“To the one who does not work but trusts him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness” (Romans 4:5).
In his book Disappointment with God Phillip Yancey says, “What we think about God and believe about God matters-really matters-as much as anything in life matters.” I would add, what we think about Justification by Faith matters- really matters-as much as anything in life matters.
Some days I forget to live on the rock-solid truth of what happened for us when Jesus Christ died on the cross and rose again from the dead. It grieves me that in this life we will always be sinful and imperfect. Therefore, in ourselves we will always be guilty. Some days I feel so guilty that even when I have confessed my sins I find myself in the darkness of discouragement and depression. I ask myself: Does God still love me? Am I going to heaven? Am I a Christian? Am I saved?
This why I must constantly remind myself of the reality of justification by faith. It is one of the most foundational and the most important things we do in what Paul describes as "the good fight of faith" (1 Timothy 6:12).
The biblical truth of justification says that my rescue from sin and God’s wrath is a legal rescue completely outside of myself. I am legally absolved of guilt and credited with a righteousness that I don’t have. That is, I am declared righteous in the courtroom of heaven, where God sits as judge, and where I, without justification, would stand condemned by his law. That’s what the word “justify” means: not make just, but declare just.
We are sinners and do not have a righteousness of our own. That’s why we are guilty and destined for eternal punishment. This is the deepest root of all our misery, shame, and sorrow. God’s gift of justification on the basis of Christ’s blood and righteousness severs this root of misery.
To make a way for us to be saved, God sent Christ to live a perfect divine-human life, and die an obedient death. In this way Christ became both the substitute punishment for our sins (Matthew 26:28; 1 Corinthians 15:3; 1 Peter 3:18) and the substitute performer of our righteousness (Romans 5:19; 10:4; 2 Corinthians 5:21; Philippians 3:9). Therefore, in the courtroom of God, my guilt for sin is removed by Christ’s blood (“In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses” (Ephesians 1:7); and my title to heaven is provided by Christ’s obedience (“By the one man’s obedience the many will be made righteous” (Romans 5:19). I am declared just—freed from the punishment of sin and now possessing a title to heaven. This is what the Bible means by justification.
We must remember that justification is by faith alone apart from works of the law. Paul said, “We hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law. . . . To the one who does not work but trusts him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness” (Romans 3:28; 4:4-5). The best news in all the world to the “ungodly,” who grieve under the cloud of darkness, shame, condemnation, unforgiveness, and guilt, is the news that God, by faith alone, counts them as righteous because of Christ. This is the rock where we stand when the dark clouds gather and the storms of darkness, guilt, shame, and condemnation come. Justification is by grace alone (not mixed with our merit), through faith alone (not mixed with our works) on the basis of Christ alone (not mingling his righteousness with ours), to the glory of God alone (not ours).
The legal issue before God is settled. In the courtroom of heaven, we ungodly sinners are declared righteous by faith alone. Christ’s righteousness is imputed to us. We do not have a righteousness of our own when God accepts us; we never do. Our faith was not our righteousness. It was our desperate receiving of Christ and all that he is for us. We had not yet become righteous. Instead, with empty hands we received Christ whose faithful life of love perfectly fulfilled the law of God. By faith alone we were united to Christ. And all that he is was imputed to us, the ungodly. This is justification. This lays the axe to the root of our turning justification by faith into justification by performance. God accepts us on the basis of Christ’s righteousness, not ours period!
This means that right now at this moment God is 100% for you! John Piper puts it this way:
What the Bible teaches is that God becomes 100% irrevocably for us at the moment of justification, that is, the moment when we see Christ as a beautiful Savior and receive him as our substitute punishment and our substitute perfection. All of God’s wrath, all of the condemnation we deserve, was poured out on Jesus. All of God’s demands for perfect righteousness were fulfilled by Christ. The moment we see (by grace!) this Treasure and receive him in this way his death counts as our death and his condemnation as our condemnation and his righteousness as our righteousness, and God becomes 100% irrevocably for us forever in that instant.
Do you hear this? God 100 % irrevocably for you?! O what a difference it makes to be assured, in the discouraging darkness of our own imperfection, that we have a perfect righteousness outside ourselves, namely Christ’s. For you and me there is a perfect, objective, external righteousness imputed to us that is not our own but Christ’s.
I love what the great John Bunyan said about the moment he came to experience and understand this precious truth:
One day as I was passing into the field . . . this sentence fell upon my soul. Thy righteousness is in heaven. And . . . I saw with the eyes of my soul Jesus Christ at God’s right hand; there, I say, was my righteousness; so that wherever I was, or whatever I was doing, God could not say of me, he [lacks] my righteousness, for that was just before him. I also saw, moreover, that it was not my good frame of heart that made my righteousness better, nor yet my bad frame that made my righteousness worse, for my righteousness was Jesus Christ himself, “The same yesterday, today, and forever” (Heb. 13:8). Now did my chains fall off my legs indeed. I was loosed from my afflictions and irons; my temptations also fled away; so that from that time those dreadful scriptures of God [about the unforgivable sin] left off to trouble me; now went I also home rejoicing for the grace and love of God.”
Oh would you join Bunyan rejoicing that you see that your righteousness is outside yourself? It is in Jesus Christ! I pray that this will be your and my experience too. How? Here is where I start? I start with my despair. I mourn and grieve inside. I despair because I cannot find any answer in myself. I can find no hope, no assurance, no confidence within me and my feelings, thoughts, and self. I cease from all efforts to look inside myself for the rescue, forgiveness, assurance, and deliverance that I need. I do not allow my feelings of guilt, shame, God's disapproval, condemnation, to rule me and determine reality; I can only in desperation cast myself on Christ. I say to him, “You are my only hope. I have no righteousness in myself. I am overwhelmed with sin and guilt. I am under the wrath of God. My own conscience condemns me, and makes me miserable. I am perishing. Darkness is all about me. Jesus Christ, Son of David, Have mercy upon me a sinner. I trust you.”
Jesus has promised not to turn you away. “Whoever comes to me I will never cast out” (John 6:37). By this act of faith God will unite you to Jesus. You will be “in him,” and in Him you will be now and forever loved, forgiven, and righteous in God's eye. He is for 100% for you (Romans 8:31). God will hold onto you (Jude 24). He will finish what He started in you (Phillippians 1:9). You will make it. That is his promise: “Those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified” (Romans 8:30). The glory is coming, you will be with Jesus in perfect sinless bodies forever and ever.
Resting in the finished work of Christ for me,
Pastor Bill
4 comments:
Mr Bill, I am saved by the blood of Christ. I am a new creation in Christ. I have been many things in my past but those truths remain. Sir please update your profile. You were a pastor for a church but who are you now? What we were is in the past. It may have an impact on who we are now but who you are is who you are in Christ today.
I feel and believe the same things my friend. I even wrote a blog last year about my identity in Christ. Also, if you read my profile carefully you will observe that it has been updated. I clearly state that I have begun a new ministry in San Clemente titled Desiring God in San Clemente and am also officiating over weddings.
Pastor,
Yes, but scripture also has warnings about sin. As below:
But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction. 2And many will follow their sensuality, and because of them the way of truth will be blasphemed. 3And in their greed they will exploit you with false words. Their condemnation from long ago is not idle, and their destruction is not asleep…..
17 These are waterless springs and mists driven by a storm. For them the gloom of utter darkness has been reserved. 18For,speaking loud boasts of folly, they entice by sensual passions of the flesh those who are barely escaping from those who live in error. 19They promise them freedom, but they themselves are slaves of corruption. For whatever overcomes a person, to that he is enslaved. 20For if, after they have escaped the defilements of the world through the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, they are again entangled in them and overcome, the last state has become worse for them than the first. 21For it would have been better for them never to have known the way of righteousness than after knowing it to turn back from the holy commandment delivered to them. 22What the true proverb says has happened to them: "The dog returns to its own vomit, and the sow, after washing herself, returns to wallow in the mire."
Of course they do. Those warnings are meant to cause the sinner to flee into the arms of Jesus where they will always find forgiveness, healing, restoration, and reconcilliation. That is the always the purpose of the warning passages . God warns us in his wrath and woos us in His mercy. His kindness leads to repentence which is turning back to Him.
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