THE FOUNDERS' WORLDVIEW
THE LAW OF LIBERTY
RIGHTEOUSNESS UNDER GOD'S LAW
The Founding Fathers understood "law" to mean "a rule of action prescribed by some superior and which an inferior is bound to obey." This definition is from William Blackstone's, Commentaries on the Laws of England. Jesus, in His Great Commission (Part II), tells us to teach the nations to obey all that He has commanded us (Matt. 28:20). Therefore, under "law," both we, as individuals and as a nation are considered by God as inferiors to Him as Sovereign, God Almighty, the Superior.
Two dimensions of "righteousness" were understood at the time of our nation's birth. Noah Webster (1828) defined them as "purity of heart and rectitude of life" whereby our heart and life conform to the divine law. Heart speaks of our condition before God (the vertical) while life refers to man's relationship to man (the horizontal). Hence, righteousness is a legal concept regarding relationships.
Righteousness under God's law requires a pure heart for God reflecting the first four of the Ten Commandments. The remaining six commandments deal with man's life with others establishing an absolute standard of right, truth and justice for any society or nation. Again, the Law, God's law, concerns both our vertical relationship to God and our horizontal relationship to others in our family, church, work and community.
Jesus spoke of these two aspects of righteousness when he said "unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you shall not enter the kingdom of heaven." He had just said he had not come "to abolish" but "to fulfill" the Law and the Prophets. He warned that whoever "annuls one of the least of these commandments [of the Law] and so teaches others, shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 5:17-20).
In other words, there was nothing wrong with the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees. It simply did not go far enough. In fact, Jesus went on to quote certain of the laws under the old covenant and actually set a higher standard to be reached in our relationship with others, even perfection (Matt. 5:21-48).
James wrote of the "righteousness of God" in the context of our actions when angry and then, urged us to be "doers of the Word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves" (James 1:19-22). Doing the word produces righteousness under God's law.
In his first letter, John gave us the means for knowing whether or not we have come to "know Him;" namely, "if we keep His commandments" (1 John 2:3-4). Where are those commandments? They are the commandments of the Law and Paul told the Galatians they were necessary to define the right and wrong thing to do (Gal. 3:19).
In His Great Commission (Part I), Jesus said "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. He who believes and is baptized shall be saved" (Mark 16:15-16). Here, He emphasizes the necessity for the individual hearer of the gospel to believe. Having done that, the believer is then saved, born again, healed, delivered, made whole...all existing translations of the same Greek word, sozo. Legal right-standing before the Creator God, namely, righteousness, has been attained.
Part II of the Great Commission (Matt. 28:18-20) focuses on the Lordship of Jesus (all authority has been given to Him in heaven and on earth). Baptism is an outward act of establishing righteousness in the flesh of the individual believer (Rom 6:13, 18-20). The phase "in the name of," means under the authority of. Thus, "baptizing" the nations "in the name of" simply means establishing righteousness under the authority of God, the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
The disciplining of a nation involves two things: (1) establishing righteousness under God's law in our nation, and (2) teaching the nation to obey all that He has commanded us. Thus, we are commanded to teach our nation to "do the right things" with respect to us and our neighbor in society.
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Neil F. Markva 11