Sermon on Justification by Faith

The Call to Local Church Commitment

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The Doctrine of Justification in Romans 5

It's an honor to be able to preach here this evening. Earlier this week I was looking back and kind of recounting on just the history that I have with Apologia. Some of you may know that the first series that Apologia ever went through was titled Doctrine.

I'm not sure how long we went through that series, but then the series that came after Doctrine was a series through the Book of Romans. And we were in Romans for some time. It seemed as though every message was centered around the doctrine of justification.

And I think at the moment I could hear and understand this doctrine, but I think in time I've come to grow more and understand how significant that doctrine is. It's going to be a focus for us tonight.

Our text this evening is going to be found in the Book of Romans, and we're going to be in chapter 5. So Romans chapter 5. I'll let you turn there. We're going to look at, well initially we're going to read verses 12 through the end of the chapter, and then our focus is going to be on a specific verse, namely verse 18.

Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we come to you in a lowly estate. Oh Lord, if you were to mark iniquity, who could stand? We ask, Lord God, that no flesh would glory in your presence. But what we desire in this moment, Lord God, is that you be worshipped.

Please, Father, grant this to us. Amen. Romans chapter 5, beginning in verse 12. Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.

For sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law. Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come.

But the free gift is not like the trespass, for if many died through one man's trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many. And the free gift is not like the result of that one man's sin, for the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brought justification.

For if because of one man's trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man Jesus Christ.

Therefore, as one trespass led to condemnation for all men, so one act of righteousness leads to justification in life for all men. For as by the one man's disobedience the many were made sinners, so by the one man's obedience the many will be made righteous.

Now the law came in to increase the trespass, but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more. So that as sin reigned in death, grace also might reign through righteousness leading to eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord.

This is the word of the Lord. Paul in his epistle to the Romans lays out for us many foundations of the Christian faith. He kind of takes a step back and paints for us a big picture. These are worldview shaping ideas.

We read in Romans chapter 1 that all know God, that God has made himself clear. He's made himself evident through the things he's made. His divine power and nature are clearly presented to everyone and everyone is without excuse.

He goes on to state that all worship. It's not a question of whether or not you worship. The question is what do you worship? Who do you worship? Do you worship the creator or do you worship the creature?

He moves further into Romans in chapter 3. He comes to the conclusion that all have sinned, right? There are none who are good. There's none who seek after righteousness. All have fallen short of this glory of God.

None seek after God. The scope is broad. He paints a picture and everybody's in it. Our passage here is no exception because here Paul informs us that there are two individuals that stand out amongst all people everywhere and for all time.

Paul tells us that whether you embrace God or you reject God, you relate to him and your status before him comes down to two individuals. The text that we just read is divided into three parts. You have Adam and Christ introduced in verses 12 through 14.

You have Adam and Christ contrasted in verses 15 through 17 and then you have Adam and Christ compared in verses 18 through 21. Our focus this evening is on this comparison and specifically verse 18. I want to focus our attention here because what you have in verse 18 in chapter 5 is a succinct straightforward and simple statement on the issue of the human race and its solution.

So I want to present this evening three points. One, the issue. Two, the solution. And three, our hope. The issue, the solution, and our hope. In this section of Romans, Paul is making the claim that the whole story of the human race can be summed up in the terms of what has happened through Adam, what has happened and yet will happen through Christ.

And the contention with Adam here in Romans chapter 5, as we read in our verse and through this passage, is that through a single act of his own, condemnation came to all. Now to help us understand this condemnation more, I want to first define it and then we'll depict it.

So I want to define it and then we'll depict it. A condemnation simply defined is to experience the complete disapproval of another. Complete disapproval of another. In this case, God's disapproval. Also, condemnation is to receive a guilty judgment.

So both condemnation and justification, they take us into the law court. So justification, as many of you know, and condemnation are both pronouncements of a judge. That is the language being utilized here by Paul.

Now the issue we face is that we, simply put, are guilty. We're guilty. God does not approve of us. The verdict is in and we're guilty. And in chapter 5, Paul lays out a path back to the source of this condemnation and he points back to the act of one individual, one man.

He points back to the sin of the first man, Adam. Now to depict this condemnation, let's follow this path with him. I want us to understand why we are condemned. Why are we condemned? Why is it that we are guilty?

You don't have to turn to Genesis, but I want us to recount quickly who Adam was, Adam's relationship to God, and Adam's relationship to us. You see, if we consider what we read in the first few chapters of Genesis and consider also what the rest of Scripture has to say concerning these chapters, this is what we know.

Adam was created in the image of God. Adam was created in the image of God. Now there are many implications that flow from this reality, but I'm only going to highlight a few. Adam being made in the image of God means he was to reflect God to the rest of creation.

He was to reflect His beauty, His love, His kindness, His righteousness, His justice. Also, Adam was to take God's creation, this creation that God calls very good, and maintain its goodness. He was to take what God had created and the resources that God put in front of him, and he was to cultivate it.

Now understand that Adam is a part of God's creation, and being a part of God's creation, there's a distinction between creator and that of what is created. You see, God is the only independent one. God doesn't need anything outside of Himself to be who He is.

He is completely and wholly self-sufficient. He's the reference point, and being the reference point, He defines all things. God does not look to anything outside of Himself to determine what or how He ought to act or be.

So God does not do something because it is good. No. Good is whatever God does. But this is not the case with humanity. We're dependent beings. Most basically, we depend upon things outside of us to maintain ourselves.

We need things like food and water to maintain and be sustained, but ultimately, we're completely dependent upon God. And when God created us, He created us to depend upon Him, not just as the giver of life, but we were to depend upon God for all things.

We're to depend upon God and find in Him our ultimate security, our ultimate peace, our ultimate joy, our ultimate satisfaction and fulfillment, our ultimate approval. We're even to depend upon God for true knowledge.

We're to depend upon God for true knowledge. You see, it is God who defines His creation. If we want to understand something's potential, God is the reference point. If God has revealed a purpose in creation and for creation, then that is its true potential.

And so Adam was to depend upon God for what he was to consider good in a moral sense, what he was to consider right or how he ought to live. So in Genesis chapter 2, you see God in His condescension relating to Adam in a special way.

He's covenanting with Adam in a special way. He says to Adam in a Max McLean voice, Adam, of all the trees in the garden you may eat from, except for the tree in the middle of the garden, that tree you may not eat from.

For the day that you eat from that tree, right, you will die. It's interesting that in Genesis chapter 2, there's a statement here that is, I think, very important but often missed because it's almost stated in passing, but it says that God placed in the garden every tree that was beautiful to the eyes, every tree that was beautiful to the eyes.

You see, from the beginning the intentions that God had for Adam and Eve were good. He had their best in mind. He wanted Adam and Eve to experience pleasure, and He places them in this garden near this land of Eden, Eden meaning pleasure.

You see, God wants us to experience pleasure. Now, as we have said, God defines this pleasure. He sets the boundaries of this pleasure. But the intention for Adam and Eve as they lived a life of worship was to find joy, a fullness of joy in the presence of God.

And so you have this covenant, this relationship established between God and man. And then in chapter 3, you may know, introduced into this narrative, you have the serpent. And we read that the serpent is no fool, but with the intention to steal and kill and destroy, he uses his greatest weapon, his greatest weapon, listen to this, and that's to call into question God's goodness and truthfulness.

He wants man to reject God, and as he holds up this forbidden fruit, he poses a question. He asks, did God say you can't eat of any tree in the garden? And with that question, he wants Adam and Eve to think and come to the conclusion that God is not seeking after their best, and that there is something else in this world that offers a better goodness than what God can.

And as Eve is standing there before this fruit, and she's seeing, it's beautiful to the eyes that it's able to satisfy her hunger, and then thinking about what the serpent just said, God is trying to keep something from you, something good, something better, because he knows that when you eat this fruit, you won't die, but you'll become exactly as he is.

And with that in her mind, she then thinks the fruit will make her wise, and she takes it, and she eats, and then gives her a husband, Adam, who is there with her, and he takes it, and following suit, he eats the forbidden fruit.

And in this moment, in this moment, Adam is rejecting God as his creator. He's rejecting God as God. He's seeking in this moment to place himself upon the very throne of God. He's dethroning God in his heart, and is placing himself upon that very throne.

You see, God is the one who determines, right? He's the one who defines all things. He's the judge. And what Adam does in this moment is he says, I'm going to define for myself what is good. I'm going to be a law unto myself, and rather than depend upon God for true knowledge, he seeks independence from him.

And in this one act, as Romans tells us, sin was introduced into the world. And moving forward into this narrative, you have the depiction of the sin as Adam, and all who are to follow bring ruin to God's good creation.

Adam has fallen. He's now on a path that pursues his own independence, his own self-autonomy. He now defines pleasure for himself and pursues it at all costs, and his heart, it's turned inward. Oh, he's going to continue to worship.

He'll continue to worship, but as we noted earlier, it's just not God that he's going to worship. His heart will continue to cling onto something. Something will continue to be the driving force of his life, but it's not going to be God.

And because Adam is made in the image of God, he knows that he's guilty. He knows that he has sinned, but he's going to do whatever he can to cover up this sin. He's going to hide. He's going to lie. He's going to blame, and he's going to try to cover up his shame and nakedness with something insufficient, some fig leaves.

So, what's happening here is twofold. Listen to this. Adam is rejecting God as his creator and God as his savior, and we know that God told Adam that the day you eat of the fruit, you will die, and Adam died.

His body, of course, began to experience decay, and spiritually, he was dead, separated from God, who is the very source of life, the one who had created him. And what Romans 5 tells us, beginning in verse 12, is that through him, sin entered into the world, but because of him, all sinned.

And because he sinned, and therefore all sinned, therefore all die. All are spiritually dead. Now, many push back at this reality, but what Paul is saying in Romans chapter 5 is clear, that Adam was a representative.

Adam represented us in that moment, and when he fell, we all fell. I'm not going to establish a thorough argument for this truth, but I will say that if you deny that Adam is a representative, then you reject the analogy between Christ and Adam in Romans 5, because we read that through one transgression, condemnation came for all, but through one act of righteousness, justification leading to life.

There are people that Christ represented, and God treated him as they should be treated, and in turn, treats them as Christ deserved to be treated. So, what Paul is saying is that if Jesus was a representative of a people, so was Adam.

If Christ imputed something to his people, then this context, Adam did the same thing. So, because we have rejected God, just like Adam, we've sought to dethrone God, and we've brought ruin to God's creation.

We had a choice to make, and rather than choose God, ultimately, we choose ourselves. And the effects of this sin, as many of you know, touch every aspect of our being. Listen to what one commentator said concerning this.

The first bad news that sin brings upon an individual is selfishness. It's bad news in human existence that every one of us is bent on fulfilling our own particular desires at any price. We are utterly self-centered.

Man will do his own thing if permitted, and whatever society will permit, he will do. He will go as far as society's toleration will allow. Man will consume everything in sight on his own lust. He will consume things, and he will consume people.

When a friend, or a spouse, or a lover, or a family member ceases to provide what an individual wants, they're discarded like an old pair of shoes that are useless. And this is nothing but the manifestation of what is deep in the heart of man, self-destructive selfishness.

And our ultimate goal in life is to achieve self-satisfaction. Whether you're in business, or marriage, or whether you're in love, man winds up perverting everything because of his selfish lust for gain, for fame, for dominance, for popularity, for money, for physical fulfillment.

And the end of it is that man is unable to sustain a meaningful relationship. He's unable to really love. He's unwilling to give, and thus he forfeits that which is the most obvious source of true joy, selflessness.

Man becomes dominated by a selfish greed that alienates him from everyone and everything, and the result of all this is that man really comes to a place of utter loneliness and despair, and he finds that all of the things he consumes on his own lust bear the law of diminishing returns in them, so that the more he gets, the less it satisfies.

This is why we are condemned. This is why we are condemned. This is why God does not approve of us. This is why we are guilty. And this condemnation, it's felt now. This disapproval is understood within us, Romans 1 and 2.

Our rejection of God as our maker and Christ as our Savior is the underlying cause of all sin. And us rejecting that reality, listen to this, it creates the felt condemnation. It creates a felt condemnation.

We exchange God for something else, and we try to find in finite things only what an infinite God can provide. And because of this, man and women live in anxiety. They live in fear. They live in sleeplessness.

They have psychological problems. They have ulcers and all sorts of issues caused by this separation. And maybe you're here, and you don't believe in God. You've been taught by society not to feel guilty.

You think that we're to determine for ourselves what is good and should not feel guilty. But keep in mind that no problem of guilt is a very big problem. If you have no guilt, then nothing is more important than you.

And your feelings and needs are all that matter. And if nothing is more important than you, nothing transcends you. And if nothing transcends you, there is no hope. There's no hope. I love what what Bovink points out in his dogmatics.

He says that everyone sees that there's something off in this world, and therefore in need of redemption. But the only hope of redemption or salvation, no matter how you define it, must come from outside the thing which is in need of saving.

You hear that? So if there is no guilt, then there is no hope. And the Bible says there is truth that transcends. Therefore, there is hope. And because there is hope, therefore, there's guilt. And because we know that God is, and because we are made in his image, we will try to go beyond ourselves.

Because all the despair we find inside, we try to validate our worth and grasp after some kind of righteousness that will remove our guilt. You see, properly understood, everyone is seeking after justification.

We're seeking after righteousness. We try to cover our shame and validate worth. And this is what justification is. But because of your love for self and not God, you will define the terms of that justification.

You see, we'll define the terms of that justification. And you know what that's called? That's called self-righteousness. The solution. And thank God there's a solution. We know that there is a solution because in our text, in Romans 5, verse 18, God has revealed that one act of righteousness leads to justification and life for all men.

This is most assuredly speaking of Christ because, of course, the surrounding context informs us of that, namely verse 17. And the act of righteousness here is referring to Christ's obedience at the cross, as Philippians 2 tells us that Jesus was obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.

Now, we've established that everyone seeks after a justification. And what Paul says here is that that's exactly what we need. We need to be justified. But listen carefully, this justification that is received because here in verse 18, the act of righteousness that produces this justification is one that is not done by us, but it's done by Christ.

So this justification, as we read here, is something that's received. It's something that's received. As one translation puts it, this one act of righteousness brings this justification. It's something that comes to us.

So I want to look at this justification. What is justification? Well, as I'd imagine everybody at Apologia knows, justification is to be declared righteous. Now, also here, that justification can be understood more deeply as a validation of worth and right to privilege.

Okay? A validation of worth and right to privilege. So to understand this more fully, I want to look at Romans chapter 3. And I just want to draw out from this passage a few significant points. First, Paul concludes that we're all sinners.

And then after concluding that we are all sinners, that none are good, that none seek for God, we've fallen short, right, of God's glory, he makes three world-changing statements. I also want to point out, too, one commentator says that this paragraph here in Romans chapter 3 is the most important paragraph ever written in human history.

But here, Paul makes three world-changing statements. First, a justification from God has been revealed now. A justification from God has been revealed now. Second, this justification is apart from works of the law.

So this justification is apart from works of the law. And finally, this justification eliminates boasting. It eliminates boasting. You see, everyone is seeking after a justification, a validation of worth, a right to privilege.

And one thing this passage leads us to do here is to ask ourselves, where are we trying to find this justification? Where are we trying to find this justification? You see, Christianity is unique. There's no world religion like it.

All these man-made religions and philosophies, they'll tell you this, that to be made right, you must work and do and go here and do this sacrament and do this pilgrimage and this ritual. And on the last day, it'll be revealed that you are right with God or that you've accomplished some state of consciousness.

If you do enough of the good, you will justify your worth. And your record will be displayed and it will be revealed that you have a right to privilege. But Christianity is far, far more different than these.

Because Paul says that this justification can be revealed now. This justification can be revealed now. You can know now that you are made right before God, that your worth is validated and you have a right to privilege now.

This is why Paul can conclude later in Romans that we have peace with God now. We can have peace with God now. These other false ideas that push you towards a justification in yourself will never produce peace, but only fear.

Because as you try to accomplish a righteousness in yourself, the only motive is out of fear of punishment of or to disapproval. You hear that? The only motivation is out of fear of punishment or of disapproval.

And something that is done in fear is always rooted in selfishness. Your good works are not for God, they're for yourself. But this justification from God that is revealed leads to the ones who receive it to live a selfless life in love for God.

Because no longer are they living in fear of punishment, but in peace because they know that their worth and right to privilege come to them. They're not from them. This is why the Belgic Confession says, therefore, far from making people cold toward living in a pious and holy way, this justifying faith, quite to the contrary, so works within them that apart from it, they will never do a thing out of love for God, but only out of love for themselves and fear of being condemned.

This is why Paul and his statement that justification is apart from works of the law is so radical. Even if you try to muster up a righteousness that is found in you, you'll come to the conclusion that in the end it's impossible.

And yes, we know this as Christians, because Paul says clearly, right, that none are good. But in Romans chapter two, he addresses those who won't receive this word, and he points out to them that any attempts at righteousness will fall short, not because these people think themselves to be bad, but because even they know that they should be much better than what they are.

Their conscience, as Paul says, right, it bears witness against them because they can't live even up to their own standards. Think of all the standards that we place upon the people around us. Everyone knows that they're not even as good as what they think others should be.

This righteousness is apart from works of the law. It must be. It must be an alien righteousness, something that comes to us from outside of us. Lastly, Paul says that this justification that is revealed now, and not based on your performance, it eliminates boasting in Romans 3 .27.

It eliminates boasting. I want us to consider this for a moment because I think that it's obvious how contradictive this is to false religion and even to secularism. Their whole systems are based on boasting, but I want us to also consider this as Christians.

You see Paul, of course, in Romans chapter 3, as we've said, he's already concluded that all have sinned, but in this section of Romans chapter 3, he wants us to look at self-righteousness. He wants us to look at boasting.

He's already concluded all have sinned, none are good. Everyone falls short of the glory of God. And now in this section, in Romans chapter 3, he wants us to consider boasting. Do you see what Paul is saying here?

He's saying that salvation comes when we repent of our false justification, when we repent of our self-righteousness. So the question is, what do we boast in? What do you boast in? Even as Christians, this question is important because as we know that in our times of flesh and in our actions, we find our justification in ourselves at times.

All of us are different, and this is going to manifest itself in different ways, but we're finding our justification in other things at times. The question is, what is it? Is it our work, our money, our youth, our beauty, maybe even our children, maybe even in ministry?

These can be things that at times we find our ultimate justification in. We hold them up and we say by them, my worth is validated. They become an identity, and we think because of them we're approved of in the ultimate sense.

And really this is twofold. It goes back to a denial of God as creator and Christ as savior, because typically in denying God as creator, the implication is that we elevate man, and we then seek man's approval as ultimate.

And in seeking man's approval as ultimate, we hold up these things before everyone and we say, look at me, and use it as our justification before this false God. And people strive for this justification, and people strive for this righteousness.

What is it that you're boasting in? Money, popularity, family? One way to identify this is by looking at what causes you to fear, what things in life cause you to experience the most anxiety. And this is the root of all sin.

This is why we need to feed off of this reality and understand more fully who God is and what he's done for us in Jesus Christ. Because Paul says here that to what degree we understand this justification will be the degree that our boasting will be eliminated, our false justification will be eliminated.

And isn't that what we desire? To be free from our boasting and self-righteous striving? You see, we need to be freed of this reality, and we need to cling to the reality that we have been justified freely.

Some may think that justification is just forgiveness. No, justification goes beyond forgiveness. Forgiveness, you could say, is a negative, but justification is a positive because it's not just pardon, but it's a bestowal of a status.

I love this quote that I stumbled on in Stott's commentary. Listen to this. The voice that spells forgiveness will say, you may go. You have been let off the penalty, which your sins deserves. But the verdict, which means justification, will say, you may come.

You're welcome to all my love and my presence. You see, through one act of righteousness, this justification comes to us. In Romans chapter 5, it's the only place that someone is referred to in all of Scripture as a type of Christ who was to come.

And Paul, in 1 Corinthians 15, he utilizes this same comparison and says that Jesus is the last Adam. You see, this covenant that God established with Adam, we all stand in it. Non-believer, believer, we stand in relationship to God in this sense, and we're condemned.

But Christ comes and he fulfills as the God-man this covenant. Where Adam fails, Christ comes and he succeeds. You see what Adam did? He climbed a tree of death and ate of its fruit, and so doing brought death to everyone, and they became accursed.

They became condemned. Jesus Christ comes and he wears thorns, which are a sign of the curse, upon his head, and he climbs up the tree of death, the cross, and he hangs there, for curse is anyone who hangs upon a tree, and he turns that tree of death into a tree of life.

And this is the hope, this is the hope, that when you come to this new tree and you take from its fruit, you realize that sin, that the sin you carried, the condemnation that you carried, is what made that tree a tree of death for him.

Because on that tree, the wrath of God that you deserved because of your condemnation was placed upon him. And that is why you can eat from its fruit and now have justification leading to life, as our text says.