Galatians 3:21

Is the Law then against the promises of God? God forbid: for if there could have been a Law given which could make alive, verily righteousness would have been of the Law.

The impossibility of even God's Law making people righteous derived from the weakness and frailty of human beings. The helplessness of mankind is implicit in this, that man alone unaided, is simply incapable of fully measuring up to God's perfect and holy standard. Glorious is the thought, therefore, that Christ did it for all people who will receive and obey him. Christ fulfilled all of God's Law perfectly; and then, through the device of setting up an extra-literal "body," called in the New Testament "the body of Christ," into which people upon believing, repenting and being baptized are enrolled, thus becoming in a true sense "Christ," and therefore "in him," achieving saving righteousness. That is what is meant by "the righteousness of God in Christ." This is a genuine righteousness, not an imputed thing at all, except by the device of the corporate body of Christ. The present-day notion of God in some manner "injecting righteousness," or imputing righteousness to sinners upon the basis of mere faith is incorrect, because "faith only" bypasses the corporate body of Christ, which is his church. This means that it bypasses the "seed singular" who is Christ!