Chapter 39
Fourfold Justification
"Being
justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." -- Romans 3:24
Perhaps the most important fact revealed in Holy Scripture is the one
which men most presumptuously ignore, the fact that God is just. “Justice and truth are the habitation of his
throne.” It is not possible
for us to understand the grace of God, the judgment of God, or the work of
Christ until we have some understanding of the justice of God.
Because the Lord our God is
just, he must always deal with men upon the grounds of strict justice. The justice of God is the rectitude and
righteousness of his character, that which compels him to deal with all of his
creatures in strict accordance with their deserts. Justice and holiness are as
essential to the character of God as love and mercy. God can no more put
aside his justice in his dealings with men than he can put aside love from his
character. Because God is just, the only way he can save a guilty sinner, the
only way he can bring a sinner into an eternal union of life with himself, is
if he can make the sinner guiltless and sinless in the eyes of his own law and
justice.
This act of God’s matchless grace, by which he declares men to be
guiltless and sinless, is what the apostle Paul calls “justification”. Justification
is a legal term. It means that God declares chosen, redeemed sinners
guiltless, sinless, and perfectly righteous before his law. And when God
declares that a person is guiltless and sinless, perfectly righteousness before
him, that person really is, in the eyes of God, perfectly righteous. Our
righteousness before God is not just a merciful supposition. It is a blessed
reality in Christ. Every believer in the Lord Jesus Christ is truly justified,
perfectly righteous in the sight of God.
But how is this justification accomplished? This is the great
question of the ages. “How can a man be
justified with God? Or how can he be clean that is born of a woman?” (Job
25:4). How can God be just and yet justify the ungodly? Find the answer to that
question and you have learned the gospel. If you have not found the answer to
that question, you do not yet know the gospel.
Because God is holy, just, and true, he demands an infinite
satisfaction for sin. No man can ever
be saved until he has suffered the just penalty of the law due unto his sins,
so that his crimes and offences against the law of God no longer exist in the
eyes of the law. God is as good as his word. And he said, “The soul that sinneth, it shall die.” The
Lord forbade Adam to eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, saying,
“for in the day thou eatest
thereof thou shalt surely die.” No sooner did
Adam eat of that tree than he and all his race died. When our father Adam (our divinely
appointed federal head and representative) died, we all died spiritually. We
began to die physically. And we came under the curse of death eternally.
Eternal death in hell is the sentence of man’s sin against God, because mortal
man can never make an infinite satisfaction for sin.
Not only does God require an infinite
satisfaction for sin; he also requires of man perfect righteousness. No
man will ever enter into heaven, in the eternal bliss of fellowship with God,
no man will ever be accepted in God’s presence, no man will ever be brought
into union with the eternal God, until he is perfectly holy and righteous, even
as God himself. The Holy Lord God says, “Be
ye holy, for I am holy.” He says, "Be
ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect"
(Matt. 5:48).
God
requires total, absolute perfection. He will accept no one who is not perfect
in holiness. Unless we render unto him a perfection of heart, perfection of thought, and
perfection of life, with never so much as one deviation from absolute holiness,
none of us shall ever see his face. If God ever accepted, delighted in, and was
satisfied with anything less than absolute perfection, he would cease to be
God.
Is man therefore without hope? God requires an infinite satisfaction
for sin. We cannot give it. God demands absolute perfection. We cannot perform
it. Are we all hopelessly doomed? Must we all perish? Is there no hope for
fallen man? Blessed be God, there is hope for sinners! He says, “I have laid help upon one that is mighty.” The
Lord God has appointed One in whom “mercy
and truth are met together; righteousness and peace have kissed each other.”
This is the good news of the
gospel. God has set forth his own Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, as our Substitute
and Representative. As our Substitute, Christ has done for us what we could not
do for ourselves, putting away our sins, bringing in an everlasting
righteousness, and accomplishing our justification. The Lord Jesus Christ has
taken upon himself our nature. He is the God-man. The Son of God rendered unto
God the perfection and righteousness, which God required of men. Our Lord Jesus
Christ made an infinite satisfaction for sin, by pouring out his life’s blood
unto death at Calvary. All that he did, he did as the Representative and
Substitute of God’s elect; and all that he has done for us, we have done in
him. Every true believer has both
rendered perfect righteousness to God and made an infinite satisfaction for his
sin in the Person of our all glorious Christ. Just as we sinned and died in the
first substitute man (Adam – Romans 5:12), so we have obeyed God and become
righteous by the second and last substitute Man (the Lord Jesus Christ – Romans
5:18-19).
As the result of Christ’s
finished work as our Representative and Substitute, it is a perfectly just
thing for God to justify all who believe on him. In saving our souls and
bringing us to heaven, the Lord God deals with us in exact accordance with
justice. He gives us that which, in Christ, we deserve. The fact is, justice
cannot allow one of those to perish for whom Christ lived and died and rose
again.
In this study, we will see that the Scriptures declare that God’s elect
are justified in four ways. If
we are justified, we are justified by the decree of God the Father in eternity,
by the death of God the Son at Calvary, by the declaration of God the Holy
Spirit in conversion, and by the display of good works before men.
First,
our Justification was accomplished by the decree of God the Father in eternity.
In the mind and
purpose of God all his elect were justified from eternity. Our justification
was actually accomplished by God’s sovereign purpose of grace in eternal
predestination before the worlds were made. This is not a matter of speculation
or hair-splitting theological precision, but a matter of unmistakable
revelation. Read it for yourself in the Book of God, "Moreover
whom he did predestinate, them he also called: and whom he called, them he also
justified: and whom he justified, them he also glorified.” (Rom. 8:30).
Our justification did not commence in time, but in eternity. Paul, speaking of God’s eternal decree of predestination, here declares that all of God’s elect were justified in his eternal purpose of grace. As John Gill put it, “God’s will to elect is the election of his people; so also his will to justify them, is the justification of them.” God’s act of justification is entirely an act of his grace. It is God accounting and constituting us righteous, through the righteousness of his Son. From all eternity, God has looked upon his Son as the Substitute of his elect, and looking upon us in Christ, we are, and always have been, righteous in his sight.
In the mind and purpose of God, Christ is the
Lamb slain from the foundation of the world (Rev. 13:8). Isaiah 53 is
commonly read as a prophecy of our Savior’s death at Calvary; and it certainly
is that. Yet, the passage speaks of that which was already done long before our
Savior’s incarnation. God the Father set up his Son as our Surety, our
Substitute, and our Redeemer, before the world began, as “the Lamb slain
from the foundation of the world,” as that One in whom he delighted, and
whose “delights were with the sons of men” from eternity (Pro. 8:30-31).
As such, in his own mind, God the Father looked upon Christ his Son as having
been slain for us from eternity. As Abraham sacrificed Isaac in the purpose and
determination of his heart Gen. 22:12), so our heavenly Father sacrificed his
beloved Son and received his sacrifice for his people before the world began,
making us “accepted in the Beloved” (Eph. 1:6). Because God our Father
looked upon Christ as one already sacrificed for us before the world was, all
the blessings of grace were given to us in him (Eph. 1:3-7; 2 Tim. 1:9). Being
accepted of God in Christ from eternity, we were granted grace, redemption,
forgiveness, justification, and sanctification in Christ before the worlds were
made.
Thomas Goodwin wrote - “We may say of
all spiritual blessings in Christ what is said of Christ himself, that ‘his
goings forth are from everlasting.’ In Christ we are blessed with all spiritual
blessings (Eph. 1:3). As we are blessed with all others, so with this also,
that we were justified then in Christ.”
Two facts compel us to look upon
justification as an eternal act of God.
1. Had it not been for the fact
that God looked upon his elect as being righteous and justified in Christ from
eternity, he would have destroyed our race as soon as Adam sinned. God spared
Adam and all the human race the full execution of the wrath threatened upon
him, because there was in Adam’s seed and elect race who must be saved. As God
spared Sodom until Lot was delivered from the city, so God spares this world
for the sake of his elect who must be saved (2 Pet. 3:9).
2. The Old Testament saints
were justified by Christ, just as we are today, in exactly the same way and for
the same reason. Their justification was just as full, complete, and perfect as
ours (Heb. 9:15, 22; Rom. 3:25). All true believers were eternally justified in
the purpose of God.
Second,
we are justified by the death of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, at
Calvary (Rom. 3:24-26). Though he is the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world, our Savior
was also slain in time for the redemption of our souls. And though God’s elect
were justified by his sovereign decree in eternal predestination, we were also
justified by the precious shed blood of God’s dear Son at Calvary.
The Bible does not teach that justification was merely provided, or made possible by the death of Christ. The Bible declares that justification was accomplished at Calvary. If it was merely provided or made possible for us, but is not accomplished until we believe, then our faith would be as much the cause of justification as the purpose of God and the sacrifice of Christ. But that is not the case. The Holy Spirit tells us plainly that when Christ died, those for whom he died were justified (Rom. 3:24-26; 4:25).
C.H. Spurgeon understood this. He said, “I must hold that, in the
moment when Jesus Christ paid my debts, my debts were canceled; in the hour
when he worked out for me a perfect righteousness it was imputed to me; and
therefore, I may, as a believer, say I was complete in Christ before I was
born, accepted in Jesus, even as Levi was blessed in the loins of Abraham.”
When the Scriptures declare
that we are justified by the faith of Christ, or by faith in Christ, the
meaning is not that our faith justifies us, but rather that Christ, the Object
of our faith, justifies us. We are not justified by our act of faith in him,
but by his faithful obedience to God for us as our Representative. Faith
receives the blessedness of peace with God as the result of justification. It
is written, Christ “was delivered for (because of) our offenses, and
was raised again for (because of) our justification. Therefore being
justified, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom.
4:25-5:1).
In his life of obedience to the law and will of God, the Lord Jesus
Christ worked out a perfect righteousness for us. In him all God’s elect
have perfectly and fully obeyed God’s holy law (Dan. 9:24; Jer.
23:6; 33:16; 1 Cor. 1:30). In his death at Calvary, all for whom he died died, fully satisfying the
demands of God’s law and justice against us for sin (Gal. 3:13; 2:20;
Rom. 6:6-7; 8:1).
Since our Redeemer is both God and man in one Glorious Person, all that
he has done is of infinite value for all who trust him. He
has effectually accomplished the eternal justification of his people. He has
obtained eternal redemption for us (Heb. 9:12). He has put away the sins of his
people (Col. 2:13-15; Heb. 9:26). He has perfected forever those who were set
apart as the objects of his grace (Heb. 10:14).
Near, so very near to God,
Nearer I cannot be,
For in the Person of his
Son, I’m as near as He.
In thy Surety thou art free,
His dear hands were pierced for thee:
With His spotless garments
on, Holy as the Holy One.
This is complete, perfect justification. The law can require no more of
us than perfect righteousness and infinite satisfaction (Eph. 2:4-6).
Complete atonement Thou hast
made, And to the utmost farthing paid,
Whate’er Thy people owed. Nor can
God’s wrath on me take place,
If sheltered in Thy righteousness,
And sprinkled with Thy blood.
If Thou hast my discharge
procured, And freely in my room endured,
The whole of wrath divine:
Payment God cannot twice demand,
First at my bleeding
Surety’s hand, And then again at mine.
We were eternally justified by the decree of God the Father before the world began. And we were justified by the death of God the Son at Calvary. By virtue of, and upon the merits of, the life and death of Christ as our Substitute, God is both just and the Justifier of all who believe on his Son. Now, in perfect consistency with his justice, God forgives all the sins of all his people. “He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins.” In Christ, God both punishes and saves the believing sinner.
Third,
every true believer is justified by the declaration of God the Holy Spirit in
conversion (Rom. 4:25-5:1). When God
the Holy Spirit regenerates the sinner, giving him life and faith in Christ, as
that sinner looks to Christ alone as his Savior and Redeemer, the blessed
Spirit sprinkles the blood of Christ upon the conscience and speaks like a
bailiff reading the verdict in court -- “JUSTIFIED!”
Thus every believing sinner receives justification by faith in Christ.
Christ has justified us by
his great sin-atoning sacrifice; and all who believe on him as Lord and Savior
receive the many benefits of his finished work. One of those many benefits
which we receive by faith in him is justification.
Faith does not cause God to justify us. The obedience of Christ has done that. But faith, resting upon Christ alone as Savior, obtains peace with God, even the peace of perfect, complete justification. Faith does not merit justification with God; but faith receives justification. Faith is not the basis upon which men are justified; but faith is the instrument by which justification is received.
Faith is essential; but it
is not meritorious. Faith receives Christ; but it does not merit Christ. Faith
receives the forgiveness of sin; but it does not merit forgiveness. Faith
receives grace; but it does not merit grace. Faith receives justification; but
it does not merit justification.
We were justified in the
court of heaven by the decree of God the Father and by the death of God the
Son. Then, in the experience of grace, we are justified in the court of
conscience by the declaration of God the Holy Spirit.
Fourth,
all who know Christ, in the experience of grace, are justified by the display
of good works before men (James 2:14-26). Yes, there is a sense in which we are justified by
works, not before God, but before men. We justify our profession of faith in
Christ by our works. Believers do not show their faith by creeds, confessions,
and catechisms, but by their conduct. This is what the Holy Spirit teaches us
in James 2:14-26.
James and Paul are not
opposed to each other. In Romans Paul shows us the accomplishment of
justification. James shows us the evidence of justification. If a person is a
true believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, he will justify his faith and prove its
reality by works of righteous obedience to God, even as Abraham did. Any faith
that does not produce obedience to God is a false faith, a demonic delusion. It
is not the faith of God’s elect. Free grace is not opposed to good works. Free
grace promotes good works (Tit. 3:4-8, 14).
What are those works that justify our
professed faith before men? What are those works that prove the reality of our
profession? The Holy Spirit describes them in the Book of James in a fourfold
manner.
1.
Good works are works of patient submission to
the will of God (James 1:2-3).
2.
Good works are works of genuine love toward
the people of God (James 2:15-16). If we love each other, we bear one another’s
burdens, weep with those who weep and rejoice with those who rejoice. We
provide for, care for, protect, and forgive those who are the objects of our
love.
3.
Good works are works of faithful obedience to
the Word of God (James 2:21-23). Believers bow to the will of God in providence
and obey the revealed will of God in Scripture.
4.
Good works are works of self-denial and
sacrifice for the glory of God (James 2:23-25).
Every believer is eternally justified in the purpose of God by the decree
of God the Father. All of God’s elect were fully justified in time at Calvary by
the death of God the Son. Every believer receives complete justification by
faith in Christ, in the experience of grace, by the declaration of God the Holy
Spirit in conversion. Every true believer is justified before men by the
display of good works. Our justification is an eternal act of God, accomplished
at Calvary, received by faith, and proved by works.