Justification by Faith (White vs Pacwa)

Debate Format and Opening Instructions

We'll begin with Mr. White, and he will have 25 minutes for an opening statement. Then, Father Pacwa will have 25 minutes for an opening statement. Following that, we will alternate back and forth. Mr. White will then have 12 minutes to either complete his statement or and rebut Father Pacwa.

Then, Father Pacwa will have 12 minutes to either complete and or rebut Reverend White. Then, there will be a second rebuttal of 7 minutes from Mr. White and 7 minutes from Father Pacwa. Then, we will take a 15-minute break.

Following the break, we will have a third rebuttal of 7 minutes for each participant. Then, we will get into, after the break, a question and answer period. During that question and answer period, again, we will alternate.

Reverend White will ask Father Pacwa a question. Back and forth, each will have an opportunity to ask the other two questions. Then, we will ask the questions that you pose from the audience. We hope to get through more than two each, but we may be limited in terms of time because we do want to get you out of here at a particular time.

This is a very important topic, and I think it's fundamental for each and every one of us to determine, you know, how are we saved, if you will, and putting it down into the vernacular. How are we saved?

This is an opportunity for us to, if you will, an exercise in ecumenism. If we each will have an open mind and listen to both sides. You may not agree with Reverend White. You may not agree with Father Pacwa.

But if you leave here with a good, solid understanding of each side's position, then we can consider the evening a success. Whether you, you know, can say whether there was a winner and a loser, I don't think that's important.

I think we can all win if we all listen, and we have an opportunity to grow as Christians and grow as a Christian family. I would ask you to be disciplined. That if you agree or disagree, I would prefer, to put it simply, we came here to listen to them, not to listen to you.

So please keep your comments, even though this may be a very volatile, very personal subject. I would ask you to keep comments to yourself. If at the end of the time that a speaker, when he finishes speaking, you would like to express your appreciation with applause, please do so.

But please, no comments. All right? I'd like to begin right now by inviting Mr. White for 25 minutes for his opening statement.

White's Opening Statement on Justification by Faith

I thank all of you for being here this evening and for braving the weather to be with us tonight to discuss a very important topic. Dr. Pacwa, I'm honored that you're here this evening, sir. We are dealing, as has been said, with a very large and difficult subject.

Yet we are dealing with what I believe is the very heart of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Therefore, I want to invite all who are present this evening to pay close attention to all that is said. It is my desire that all that are here this evening would have a clear knowledge of both sides of this debate question when they leave this evening to allow for a full understanding of the Protestant position.

I will have to at least give a brief outline of the Roman Catholic position. I'm sure Dr. Pacwa will do a fine job in stating even more clearly the Roman Catholic position during the time that is allotted to him.

However, for purposes of contrast, I need to provide you with some of that information. The Protestants, and I believe the biblical doctrine of justification, differs from the Roman Catholic view in four very important and I believe foundational aspects.

First of all, we differ on the meaning and the extent of the term justification. Secondly, we differ on the meaning and the extent and the purpose of the term impute or imputation. What does it mean that righteousness is imputed?

Thirdly, we differ on the instrument by which justification takes place. Is it faith alone or faith plus works? And that goes back to the meaning of justification itself as well. And finally, and I believe most importantly, I believe that we differ on the grounds or the basis upon which sinful men are justified.

I shall deal with these four areas as being most important in my thinking this evening. Now, in defining the Roman Catholic perspective on this subject, I would like to turn to the Council of Trent, which defined justification as follows.

Justification is a translation from that state in which man is born a child of the first Adam to the state of grace and of the adoption of the sons of God to the second Adam, Jesus Christ, our Savior.

This translation, however, cannot, since the promulgation of the gospel, be effected except through the labor of regeneration or its desire, end quote. That is, by baptism, which Trent said, without which no man was ever justified finally.

Therefore, the initial means of justification is baptism, according to the Roman Catholic position. The Council of Trent then went on to assert that God gives to men predisposing grace so that they, quote, may be disposed through his quickening and helping grace to convert themselves to their own justification by freely assenting to and cooperating with that grace so that while God touches the heart of man through the illumination of the Holy Ghost, man himself neither does absolutely nothing while receiving that inspiration, since he can also reject it, nor yet is he able by his own free will and without the grace of God to move himself to justice in his sight.

The Catholic position asserts that, quote, faith is the beginning of human salvation, the foundation and root of all justification. We are therefore said to be justified gratuitously because none of those things that precede justification, whether faith or works, merit the grace of justification, end quote.

Notice what is said here. According to Trent, we can say that we are justified by grace or gratuitously solely because those things that precede justification, faith and works, are prompted and aided by God's grace.

The process of justification is based upon God's grace, but from our perspective it is not completely of God's grace, and it cannot be said that God's grace alone without human activity and human merit is sufficient to bring about complete and full justification.

The justified person is told that, quote, they through the observance of the commandments of God and of the Church, faith cooperating with good works, increase in that justice received through the grace of Christ and are further justified, end quote.

It seems clear then from the Protestant perspective that the justice that is received is not as Protestants understand it, that is the imputed righteousness of Christ alone, for how could the righteousness of Christ be increased or a person grow in that?

Faith alone is explicitly denied as being the sole instrument of justification, for Trent says, quote, wherefore no one ought to flatter himself with faith alone, thinking that by faith alone he has made an heir and will obtain the inheritance, end quote.

Roman Catholicism teaches that the grace of justification can be gained and lost. Gained and lost, Trent said, quote, those who through sin have forfeited the received grace of justification can again be justified when, moved by God, they exert themselves to obtain through the sacrament of penance the recovery by the merits of Christ of the grace lost.

Hence it must be taught that the repentance of a Christian after his fall is very different from that of his baptism and that it includes not only a determination to avoid sins and a hatred of them, but also the sacramental confession of those sins, at least in desire to be made in its season, and sacerdotal absolution, as well as satisfaction by fasts, alms, prayers, and other devout exercises of the spiritual life, not indeed for the eternal punishment, which is, together with the guilt, remitted either by the sacrament or by the desire of the sacrament, but for the temporal punishments, which, as the sacred writings teach, is not always wholly remitted as is done in baptism.

Justification in Roman Catholic theology involves an infusion of grace, the grace of justification, into the individual. This involves a subjective change in the person. Because of the subjective change in the person, he is enabled, through the power of grace, to do good works, and these works are, according to the Council of Trent, meritorious in God's sight.

We read,.

Hence to those who work well unto the end and trust in God, eternal life is to be offered, both as a grace mercifully promised to the sons of God through Jesus Christ, and as a reward promised by God himself to be faithfully given to their good works and merits.

We must believe that nothing further is wanting to those justified to prevent them from being considered to have, by those very works which have been done in God, fully satisfied the divine law according to the state of this life and to have truly merited eternal life to be obtained in its due time, provided they depart this life in grace.

It must be emphasized this evening that eternal life is merited by the good works performed by the person in the state of grace. The basis, then, of one's final salvation is not solely the work of Christ.

Dr. Ludwig Ott wrote,. By his good works, the justified man really acquires a claim to supernatural reward from God. And Matthias Prem also wrote,. Man, for his part, in order to arrive at full sanctification, must cooperate with the grace of the Holy Spirit through faith, hope, love of God and neighbor, and prayer, but he must also perform other works.

It is a universally accepted dogma of the Catholic Church that man, in union with the grace of the Holy Spirit, must merit heaven by his good works. These works are meritorious only when they are performed in the state of grace and with a good intention.

We have shown that according to the Holy Scripture, the Christian can actually merit heaven for himself by his good works. Therefore, we see that justification in the Roman Catholic understanding encompasses the entire concept of forgiveness as well as sanctification, for it involves a subjective, inward change in the individual.

Justification is not solely a process of imputation, but a process of infusion of grace into the individual. Finally, the grounds of justification is not solely the work of Jesus Christ. While Christ's passion merits the grace of justification, this grace then produces good works which form part of the basis of final salvation of the individual.

It might be added that the Council of Trent provided numerous anathemas or condemnations for those who would knowingly disagree with its teachings. Now, in contrast to the Roman position, allow me to provide the Protestant position, taken this evening from the 1689 Baptist Confession of Faith, which agrees word for word with the Westminster Confession of Faith in defining justification.

May I ask you please to listen closely to what is said. Quote,. 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, not by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them as their righteousness, but by imputing 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.

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.

Christ, by his obedience in 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.

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 right grace of God might be glorified in the justification of sinners.".

The Westminster Shorter Catechism summed it up well by stating in question 33,. What is justification? Answer, justification is an act of God's free grace wherein he pardoneth all our sins and accepteth us as righteous in his sight only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us and received by faith alone.

Now I'd ask you to note the following items. Justification is said to be an act of God as judge wherein he declares the believer righteous. Justification, therefore, is a legal, forensic declaration on the part of God concerning the believer.

Justification is undertaken by God and it is not based upon anything done in or done by the believer. It is an act of sovereign grace and justice. Justification is based solely and completely upon the merits of another, and that is Jesus Christ.

Justification involves the imputation of the righteousness of Christ, both his perfect life as well as his perfect, all-sufficient atoning sacrifice to the believer upon which basis the believer is called righteous.

Justification is by grace through faith. Faith is the instrument or means of appropriating justification. This kind of saving faith is a true faith. It is not an empty faith, but it is the work of God in the believer's heart by the Holy Spirit of God.

Justification, while distinct from sanctification, cannot possibly be separated from it. God changes man in regeneration and in sanctification. God declares man righteous in justification. Any man who is justified will be sanctified.

It is impossible to separate justification and sanctification, but it is absolutely necessary to distinguish them. Justification is a once-for-all action. Since it is based upon the completed work of Christ, it cannot be undone or destroyed by the actions or sins of man.

We look back upon our justification, just as Paul wrote in Romans 5 .1,. Therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Now, in the time remaining, we must look to God's word to reveal to us which perspective is true.

For, as Jesus said to the Father, Your word is truth. That which does not accord with the Bible cannot possibly call for the allegiance of the heart of the Christian. Are we justified only after being baptized?

And is justification something that can be undone by human evil? Are we required to go through a sacrament of confession involving contrition, confession, doing works of satisfaction? Is God working in us so that we ourselves can make satisfaction for our sins?

Or did Christ make full and complete satisfaction in our place on Calvary so that now God is working in us to conform us to the image of Christ? I shall use what seems to have been a favorite passage of the Apostle Paul, Genesis chapter 15, verse 6, to help give order and cohesiveness to my presentation of the biblical doctrine of justification by faith.

Genesis 15 .6, as many of you know, says,. And, speaking of Abram, he believed in Yahweh, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. The first concept to examine is that of faith. Abram believed in God.

We assert that man is justified by this kind of faith and not by any other actions. This is exactly what Paul said when he faced Peter in Antioch. Remember what happened in Galatians chapter 2. Peter had seriously compromised the gospel by withdrawing from table fellowship with the Gentiles.

In rebuking him, Paul said in the 16th verse of the second chapter,. Knowing that a man is not justified by works of law, but by faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus so that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of law, for no flesh shall be justified by works of law.

He took our central passage this evening, Genesis 15 .6, and made the same point in Romans chapter 4, one of the clearest and, I believe, most obvious arguments for justification by faith. Having concluded the first section of the book of Romans in the 28th verse of the third chapter by saying,.

Therefore, we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the works of law. He wanted to cite our passage in verse 3 of chapter 4 and immediately upon citing the justification of Abram, Paul asserted this,.

Now to the one who works, the wage is not reckoned as a gift, but as what is due. But to the one who does not work, but rather believes upon the one who justifies the ungodly, his faith is reckoned as righteousness.

Note well what is said. Paul contrasts the concepts of working and believing. This is a common concept in the New Testament. There is a strong antithesis between belief and work when it comes to being right with God.

One must either work at doing the deeds of law or one must believe in Christ. One simply cannot meld the two together. They are two roads that go 180 degrees from one another and it's impossible to walk down this road and that road at the same time.

Paul asserts that those who do not work but in opposition to this believe are the ones who receive righteousness. The antithesis between faith and works is found to be central to all of Paul's discussion of how a man is made right with God.

Prior to this, Paul had said in Romans chapter 3, verses 21 through 25,. But now apart from the law, a righteousness from God has been revealed, being witnessed to by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God by faith in Jesus Christ, to all the ones believing, for there is no difference.

For all have sinned to come short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation through faith in His blood.

Men are justified freely and by grace. Paul asserts that justification is by grace. Here in Romans 3 .24, and he says the same thing in Titus 3 .7. Is Paul contradicting himself by saying that we are justified by grace and that we are justified by faith?

Not at all. As Paul explains in Romans 4 .16,. Justification is by faith alone so that it would be in concert with grace. Faith, that Paul is talking about, abandons all efforts at work or merit and realizes man's complete dependence upon God, not just for the provision of a way of salvation, a plan of salvation, but for the entire action of salvation itself.

We are saved by grace. We are kept by grace throughout eternity. For salvation to be of grace, it cannot possibly be of works. As Paul said in Romans 11 .6, it is either on the basis of works or is on the basis of grace.

It cannot be both. Grace, by definition, excludes the entire concept of human works or merit. Grace cannot be merited and cannot coexist with merit on the part of the one to whom it is given. The contrast of faith and works as mutually exclusive concepts is continued in Paul's strong letter to the Galatians.

He asserts that one simply cannot combine works of law with faith in Christ. Listen to his strong words in Galatians 2 .21,. For if righteousness comes through law, then Christ died needlessly. If one asserts that righteousness is a result of God's grace and human action, then one is nullifying the work of Christ completely, as Paul said in Galatians 2 .21.

No synergism is possible. It is either all of grace or not of grace at all. Finally, Paul provides a clear antithesis when in Galatians 3 .10 -11 he writes,. For it is written,. Cursed are all those who do not abide in all the things written in the book of the law to do them.

But that no one shall be justified before God by law is evident, for the just shall live by faith. Now the impossibility in my opinion of the Roman position is clearly seen. Faith plus works nullifies grace.

Grace plus works, my friends, is dead. But does not the Bible say that Christians are to do good works? Are there not many passages that say this? Well, of course there are. But the only one who can do good works is the one who has already been justified.

As Paul taught the Ephesians, Ephesians 2,. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

Salvation is the gift of God, not just the bare plan of God or even just the bare grace of God that prompts us to move toward God, but all of salvation is of God. Were this not the case, we would certainly boast.

But salvation is not of man or by man, it is of and by God and God alone. The purpose of God is clearly presented. We have been created in Christ Jesus unto good works, not by good works, not with the help of good works, but that we might perform good works.

First comes full salvation from God. Then, as a result, the works prompted by the Holy Spirit of God. No human merit, even that supposedly produced by human works, performed in a state of grace, will ever stand before the judgment bar of God.

Only the righteousness of Christ, apprehended by faith, will avail. Now, the next term we need to examine in Genesis chapter 15, verse 6, in the few minutes we have left, is the term translated reckoned or imputed.

The Hebrew term kashav has some very interesting uses in the Old Testament. We need to discover the background of Paul's use of the term.

As it is found. Relative.

To the imputation of righteousness, for example, in Romans 4. A few examples in Genesis chapter 31, verse 15, Rachel and Leah, Jacob's wives, speak of their father and the treatment they have received at his hand.

They say, do we still have any portion or inheritance in our father's house? Are we not reckoned or imputed by him as foreigners? Of course, Rachel and Leah were not actually foreigners, but they were reckoned as such, treated as such, by their father.

Another example of this usage is Leviticus 17, 4. Hear any man who did not bring an animal he had slaughtered to the door of the tabernacle as an offering to the Lord, as the scripture says, blood guiltiness is to be reckoned to that man.

Surely this guilt is not infused into the man, but he is legally declared guilty of blood for his trespass. One other quick example. In Leviticus chapter 25, verse 31, the law concerning redemption rights is presented.

We read,.

The houses of the villages, however, which have no surrounding walls, shall be considered reckoned, imputed as open fields. They have redemption rights and revert in the Jubilee. The houses in unwalled villages were to be treated as if they were open fields.

They were not, of course, open fields, ask anyone who lived in one, but legally they were treated as if they were. All the examples that I have provided to you of this use of the Hebrew term are translated in the Greek Septuagint by the very same term Paul uses in Romans chapter 4 when he speaks of the imputation or reckoning of righteousness to the believer, that being the Greek term, lagizimai.

I suggest that it is the proper background for Paul's understanding of the term in Genesis 15, 6 as well. To reckon something to someone's account does not involve a subjective change in that person. This is especially clear in a legal context, and that is what we have in Romans chapters 3 and 4.

As time is fleeting, I shall turn quickly to the next important term, that being the term righteousness. Abram believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Christ became sin in our place that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.

What do these terms mean? The Hebrew term tzedakah carries two main thoughts. It is often used of what we normally considered as moral righteousness or uprightness. The New Testament uses the term in this way as well, for example, in describing Joseph as a righteous man in Matthew 1 .19 and Luke 1 .6 where Zechariah and Elizabeth are described as just.

But the Hebrew tzedakah also carries a forensic or legal concept of being right in the eyes of law, right in relationship to the law. This is often the case when the verb form is used, specifically, especially the hephel forms.

There are a number of examples of this usage in the Old Testament. They include Exodus 23 .7, Proverbs 17 .15, but I shall use just one example, 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, note the context.

We are in a law court. To justify the righteous obviously means to give a legal, forensic declaration regarding his proper standing before the law. This is clearly seen by the term that is paralleled with the act of justifying, that is, to condemn.

Neither involves a subjective change of the individual. The righteous man was righteous inwardly even before the declaration of his righteousness, just as the guilty man was guilty before the proclamation of his guilt and condemnation.

Now, in the time that I have after Dr. Pacwa's opening statements, I will continue, at this point, dealing with the meaning of the term righteousness as it is used by Paul, but my time has escaped me.

Dr. Pacwa, the podium is yours, sir.

Thank you.

Pacwa's Opening Response: Justification, Faith, and the Catholic Reading of Paul

Thank you, Mr. White. I appreciate your comments. I appreciate also that you used the documents and used the sources that we're dealing with. Namely those of Trent and the Protestant statements of faith as well.

I approach this as somebody, like all of us who exist, that needs justification myself. I approach this as someone who takes a look at the scriptures and looks to them as the inerrant word of God, that which is the norm for our faith, as the Catholic Church teaches and has taught from its beginning.

And I want to understand this issue of justification, especially as the scriptures teach it. And as it turns out, I believe that that teaching is found in its fullness in the Catholic Church. Now, I also would like to begin with a contrast by looking at the doctrine of justification as taught by the Reformers.

We see that this idea of justification by faith alone is not a doctrine that's early in the Church. It appears with the Protestant Reformation. The strongest advocate of the doctrine of justification by faith alone was Martin Luther.

Even more strong and clear on that than John Calvin or Zwingli or the other Reformers.

He looked to St. Paul.

To find this doctrine, a doctrine of justification that originally had frightened Martin Luther. He was afraid of God's justice because he saw it as the justice that would condemn him. But as he studied Romans as a professor of scripture, he found another sense of justification, one in which he believed it to be a gift.

He received from God. And that understanding of justification as a gift from God imputed to him, given to him freely by grace without any merit on his part, gave him peace of mind. And he taught that doctrine.

However, Dr. Martin Luther also realized that the doctrine of justification by faith alone is not a doctrine that is found in the text of scripture explicitly. He recognized that by the fact that when he translated Romans 3, twice he added the word only as a modifier to faith, and once he added the word alone, glaba alaina and nur glaba.

And therefore, if we see that Luther himself admits, and he did this in correspondence with Dr. Link, that he had to add these words, then we see that it's not an explicit biblical doctrine of justification by faith alone, but Martin Luther's interpretation of the text.

And the question for Catholics that is posed to the Protestant interpretation is does the text bear reading into it faith alone? We think not. I personally think not. First of all, we see that because it is something implicit, Protestants themselves have disagreed about the role of faith alone.

Luther insisted that it is a faith that apprehends Christ's merit as Mr. White has so clearly stated, and that it is not the faith itself that redeems the Christian, it is Christ who is apprehended or grasped by that faith that redeems the Christian.

And that faith, which is a gift, is not itself saving, it is Jesus Christ that is the one who saves. And it's very important for us to understand about the Protestant approach,.

To be fair to them.

There's a problem with the parable in Matthew chapter 18,.

Verse 23 and following.

The parable is of a servant who cannot pay a debt to his master. And he throws himself upon the mercy of the master and the master imputes to him the debt. He accounts the debt as being paid. And there's that absolute confidence in what the servant cannot do but the master can do.

That is a perfect parable for what it means to have the kind of faith Dr. Luther talked about, a faith that came by faith alone. However, as we know from the rest of the parable, that servant did not remain faithful because he would not forgive a servant who owed him a much smaller amount.

And for that reason, the master said to him, out of my sight. Now, this shows part of the problem of faith alone. And some of the other reformers began to see the criticism. Faith alone did not keep that servant in a proper relationship with the master.

And so, some of the reformers, Melanchthon, Gerhardt and Calvin himself added that it must be a lively faith and it must be a faith that works itself out in love. So that they had to add another quality to their faith, namely the quality of love within the faith so that it can apprehend Christ.

Who gives them the redemption.

And they would also say, very clearly, that the faith and that love is itself a gift from God too. So there's already difference of interpretation about this faith that apprehends or grasps Christ even among the reformers.

And we have to ask, why should we accept this interpretation and why should we, which one of these reformers should we accept? Faith alone or faith that works itself out in love in order to grasp Christ?

That's one problem. And then, we look at the texts that Martin Luther and Mr. White have focused on. Namely, Romans and Galatians and also Philippians.

Letters by St. Paul.

That certainly do present the way to righteousness or justification.

Through faith.

In Jesus Christ as the propitiation, that is as the offering for our sins. But what Luther did not grasp clearly enough is that these epistles are dealing with specific problems and St. Paul addresses specific issues in this question of justification by faith.

Namely, that of Judaizers. The problem began in Galatia. He takes it up again in Romans and then it reappears in Philippians. Certain Jewish Christians tried to insist that the Gentile Christians had to undergo circumcision and because they had to undergo circumcision would take on all of the ritual law of the Jews.

And so therefore, St. Paul sets up an opposition between the law and faith. But it's the law, as referring to the Jewish ceremonial law, as most specifically represented by the experience of circumcision, which made someone a member of the old covenant.

Circumcision was how the Hebrew male child was made a member of the covenant and how the convert became a part of the covenant. The old covenant, the covenant given to Abraham. And St. Paul clearly and correctly saw that this is inappropriate for entering into the new covenant in Jesus Christ.

And where do we see texts supporting this? First of all, Galatians, chapter 5, verse 6. Paul brings out the point clearly saying, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything in Christ Jesus, but faith working through love.

So here we see that he talks about faith working through love, a text that Calvin and others quote right out of Paul, and we certainly agree with it. Works itself out in love rather than circumcision or uncircumcision.

Then in Galatians 6, 15, for neither faith, excuse me, for neither circumcision is anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. And this gets us into another problem with the Protestant approach towards justification.

As we'll see in a minute. Namely that it is an interior change. Christ came to make us new creations. Not only taught here in Galatians, but taught earlier by Paul in 2 Corinthians chapter 5. Because we need to be recreated from the inside.

It's not merely imputation, but it's a new creation. And then the third text, also dealing with this problem of circumcision, is 1 Corinthians 7, 19. Circumcision is nothing, uncircumcision is nothing, but keeping the commandments of God is something.

That's what he implies.

So that, for Paul, the issue is not of any law, or all law, versus faith, or all good works versus faith, but the issue is rather Judaizers cannot make us undergo the ritual ceremony of circumcision, which was meant to make us part of the covenant with Abraham.

But rather, we are to be part of this new covenant in Christ by our faith, but we are to be made into new creations by this Jesus Christ, by His grace, and we are to keep the commandments of God as part of that new covenant.

And that this is something that is necessary. Now, not only did Luther misunderstand what St. Paul meant by the works of the law, when he talked about it, and not only did he overlook these texts from Galatians.