place."
All right, put yourself in the preacher's chair and listen
as the bride (you and me) and the groom (Paul and the rest of
scripture) try to hammer this out. Just as with any two folks
about to get married, the problems of expectations are not
insoluble. The solution comes in communicating and clarifying
those expectations, reaching reasonable compromise, if necessary,
then getting on with the business of living. Let's talk.
Ladies first...us. What are our expectations when we hear
the R word? To be honest, much of the teaching and preaching has
been confusing. On the one hand, pulpits thunder the words of
scripture, "There is none righteous, no not one." Yeah, we can
buy that. We have heard all our righteousness is as "filthy
rags" in the sight of God. OK. But then a lesson or sermon on
the breastplate of righteousness would come along and most likely
say that we should BE righteous (which let me out right away),
and if we were, we would be PROTECTED (after all, a breastplate
IS for protection) from the slander of enemies, we would avoid
wrongdoing, and keep unruly passions in check (that is the one we
heard in Senior Hi youth). In essence, we should lead an upright
life, a blameless life, RIGHTEOUS.
That is why there is confusion. Which is it? What is the
expectation? That we cannot be righteous, no matter what we do?
Or that we should be righteous, or at least give it the old
college try?
The bride is close to tears as she shares her distress. She
wants this marriage to work. She has been joyfully anticipating
her new spiritually excellent life. She hates the feeling that
this righteousness issue will throw a monkey wrench into the
works before the honeymoon can get started.
The pastor wants to hear more from her. He interrupts her
distress with a question: What do you think righteousness is?
We, the bride, sit there for a moment in silence. To be
honest, we would probably have to say we do not think about it
very much. Most of the time, the word only enters conversation
prefixed by "self." On TV the only time we hear the word
"righteous" is when a cop is defending gunning down a bad guy...a
righteous shoot. The dictionary is not much help. The handy
dandy American Heritage defines righteousness as something
"Morally upright; without guilt or sin...conforming to a standard
of right."(1) Gee. The thesaurus is better...it lists synonyms
like godliness, uprightness, good, moral, puritanical. Those are
what come to mind when we think of righteousness.
Do we expect that of anybody? We try to apply that as a
standard for politicians and preachers, and profess great outrage
when the expectation is not met (ask Jimmy Swaggart or Jim Bakker
or Gary Hart, or perhaps Paula Jones), but the truth is we do not
really expect it. In fact, we would look at someone that
"righteous" as a goody-two-shoes and not someone to invite to
dinner.
The couple sits silently for a moment. The preacher has
heard the bride, now he looks to the groom (Paul and the rest of
the Bible) to find out the expectation there. He asks, "What
does scripture mean when it uses the word righteousness?"
Paul speaks. To get a handle on that, we go back to the far
reaches of language. The ancient root of the Hebrew and Greek
words that come to us in English as "righteous" or
"righteousness" means "to be in order." As the centuries moved
on to Bible times, it came to be thought of in terms fulfilling
the demands of a relationship. Despite what modern minds think,
Biblical righteousness had nothing to do with godliness or
uprightness or being good or even being moral. Was the
relationship "in order" or not? Was it RIGHT? If it was, as far
as the Bible was concerned, you were righteous.
Abraham is one of the Old Testament characters called
righteous. Why? Because he did everything right? Of course
not. Abraham was just as much a sinner as any of us. The Bible
says Abraham was considered righteous because of his faith. His
relationship with God was right. It was in order. He had enough
faith to pull up stakes and move to a foreign land because God
told him to. He had enough faith to trust God to give him a son
and heir even though he was an old man. He even had enough faith
to be willing to sacrifice that heir simply because God asked him
to do it. The relationship between Abraham and God was one of
master and servant, and Abraham kept that in order. Thus,
Abraham was called righteous.
Suddenly, we who are the blushing bride interrupt, a smile
playing across the face. We can buy that concept even if we do
not use the R word.
An example from politics is helpful. For the past five
years, Al Gore has been like a dutiful child...seen and not
heard. He has been respectful, deferential, made no waves,
rocked no boats, in short, exactly what we have come to expect of
a Vice President. In an obvious over-simplification, he is the
servant, Bill Clinton the master. Biblically, Al Gore is
fulfilling the demands of his office "in all righteousness." And
come the next presidential election, Al Gore will no doubt count
on President Clinton's whole-hearted support in exchange for that
(which, according to those who are supposed to know these things,
Mr. Gore will get).
Paul and the rest of Scripture smile. "You are getting
there."
The bride continues. Now things change. Come election
time, Mr. Gore's relationship to the American people will still
call him to be respectful, but will demand that he not be so
deferential. He will be EXPECTED to make waves, rock boats.
Should he be fortunate enough to be elected (or perhaps
UNfortunate enough), if he handles his presidency in the same way
as he did the Vice Presidency, we will not be satisfied. He will
not have met the expectations of the relationship we established
at the ballot box. Unrighteous.
With a smile, the groom talks again and says that Jesus
understood righteousness that way. Do you remember his story
about the Pharisee and the tax collector at prayer in the temple?
The Pharisee stood up with arms outstretched and eyes toward
heaven and said, "'God, I thank you that I am not like other
people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like this tax
collector." The tax collector stood off in a corner with eyes
down toward the ground and whispered, "God, be merciful to me, a
sinner." Now, given the culture of the day, there is no question
that the Pharisee would have been the more moral, the more
ethical, the more law-abiding, the goody-two-shoes of the pair.
But Jesus' conclusion was that the tax collector was the more
righteous. Why? His prayer was that of powerless servant to
all-powerful master - the way it should have been; the Pharisee's
prayer was a conversation between the executive vice president
and the chairman of the board. That was not the proper
relationship...not right...not righteous.
Hmmm, says the bride. The more I get into the REAL
expectations of righteousness, the less intimidating it seems.
Right relationships, not saints and haloes. Perhaps the bride
and groom can get back to the issue that caused all this in the
first place, the breastplate of righteousness.
The Apostle Paul speaks again, glad that some light is
finally beginning to break through. After all, he is the one who
coined the phrase, and to be honest, was very much into
righteousness all his life. A quick count of the root word we
translate into English as "righteous" or "righteousness" appears
in his epistles some 115 times. Like the rest of the Bible, it
signified for Paul a relationship in which the parties did what
was expected of them...a place for everything and everything in
its place. The relationship was "right." Any moral or ethical
or legal considerations were incidental.
But one thing should be noted here. In all the teaching and
preaching and rattling around in this Christian armory through
the years, one fact tends to get overlooked more than any other.
Whose armor is it? Thank you. It is not our armor. It is not
our righteousness that protects us. The breastplate that
protects our often very faint heart is GOD's righteousness.
What IS God's righteousness? The same as any other
righteousness in the Bible. God is called righteous because God
fulfills the expectations of the master/servant relationship with
people in delivering and preserving them. God delivered the
covenant people from slavery in Egypt and preserved them from
extinction despite centuries of powerlessness. God delivers and
preserves the people of the NEW Covenant, you and me, from sin
and death through the saving work of Jesus Christ. God can be
counted on. God upholds the divine part of the relationship.
God does right by us. God is righteous.
Suddenly the bride and groom are all smiles again. They
kiss and hug. She apologizes for jumping to conclusions, and
adds that, these days, that is often the only exercise she gets.
They thank the pastor, and walk out hand in hand. The
expectations are realistic, not threatening, actually comforting.
Righteousness was not a problem; it was a solution. After all, a
breastplate is designed to help us...to protect. All it took was
a little conversation to understand it and clear the air.
If we want lives that are spiritually excellent, we will do
everything in our power to make all our relationships RIGHT. We
will do what is expected of us, and we will do it when we should
and the way we should. That is basic discipleship. And just as
it will get life off on the right foot for newlyweds, it will
make life good for any of us. The truth, of course, is that,
despite all our high hopes and remarkable resolve, we will
sometimes mess up...BIG time. The good news is that this
protective breastplate comes from the God who NEVER messes up.
This is one relationship that will never let us down. The
breastplate of righteousness. The R word can become OUR word
because it is God's word.
Let us pray.
Lord, we confess that too much of our reluctance in pursuing
a proper relationship with you comes from misunderstanding. Help
us to commit ourselves to overcoming our own confusion so that we
might share your good news with a world that is even more
confused. We pray it in Jesus' name. Amen!
1. American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 3rd Edition, (Houghton Mifflin Co., 1992)
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