Three Kinds of Righteousness

There are three kinds of righteousness, or at least three kinds of righteousness which bear that name.

There is inherent righteousness, of which we have none.

There is imputed righteousness, which is all our justification.

And there is imparted righteousness. when God the Spirit makes us new creatures, and raises up in the heart that "new man, which after God" (that is, "after the image of God") "is created in righteousness and true holiness."

When the Lord said, "Except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven," he did not mean only an external righteousness wrought out by his obedience to the law for them, but an internal righteousness wrought out by the Holy Spirit in them.

-J.C. Philpot, Through Baca's Vale