Imputed righteousness is a temporary device. It also is a fact that the imputed (ascribed) righteousness given to the sinner is not intended to be a perpetual covering. Rather, ascribed righteousness is a device used to enable the disobedient to start on the path of obedience to God. God forgives us through Christ so that by the grace of Christ we can pursue the task of being changed into Christ's moral image.

The Lord Jesus did not come to do away with the Kingdom law of sowing and reaping, but to turn people to the Lord. The same was true of John the Baptist.

And many of the children of Israel shall he turn to the Lord their God. And he shall go before him in the spirit and power of Elias, to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord. (Luke 1:16,17)

Imputation (assigned righteousness) is not intended to be the means by which God will relate to man for eternity. The idea that the only righteousness the saint ever will possess is that which is ascribed to him or her on the basis of Christ's own righteousness is unscriptural and misleading and weakens the determination of the believer to overcome sin and self-will.

Can you imagine a new Jerusalem, a holy city, in which people still are self-centered and rebellious but whom God sees only as the righteousness of His Son? Even if God were pleased, such an unholy city still would be Hell for those who had to endure the evil character of their neighbors.

The holy city and the new earth would be no different from what we are experiencing today. In this instance, the only difference between the inhabitants of the new Jerusalem and the inhabitants of the Lake of Fire would be that the one group was "saved by grace" and the other was not. Would not the spirits in torment cry out at the injustice of this? How could God tolerate such an obviously unjust situation and still declare that He is righteous?

The two concepts we have just mentioned, the idea that God despises the righteous behavior of honorable people, and making the legal device of imputation a permanent covenant in which our holy God has fellowship with unholy people, appear to be fundamental principles of modern Christian theology. They are unscriptural, illogical (in terms of all that God has done previously), and destructive of the Kingdom of God. They are an affront to God's character, to His sense of justice and righteousness, to His very wisdom. He forever would be enduring rebellion.

To be continued.