Something I see very often is the ‘holier than thou’ attitude we possess.

To some who are proud of this so-called righteousness and look down on others, Jesus said in Luke 18: 10-14: ¹⁰ Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. ¹¹ The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. ¹² I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’

¹³ “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’

¹⁴ “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

The definition of a righteous person is that of a moral, upright person who follows or does what is right.

Now, here’s the thing,- can you show me one person who has been upright throughout his or her life, and does or has done what is right all and every day of his life?

No, you can’t, because apart from Jesus nobody has ever lived that way. But God is willing to see us as righteous not through our own efforts but as an ‘exchange’: Here is how the exchange works: Christ takes on our sin, in fact he becomes our sin and in exchange for our sin we receive his righteousness. To be declared righteous in God’s sight you must be willing to put all your sin on Christ and take up his righteousness. I know sometimes that is hard to grasp because it sounds too good to be true, but thankfully it is.

If you will allow Him by believing in Him, God will take your sin and exchange it for His righteousness.

Which means no one has any right to call themselves righteous, and can only direct others to the source of the ‘exchange’.

Do we do that? Even after knowing we are not righteous, we look down on others, not just from another faith but our own.

As Jesus told the parable to His followers he wasn’t just looking at the Pharisees and Sadducees in his audience, but at some of us who believe that we have become pure, elders, believers, even priests who believe they are above others, and all of mankind, who by their own means can never ever become righteous, and have only one cry they can make; that of the tax collector in the story, who beat his chest and cried, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’

When such a cry leaves our lips, we will never ever look down on others, and instead bring them to the ‘exchange’ experience..!

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