Live out Christ as our Subjective Righteousness for the Righteousness of the Bride

As believers in Christ, we enjoy and have Christ as our righteousness in two aspects: first, Christ is our objective righteousness covering us before God to justify us and make us acceptable to Him, and second, He’s our subjective righteousness as our lived-out righteousness to be our wedding garment.

Hallelujah for Christ our objective and subjective righteousness! God is righteous, and He is making us the same as He is by our faith in Him and our experience of Him.

Both in the Old and in the New Testament, we see the matter of God being righteous and us enjoying or participating in God’s righteousness.

In the Old Testament, God gave Moses the law as a portrait of God as the righteous, holy, and glorious One.

The law was not given for man to keep but for man to see who God is, what God is, and what God wants His people to be by their coming to Him and allowing Him to do it in them.

Then, when the Lord Jesus came as God incarnate, just before He was about to start His earthly ministry, He went to John the Baptist to be baptised.

Initially, John did not want to baptise the Lord, for he thought that he should be baptised by Jesus.

But the Lord Jesus said, Allow it, for in this way we fulfil all righteousness.

The Lord Jesus was God incarnated as a man, yet He still had to fulfil all righteousness; He had to go through God’s procedure in order for God’s righteousness to be fulfilled.

He submitted Himself to be baptised by John the Baptist in order to fulfill all righteousness.

Then, as we read in the Epistles, the matter of righteousness is very much presented and expounded on.

And Peter wrote in his epistle that in the new heavens and new earth, righteousness will dwell; even for eternity, righteousness is present, for God is righteous.

As we prayerfully consider the matter of the bride of Christ we need to see the righteousness of the bride; the bride is not just loving, beautiful, and mature, but even more, the bride has a particular garment, fine linen, bright and clean, which is the righteousnesses of the saints.

However, it is easy for us to think that we know what righteousness is, for each one of us has their own understanding of righteousness and what righteousness is.

We need to read the Bible and open to the Lord, allowing Him to speak to us and renew our mind concerning this matter so that we see what is God’s view of righteousness.

We need to see what righteousness is according to God’s economy and have Christ as our righteousness, not only in an objective way but even more, in a subjective way, Christ lived out in us.

The Righteousness of the Bride: Christ is our Objective and Subjective Righteousness

In verses 7 and 8 in Revelation 19 we see the righteousness of the bride; the bride was given to be dressed in white linen, bright and clean, for the white linen are the righteousnesses of the saints.

As we prepare ourselves to be the bride of Christ, we need to consider the matter of the righteousness of the bride.

What is this righteousness? What are the righteousnesses of the saints? How can righteousness be applied to our experience as we are cooperating with the Lord to be prepared as the bride of Christ?

There are two aspects of Christ being righteousness to the believers. Righteousness is Christ; God is righteous, and Christ is our righteousness. Merely saying that Christ is our righteousness is quite general; we need to see the two main aspects of Christ as our righteousness.

The first aspect is that Christ is our righteousness for us to be justified before God objectively at the time of our repenting unto God and believing into Christ (Rom. 3:24-26; Acts 13:39; Gal. 3:24b, 27).

Even though we are fallen and sinful, falling short of the glory of God, by faith in Christ we are justified freely before God and by God.

Justification by faith is free; we are justified freely by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus. This Christ Jesus God set forth as a propitiation through faith in His blood, for the demonstrating of His righteousness. Wow!

God demonstrates His righteousness in the present time so that He might be righteous and the One who justifies the one who has faith in Jesus Christ.

This is the objective righteousness, referring to Christ as the righteous robe covering us.

In 1 Corinthians 1:30 we are told that Christ became wisdom to us from God, both righteousness and sanctification and redemption. Christ is our righteousness.

Our righteousness is not a behaviour or a conduct; our righteousness is a person, Jesus Christ Himself. This gives us the standing before God for us to be justified before Him and fellowship with Him.

The second aspect of Christ as our righteousness is that He is our subjective righteousness lived out of us as the manifestation of God (Rom. 4:25; 1 Pet. 2:24a; James 2:24; Matt. 5:20; Rev. 19:8).

God is the righteousness in Christ given to us, the believers in Christ, for us to be justified by God subjectively.

Our righteousness subjectively refers to Christ Himself as righteousness being lived out of us, Christ living in us.

On the one hand, we apply Christ as our righteousness objectively by faith in Him and we are covered with Christ as our righteousness; this is for us to be justified before God. On the other hand, we enjoy Christ and live Him out for Him to be our lived out righteousness.

Thank the Lord for dying for us on the cross to become our righteousness, covering us before God as our righteous robe for our justification.

And even more, thank Him for going through death and resurrection to become a life-giving Spirit to come into us and live in us, even to be expressed through us as our subjective righteousness.

We need not only the objective aspect of Christ as our righteousness but even more, the subjective aspect of Christ living in us to be our righteousness subjectively.

As our objective righteousness, Christ is the One in whom we are justified by God (Rom. 3:24, 28; 4:25; 5:1, 9, 16, 18). As our subjective righteousness, Christ is the One dwelling in us to live for us a life that can be justified by God and that is always acceptable to God (Matt. 5:6, 20).

Lord Jesus, thank You for dying on the cross for our sins so that, by faith in You, You may become our righteousness! Praise the Lord, by repentance and faith in Christ, we have Christ as our robe, covering us before God for our justification! Amen, Lord, we want to daily know You and apply You as our objective righteousness in our daily living; we have no merit or standing in ourselves, but You are our righteousness! Praise the Lord! May we stand on Your righteousness and go on to allow You to live in us as our subjective righteousness. Amen, Lord, live in us today. Be manifested through us. May we have Christ manifested through us so that we may have the subjective righteousness, Christ lived out in us! Amen, Lord, we want to be justified before God subjectively and have the wedding garment, the righteousnesses of the saints. We allow You as the indwelling One to live in us and for us a life that can be justified by God and that is always acceptable to God! Hallelujah for Christ as our objective and subjective righteousness!

Christ is our Objective Righteousness Covering us before God and our Subjective Inward Righteousness for us to Live out Christ

One very good illustration of Christ as our objective and subjective righteousness is seen in Luke 15:22-23 with the return of the prodigal son.

After squandering all he had and spending it dissolutely in a far away land, the prodigal son return to his father, and the father did something very interesting.

Instead of listening to the speech the prodigal son prepared, the father interrupted him and commanded his servants to bring out the best robe to cover his son, put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet, and slaughter the fattened calf for them to rejoice, feast, and be merry.

This is what God does for us whenever we return to Him and repent: He immediately covers us with Christ as our objective righteousness (the robe) and gives us the all-inclusive Christ as our supply for us to live out God in Christ as our subjective righteousness.

On the one hand, what we need is to be covered before God and be righteous before Him so that we may be pleasing to Him and have access to Him.

On the other hand, merely being covered with the best robe is not enough – we need something inwardly to be supplied for us to live Christ as our subjective righteousness.

We need to partake of and enjoy Christ as our feast, the reality of the fattened calf, for us to be supplied and strengthened to be able to live out Christ as our subjective righteousness.

This experience that the prodigal son had is not something unique; this is our experience day by day, even many times during the day.

We are learning to return to the Lord and repent before Him, for we are away from Him so many times and we waste our time and energy on many things different from God’s purpose.

As we repent and confess, He covers us with Christ as the best robe, our objective righteousness, and He gives us the all-inclusive Christ as our food so that we may be able to live out God in Christ as our subjective righteousness. Praise the Lord!

Many Christians today are satisfied with only having Christ as their objective righteousness; this is not enough, for it fulfils only our need, not God’s need.

Yes, our need is to be justified, and nothing we can do can accomplish this – only our repentance and faith in Christ can cause us to be justified and have Christ as our objective righteousness. This meets our need.

But what about God’s need? He wants us not only to be justified, clean, and righteous; He wants to obtain an expression in us and through us, so He wants to be our subjective righteousness.

We praise and thank the Lord Jesus for dying for us on the cross so that we may be justified, and we apply Him as our objective righteousness today.

But we do not remain here; we want to go on with the Lord and partake of His riches in spirit so that we may live Him out in our daily living as our subjective righteousness.

Christ is both our robe and the fattened calf for us to both be justified and be able to live out Christ. As we eat Christ, we live because of Him (John 6:57).

As we partake of the riches of Christ, we can be inwardly supplied and energised so that we may live out Christ and have Him expressed through us in our daily living as our subjective righteousness.

Thank the Lord that He was delivered for our offenses and was raised for our justification (Rom. 4:25). He bore our sins in His body on the tree in order that we, having died to sin, might live to righteousness (1 Pet. 2:24).

We have died to sin; now we live to righteousness. Righteousness is not just objective to us; righteousness is now subjective, for we live to the Lord by being inwardly supplied with the Christ we enjoy and partake of.

By eating the fattened calf, the prodigal son was inwardly supplied and transformed, even enabled to function as the son of his father.

Similarly, by eating Christ and partaking of Him as our food, He can be expressed through us, and we can live Christ for God’s good pleasure.

In this way we are cooperating with the Lord to have the righteousnesses of the saints, the embroidered garment, the righteousness of the bride.

We produce our wedding garment by our daily walk in the Spirit and according to the Spirit and by having a life of the Spirit.

Day by day, week by week, month by momth, and year by year, we need to live and walk according to the Spirit so that we may prepare our wedding garment.

May we be those who cooperate with the Lord day by day in our living by enjoying Christ as our objective and subjective righteousness.

Lord Jesus, we come to You as we are; we repent and confess our sins, and we believe in Your redemptive work on the cross. We take You as our righteousness objectively before God. Thank You for being the best robe given to us by God for us to be justified by God according to His standard of righteousness. Amen, Lord, we open to You and we partake of Your riches in spirit. Hallelujah, Christ is our feast! We exercise our spirit, Lord, under the covering of Your blood, to enjoy You, eat You, and drink You. You are our life and our life supply. We eat You and we want to live because of You. Live in us today. Be expressed through us. May we have the righteousnesses of the saints, the lived out righteousness as our wedding garment! Amen, Lord, we want to cooperate with You today to prepare our wedding garment by having Christ lived out of us in our daily living! Keep us enjoying and experiencing You as our objective and subjective righteousness today!

Read this article in the Romanian language – citiți acest articol în limba română la următorul link, Îl trăim pe Cristos ca dreptatea noastră subiectivă pentru dreptatea miresei.

References and Hymns on this Topic

• Inspiration for this article/sharing comes from the Word of God, the enjoyment in the ministry, a sharing by the brother James Lee in this conference, and portions from, Collected Works of Witness Lee, 1994-1997, vol. 1, “Crystallization-study of the Epistle to the Romans,” pp. 259-260, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, The Maturity of the Bride (2025 Memorial Day Blending Conference), week 5, The Righteousness of the Bride – day 5.
• Hymns on this topic:
  – With a life strict to self we must righteousness hold, / Kind to others in peace, and with God joyful, bold; / In the Kingdom’s reality e’er to remain, / For its manifestation prepared thus to reign. / Then Christ when He comes with the kingdom from God / Will to us grant His kingship to share as reward; / Thus the Lord will His righteousness thru us maintain / And His wisdom to heavenly powers make plain. (Hymns #947 stanzas 4-5)
  – Who will now be clothed in linen bright and pure? / “Behold, the Bridegroom cometh!” / Acts of righteousness will make her rapture sure, / “Behold, the Bridegroom cometh!” (Hymns #1309 stanza 5)
  – He will sanctify thee wholly; / Body, spirit, soul shall be / Blameless till thy Savior’s coming / In His glorious majesty! / He hath perfected forever / Those whom He hath sanctified; / Spotless, glorious, and holy, / Is the Church, His chosen Bride. (Hymns #825 stanza 4)