Disposition And Deeds
“Except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes
and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven.”
Matthew 5:20
The characteristic of a disciple is not that he does good things, but
that he is good in motive because he has been made good by the
super-natural grace of God. The only thing that exceeds right-doing is
right-being. Jesus Christ came to put into any man who would let Him a
new heredity which would exceed the righteousness of the scribes and
Pharisees. Jesus says - If you are My disciple you must be right not
only in your living, but in your motives, in your dreams, in the
recesses of your mind. You must be so pure in your motives that God
Almighty can see nothing to censure. Who can stand in the Eternal Light
of God and have nothing for God to censure? Only the Son of God, and
Jesus Christ claims that by His Redemption He can put into any man His
own disposition, and make him as unsullied and as simple as a child. The
purity which God demands is impossible unless I can be remade within,
and that is what Jesus has undertaken to do by His Redemption.
No man can make himself pure by obeying laws. Jesus Christ does not give
us rules and regulations; His teachings are truths that can only be
interpreted by the disposition He puts in. The great marvel of Jesus
Christ's salvation is that He alters heredity. He does not alter human
nature; He alters its mainspring.