NOTES for Psa 24:3-4
Holiness and righteousness: where do they come from? From God or from the human person? Of course, the simplest answer is: from God. He is holy and righteous, while we are sinful people from whom no holiness or righteousness can be expected. And yet God gives the commandment precisely to the human person. At first glance the situation appears paradoxical: even before Paul, long before Christ came into the world, people understood, or at least guessed, that by and large there are no righteous people in the world, that human righteousness is a very relative thing, and that if God wants to find some spiritual or moral flaw in a person, He will always find it, even if He approaches the person not with His infinite measure but with a finite human one. And yet only a righteous person can stand before God. So where can a person get such righteousness? Only from God, of course. Only He can make a person righteous. But from the person readiness to receive is required. In fact, a person's righteousness consists precisely in this: it is important for him to be able to receive what God is ready to give him in full measure. And all the commandments, all the laws given by God, are needed in the end not at all to make the person better: no laws, moral norms, or rules of behavior make a fallen person better. They are needed to make a person receptive to God's action on his heart. And God Himself will make the person what He wants him to be.