The Justification by Faith Seminar

Alpha & Omega Ministries

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where we have certain freedoms. We have freedoms to worship, we have freedoms to carry this book in our hands without fear of reprisal, without fear of punishment.

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But it has not always been this way. There have been times in the not so distant past when the

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Word of God was primarily unknown amongst the people. Only an elite group of people knew what the

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Bible said and even they did not have a great knowledge of it. And then there came that time about four hundred and sixty years ago of great upheaval in western civilization known as the

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Reformation. Now I'm not going to spend a whole lot of time on the subject of the Reformation this evening, but I do want to mention to you that there were two primary principles that brought about the

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Reformation. The first was the doctrine of sola scriptura. Sola scriptura.

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And what is that doctrine? It is the concept that the scriptures and the scriptures only are the sole rule of faith for the church.

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That there is no authority over the scriptures. That human tradition, human teachings cannot possibly be added to scripture.

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That scripture is not incomplete without the addition of human traditions and things like that.

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That if we are going to say that God has revealed that something is true, we must be able to demonstrate that from the words of the

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Bible. This was one of the guiding principles of the Reformation. And it gave rise to what might be called the material principle of the

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Reformation, and that was justification by faith. Not justification by faith coupled with obedience to gospel rules and principles.

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Not justification by faith coupled with various and sundry performances of sacramental duties.

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But justification by faith alone. Sola fide. Faith alone.

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Martin Luther, who was well known obviously in his role in the Reformation, described justification by faith as the article of the standing or falling church.

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The article of the standing or falling church. And what he meant by that was that you can sort of take the pulse of the health of the church by listening to what she says about justification.

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You can understand the health of the church by listening to what she says about justification.

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How often, in what terms, with what feeling of gratitude in her heart does the church speak of her justification?

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For justification truly is that description of how a man who is not right with God can be made right with God.

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And there can be few things that are more foundational or elemental than how it is that men who are sinful and are unjust can be made just and right in God's sight.

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And so if the church is not talking about these basic things any longer, or if the church has so overlaid that process that we call justification, that act of God that we call justification, with her traditions and with her ceremonies that the people of God no longer speak of justification, then we know that not all is well in the church.

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And if we apply this to our modern day, I am afraid that we can say with a fair amount of certainty that amongst those who claim the name of Christ, there is a problem.

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For we don't hear often of justification. We don't hear people speaking of justification with love and thankfulness in their hearts.

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There seems to be other topics that are more important in our minds than how it is that God has taken us from being unjust to making us just and righteous in his sight.

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Why don't we hear more about justification today? Why when we turn on the radio and we listen to radio programs, why do we not hear a tremendous amount of discussion about this subject?

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Well, I would first suggest to you that it is a theological concept, and we are in what must be described as an anti -theological age.

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It is a theological concept, but many today in the modern church feel that theology and doctrine are dry husks of a past age.

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I want something more. Not recognizing that theology and doctrine is simply our knowledge of God.

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It is simply what the scriptures teach us about who God is and what he's about in this world.

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And secondly, in regards to why we do not hear more about justification, I would quote the words of the great writer of this century, but a little while back,

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John Murray, who said, and we are all wrong with him, that is with God, because we have all sinned and come short of the glory of God.

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Far too frequently we fail to entertain the gravity of this fact. Hence the reality of our sin and the reality of the wrath of God upon us for our sin do not come into our reckoning.

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This is the reason why the grand article of justification does not ring the bells of the innermost depth of our spirit.

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And this is the reason why the gospel of justification is to such an extent a meaningless sound in the world and in the church of the 20th century.

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We are not imbued with the profound sense of the reality of God of his majesty and holiness. And sin, if reckoned with at all, is little more than a misfortune or maladjustment.

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It is true, to speak of justification, we must speak of who we really are as sinners under the wrath of God, where we were and where we now are by the grace of God.

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Furthermore, justification presents to us God the Father in his role as judge.

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And we don't like to think of God the Father as judge. We like to think of God the Father primarily as provider, as Abba, as the one who comforts us, as the one who has given his son for us.

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But we don't like to think of God the Father as judge, despite the fact that the New Testament clearly presents him in that role to us.

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And finally, justification emphasizes the sovereignty and control of God, because as we will see this evening, the scriptures present justification as the action, the declaration of God.

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God is the one who declares us just. We do not declare ourselves just. We do not bring about our own justification.

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God is the one based solely and completely on the work of another, that is the person of Jesus Christ.

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God is the one who declares us righteous. We are the passive object of God's action of justification and we don't like that.

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We don't like that because we're not in control. We don't like that because it strikes at our own supposed sovereignty.

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And so there is rebellion against it. However, justification as an issue, as a doctrine, is vital.

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It is central to the gospel itself. Any person who reads Romans or Galatians cannot help but be faced with the fact that in the

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Apostle Paul's mind, how one was justified was central to the gospel so much so, that as we will see when we examine the book of Galatians briefly this evening,

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Paul could, on the basis of a person's teaching on this subject, say that an entire group of teachers were under the anathema of God, the very curse of God, because they perverted the gospel of Christ.

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And how did they pervert the gospel of Christ? They taught error or falsehood about how a person is justified.

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And so we are not talking here simply about a theological subject that is primarily for theologians to debate in a seminary class.

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We are not talking about something that we can either take or leave. We are talking about something that is central and definitional to the gospel of Jesus Christ itself.

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Now to help us to understand the various concepts, this evening what

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I would like to do first of all is to provide for you a definition of justification as held historically and at the time of the

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Reformation by the Roman Catholic Church, so that you have a position against which the

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Reformers were reacting and it can be helpful to you in understanding what the

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Reformers themselves were saying. Now I'm not going to read the entire section on justification from the

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Council of Trent because it is fairly long. If you would like to read what has not changed in any way, shape, or form in regards to what the

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Roman Catholic Church teaches, then I would suggest that you would want to read the sixth session of the

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Canon of the Council of Trent, Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, available at any Roman Catholic bookstore.

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But the best way to sort of hear some of these things is to read the anathemas that are leveled by the

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Council of Trent against various concepts that have been put forward. For example, just to give you some ideas,

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Canon 4 from the Council of Trent says, If anyone says that man's free will, moved and aroused by God, by assenting to God's call and action, in no way cooperates toward disposing and preparing itself to obtain the grace of justification, that it cannot refuse its assent if it wishes, but that as something inanimate it does nothing whatever and is merely passive, let him be anathema.

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If anyone says that after the sin of Adam, man's free will was lost and destroyed, or that it is a thing only in name, indeed a name without a reality, a fiction introduced into church by Satan, let him be anathema.

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Canon 9, If anyone says that the sinner is justified by faith alone, meaning that nothing else is required to cooperate in order to obtain the grace of justification, and that it is not in any way necessary that he be prepared and disposed by the action of his own will, let him be anathema.

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Please note over and over again, obtaining the grace of justification, obtaining the grace of justification.

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If anyone says that justifying faith is nothing else than confidence in divine mercy, which remits sins for Christ's sake, or that it is this confidence alone that justifies us, let him be anathema.

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If anyone says the grace of justification is shared by those only who are predestined to life, but that all others who are called are called indeed but receive not grace, as if they are by divine power predestined to evil, let him be anathema.

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The Roman Catholic concept of justification is that justification is not by faith alone.

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One receives the grace of justification originally in baptism.

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When a person is baptized as a child, or if the person is a convert to the church, when they are baptized, all of their past sins are forgiven.

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The original sin of Adam is washed away, and they receive what is called the grace of justification.

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This is a grace that is infused into them and changes them inwardly.

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Justification in Roman Catholicism is subjective in nature.

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It changes a person on the inside. Justification in Roman Catholicism also includes within it what most of us

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Protestants would understand as sanctification. Sanctification and justification in Roman Catholic theology are connected in the sense that they are confounded.

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They are not considered to be two different things. The grace of justification in Roman Catholic theology can be lost by committing a mortal sin.

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If you commit a mortal sin, the grace of justification that was given you in baptism is destroyed.

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You are lost. You are no longer justified. The only way to again receive this infused grace is to go through the sacrament of confession.

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Perform penance, satisfaction, have contrition, all the things that are involved in confessing to the priest, and when this takes place, the grace of justification is again infused into you, and you are considered to be right with God.

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But there are some things you need to understand. When we talk about justification, as we are going to get to in a moment, when we talk of a person being just or righteous, we think of a person being in the proper standing with God.

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All sins wiped away. All hindrances to fellowship gone. Every stain of sin removed from the soul.

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But this is not so in Roman Catholicism. For in Roman Catholicism, you can be justified.

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You can have the grace of justification, and yet have the stain of sin upon your soul.

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And in fact, every single person who in Roman Catholic theology is in purgatory today, or who will end up in purgatory, the only way you can get into purgatory is if you are justified.

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If you have the grace of justification. So why are you in purgatory? Why are you suffering in purgatory?

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Because you still have the stains of sin upon your soul. So a person can be justified, have the grace of justification in their life, but not be perfectly spotless and clean.

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Now if you are thinking with me, if you are thinking about what that means, you may already be considering some of the problems.

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For we believe that a person is justified solely on the basis of the work of Jesus Christ.

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And how then could the work of Jesus Christ possibly leave stains of sin upon the soul?

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In fact, the righteousness that is ours, that we have before God, and we are going to discuss all this in a few moments, the righteousness that is ours is not our righteousness.

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It is not the result of a change in us. Whose righteousness is it?

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It is the righteousness of Jesus Christ. That is the righteousness that a believer has.

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And how then can there possibly be the quote unquote stain of sin upon the soul that I must suffer for and that my sufferings bring about atonement for, which is what

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Roman Catholicism teaches in regards to purgatory, after I die? There is obviously a great difference between the two perspectives.

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So in Roman Catholicism you have a subjective but not necessarily permanent change inside of a person that is based according to Roman Catholicism upon the grace that is made available through the work of Christ, but it is not actually the imputation of the righteousness of Christ to us.

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Now, those of you who are not Baptists will give me a little bit of slack,

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I hope, if I use the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith to present to you the

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Reformed understanding of justification, the Protestant understanding of justification.

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But in case you might be, for example, a Presbyterian or something like that, what you have in the

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Baptist Confession of Faith is identical, word for word, for what you have in the

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Westminster Confession of Faith itself from 1648, showing how closely those two perspectives once were.

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And please forgive me if I read it fairly laboriously to you, but I want you to hear what is said.

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Justification. Those whom God effectually calleth, he also freely justifies, not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning their sins and by accounting and accepting their persons as righteous, not for anything wrought in them or done by them, but for Christ's sake alone.

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And I say this, not by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them as their righteousness, but by imputing

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Christ's active obedience under the whole law and passive obedience in his death for their whole and sole righteousness, they receiving and resting on him and his righteousness by faith, which faith they have not of themselves, it is the gift of God.

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Did you catch that? The Protestant perspective was that faith is the work of God in the heart of man.

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It is the gift of God. We'll discuss that a little bit more later.

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Faith thus receiving and resting on Christ and his righteousness is the alone instrument of justification, yet it is not alone in the person justified, but is ever accompanied with all of the saving graces, and is no dead faith, but worketh by love.

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What does that mean? According to the Baptist confession, according to the Westminster confession, saving faith is not simply tipping one's hat toward God.

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Saving faith, the faith that is the work of the spirit of God in a person's heart, is not a faith that simply acknowledges that God exists, says, well,

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I guess Jesus died for my sins, and it goes on from there. It is the work of God, it is accompanied with all other aspects of the work of God in a person's heart.

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It is not a faith that is alone. In fact, this is probably where the saying came from, faith alone saves, but a saving faith is never alone.

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Christ by his obedience and death did fully discharge the debt of all those that are justified, and did by the sacrifice of himself in the blood of his cross, undergoing in their stead the penalty due unto them, make a proper, real, and full satisfaction to God's justice in their behalf.

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Yet inasmuch as he was given by the Father for them, and his obedience and satisfaction accepted in their stead, and both freely, not for anything in them, their justification is only of free grace, that both the exact justice and rich grace of God might be glorified in the justification of sinners.

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What are they saying? They are saying that Christ died in behalf of his people, that Christ's death is the full and sufficient payment for all of their sins.

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Nothing needs to be added to the work of Jesus Christ. Nothing could possibly, anything we could ever do, could possibly be considered to be necessary to be added to the work of Christ.

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His work alone is sufficient. In fact, though they do not say it here,

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I'm sure they would have agreed with the statement that to say that there is anything that you could add to that is a blasphemous statement, a blasphemous statement, and certainly shows that you do not understand the richness of the work of Christ.

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God did from all eternity decree to justify all the elect, and Christ did in the fullness of time die for their sins and rise to their justification.

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Nevertheless, they are not justified personally until the Holy Spirit doth, in due time, actually apply

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Christ unto them. Two more. God doth continue to forgive the sins of those that are justified, and although they can never fall from the state of justification, yet they may by their sins fall under God's fatherly displeasure, and in that condition they have not usually the light of his countenance restored unto them until they humble themselves, confess their sins, beg pardon, and renew their faith and repentance.

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Finally, the justification of believers under the Old Testament was, in all these respects, one and the same with justification of believers under the

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New Testament. Let me expand upon some of the things that are said here. First of all, there is a direct denial that justification is an infusion of righteousness into us.

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A direct denial of that. Secondly, and this is extremely important, according to the

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Protestant perspective, justification is primarily, and I will use two names to describe it, a judicial, or a more technical term, a forensic declaration on the part of God.

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What do I mean by that? It is a legal, judicial, forensic declaration.

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It is a statement by God about the believer. God as judge says about you as sinner, when you have faith in Christ because of what

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Christ has done on your behalf, because he has borne your sins, God makes a declaration.

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You are just. You are in the proper relationship to the law.

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And as we get into the scriptures and look how the word is used, you will see how this comes directly forth from the pages of the

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Bible. That you are in the proper relationship with me. It is not, the confession says, a subjective change in the heart of a person.

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In other words, clearly justification and sanctification are differentiated in Protestant theology.

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Justification is solely the work of God. Man's actions are not a part of God's declaration.

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The sole ground of justification is the work of Jesus Christ. Notice the two things that were said, his passive and his active obedience.

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What does that mean? Since it is not a biblical term, we need to make sure the Bible actually presents the concept.

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We understand his active obedience and his passive obedience in regards to what he did positively and negatively is how

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I like to picture it. Negatively, our sins, our debts to God, our transgressions were laid upon Christ as the perfect and sinless

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Son of God, the Lamb of God who was slain in our place. So Christ has borne our transgressions, but that is not all he did.

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That is not all he did. See, we frequently think of the work of Christ solely in the concept of his passively being obedient to the will of the

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Father in dying in our place. But is that all Christ did? The righteousness that is given to us in Christ Jesus, is it solely just the forgiveness of our sins?

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Or is there something more? What the confession talks about is the fact that Christ fulfilled the law in our place.

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Do any one of us love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul, mind and strength every minute of every day, every second of every minute?

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Do we ever fail in the positive accomplishment of that commandment? Personally, I don't believe that any heart that is enlightened by the

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Spirit of God could possibly fail to admit that we fail to love God perfectly.

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So how could you ever stand before him? Christ has loved the

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Father perfectly every day, every minute, every hour, every second of every minute and it is his righteousness that you plead before God, not your own.

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So there is a positive aspect to the righteousness of Christ.

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It is the fact that he lived the perfect life in my place. He has given me his righteousness.

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It is that that is given to us in our salvation. So it is the work of Christ.

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The instrument, and we will discuss this a little more closely or some theologians use a more complicated term called the appropriating organ.

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Theologians like coming up with words like that. The appropriating organ of justification is faith and faith alone.

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We are not justified because we have faith. Faith does not force

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God to justify us. Faith is the instrumentality through which

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God justifies us. And we will get into that a little bit later. Justification is possible because Christ is our substitute, has borne our sins in his body on the tree.

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And finally justification is a non -repeating once for all event. One is either justified or one is not.

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One cannot be partially justified. Now that is the Protestant perspective.

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We have talked a little bit about the Roman Catholic perspective. Obviously, especially

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I as a Protestant believe that the only authority upon which this topic can be addressed is the authority of Scripture.

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And so if we are going to substantiate the Protestant position we must look to Scripture and be reformed by Scripture, be taught by Scripture.

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So let us do that. Let us turn our Scriptures to Exodus chapter 23. And as you are turning there,

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I wish to ask you a question. I wish to ask a question of you.

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Those of you who have been in other seminars relevant to this issue cannot answer. I just wish you to think in your own mind, what is the difference between justification and righteousness?

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What is the difference between justification and righteousness?

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Now as you think about those two terms, let me give you some of the answers that have come up in past discussions about this.

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Normally in the English language when we think about these two terms, we think of righteousness in a moral or ethical sense.

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When we think of someone who is righteous, we think of someone who is pure, who is holy.

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It is a moral concept. It is a spiritual concept. When we think of someone being justified, when we think of justification, normally we think of something more legal.

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But in reality, biblically, the

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Bible itself, especially in the New Testament where this topic is going to be discussed most fully, the

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Bible only uses one term, or one family of terms.

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The noun that is used, dikayasune in the Greek, the verb dikayao, the adjective dikayas, to justify someone, to make someone righteous, is the same term in the

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New Testament. And different translations will render the same word in different ways depending upon the context.

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But we must understand that if we want to know what Paul taught about justification, we must look at the words that Paul used, not the words that we use to translate

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Paul's words. And so we must go to the original meanings, we must go to the original terms.

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In the Old Testament, the term that is normally translated as righteousness and the whole family of terms, tzedek, is translated in the

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New Testament by the term dikayasune or righteousness. Let's look at some passages in the

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Old Testament that address the word righteousness or justification and see how it is used.

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Now first of all, I just say right off the top, obviously there are numerous passages, both in the

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Old and New Testament, where righteousness or justification is used primarily in a moral sense.

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Someone is described as being righteous. Job, for example, is described as a righteous man, but Job offered sacrifices.

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So obviously he was not a perfect or sinless man, but he was a godly man.

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And it is used in that way. But it is also used in a way that we will see here in Exodus and a number of other passages in a solely forensic or legal way.

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Let's look at Exodus 23 .7. Keep far from a false charge, and do not kill the innocent or the righteous, for I will not, and this translation uses the term, acquit the guilty.

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How about some other translations? What does the King James say? Justify.

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That is the same term in Hebrew. God says that he will not justify the guilty.

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Now, you say, but in the New Testament, isn't that what he's doing? I mean, isn't that what the gospel is all about, is how those who are guilty are going to be made righteous or justified?

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Yes, that's true, but he's obviously not talking about that here. God will not acquit or justify the guilty.

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Notice the context. It's the law court. God is acting as judge, and he is pronouncing sentence in regards to guilt or innocence.

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Right before that you had, do not kill the innocent or the righteous, for I will not acquit the guilty.

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See these terms that are being used? Innocent, guilty. They are statements about a person's relationship to the law.

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If a person is innocent, that means there is no charge against them from the law. If they are guilty, that means they are condemned by the law.

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These are legal usages of the term here in the Old Testament. You want to see another one?

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Look at Deuteronomy 25 .1. If there is a dispute between men, and they go to court, and the judges decide their case, and they justify the righteous and condemn the wicked, then it shall be, if the wicked man deserves to be beaten, the judge shall then make him lie down, and so on and so forth.

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Listen to what is said. Do you hear those terms? Justify the righteous, condemn the wicked.

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Now let me ask you a question. When a judge justifies the righteous, is he subjectively changing that person?

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Is he changing the person on the inside, making him a good person? No. The judge is making a declaration about that person, and is saying this person is righteous.

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What about the wicked? If the judge condemns the wicked man, is he changing the wicked man?

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Is he making the man wicked? No. He is making a statement about the condition or the status of that man.

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He is not changing him. It turns me to Proverbs 17. Proverbs 17 .15.

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15. He who justifies the wicked, and he who condemns the righteous, both of them alike are an abomination to the

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Lord. He who justifies the wicked, or condemns the righteous.

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See how these same terms keep getting used over and over again? Justify, condemn.

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Those are the two terms. Those are the opposites. Now when I condemn someone, am I changing them on the inside?

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No. I'm making a statement about them. I'm making a judgment about them. And so in the same way, here in verse 15 where it says, he who justifies the wicked, well, hey, if justification is changing a person on the inside, that would be great.

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In fact, that's what God does with us, isn't it? He's changing us on the inside, but that's not what it's talking about.

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He who justifies the wicked, that's an abomination to God, because it is a statement about someone who is wrong, someone who is out of harmony with the law of God, saying, oh, they're in the right relationship to the law of God, they're in the right relationship to God.

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No, that's not what it's about. One other very quickly, Isaiah chapter 5.

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Isaiah chapter 5, verse 23. Discusses those who justify the wicked for a bribe and take away the rights of the ones who are in the right.

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In each one of these passages, you clearly have an understanding of the word justify that cannot be taken as anything but a forensic, legal declaration about the individual.

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And so when you come to that signal passage at the beginning of the New Testament, right off the bat in Genesis chapter 15, verse 6, a passage you should be familiar with if you know your

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New Testament very well. Genesis 15, 6. Abraham believed

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God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.

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Then we see the consistent usage of that through the Old Testament means that Abraham was not inwardly changed at that point.

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That's regeneration, that's sanctification, that's something else. His justification, as Paul is going to tell us, was a declaration on the part of God regarding Abraham's relationship to himself.

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That Abraham was rightly related to him, that all the impedances to fellowship, all the sin was removed.

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Now yes, justification, regeneration, sanctification, forgiveness of sins, all these things are intimately connected.

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You can never tear them apart, but we must differentiate them just as Scripture does.

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Is this legal sense carried on in the New Testament? You tell me. Romans chapter 8, verse 33.

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Romans 8, 33. Very quickly, because I see that the hands and the clock for some reason move so swiftly.

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Romans 8, 33. Listen to this language. Who will bring a charge against God's elect?

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God is the one who justifies. Who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is he who died.

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Yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us.

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Do you hear the word justification there? God is the one who justifies. And what's the context?

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Who will bring a charge against God's elect? It's the law court again.

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Who will bring a charge under the condemnation of God's elect? Well, no charge can be brought against them because God is the one.

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God as judge is the one who justifies. He is the one who declares them to be righteous.

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So who could possibly think that someone could come before the judge who has declared us righteous and bring a charge against us?

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An impossibility. Now with that in mind, I would like you to turn with me to the book of Galatians.

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And we're going to slow down here for a second. And we're just going to look at scripture. We're going to follow

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Paul's argument. Why Galatians? Why not Matthew?

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Or why not Mark? Well, I need to make a few comments about that very thing. If we are going to ask the question, what does the

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Bible teach about the doctrine of justification? You may be able to glean some information about justification from other passages in scripture.

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But we must recognize the fact that there are certain passages of scripture that specifically and purposefully address this issue.

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And we must go to those central passages first where the full discussion is given before we can then move from there to other passages where there's a brief mention made.

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But many people find one passage of scripture someplace that makes mention of something.

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They build an entire theology on that and then import that theology into all of the book of Romans or all the book of Galatians where the subject is so very clearly discussed.

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That's not how we should do it. We should go to the plain and clear passages first, understand them, and then move out from there.

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And so if you're going to ask the question, what does the New Testament teach about justification? There are two books that are going to immediately jump into your mind in regards to this subject.

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Galatians and Romans. Now does that mean it's not discussed someplace else?

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No, of course it is. But the main point of Paul's discussion in Galatians and in certain sections of Romans is justification.

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In fact, he's engaged in argument. He's engaged in polemic. He's engaged in debate on this issue.

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And frequently, that's one of the things I like about debate. When you are in debate, you have to clearly state your position over against another position.

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And that's what you have in Galatians. In Galatians, there are people, Judaizers we identify them, in the churches of Galatia that are teaching certain things.

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And Paul says that they are wrong. And in defining how they are wrong, we get very clear definitions about what is right.

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And what is right is his doctrine of justification. So turn with me please to chapter 2.

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In the very brief time we have together, we have to move through these things quickly. I hope that you will take the time to look at them much more slowly.

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Some of you already have taken the time for doing that. But beginning at verse 11, just for a background statement.

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In verses 11 -15, we have the incredible encounter between Paul and Peter.

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And Peter has engaged in a certain activity that compromises the gospel of Christ.

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What has he done? He has withdrawn table fellowship from the Gentiles.

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By his statement, he has said that simple faith in Christ alone is not sufficient.

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You have to do something else. You have to be circumcised. You have to be part of the Jewish community.

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Faith alone is not sufficient to bring about the proper and full standing with God.

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And Paul recognizes how important this is. And he opposes

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Peter. And he begins to speak to him. Beginning in verse 11, you can see where he opposes him.

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And in verse 14, he starts to speak to him. In verse 15, we who are

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Jews by nature, and not sinners among Gentiles, nevertheless knowing that a man is not justified by works of the law, but through faith in Christ Jesus, even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we may be justified by faith in Christ, and not by the works of the law, since by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified.

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Now it almost sounds like Paul repeated himself unnecessarily over and over again.

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But he didn't. The point that he is making is this. You and I, Peter, we're

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Jews. Yes, we have possession of the law. We know about the law.

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We've been instructed in the law from the very beginning. But you know something, Peter? You and I stand on the same level ground as the

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Gentile does. We're both condemned. Just simply possessing the law doesn't give us any advantage.

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In fact, it condemns us all the more because we know the law. And the law convicts us. Even we who are

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Jews by nature, we have believed in Jesus Christ.

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Why? Because we know that a man is not justified by the works of the law.

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Let me ask you a question. Could he possibly truly be saying that a man is not morally affected by keeping the law of God?

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No, of course. The Jewish person was morally superior, outwardly anyways, to the

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Gentile. He didn't engage in many of the abominable practices that the

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Gentile did. So it wasn't, Paul's not talking about a subjective change here.

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Paul says we know that no man can be justified by works of the law in the sight of God.

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Not that a man is not morally changed by the law. That's not what Paul's use of the term justification is.

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He is drawing from the same use of justification we saw in the Old Testament. No man is declared righteous.

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No man is justified by works of the law. So how is a man justified?

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How can a man be made to stand before God correctly if it's not through the law? And the construction in the

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Greek language here in verse 16 makes it very clear that what Paul is saying, no man is justified by works of law.

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The only way of justification is by faith in Christ Jesus. The only way.

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No other way except by faith in Christ. Not by following Buddha.

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Not by following Mohammed. Not by following all these supposed many roads that people have.

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The one way is faith. But we may be justified how?

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By faith in Christ. Not by anything else.

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Not by my circumcision. Not by keeping rules and regulations and laws.

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I plead nothing else if I am going to be justified. If I am going to be made righteous. If I am going to stand before God without feeling his wrath.

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The only way is by belief in Jesus Christ. Not by works of law since by works of law how many will be justified?

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No flesh. Paul is saying there are two roads.

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This is the road of works righteousness and it goes that direction. And this is the road of faith righteousness and it goes that direction.

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Now I dare you to walk both roads at the same time. You can't. You either must go this way or you must go that way.

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There is no middle way. It is impossible to wed faith in Christ for justification with works of law.

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Any works of law. Any works of law. You cannot put them together.

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Only by faith in Jesus Christ. Or only by works. You cannot wed them. You think that is a too strong interpretation of what he says?

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Look at verses 20 and 21. I have been crucified with Christ and it is no longer

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I who live but Christ lives in me. And the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the

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Son of God who loved me and delivered himself up for me. Listen to this.

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I do not nullify the grace of God for if righteousness comes through law then

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Christ died needlessly in vain unto emptiness.

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Do you hear what he is saying? Those are strong words. If you can walk this path he says, if you can walk this path of works righteousness, if you can receive righteousness by the works that you do, what does it mean?

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It means that Christ died for nothing. His death is an empty sham. It is a mockery of God.

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If you can gain so much as one scintilla of righteousness in God's sight by the actions that you do then

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Christ did not need to die. His death is in vain.

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Strong words. Strong words but they are vitally important to our understanding of the gospel.

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Either one trusts in the sole sufficiency of the work of Jesus Christ on the cross of Calvary or one does not.

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You cannot say that I believe in Jesus Christ according to the scriptures.

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But I also think I have to do this, this, this, and this to add to his work to bring about my justification.

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There are so many who believe that way. There are so many who believe that way. These people in Galatia were not standing there saying,

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Christ did not die for your sins. They talked about Jesus. They used the name of the Lord.

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They probably told you, you have got to believe in Jesus. You must believe in Jesus. Jesus died for your sins.

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They probably said all those words. But they said, yes

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Christ died for your sins but you also need to do this.

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Some people have asked me, you have written two books about Roman Catholicism and you are debating

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Roman Catholic next week. Why do you do that? That is not very popular today.

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You don't get very far in the big theological circles if you do things like that. Do you remember what

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I read to you from this? Do you remember what I mentioned to you? How does the grace of justification come?

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By baptism. By the sacraments. By things you do.

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There are things you must do. There are things you must do according to certain laws and ordinances to gain the grace of justification.

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The reason that I have done what I have done and taken the stands that I have taken in regards to Roman Catholicism is simply this.

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This is my authority. When I look into the pages of this book and I look at the New Testament, I listen to what

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Paul says and then I examine the doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church and many other organizations.

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They not only do what the Judaizers did in Galatia but they go far beyond. If Paul said what he said and if Paul said the gospel is more important than what people think about you or think about the attitudes you take, then if the

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New Testament is my authority, I must do as Paul did and identify that as a false gospel.

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Any person who looks at that book of Galatians and says this is God inspired scripture cannot but do that.

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That is my feeling. Let us continue on. Look at Galatians chapter 3 verses 6 -14.

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In verse 6 you have the citation of Genesis chapter 15 verse 6. Abraham believed

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God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Abraham was made righteous, how?

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By faith. So those who wish to follow Abraham must be of faith as well.

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But then look down at verses 10 -11. Important passage. Mark it. Memorize it if you wish to share the gospel with those who are involved in works salvation system.

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For as many as are of the works of the law are under a curse. For it is written,

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Cursed is everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law to perform them. Now that no one is justified by the law before God is evident for the righteous man shall live by faith.

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What do these two passages teach? They teach two things. First of all if you are going to follow that path, if you are going to go by law, as many as are of law, then realize that the only thing the law can provide to you because you are a sinner, and that is the underlying assumption in this passage, all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.

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In the book of Romans Paul is going to spend three chapters establishing the point that he assumes here. All have sinned.

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And therefore the only thing that the law can provide to you is a curse.

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Because you have not abided in all the things written in the book of the law.

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You want to follow the law? Fine. Realize what it means. The law demands perfection.

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The law is not gracious in regards to providing oops factors.

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If you want life from the law then you must be perfect. Because the only thing that the law provides to the one who breaks it is the curse.

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But he says to those who are of faith in verse 11, to those who are of faith, that is how you live.

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Habakkuk has said it long before. The righteous man shall live by faith. And Paul takes this to mean that it is clear, it is evident that no one is justified by the law before God.

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Why? Paul's whole point in this is going to be this. The true purpose of the law was never to give life.

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Was never to give life. Look at verse 21. Is the law then contrary to the promises of God?

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May it never be. For if a law had been given which was able to impart life then righteousness would indeed have been based on law.

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But again the construction in the Greek tells us that Paul is assuming that that's not the case. That a law has not been given and could not be given whose purpose it was to give life.

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And so the purpose of the law was not to give life. It was to reveal the holy will of God. So why then the law at all?

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Continue on. The scripture has shut up all men under sin. That the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.

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But before faith came we were kept in custody under the law being shut up to the faith which was later to be revealed.

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Therefore the law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ that we may be justified not by the law but by faith.

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The law does not exceed the bounds from which it was created. As the proper pedagogue, as the proper tutor or schoolmaster it does not arrogantly decide that it's going to change its function and try to justify those who keep it.

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The tutor was to take a child and to direct the child in the proper way. It was to teach the child proper things.

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The law teaches us about what God's will is. The law is holy and just and good because it teaches us what

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God's will is and because it does that it tells us what we really are. It holds a mirror up to us and we see how far from God's will we are.

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How desperately we are in need of a savior. But the law does not then step in and say, see you're a sinner now

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I'm going to provide the way for you. No, the law takes us by the hand and leads us and points us to the savior to Christ.

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That's the law's function. And what Paul is saying is you Judaizers and anyone else down through history who has taken the law and has decided that by performance of certain duties and obligations and sacraments and penances and pilgrimages and indulgences and everything else, by doing all these things we somehow are made righteous with God, somehow gain justification.

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Paul says no, no, no that was never the purpose in the first place. You misunderstood the law.

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But how many times, and admit it, admit it if you will, if you walked into the vast majority of churches in our valley today and asked the average good

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Christian in the pew, how were men in the Old Testament saved, you know what they'd say?

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By keeping the law. Have any of you ever done that? I have. I've asked.

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I stopped asking because it was so depressing. By keeping the law, that's how they were saved.

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Paul says no, that was never the function of the law. Abraham was made righteous by faith just as much as you and I were.

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That's his argument. Quickly, Galatians chapter 5 verses 1 -4.

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It was for freedom that Christ set us free, therefore keep standing firm and do not be subject again to a yoke of slavery.

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Behold I, Paul, say to you that if you receive circumcision, that is if you add just one right hand to your right hand, that's right.

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That's only one thing, just circumcision. It's just one little thing. If you receive circumcision, what does he say in the rest of that verse?

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Christ will be of no benefit to you. You can't walk both roads.

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If you're going to add to the work of Christ, Christ will be of no benefit to you.

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Strong words. And I testify again to every man who receives circumcision that he is under obligation to keep the whole law.

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Perfectly every bit. Don't give me this, well there's just this, we're only going to accept this part of the law now and we're going to do these things of the law and that's how we're going to be justified.

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No, Paul says you buy into that road, you've got to buy into all of it. You've got to have the whole thing.

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You've got to keep the law perfectly and you've got to keep the whole law. And then it's amazing to me that verse 4 has been used so many times to deny the eternal security of the saints when you read it in context it has nothing to do with it.

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You who, you who are seeking to be justified by law, you have been severed from Christ.

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You who are seeking to be justified by law, you have fallen from grace. He's talking to people who are seeking to be justified by law.

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Not to Christians, not to believers who trust in their whole hearts solely upon the work of Christ, but those are still awful strong words.

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You who are seeking to be justified by law, don't look for God's grace.

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Don't expect God's grace to meet you halfway. You know who that incredibly describes?

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You know who that is so, so relevant to? There's a passage in the Book of Mormon.

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Some of you know it. 2 Nephi 25 .23. You know what it says? It's by grace we are saved after all we can do.

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It's by grace we are saved after all we can do. We do everything we can do and then

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God's grace meets us. Paul says, I'm sorry, God's grace isn't going to meet you.

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God's grace only encounters the man who has nothing in his hands, who knows there's nothing he can offer to God, who knows he's utterly helpless.

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That is the man who receives the grace of God. But the man who stands there and works and tries and does this and that and the other thing, that person has no real understanding of the depth of his own depravity and sin and the holiness of the

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God that he is trying to bribe. Only the perfect righteousness of Christ can ever stand before the holy gaze of God.

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If you think your efforts are in that league, you don't know your heart very well.

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Strong words from Paul. Some of the strongest words in the New Testament are in Galatians.

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We didn't even cover some of them. But it seems, in my opinion anyways, that Galatians was written prior to that tremendous, tremendous passage of Scripture, the book of Romans.

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I believe Romans comes later and Paul is not in the same turbo mode, you might say, of he's in Galatians.

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He's not running a lawn mower over his opposition. He takes a little more time to explain his positions, but he says many of the same things.

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Many of the same things. The first three chapters he establishes that which he assumes in the book of Galatians.

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All men are sinners. In fact, if you look at verses 10 through 18, I will not read the whole thing, but it is important for us to understand justification by faith, to recognize what

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Paul teaches in this difficult catena of passages. Quoting from the

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Old Testament he says, there is none righteous, not even one.

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There is none who understands. There is no God seeker. All have turned aside.

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Together they have become useless. There is no one who does good, not even one. Do we take those words seriously?

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We don't like to. Do we really believe

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Paul when he says there is no God seeker? Do we really accept the authority of Scripture when

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Scripture tells us what our minds don't want to believe? Oh, but I know this person.

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He is seeking God. If he is truly seeking God, he is only seeking

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God because God has sought him. In the vast majority of situations, may

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I submit to you that those who say they are seeking

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God are seeking for the benefits of God, without God. It is nice to have a warm fuzzy security blanket, but not when that warm fuzzy security blanket means you have to deal with the holy and righteous

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God. Scripture says there is no God seeker. There is no man who in and of himself is seeking after God.

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Every one of us has gone out of the way. Every one of us has turned our backs upon God. Every one of us is in rebellion against God.

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Paul, I think fairly completely, establishes the absolute universal sinfulness of man.

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That is important to understand because you see what it means is that we all are unjust. There is no just man.

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There is none. All of us are unjust. So once you have everybody on even ground, then

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Paul can discuss the subject of how you get from there to being right with God. Unfortunately, a lot of modern evangelism forgets that.

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We don't worry about making men mindful of the fact that they are unjust.

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We let them think that they are pretty good Joe. Pretty nice guy. Jesus is sort of a new self -help manual that you add to the various ones that you have already collected during your life.

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Paul didn't do that. Paul started off in those first three chapters and you want to offend the natural man?

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Have him read those chapters. They are not going to like him very much. But he starts off there.

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He says all men are unjust. All men are under the punishment of God. So what do we do?

01:06:26

Romans chapter 3 beginning at verse 19. Now we know that whatever the law says speaks to those who are under the law that every mouth may be closed and all the world may become accountable to God.

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Because by the works of the law no flesh will be justified in his sight. For through the law comes the knowledge of sin.

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There is the real use of the law. There is the real purpose. Through the law comes the knowledge of sin.

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Not righteousness. Not justification. That's not what comes through law. What comes through law is the knowledge of who we really are.

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So what do we do? Well, it's almost blasphemous to attempt to go through verses 21 -31 in a short period of time.

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You could spend the rest of your life in that passage and not exhaust it. I guarantee you that.

01:07:25

I guarantee you that. I remember one commentary that's in the

01:07:30

ICC series as I recall where the writer spent 17 years putting together these two volumes of this commentary.

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Dr. Caldwell. 17 years. And when he wrote the foreword to the work of 17 years of his life he said,

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I only feel that I have begun to have a grasp at all on what this book says.

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After 17 years. And I believe he's right. I believe he has the proper perspective.

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But to help us to understand justification by faith we need to look at these verses at least quickly and I hope that all that will do is wet your appetite.

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Wet your appetite to do further and ever deeper study of this and any passage of scripture but especially this.

01:08:26

But now apart from the law. Apart from the law. The same term I believe is used in John 1 verse 3 where John says that apart from him nothing was made that was made.

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So here, apart from, without the law the righteousness of God has been manifested, has been made known, being witnessed by the law and the prophets.

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Even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe.

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For there is no distinction for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Everybody knows Romans 3 .23

01:09:06

but not everybody knows the context of Romans 3 .23. What is Paul talking about?

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Righteousness by faith can be for all those who believe because of the fact that there is no distinction.

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All men have sinned. We are all standing on the same place. We are all under the wrath of God.

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None of us is up one leg on somebody else. And do you hear what that means about justification? Aren't there some men that are more moral than others?

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Aren't there some men that are better than others? Do we not see certain men who are just debauched, depraved creatures and they live it?

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And then other people who are depraved creatures but at least they strive for some sort of moral life.

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Yes, there is a distinction morally, subjectively but that is not what

01:09:59

Paul is talking about. That is not what justification is. It is not moral and subjective. It is absolute.

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All men are under the condemnation of the law. We are all standing on level ground. Since we are all there, all of us have sinned, all of us fall short of the glory of God, then there is only one way for us.

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There is only one way out of that situation. And it is the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all those who believe.

01:10:30

For everyone. And what happens if you believe? Verse 24, being justified freely, or you can translate it as a gift, by his grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus.

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Boy, if there is any one single statement of justification in the New Testament, there it is.

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Everything is there. We are justified freely, how?

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By our works? By our merit? Does God have to justify you because you have earned certain merit by your good works?

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If you know Roman Catholic theology, if you know what congruent and condign merit is, and we are not going to get into all that tonight, you know that in Roman Catholic theology,

01:11:29

God gives to you grace on the basis of your merit, what you have done.

01:11:37

That is not what the New Testament says. We are justified as a gift, we are justified freely, how?

01:11:45

By his grace. Grace, by definition, cannot be earned, it cannot be purchased, it cannot be merited.

01:11:56

So we are justified freely by his grace, but God does not take a filthy, wretched sinner and just simply go, well, you are righteous, you are clean.

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No, God does not say that something is when it isn't. How is it that God can freely justify you and you and you and me?

01:12:23

That is what he says in verse 24, through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus.

01:12:30

There could not be justification without the work of Christ, without his substitutionary atonement on our behalf.

01:12:37

There could not be a statement that we are in the proper relationship with God unless our sins are dealt with.

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And how are our sins dealt with? In Christ Jesus, whom

01:12:50

God displayed publicly as a propitiation in his blood through faith. This was to demonstrate his righteousness because in the forbearance of God he passed over the sins previously committed.

01:13:02

What does that mean? How is Abraham justified? How was it that back in Genesis 15, verse 6,

01:13:08

God could say to Abraham, his faith is reckoned to him as righteousness, when Christ had not yet died for his sins?

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Well, Paul explains to us here in this passage that God was righteous and proved himself righteous in accepting

01:13:26

Abraham because of the coming sacrifice of Christ. Oh yes, the death of Christ was still future from our perspective, but this sort of ties in just for you to your information.

01:13:44

If what happens in this world is contingent, if God is just trying to keep everything running in the same direction, how could

01:13:51

God know that the sacrifice of Christ was ever going to happen? You see, our

01:13:57

God is sovereign and there is no possibility that it couldn't happen. So God could look at Abraham and though Christ had not yet died, how does the

01:14:08

Bible describe Christ? At least in the King James Version, Revelation 13, verse 8, the

01:14:13

Lamb slain from the foundation of the earth. And so Abraham's faith in Jehovah God and our faith in the full revelation of Jesus Christ, both of them bring about justification.

01:14:34

And so God was just to pass over those sins because of the death of Jesus Christ.

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And today we, nearly 2 ,000 years later, continue to receive the benefits of what happened back there.

01:14:54

Because you remember what Paul said in Galatians 2 .20? I have been crucified with Christ. The death of Christ is our death as well because we have been united with him.

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But that goes into the whole subject of our union with Christ and I see that the clock inexorably continues to move forward.

01:15:13

Let us press on quickly. In chapter, I'm sorry, down below verse 27, where then is boasting it is excluded by what kind of law?

01:15:22

Of works no, but by a law of faith. For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from works of law.

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That is the biblical position. A man is justified by faith apart without, same term, works of law.

01:15:47

And then to give the perfect example of this, you have the fourth chapter of the book of Romans.

01:15:53

And very quickly, look with me at verses 3 -9. What did the scripture say?

01:16:02

Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Again, Genesis 15 .6. Listen to verses 4 and 5.

01:16:10

Now to the one who works, his wage is not reckoned as a favor but as what is due.

01:16:17

Clear point. If you walk into your job and you're given your paycheck and the boss says, here's a gift for you, you're going to be offended.

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Why? Because you worked for it. That's not a gift. If you work for something, you receive wages, that's what's due you.

01:16:34

You worked for it. Well, everybody understands that. A few people understand verse 5. But to the one who does not work but believes, see the contrast?

01:16:49

Working over against believing. But to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned as righteousness.

01:17:04

How is God described in that verse? The one who justifies the ungodly.

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The one who makes the ungodly godly. Faith in him, that kind of faith is reckoned as righteousness.

01:17:25

Just as David also speaks of the blessing upon the man to whom God reckons righteousness, apart from works.

01:17:38

When David says, blessed are those whose lawless deeds have been forgiven, whose sins have been covered, blessed is the man whose sin the

01:17:46

Lord will not take into account. Well, how can

01:17:53

God not take into account the sins of man? How can that be?

01:18:02

Because Jesus Christ has borne those sins. And so he gives the example of Abraham, and then chapter 5 verse 1 starts off by saying, therefore having been justified by faith.

01:18:25

The phrase having been justified by faith is an aorist participle in the

01:18:31

Greek, if you're interested. And that means it refers to a past action.

01:18:39

Justification is something that the believer can look back upon.

01:18:46

There are many who are working and striving toward justification. Paul says, no.

01:18:53

You are justified by faith. And what is the inheritance of the person who is justified by faith?

01:19:03

What do they have? Verse 1, we have peace with God through our

01:19:09

Lord Jesus Christ. If you cannot say that you have been justified, then you continue in enmity against God.

01:19:19

You do not have peace with God. So how can there be those who are saying that you are striving toward justification when you're actually an enemy of God?

01:19:34

You're not at peace with God. Is the Holy Spirit of God sanctifying and living in and making holy the lives of people who aren't even at peace with God?

01:19:45

Of course not. We have been justified by faith and therefore we have peace.

01:19:58

Then down below, very quickly since we're running short on time, God demonstrates his own love toward us while we were yet sinners.

01:20:07

Christ died for us. Much more than having now been justified by his blood.

01:20:14

We shall be saved from the wrath of God through him. Paul can describe justification in a number of ways and each one tells us a little something more about what justification is.

01:20:26

We have been justified by his blood. Does that mean we have been subjectively, inwardly changed?

01:20:32

Well, in sanctification and regeneration, yes, that's what he's talking about here. We shall be saved from the wrath of God in him.

01:20:41

Well now, outside of Christ is a man deserving of the wrath of God. So how can a man be saved from the wrath of God?

01:20:50

Well, it says we have been justified in his blood. Somehow, in some way, the shed blood of Christ results in our justification so that we are no longer under the wrath of God.

01:21:05

But when God's wrath breaks forth in judgment, does

01:21:11

God's wrath come against those who are righteous?

01:21:18

In whom there is no spot? Who have no sin?

01:21:24

No. God's wrath does not come against them. This tells us what righteousness is.

01:21:29

This tells us what justification is. It is a declaration. It is a statement that we can stand before the basis of our own merits, in Christ Jesus, justified in his blood, and the wrath of God will not touch us.

01:21:52

You think maybe Paul was thinking a little bit about Passover night here? Destroying angel when he came through.

01:22:01

He saw the blood. Didn't destroy that house. Didn't kill the firstborn. When the wrath of God comes against all men for their sin, the only place to stand is in Jesus Christ, justified in his blood, not by our works, not by anything that we have done.

01:22:23

Therefore, obviously, justification, the fact that we have peace with God, the fact that we will not be under the wrath of God, justification has to be foundational to all the rest of the

01:22:36

Christian life. You can't talk about walking in sanctification. You can't talk about the

01:22:41

Spirit working in your life and conforming in the image of Christ if you haven't been justified. If you haven't been made right with God.

01:22:50

It's just an impossibility. I am surprised by the fact that I look back there and I see what time it is and I look down here and see how much more

01:23:06

I still have to go. We have discussed what justification is and looked at it from scripture and we have seen what

01:23:15

Paul has to say about it. Each time we have talked about justification by faith, I think it is necessary in the modern context to briefly digress from the doctrine of justification to consider together what faith we are talking about.

01:23:38

Are we simply talking about faith in a generic sense of an acceptance of saying, well, yes,

01:23:45

I believe Christ died for my sins and so that's it. What is the nature of saving faith?

01:23:53

What I would like to do very quickly is to run through some passages. Now this is something that maybe 100 years, 150 years ago amongst

01:24:04

Protestants you would not have to have done this. Because it was generally understood by many people that the

01:24:13

Protestant position was that faith is the work and gift of God.

01:24:19

But today in our culture there are so many different concepts of faith that we must,

01:24:29

I think, necessarily digress a little bit and examine the biblical evidence concerning the nature of this saving faith, this faith that brings about justification.

01:24:42

So what I would like to do is very quickly turn with me to the book of Colossians chapter 1.

01:24:49

I am just going to run through these passages pointing out the significance that they have regarding faith.

01:24:57

Colossians chapter 1 verses 3 and 4. We give thanks to God, the

01:25:03

Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, praying always for you since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and the love which you have for all the saints.

01:25:14

Now what I am doing is I am starting with the less obvious and moving toward the more obvious passages.

01:25:20

But what I am trying to do in this passage is point out to you that the concept of faith being the work of God is so given in the

01:25:29

New Testament that it can be found underlying the entire thought of someone like the

01:25:35

Apostle Paul. For example, in this passage Paul says that he gives thanks to God, the

01:25:40

Father. Why? Why does he give thanks? Since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and the love which you have for all the saints.

01:25:50

Now many of us would recognize that if we have love for the saints, that this is the work of God in our heart.

01:25:59

That is not something that is difficult for most people today to accept. But if you accept that the work of love in our heart comes from God, then what does that mean about faith immediately preceding?

01:26:14

The faith that we have in Christ Jesus. If Paul can give thanks that we have faith in Christ Jesus to God, then

01:26:22

God must be responsible for the fact that we have faith in Christ Jesus. And this is going to be found in many of the salutations in Paul's literature.

01:26:34

You will find it all over the place. That Paul is thankful to God for the faith of the saints.

01:26:41

Therefore, obviously God must have something to do with it. Turn with me to 2 Thessalonians 2.

01:26:47

Verse 13, a classic passage. 2 Thessalonians 2.

01:26:53

But we should always give thanks to God for you, brethren beloved by the

01:27:04

Lord, because God has chosen you from the beginning for salvation through sanctification by the

01:27:12

Spirit and faith in the truth. Now is the sanctifying work of the

01:27:19

Spirit in our lives the work of God? Is God responsible for the work of the

01:27:25

Spirit in sanctifying our lives? Well, of course he is. Well, then what about faith in the truth?

01:27:33

Is that also not then the work of God in our lives? Most definitely it is.

01:27:39

Do you remember the story back in Acts 3? Acts 3. Verse 16 of Peter and the healing that takes place and they go into the temple and all the people are gathered around and there is a great uproar going on.

01:27:52

Listen to what Peter says in his sermon. Acts 3. Verse 16. And on the basis of faith in his name, it is the name of Jesus which has strengthened this man whom you see and know.

01:28:04

And listen to this. And the faith which comes through him has given him this perfect health in the presence of you all.

01:28:13

Oh, step on some big toes there in our culture. Where did the faith that this man had come from?

01:28:22

Acts 3. Verse 16. And the faith which comes through him, that is through Christ, has given him this perfect health in the presence of you all.

01:28:33

That faith came through Christ. Hebrews 12.

01:28:39

Verse 2. Maybe one that you have memorized. Hebrews 12. 2.

01:28:45

Fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and finisher of faith.

01:28:53

The author, the beginner, the origin and the perfecter, the finisher, the completer.

01:29:03

Christ is the author of faith. He is the finisher of faith. Therefore, this faith, this faith that is being spoken of, is clearly the work of God.

01:29:15

It is the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. Author, finisher, and interestingly enough object.

01:29:24

Christ is the object of our faith as well. And he is the one who begins it in our lives.

01:29:31

This passage only recently, showing how thick -skulled I am, broke into my consciousness.

01:29:38

Philippians 1. Verse 29. Philippians 1. 29.

01:29:46

And I say that not primarily to disparage my own self, but to simply recognize that it's just seemingly so clear.

01:29:55

For to you it has been granted for Christ's sake two things. Not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for his sake.

01:30:08

It was understood that it has been granted to us for Christ's sake, what?

01:30:14

To believe in him. And don't get me on to the discussion of the rest of that verse, that we are also to suffer for his sake.

01:30:25

It has been granted to us for Christ's sake to believe in him. Clearly then, if it has been granted to us, then it is something that we do not have in and of ourselves if it has to be granted to us.

01:30:41

1 Peter 1. I promised you a quick trip through these.

01:30:47

I'm not going to spend a whole lot of time on each one. 1 Peter 1. Verse 21.

01:30:57

Who through him, that is through Christ, are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God?

01:31:08

You say, well that doesn't specifically say that my faith is a gift of God. But my faith and my hope could not be in God were it not for the work of God in Christ Jesus.

01:31:20

The work of God in Christ Jesus is foundational and primary to, as we will see later on, both faith and hope are described as those things that God gives us relevant to the person of Jesus Christ.

01:31:36

So God's work always remains prior, it always remains before man's response to the work of God.

01:31:45

Ephesians chapter 6, verse 23. Ephesians 6 .23. A little

01:31:52

Bible drill here. Peace be to the brethren and love with faith from God the

01:31:59

Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. What comes from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ?

01:32:06

Peace, love, no one has a problem with that. Peace and love, they come from God.

01:32:13

Peace, love, and faith. Peace, love, and faith come from God the

01:32:22

Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. What is the fruit of the Spirit? Galatians 5 .22.

01:32:30

Love, joy, peace, kindness, goodness.

01:32:40

What's next? What's next? Faith. Oh, it can be translated faithfulness, but you cannot be faithful if you do not have faith.

01:32:50

The fruit of the Spirit, love, and did we not see love and faith connected intimately just a moment before in Ephesians 6 .23?

01:32:59

This type of Christian faith is the work of the Spirit of God.

01:33:04

It is the fruit of the Spirit of God. Now some of you may have been surprised because if you know anything about the

01:33:10

Arminian -Calvinist debate and when this subject comes up, we poor

01:33:18

Calvinists are always charged with immediately going to one particular passage to demonstrate that faith is the gift of God.

01:33:27

And what is that immediate passage? Well, it's one that I put almost at the end because I don't like going to what you automatically assume

01:33:34

I'm going to. I like going the other direction. Ephesians 2 .8

01:33:39

-9. Ephesians 2 .8 -9, most of us have it memorized.

01:33:46

For by grace ye have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not as a result of works, that no one should boast.

01:33:57

Ah, but let me play the devil's advocate, no offense attended to anyone, and point out that grammatically in the

01:34:09

Greek, the word that, as in that not of yourselves, is not the same gender as the word faith.

01:34:21

In the Greek language, the word faith is feminine, pistis. This is a neuter term that is used, that not of yourselves.

01:34:30

And so it is said this can obviously not refer to faith. And if you think that I am misrepresenting the opposition, you haven't picked up any of the modern books edited by people like Clark Pinnock or others.

01:34:47

Because this is the exact argument that is presented. Well then, why did

01:34:53

I cite Ephesians 2 .8 -9? Because it seems like the text contradicts me, but it does not. Because in actuality

01:34:59

I just presented you a caricature of the Reformed position. Because the fact that the word that, not of yourselves, is the gift of God, is not the same gender as anything in the preceding phrase, actually.

01:35:18

Grace, faith, doesn't apply to any one of them. But Paul and Peter, both of them, do the following thing.

01:35:31

They take an entire clause, here it's for by grace you have been saved through faith.

01:35:38

They take an entire clause and then refer to it by the use of the neuter.

01:35:45

And what Paul is saying here is that not of yourselves, that refers to the whole preceding clause.

01:35:54

Grace and faith. The whole action of God. Everything.

01:36:03

So, I do believe the passage clearly presents to us that faith is a gift of God as well as grace.

01:36:10

I don't limit it just to faith. You're right. If anyone said that the specifically refers to faith, they're wrong.

01:36:18

The that refers to the whole phrase. Not just to faith, but it does apply to faith and grace and the salvation of God, the whole nine yards.

01:36:29

Second Peter 1 .1. Just two more passages to look at and then we will move back into justification. Second Peter, the salutation of the second epistle of Peter says,

01:36:47

Simon Peter, a bondservant and apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who have received a faith of the same kind as ours by the righteousness of our

01:36:58

God and Savior Jesus Christ. How does he describe Christians? He describes

01:37:05

Christians as those who have what? Received the same kind of faith.

01:37:12

Christians share a lot of things in common. One of them is they all have saving faith. And the only way they have that saving faith is how?

01:37:20

By the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ. And by the way, just in passing, you might want to note the clear reference to the deity of Christ there.

01:37:31

Our God and Savior Jesus Christ. It's not our God and then our

01:37:36

Savior Jesus Christ. The Greek construction very clearly makes it without question,

01:37:42

God and Savior are both being applied to the one person, Jesus Christ. One last one.

01:37:49

First Timothy chapter 1. First Timothy chapter 1. Verse 14.

01:37:59

First Timothy 1 .14. And the grace of our Lord was more than abundant and the faith and love which are found in Christ Jesus.

01:38:10

Now I want someone to read, if they would for me, the NIV translation of that because I think the

01:38:15

NIV does an excellent job in bringing that out. Anyone? You hear that?

01:38:28

Along with the faith and love which are in Christ Jesus described as being poured out abundantly upon Paul.

01:38:39

Here is a man in his trials and tribulations, the persecution he's undergone for the cause of Christ, and he could say that through the

01:38:46

Spirit of God love and faith had been poured out upon him. And it is a truly tragic thing in my mind that so many in the church today do not recognize that God is the giver and the origin of faith.

01:39:02

That they think that it's a humanly derived thing. You know why? Because when we encounter difficulty, persecution, tribulation, and trial, which we will encounter no matter how many teachers tell you, you won't.

01:39:18

We can have the trust that as Paul, sitting in prison, had love and faith abundantly poured out upon him to meet his needs in his situation, we too have the same promise.

01:39:35

We don't have to sit there and say, well I see a tribulation coming and I see a real difficult problem,

01:39:40

I better rev up my faith and get it going fast enough that I can get through this thing. Grace sufficient in the time of need, and that includes faith sufficient in the time of need.

01:39:54

So this faith of which we speak, when we speak of justification by faith, we are not making justification dependent upon human faith.

01:40:06

We are not making justification dependent upon anything but the completed work of Christ. All we are asserting is this, that God in his sovereign plan has decreed that he makes the declaration of justification at a point in time, and there are numerous passages in the scriptures that make it very clear, it takes place at a point in time, and he has decreed to do that at the point in time when his wonderful gift of grace takes hold in our lives.

01:40:39

And not before, and not after, that's when he's decreed to do it. It's not a work of man.

01:40:46

It is not something that merits justification. We are not saying that God justifies us because we believe and because that faith demands that God does this for us.

01:40:56

That's not what we're saying. It is the instrument, it is the appropriating organ to use the theological term.

01:41:05

It is the means by which God does this. We are justified because of what Christ did. And that's why

01:41:11

Paul, for example, can speak of justification by faith or listen to what he says in Titus chapter 3, verse 7.

01:41:25

That being justified by his grace, we might be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

01:41:34

Does that tell you something about true saving faith? If faith and grace can be paralleled in Paul's thinking, then faith cannot be of a different origin than grace is.

01:41:47

Both grace and faith must come from God. For those two statements made by the same apostle to be consistent with himself.

01:41:59

Now, very quickly, I want to touch upon the richness of the righteousness of Christ that is yours as a believer.

01:42:12

What is the righteousness of Christ? Why is it that, for example, one of the things that I appreciate so much about this church, this is my church,

01:42:26

I teach here very frequently, I feel very at home up here. There's a number of you here that are from my church and there are some of you that are from other churches.

01:42:35

And some of you know the great love I have for other churches in the valley. And some of you know who

01:42:41

I'm referring to. But here in our church, one of things that I really appreciate is that when we gather for prayer on Wednesday night, those of you who are part of the fellowship, we go through that little door back there and we gather in the corner of the worship center and we pray together.

01:43:08

And hardly a week goes by that one of you gentlemen does not pray a prayer of thanksgiving and thankfulness for your justification.

01:43:22

For what Christ has done for you in making you right before God so that we have the privilege of coming before Him without condemnation, without a fear of the wrath of God, because of what

01:43:39

Christ has done for us and the righteousness that is ours. There is a constant emphasis upon thankfulness for the righteousness of Christ that is imputed to us.

01:43:48

And I appreciate that. I think that, like I said at the beginning, is a good pulse meter of where the church is.

01:43:58

Are we thinking about what God has done for us in Christ Jesus? We should be. We should be.

01:44:06

What is the righteousness of Christ? Well, what is that beautiful passage in 1 Corinthians 1? Verse 30.

01:44:15

But by His doing, another passage about the sovereignty of God and salvation all over the place, aren't they?

01:44:21

But by His doing, you are in Christ Jesus who became to us wisdom from God and righteousness and sanctification and redemption that just as it is written, let him who boasts, boast in the

01:44:42

Lord. Christ is our all in all. He is our wisdom.

01:44:48

He is our righteousness. He is our sanctification. He is our redemption. And note simply in passing,

01:44:53

Paul differentiates between righteousness and sanctification. In that passage, he doesn't confuse the two of them.

01:45:01

There are certain groups that do. But Christ Jesus is our righteousness. He is our sanctification.

01:45:08

He is our redemption. But what is the righteousness of Christ? Some of you know the great theologian

01:45:17

Charles Hodge in his works. He defined it in this way. By the righteousness of Christ is meant all

01:45:26

He became, did, and suffered to satisfy the demands of divine justice and merit for His people the forgiveness of sin and the gift of eternal life.

01:45:39

The righteousness of God is commonly represented as including His active and passive obedience.

01:45:46

Now we talked about this briefly beforehand when we went through the confession. The negative aspect or His passive obedience would be for example 2

01:45:56

Corinthians 5. He who knew no sin was made sin in our behalf that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.

01:46:04

Our sins were laid upon Him. He died as our substitute. But the positive aspect we talked about is the positive way in which

01:46:16

He lived the perfect life. He loved the

01:46:22

Lord our God with all His heart, soul, and mind. And that is ours as well when we stand before God.

01:46:30

You see this righteousness is imputed to us. Now I'm going to pick on a close personal friend because I know close personal friends will allow me to pick on them.

01:46:45

But if I impute to my friend over here, if I impute a bad reputation to him, if I say to all of you, you've got to be careful about this guy.

01:46:58

If I impute some shady business to him, have I by imputing that to him changed him inside?

01:47:08

Have I actually changed him? No. When you impute something to them, you put it to their account.

01:47:15

You charge it to them. That doesn't change the person. But it is an imputation to them.

01:47:24

I am laying something at his account. Now if I did the same thing, am

01:47:31

I infusing anything into him? Infusion and imputation are two different things.

01:47:37

Remember the Council of Trent? Remember the Roman Catholic position? The grace of justification is infused into.

01:47:45

But the term used by Paul in Romans was what? Imputed. Imputed.

01:47:52

Righteousness. Righteousness. Is imputed. What does that mean? What does all of this have to do with the righteousness of Christ? If justification were nothing more than the forgiveness of past sins and the infusion into us of some kind of grace that helps us to do more good works so we can merit more grace from God, which is really how the whole system works in Roman Catholic theology.

01:48:25

If that's all it was, if it was just simply a forgiveness of past sins, it puts us back at point zero.

01:48:34

I'm now at the neutral point. My sins are forgiven.

01:48:40

But I have no positive righteousness. I'm just at the neutral point.

01:48:46

There's no reason why I should have eternal life. Why should God give me eternal life? I'm just at the neutral point.

01:48:54

I have no righteousness, positive righteousness, no goodness to plead before God. Nothing.

01:49:00

I'm just at the neutral point. But it's not that. It's not just that. The whole righteousness of Christ is imputed to me.

01:49:10

God reckons it to my account. And since it is reckoned to my account by God, then

01:49:20

I can rightly and truly plead it as my own. It's not my own. I know it's not my own.

01:49:25

I know that I have no righteousness in and of myself. I am totally and completely dependent upon the righteousness of Jesus Christ.

01:49:31

But it's imputed to me. And so I stand before God. And when

01:49:36

God looks at me, he sees the righteousness of Christ. Not just the negative, though that's wonderful and tremendous.

01:49:45

Can you imagine trying to work off that load? It's impossible. We were condemned. We were sinners.

01:49:52

But I am positively righteous. I am adopted into the family of God. He gives to me eternal life.

01:50:02

And this is imputed to me by faith. Incredible, incredible truth that it is.

01:50:10

Now, very quickly, when

01:50:15

God says that we are righteous, it is wrong to say, you know, we recognize that we still have sin in our lives.

01:50:24

We're going to talk about the forgiveness of sin last. But God has constituted our righteousness and then declared it to be so.

01:50:34

How is that? He constituted our righteousness in the work of Christ. Let me read you a quotation, actually two quotations very quickly.

01:50:45

John Murray, when we think of such an act of grace on God's part, we have the answer to our question.

01:50:52

How can God justify the ungodly? The righteousness of Christ is the righteousness of his perfect obedience, a righteousness undefiled and undefilable.

01:51:02

A righteousness which not only warrants the justification of the ungodly, but one that necessarily elicits and constrains such justification.

01:51:13

God cannot but accept into his favor those who are invested with the righteousness of his

01:51:19

Son. And Charles Hodge further asserted, so when righteousness is imputed to the believer, he does not thereby become subjectively righteous.

01:51:29

If the righteousness be adequate and if the imputation be made on adequate grounds and by competent authority, and certainly since it's done by God, it's a competent authority, the person to whom the imputation is made has the right to be treated as righteous.

01:51:44

And therefore, in the forensic, although not in the moral or subjective sense, the imputation of the righteousness of Christ does make the sinner righteous.

01:51:54

That is, it gives him a right to the full pardon of all his sins and a claim in justice to eternal life.

01:52:03

This does not compromise what we have said about the fact that righteousness in the

01:52:08

New Testament in regards to salvation is legal, not subjective. What we are saying is that Christ has died in our place, he has lived in our place, that is imputed to us by God, God has the right to do that, and God can then treat us and speak to us and work with us as righteous individuals despite the fact that each one of us knows we still encounter sin in our lives, which immediately brings up the last point that we're going to struggle with this evening.

01:52:48

And that is this, what does Colossians chapter 2 verses 13 and 14 tell us?

01:53:02

Colossians chapter 2 verses 13 and 14. And when you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, he made you alive together with him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, and which was hostile to us, and he has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.

01:53:35

How many of our transgressions were forgiven? The majority of?

01:53:40

No, all. Have you ever struggled with that? Have you ever found that to be a difficult concept?

01:53:52

I think it was Dr. Ironside in his book on eternal security as I recall, who mentioned a woman coming up to him after he spoke on the subject of eternal security, and she said, well

01:54:04

I just can't understand what you mean to say that all of our sins are forgiven.

01:54:13

How can the sins that I haven't committed yet be forgiven? They're still in the future.

01:54:20

Dr. Ironside's response was, ma 'am, when Christ died, how many of your sins were in the future?

01:54:28

And she thought, and she said, well all of them were. Well then all of your sins were future in regards to the death of Christ, so you don't have a problem in thinking that your past sins, which were future to the death of Christ, have been forgiven, right?

01:54:43

Well, right. Well then why can't your future sins be forgiven? But we still struggle with it.

01:54:49

And I think Dr. Ironside was right, and Charles Hodge makes the mention that primarily what we're struggling with is our own language.

01:54:58

Our language is a very time -based language, and we're talking about an eternal God here who does things outside the realm of time sometimes.

01:55:07

It sort of causes us some difficulties, and I would hope that most of us would recognize that we shouldn't judge what

01:55:12

God can and cannot do on the basis of our limited understanding of him, though we frequently do anyways.

01:55:19

But in our saner moments, we recognize that that's not a wise course to follow, and so we can see that, hey, the scriptures say that all of our sins are nailed to the cross of Christ, we've died with him, and we understand that and we will accept that.

01:55:34

But Dr. Hodge presented another aspect that may be helpful for you in understanding this.

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Remember what Paul said in Romans 4 .8? He's quoting from David and from the

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Psalms, and David had said, Blessed is the man whose sin the

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Lord will not take into account, or blessed is the man to whom the

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Lord will not impute sin. Remember that? Well, this is the suggestion that Dr.

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Hodge made on the basis of that passage. The sins which are pardoned and justification include all sins past, present, and future.

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It does indeed seem to be a solacism that sins should be forgiven before they are committed. Forgiveness involves remission of penalty.

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How can a penalty be remitted before it is incurred? This is only an apparent difficulty arising out of the inadequacy of human language.

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The righteousness of Christ is a perpetual donation. It is a robe which hides, or as the

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Bible expresses it, covers from the eye of justice the sin of the believer. They are sins. They deserve the wrath and curse of God, but the necessity for the infliction of that curse no longer exists.

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The believer feels the constant necessity for confession and prayer for pardon, but the ground of pardon is present for him to offer and plead.

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So it would perhaps be a more correct statement to say that in justification the believer receives the promise that God will not deal with him according to his transgressions, rather than to say that sins are forgiven before they are committed.

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What he is saying is that he is not denying that all sins are forgiven, but he is trying to help us understand how it is that you and I feel our sin.

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We are convicted. We cry before God for forgiveness, and yet we go, but if these are forgiven then, and there are some who actually say this,

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I should never bring them before God because that is reminding him of the sin he has already forgiven. That is a sin of itself, and you have this person going around and around and around, and you know which ends up.

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And what Hodge is suggesting is this. What does

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Paul say in Romans 4 .8? Blessed is the man to whom the Lord will not impute sin.

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The sins are committed, but they are not imputed to us. How? Why?

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To whom were they imputed? They have already been imputed. The sins are not imputed to us.

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They are committed. We feel them. If the Spirit of God dwells in your heart, he will place into your heart a hatred of sin.

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That should be our desire. We should hate our sin. We commit them, but we are not punished for them.

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Why? Because they are not imputed to us. They were imputed to someone else 2 ,000 years ago who was worthy of taking them, and by his death, he suffered the penalty for them.

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And so it is the non -imputation of sin. The sin is committed, but it is not imputed to us.

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It is imputed to another. That might help you in struggling with, if it could be called struggling, to struggle with the incredible grace of God we have been discussing tonight, in struggling with that concept of the forgiveness of sin.

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Certainly, there is the full and complete promise of God that the one who trusts in Christ will find a safe refuge.

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All of our sins were laid upon him. Certainly, we can all then understand that one of the reasons we would want to hate our sin so much is to know that every time we do sin, that was one of those sins that was laid upon the

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Lord Jesus. Why would we ever, ever want to increase that burden? If we love him, we will not desire to do so.

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So why is justification by faith so important? Because justification by faith is simply how

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God takes men who are sinners and makes them saints. He makes them right with himself.

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It is the gospel. If you don't have the proper concept of what it is to be just, you don't have the gospel.

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If you don't understand the absolute supremacy of God's grace in justifying you, if you think there are things that you have to go walking through this process to bring about your justification, then it suggests to me anyways that you've never really understood the seriousness of your sin, the holiness of God, the gospel, the gospel itself.

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Aside from the polemic aspect that of course I always tend to emphasize for some strange reason, in closing, if you're a believer, if you name the name of Christ, if you sit here this evening and the

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Spirit of God has given you the assurance that you truly have trusted in Christ for your salvation, then any time that you look at these passages and you think about what

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Jesus Christ has done for you, the result in your heart should be worship.

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It should be praise. In any situation of life that we are in, no matter how bad business might be or school might be or work might be or whatever it might be, is it so bad when you step back and recognize the fact that God in his mercy and grace has taken you, you who were a rebel, you who were filthy in your sins in the sight of a holy

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God, and solely by his grace, he's united you with Christ and he has imputed to you the righteousness of his

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Son so that you can stand before him adopted into his family, everything you have, your life, everything you will ever be, you owe totally and completely to him.

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Can anything in our lives be so bad that it takes away from us the joy of recognizing what

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God has done for us? Some people look at Paul and they see

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Paul sitting in a prison in Rome and they go, man that Christian, he's a nut.

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He's rejoicing and praising God. The simple fact of the matter is they don't understand why

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Paul could do that. The sad fact of the matter is we, for our own ignorance of the word and our own willingness to dig into it and to study these things deprive ourselves of many of the greatest blessings we can have because, hey, that's why

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Paul could rejoice. He could look at everything in this life, he could look at everything in this world, and he could still be thankful to God because his mind was centered on the proper things.

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He didn't think about, well what blessings didn't I get from God this week? My house isn't as big as somebody else's.

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It never entered his mind because his mind was so often overflowing with thankfulness whenever he considered the tremendous truth of what

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God has done for us in making us righteous, in justifying us.

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So I hope whenever you hear the term justification by faith, you will immediately thank

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God for his mercy, his grace toward you in justifying you.

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It should be something that causes immediate feelings of thanksgiving and worship toward God.

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I hope that the brief time together tonight looking through God's word has helped you to see that and will direct you toward again thinking about what

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God has done for us in Christ Jesus. Let's have a word of prayer and then we'll take some questions.

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Our Father, we confess that far too often we are very glib about our faith.

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Father, we take what you've done for us for granted. We can look at such tremendous truths as justification by faith, as mere doctrinal formulations.

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We can become so cold, so hard that the words do not penetrate the hardness of our hearts and call forth from us the praise and thanksgiving that should always be the proper response of the child of God.

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Father, we confess that we are totally dependent upon you and it is the desire of our heart that you would place into us, the desire, the drive to be a people who upon the recognition of your mercy in Christ Jesus that has been given to us, that we be a people who would lift blessings to your name.

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Thankfulness should be the watchword of our existence. Lord, help us to recognize that everything we have comes from you.

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In fact, the very privilege we have to bow our heads and to approach the throne of grace is ours solely because of your mercy.

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Father, we ask that in the battle against falsehood that surrounds us, that as we attempt because of our love for you, because of the command of the word of God, to share the truth about justification, that you would never let us get so battle scarred that we would not be touched in our hearts every time we speak of your grace toward us in Christ Jesus.

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Father, we thank you for blessing this time. I ask that you would by the Holy Spirit apply these things to our hearts, drive us into your word to be ever greater students of that tremendous gift of grace called the

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Bible. We thank you for all these things in Christ's name. Acts 2, verses 37 and 38,

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Peter has preached the famous sermon at Pentecost, and the men have heard it, they've been pierced to their heart, and they say to Peter and to the other apostles, what shall we do, men and brethren?

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And Peter answers and says to them, repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Christ Jesus, under the remission of sins, and you will receive the gift of the

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Holy Ghost. Now, let me ask in regards to your question, the emphasis is not so much upon, as I hear your question, so much upon the baptismal regeneration aspect, maybe it is, as upon what must we do.

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Now, most Arminians I know of, Arminius anyways, did not believe in baptismal regeneration, but if they were to be consistent, they almost would have to, if they are thinking that the actions that they undertake are first of all coming from their own will and their own ability, and secondly, that they somehow have some saving effect.

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I think the real issue is that we must emphasize that any action that we examine has to be based upon the fact that it has its origin in God, but we are still doing it.

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Remember what Paul says in Philippians chapter 2, he is doing what? He is working out his salvation with fear and trembling.

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But what does the next verse say? For it is God who is at work within us to do and to will according to his good pleasure.

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Now, which of those two things comes first? Obviously the Bible says God's work does first, but that doesn't mean that I'm not here, that I'm just the puppet on the string as many people like to accuse us of.

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So, I like to reverse the question. If God were to pierce you to your heart, and it was

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God who pierced them to the heart, I can't imagine anyone would deny that these people were just pierced to the heart by the tremendous oratory of Peter.

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If God has pierced you to the heart and has shown you your need, what are you going to say?

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If you have not yet received instruction and God has decreed that the gospel will be presented, how?

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By us! Now, God may be working with a terrible handicap that way with some of us, but he has decreed that that's the way he's going to do it.

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If the person has not yet been instructed as to what they should do, then they need to be instructed in what they should do.

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It is not the doing that caused God to pierce them to the heart.

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And it was God, according to Paul elsewhere, who has given them the desire to even ask, what shall we do?

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Obviously these people already had faith, but why would they think that doing anything would accomplish anything in the first place?

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The problem is Acts chapter 2 is not meant to communicate to us the theology of salvation.

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It is supposed to communicate to us the historical presentation of the very first message of the gospel and how people responded to it.

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This is a classic example of what I was talking about earlier. You don't go to this section and try to develop your soteriology.

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Hey, you go to where the Bible talks about it. And the Bible talks about it in other places with much more clarity.

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So I would say, in conclusion, and I don't believe for a second that someone who is absolutely dead set upon not believing what

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I'm saying is going to be convinced by anything I said in the first place. But from my perspective, the passage in Acts chapter 2 clearly shows the priority of the work of the

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Spirit of God in these men's lives because before they asked the question, they were pierced through to the heart by the proclamation of the gospel.

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And so I don't think that any one of them would have thought my doing is going to bring about my salvation.

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But what are you going to ask you've got to ask. I am convicted. You are right.

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Jesus was the Messiah. And I have had a part in shedding his blood. What must I do? What must

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I do? And there is nothing that I see that is in the least bit contradictory in the heart crying out in that way.

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Yes sir. Indeed.

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Context, context, context. Yes sir. Right, we believe.

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It is true. Well, what

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I mean by that is first of all, while, and that's why I emphasize the nature of faith, that faith itself is not the instrument in the same sense, or even anywhere near the same sense, that the work of Christ is the instrument of our justification.

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The true instrument of our justification, quote unquote, is the work of Christ. It is by his death that we are justified.

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But since justification is a forensic or legal declaration that we are a part of God, and since the

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New Testament makes it very clear that we are justified by faith, then what

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I understand faith to be is first of all the supernatural action of God in man.

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Therefore it is not contingent. It is not something that can fail. It is not something that is dependent upon man.

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But secondly, since the New Testament text speaks of justification taking place at a point in time by faith.

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Romans 5 .1, Galatians 3 says the same thing, that God is justifying point actions in time, men, by faith.

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That at the action of faith, which is the result of God's work, therefore it's not a contingency, it's not something that is, well, it might happen, it might not happen.

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That that is the time in God's sovereignty, in God's providence, that he makes, on the basis of the work of Christ, that judicial declaration.

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That in the, what in Latin is called the Ordo Salutis and the order of salvation, if any such thing can even be designed, that that is the point in time where God, though the justification itself, the grounds of the justification of the completed and finished for 2 ,000 years, that the actual act of justifying takes place at faith and the only defense

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I have for that is that I cannot possibly see any other reading of the

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Greek text of the New Testament. It just simply can't be done. Over and over again

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God is described, does that mean that there is a process of justification going on? No.

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What it means is that as each individual comes to that point of faith, as God implants that faith, he regenerates them, he makes them new creatures, he gives them faith and repentance, they act.

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Now, I need to explain why that might be significant. As that takes place in each person's life, then

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God is making that declaration of justification relevant to this person, relevant to this person, relevant to this person.

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God is ongoing in his justifying mankind through time.

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It's not a process. It's one point for this person, one point for this person, one point for that person. And that's the problem

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I have with the concept of eternal justification, is the idea that we have always been justified,

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I cannot accept simply because of the fact that in the Greek New Testament you are forced by the biblical language to accept the fact that justification takes place in time, it takes place at a certain point in a person's life, and it takes place because or at, not because or on the grounds of, or at the action of faith.

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And this happens so many times in both Romans and Galatians and elsewhere that I am simply constrained by the biblical text.

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Now, I understand the perspective. I understand why someone would view that, but I personally am forced to the biblical language itself in regards to that issue.

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Where I would disagree with the position is that faith is simply the recognition of the blessings of a justification that has been ours from eternity.

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I believe that faith is the action upon which we are actually justified.

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Not just simply the reception of the blessings of justification. In fact, that term doesn't appear biblically.

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Just quickly, because I don't want to spend too much time on it, the confession says,

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God did from all eternity decree to justify all the elect. And Christ did in the fullness of time die for their sins and rise again for their justification.

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So the grounds, the whole grounds of our justification is a completed action in Christ Jesus.

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Nevertheless, they are not justified personally until the Holy Spirit doth in due time actually apply

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Christ unto them. And so I agree with that and I believe that that is, let me just put it this way.

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My theology, because of the work that I do, is primarily a theology that I am forced into because of the biblical text.

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In other words, I can't dogmatically state something that I can't demonstrate from scripture.

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For example, and this will be the last question real quickly because I don't want to keep you any later. One of the fellows who left a couple of moments ago and I were talking with some

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Jehovah's Witnesses recently. They were utterly flabbergasted when they started talking about eschatology that I took such an easy view of the whole subject.

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Oh, you believe that? That's fine. I'm not really big on arguing about eschatology.

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And they were totally flabbergasted. That's because I can't dogmatically prove and I'm not forced into a particular position by the text.

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But in regards to this issue, in regards to when we are justified, the language of the text forces me to say that Romans 5 .1,

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therefore, having been justified by faith. Not having recognized the blessings of a far previous justification by faith, but the only way

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I can understand the Greek text is that at a point in time, it's an

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Aristotle, I was justified by faith. It's there, it's in the text,

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I'm forced to go with that perspective on it. I know the discussion, but I'm afraid a number of other people might not be totally familiar with exactly.

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Okay, I think

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I hear what you're saying about that, but it would require us to be here a good bit longer to go into the whole discussion of it.