Our salvation, calling and good works in life are all founded on, motivated and empowered by the grace of God working in us. Christ's Gospel work -His Life, Death and Resurrection- is what secured this grace in the past and ensures it forevermore in the future. We must depend by faith on the continual arrival of this grace moment by moment in order to walk with God in a pleasing way and accomplish the works that he has given us to do for his glory.

In Jesus' day the Scribes and Pharisees were thought to be some of the most righteous people around. But Jesus said that in order to get into the Kingdom of Heaven our righteousness must go far beyond their deficient righteousness. Jesus' statement is not meant to get us to try harder, but to see the impossibility of fulfilling God's perfect requirements in ourselves. We need the righteousness that only Christ can provide, the righteousness that is by faith alone. Then and only then can we be guaranteed entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven.