Christ our Righteousness

"But one day . . . this sentence fell upon my soul, 'Thy righteousness is in heaven'; and methought withal, I saw with the eyes of my soul, Jesus Christ at God's right hand; there, I say, as my righteousness; so that wherever I was, or whatever I was doing, God could not say to me 'He wants my righteousness,' for that was just before him. I also saw, moreover, that it was not my good frame of heart that made my righteousness better, nor yet my bad frame that made my righteousness worse; for my righteousness was Jesus Christ himself, 'the same yesterday, today, and forever.'

"Now did my chains fall off my legs indeed . . . Oh! methought, Christ! Christ! there was nothing but Christ that was before my eyes . . . Now I could look from myself to him, and would reckon that all those graces of God that now were green on me, were yet but like those cracked goats and four-pence-half-pennies that rich men carry in their purses, when their gold is in their trunks at home: Oh! I saw my gold was in my trunk at home! In Christ my Lord and Saviour. Now Christ was all; all my righteousness, all my sanctification, and all my redemption."

-John Bunyan