For to receive the grace of God in Jesus Christ means not
only that my sins are forgiven because of His death for me on the cross on
Calvary’s hill, but also that I have been given a new life and a new nature. It means
that Christ is being formed in me, that I have become a partaker of the divine
nature, that old things have passed away and all things have become new. It
means that Christ is dwelling in me, and that the Spirit of God is in me. The
man who has been born again, and who has the divine nature within him, is a
man who is righteous and his righteousness does exceed that of the scribes and
Pharisees. He is no longer living for self and his own attainments, he is no
longer self-righteous and self-satisfied. He has become poor in spirit, meek, and
merciful; he hungers and thirsts after righteousness; he has become a peacemaker.
His heart is being purified. He loves God, yes unworthily, alas, but he
loves Him and longs for His honour and glory. His desire is to love God and
to keep and honour and fulfil His law. The commandments of God to such a
man ‘are not grievous’. He wants to keep them, for He loves them. He is no longer
at enmity against God; but he now sees the holiness of the law and nothing
so appeals to him as the living of this law and the exemplifying of it in his daily
life. It is a righteousness that far exceeds the righteousness of the scribes and
Pharisees.

Some of the most vital questions that can be asked, then, are these. Do you
know God? Do you love God? Can you honestly say that the biggest and the
first thing in your life is to glorify Him and that you so want to do this that you
do not care what it may cost you in any sense? Do you feel that this must come
first, not that you may be better than somebody else, but that you may honour
and glorify and love that God who, though you have sinned against Him grievously,
has sent His only begotten Son to the cross on Calvary’s hill to die for
you, that you might be forgiven and that He might restore you unto Himself?
Let every man examine himself.
-D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, page 182-183