Life-Study of Matthewby Witness Lee
ISBN: 0-7363-0332-4
Printed Copy: Available Online from Living Stream Ministry
ISBN: 0-7363-0332-4
Printed Copy: Available Online from Living Stream Ministry
Font Size
In Matthew 27 we see a contrast between man’s unrighteousness and God’s righteousness. In the crucifixion of Christ, man’s unrighteousness turns into God’s righteousness. We need to see this matter very clearly.
As we pointed out in the previous message, the Lord Jesus was on the cross for six hours. During the first three hours, He was dealt with by man, and during the second three hours, He was dealt with by God. Everything man did to the Lord Jesus in chapter twenty-seven was unrighteous. Not only was Pilate unrighteous toward the Lord Jesus, but the Jewish leaders were also unrighteous toward Him. They arrested Christ in an unrighteous way, and they also judged and bound Him in an unrighteous way. Everything the religious leaders did to the Lord was unrighteous. Judas, of course, was also unrighteous in betraying the Lord Jesus. The Roman soldiers also treated Him unrighteously. Their mocking, spitting, and beating were unrighteous. Furthermore, they unrighteously forced Simon of Cyrene to bear the Lord’s cross. Thus, on man’s side, there was nothing righteous.
Praise God that man’s unrighteousness turned into God’s righteousness! Man could only go so far. He could mistreat the Lord and put Him on the cross as the Passover Lamb. Everything man did to the Lord Jesus set the stage for God’s righteousness to come in. On man’s side, everything was black, but on God’s side, everything was white. On man’s side, everything was unrighteous, but on God’s side, everything was righteous. Man’s unrighteousness prepared the way for God’s righteousness to be fully manifested. In this way, man’s unrighteousness turned into God’s righteousness. In the crucifixion of Christ, man’s unrighteousness was fully exposed; yet it brought in God’s righteousness. Thus, the killing of Christ was the first way through which man’s unrighteousness brought in God’s righteousness.
However, this was not the basic way. The basic way in which man’s unrighteousness turned into God’s righteousness was through Christ. In turning man’s unrighteousness into God’s righteousness, Christ first exposed man’s unrighteousness to the uttermost. In all of human history there has not been a case in which man’s unrighteousness has been as totally exposed as in the crucifixion of Christ. As we all know, there is unrighteousness in the judicial branch of any earthly government. But no earthly court has seen as much unrighteousness as was exposed in the case of the trial and crucifixion of the Lord Jesus. The Lord Jesus completely exposed human unrighteousness. We have seen that the Lord’s betrayal at the hands of Judas was unrighteous. The elders, the high priests, and the Sanhedrin all were unrighteous. Thus, the case of the crucifixion of Christ was unique in being filled with unrighteousness. Nearly everyone involved with His case was unrighteous. In every way and in every aspect, it was unrighteous. The very presence of Christ in this unrighteous situation was a full exposure of man’s unrighteousness.
Note: We hope that many will benefit from these spiritual riches. However, for the sake of avoiding confusion, we ask that none of these materials be downloaded or copied and republished elsewhere, electronically or otherwise. Living Stream Ministry retains full copyright on all these materials and hopes that our visitors will respect this.
Downloading this material, even for personal use, is prohibited.
Your IP address is 3.239.109.55 [4:41:50 PM (GMT -08:00), January 21, 2021].
Common words, such as "and", "is", "but", and "the", also known as noise words, are bypassed in a search. The search string, the Spirit & who, would result in an error since who, which stands by itself, is a noise word. The following is a list of noise words:
$, a, also, an, and, another, any, are, as, at, be, because, been, being, both, but, by, came, can, did, do, each, for, has, had, he, have, her, here, him, himself, his, how, if, in, into, is, it, like, make, me, might, much, my, of, on, or, our, out, over, said, should, since, some, still, such, take, than, that, the, their, them, then, there, these, they, this, those, to, too, very, was, way, we, well, were, what, where, which, while, who, with, would, you, your
×Rank is a value from 0 to 1000 indicating how closely a match scored or ranked against the original search string. Rank values are affected by the following factors:
This option breaks out the search string into its individual words and generates all conjugations and declensions for each word in the search phrase. A search on the word, dwell, would search for dwell, dwelling, dwelling's, dwells, dwelt, and dwelled.
There is no need to use ^ (inflectional search) or * (prefix search) when using the Include all word forms search scope.
This option searches for exact matches of the specified words or phrases used in the search string. Use of ^ (inflectional search) with a particular word in the search string will broaden the search for that given word in that all conjugations and declensions for that word will be searched. Similarly, use of * (prefix search) with a particular word in the search string will broaden the search for that given word in that all words with that prefix will be searched as well.
Common words, such as "and", "is", "but", and "the", also known as noise words, are bypassed in a search. A list of all noise words is as follows:
$, about, after, all, also, an,and, another, any, are, as, at, be, because, been, before, being, between, both, but, by, came, can, come, could, did, do, each, for, from, get, got, has, had, he, have, her, here, him, himself, his, how, if, in, into, is, it, like, make, many, me, might, more, most, much, must, my, never, now, of, on, only, or, other, our, out, over, said, same, see, should, since, some, still, such, take, than, that, the, their, them, then, there, these, they, this, those, through, to, too, under, up, very, was, way, we, well, were, what, where, which, while, who, with, would, you, your
×