By Mike Ivaska
โWhy do you call me good? There is none good except God alone.โ โ Mark 10:18
โTruly, truly, I say to you, the rooster will not crow till you have denied me three times.โ โ John 13:38
In my devotional reading lately, Iโve been relearning some valuable old lessons.ย Iโve been relearning the gospel of Godโs grace.ย And as Iโve gotten reacquainted (how sad it is Iโve needed to get reacquainted!) with the biblical fact that God declares sinners righteous on the basis of faith alone, Iโve realized how moralistic my reading of the Old Testament has been.ย Iโve read every failure of every Old Testament saint as a โdonโt let this happen to youโ example. . .
And of course, these episodes of failure are recorded as examples for us:ย Abrahamโs wobbly faith that led him to sleep with Hagar to produce a son, Davidโs adultery and subsequent cover-up, Solomonโs moral and religious drift, Hezekiahโs unwillingness to accept the word of the LORD regarding his illness, and so on, were all recorded to provide us with examples of what not to do.ย But, more importantly, they are provided as examples of the fact that โall have sinned and fall short of the glory of Godโ (Romans 3:23).ย They are provided to dispel any myths we might have about what it means to be โrighteousโ before God.ย They are provided to show that there can only be one Savior, that no other righteous man or woman has ever walked in true blamelessness, that even the upright need forgiveness, and that โthere is none good but God.โ
Our righteousness before God is the righteousness of Another, a spotless Lamb, a perfect Savior, who though he knew no sin was made sin for us, โso that in him we might become the righteousness of Godโ (2 Corinthians 5:21).ย The stories of failure among the saints are preserved, not to humiliate them, but to preserve all glory for the One who alone deserves it.