Question 33

We owe the full and clear exhibition of the great Christian doctrine of justification, as we here possess it, to the labours of the Reformation divines. The Greek Fathers, after centuries of study and discussion, bequeathed to the Church universal the noble inheritance of the doctrines of God, of the Trinity, and of the Person of Christ, as all the orthodox Churches now possess them. The Greek Church, the Latin Church, and the Reformed Church all substantially accept the same answer to the questions, What is God? How many Persons are there in the Godhead? and How did the Son of God become man? And happily, the agreement that extends thus far extends still farther. For as there is no confessional disharmony among the Churches on the Person of Christ, neither is there any schism among them on the great evangelical doctrine of His atoning and redeeming work. But when we come to treat of the work of the Holy Ghost in “applying the redemption purchased by Christ,” errors the most serious, if not fatal, are taught by the Church of Rome. And as the development and vindication of the theological doctrine of God and Christ made the fourth and fifth centuries for ever famous, so the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries stand out above all that went before them in their full and clear exhibition and promulgation of the doctrines of grace. And among the cloud of witnesses God has from time to time raised up to preach His truth, Luther, and Calvin, and Knox, and Owen, and Bunyan stand in the front rank beside Athanasius, and Cyril, and Augustine. All those men, each in his own age and church, proved themselves the true successors of the apostles in the drawing out and defence of scriptural and saving truth.

Justification—In entering on this great subject, it must be clearly seen and understood that the whole idea and conception of justification rests and operates on the ground of the divine law. And the divine law is an eternal ground, eternal and unchangeable as God Himself. And all law to be law must have its inseparable sanctions; that is to say, it must be adequately supported and unflinchingly enforced. Now both nature in conscience, and revelation in Scripture, testify that we are in all things and at all times under law to God, under a law moreover that has sanctions of reward and punishment corresponding to the greatness of our trespass or the merit of our obedience. The apostolic and Protestant sense of this word is not the same as its strict etymological sense. According to its root, the word literally means to make just or righteous. But in its secondary and scriptural sense it means to count and pronounce just or righteous. In gospel justification, God treats a sinner as if he were a just man. How God can be both a just God and a Saviour, we are on the way to see. But let the student always remember that justification is the antithesis of condemnation, and he will never go wrong on this essential truth of the gospel. This contrast and the true sense of the terms are to be seen in such passages of Scripture as Rom. viii. 1, 33, 34. Condemnation is the act of a judge, so is justification. If this simple and clear distinction is kept before the mind, there will be little danger of error or mistake in what follows on justification, and sanctification, and saving faith.

an act—As distinguished from a work. Even a child, if he is intelligently taught, should never mistake and say that justification is a work. A judge’s sentence is an act; it is uttered and executed at once. A teacher’s work and a physician’s extend from day to day, and year to year. Now God’s act in justification is the sentence of a judge, while the Spirit’s work in sanctification is that of a heavenly Teacher and Healer sent from God. Q. Why do you call justification an act and not a work?—A. Because it is a thing done all at once, as the sentence or declaration of a judge; and not a work of time, carried on by degrees, as effectual calling and sanctification are (Willison’s Catechism).

of God’s free grace—“If it be asked, How it is an act of free grace by which we are justified, since it is through the redemption that is in Christ? The answer is this: The redemption that is in Christ is the channel through which justifying grace freely flows to us. It was free grace that provided a Saviour, free grace that led the soul to, and gave it an interest in, the Saviour . . . To the Saviour Himself, it is indeed an act of strict justice, that His people should be justified, since He has paid the full price of it. But to His people who receive the benefits of redemption, it is grace from the foundation to the copestone” (Green). (See Larger Catechism, Answer 71.)

pardoneth all our sins—Forgiveth, remitteth a penalty; per-donare—thoroughly to forgive. So far true and scriptural. But gospel justification is more and better than mere pardon. Pardon is an act of grace where no reparation or satisfaction has been made. But in the gospel, forgiveness of sin is offered and bestowed on the ground of a reparation and satisfaction having been made to the broken law. If a criminal expiates his crimes, and exhausts his sentence, it is not a pardon he receives when his chains are struck off and his prison door is thrown open. He can claim his freedom as an act of justice. And the Scripture asserts that it is but an act of “faithfulness” and “justice” to the penitent believer when God bestows forgiveness upon him. True; in gospel justification, the sinner has not in himself made satisfaction or endured the penalty, but then the whole gospel goes on this, that Another has done all this for him; his Surety has met the bond and accusation, and on the ground of that offered and accepted satisfaction the sinner is righteously absolved and set free. Pardon is an act, but it is a continued, a constantly-repeated act. We “daily break the commandments of God in thought, word, and deed.” And to meet this, our Lord hath taught us to pray for the daily forgiveness of sin. “Nor do I dislike the remark of Chrysostom, that the verb in the present tense, who taketh away, denotes a continued act; for the satisfaction that Christ once made is always in full vigour” (Calvin on John i. 29).

and accepteth us—Acceptance is a Scripture word—“He hath made us accepted in the Beloved” (Eph. i. 6). And the fact that this definition of justification embraces this element, goes to prove our contention above, that justification is more and better than mere pardon. A sovereign may pardon a criminal, but the pardoned man may be abhorred and eschewed by him to whose clemency or statesmanship he owes his pardon. To see how different it is with a justified man, read the context of the above scripture.

as righteous—We are not in ourselves righteous, for, ex hypothesi, we are condemned sinners; but the way of salvation through Christ meets all our case, and the justification which is here under discussion has this as its essential feature, that it “justifies the ungodly.” In effectual calling and sanctification, God makes us righteous; in justification He accepteth us as righteous. By infusing or implanting righteousness, He renews and sanctifies us; by imputing righteousness, He justifies us. He never does the one without in the same subject doing the other; but they are separate operations or acts of His, and those acts and operations are clearly set forth in the Answers immediately before us.

in his sight—“This expression is a continuation of the forensic scenery. God is on His judicial throne. Men are standing at the bar. The justification referred to is the justification that is realizable in a court of justice. . . . The therapeutical production of inherent righteousness is also and amply provided for. Justification is really in order to sanctification. It is a stepping-stone to something beyond itself. And it is no disparagement to the greater blessing, which is realized in the production of inherent righteousness or holiness, that it is ruled under a different rubric than the term justification” (Morison).

only for the righteousness of Christ—The prophetic and apostolic conception of righteousness differs fundamentally from all those conceptions of this noble idea that have ever been entertained in the world of religion and morals outside the sphere of divine revelation. Righteousness, as the writers of Holy Scripture set it before us, is first a divine attribute, manifested as the supreme order and law of heaven; and then after and under that it is a condition of created character, a state of rectitude and uprightness the alone source and supreme standard of which is God Himself. “I will fetch knowledge from afar,” says the prophet, “and I will ascribe righteousness to my Maker.” So far all is clear and plain. But what is this “righteousness of Christ” of which such things are said in Scripture and Confession and Catechism? The righteousness of Christ is the result of His life of voluntary, sponsorial, and perfect obedience to the whole law of God under which He with and for us was born; His life of obedience and then His death of atonement for our sins. Jesus, as the Christ, the second Adam, the Surety, the Lamb of God, wrought out a righteousness and acquired a merit, “finished a work,” which according to the covenant of grace is made over to those who by repentance and faith are found in Him. He was “made under” our law; He magnified it, and made it honourable; and we were represented by Him in all He did. From the first breath of humiliation He drew in the manger of Bethlehem to the last sigh of resignation He heaved on the cross of Calvary, in both and in all that came to Him between them, Jesus was acting for God and for us as the Christ. And now because of Christ’s work, God is the justifier of the ungodly, and in Christ and before God the sinner becomes the justified. This, then, is “the righteousness of Christ” of which we read so much in the Epistles of Paul. There is no subject the apostle deals with with such pains and power and joy. There is nothing that gives Him such gladness as to be able to offer to sinners the “gift of righteousness.” And there is nothing that arouses His power of rebuke and expostulation like seeing this divine gift despised and rejected. “Do we ask of Paul what is the great want of man? He will answer it is righteousness. Ask what is gained for man by redemption? Again he answers, righteousness. What is the subject of gospel preaching? Jesus died and rose again, that we might be made righteous. What is the purport of the gospel? To declare to men that henceforth there is a way by which they may attain to righteousness. What is that which redounds most to the glory of God? It is that He has revealed the possibility of His being at once just and a justifier. We do not need to multiply these examples; as the reply to all questions, the substance of all arguments, the basis of all definitions, we shall find righteousness” (Reuss). (See Greatheart’s discourse to the pilgrims on the Righteousness of Christ.)

imputed to us—Imputare, to reckon or credit with, to set down to any one’s account. Imputation is a scriptural word which the Holy Ghost has used, and designs us to use, in describing one of the divine steps in the act of justification. The word literally means to set down to any one’s account, to lay to any one’s charge. At the same time, to impute may mean either of two things. It may either mean to lay to the charge of any one what he himself has actually done, as in Ps. xxxii. 2, 2 Cor. v. 19; or it may mean to lay to one’s charge, and reckon to one’s account, what another has done as representing him, and as standing and acting in his room and stead. This latter is the fixed and invariable sense of the word in all those scriptures and scriptural creeds that treat of Adam and his posterity, and of Christ and His people. To impute in the Adamic and Christian sense, is to account to the children what has been done by their father acting in their name; it is to count and treat with the members as one with their covenant Head. This physical, moral, and spiritual law runs through the whole scheme and constitution of human life on the earth. National life, social life, family life, are all full of illustrations of this federal principle, and the scriptural and catechetical doctrines of the oneness of Adam and his children and of Christ and His people are but divine revelations of the universality and depth of the federal and solidary law of human life. There are but two men, says Thomas Goodwin, who are seen standing before God, Adam and Jesus Christ; and these two men have all other men hanging at their girdles. (See this same subject treated under Question 16.)

As was to be expected, this word is frequently found in Paul, he being the apostle who was appointed and enabled to set forth most clearly and fully the divine way of justification. (See Reuss above.) Indeed, so fundamental and ever present is this idea with the apostle, that an exegetical author writing on this subject is able with perfect truth to say, “I know of no passage in the New Testament in which the doctrine of imputation is more distinctly and unequivocally expressed than in a text where the word imputation is not used. It is this: ‘For He hath made Him to be sin for us who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.’” “Justificatio must be taken as the old Protestant dogmatists rightly took it, sensu forensi, i.e. imputatively. . . . All interpretations that overlook the fact of imputation, such as the Roman Catholic, are erroneous” (De Wette in Alford, Rom. i. 17).

“The more strictly we attach the character of a legal and judicial procedure to the act of God in justification, so much the better. . . . We can scarcely err in the direction of viewing justification too forensically,—casting it too strongly into the mould of what passes, or may be supposed to pass, in a court of law. . . . Then, indeed, grace shines forth in it conspicuously,—grace providing the substitute; grace making us one with the substitute; grace receiving us and dealing with us as one with the substitute. Thus to conserve its gracious character, it is indispensably necessary to hold fast and firm the forensic character of justification” (Candlish, Fatherhood).

received by faith alone. “To the objection that the exclusive term alone is not found in Scripture, it is replied, that though the word be not found syllabically used with this purpose, yet there are exceptive expressions equivalent unto it” (Owen).

“At some point or other it was necessary to draw a line between the Catholic and Reformed doctrines of justification. Was it to include works as well as faith? but, if not, was love to be a coefficient in the work of justification? They felt this difficulty, and tried to preserve the doctrine from the alloy of self-righteousness and external acts by the formula of faith only” (Jowett).

“Luther and his apologists were taunted as being solifidians (faith-alone-ians) and fide solarians. They accepted the taunt, so far as the matter of justification is concerned, and gloried in it. But they ever contended that faith must not, and does not, remain solitary in the soul. Their maxim was, that ‘faith never exists without works, although it justifies without works.’ ‘No works,’ says a Latin writer, ‘have place in the justification of man before God. Men are justified by faith alone, without works, moral, ceremonial, or judicial, of any law whatsoever, whether natural, Mosaical, or evangelical.’ It is altogether uncalled for to deny that an unbeliever may be in some, or perhaps in many respects a noble man,—noble in honesty, noble in honour, noble in patriotism, noble in philanthropy. Yet his nobility of character has no justifying element in it. Perfect nobility in all relations, Godward and manward,—perfect and full-orbed righteousness from beginning to ending of his probationary career,—would be requisite, if man were to be justified by works of law.” (See Dr. Morison’s fine Monograph on Romans Third.)

“But you will say, Is not faith an act? It is true, it is, in a grammatical signification, an act; but in the true, real import of it, it is merely passive. Faith doth not give anything to God, as love doth; faith only suffers God to be good to it; it takes in that salvation which grace would bestow upon it. My brethren, the hands of all the other graces are working hands, but the hands of faith are merely receiving hands; now saith the apostle, Not to him that worketh, but believeth” (Goodwin).

Uses

“I cannot but think it best for those who would learn or teach the doctrine of justification in a due manner, to place their consciences in the presence of God, and their persons before His tribunal, and then, upon a due consideration of His greatness, power, majesty, righteousness, holiness, to inquire what the Scriptures and a sense of their own condition direct them unto as their relief and refuge, and what plea it becomes them to make for themselves” (Owen).
“God did, from all eternity, decree to justify all the elect; and Christ did, in the fulness of time, die for their sins, and rise again for their justification; nevertheless they are not justified, until the Holy Spirit doth in due time actually apply Christ unto them” (Confession of Faith).
“We seldom sit down to meat but we eat and leave; so there is in Jesus Christ more merit and righteousness than the whole world has need of” (Interpreter’s aphorism in Pilgrim’s Progress, ii.).
“The condescending goodness of Scripture, which speaks of the righteousness of the pious, ought not to be treated as if it were in opposition to the doctrine of justification by faith” (Bengel).
“At that time, while I was greatly reproached for defending this doctrine in the pulpit, and just upon my suffering a very open abuse for it, God’s work wonderfully broke forth among us, and souls began to flock to Christ, as the Saviour in whose righteousness alone they hoped to be justified. So that this was the doctrine on which this work, in its beginning, was founded, as it evidently was in the whole progress of it” (Jonathan Edwards’ Thoughts on the Revival in New England).

Questions

Derive Justification, and give its true Pauline and Protestant sense. Can you explain Dr. Cunningham’s statement as to the disservice that etymology has in this instance done to divine truth?
The old divines had a saying to the effect that it was conviction of sin that made a man subjectum capax justificationis, a subject for justification. Explain.
In the technical language of theologians, Regeneration is called a physical change, and Justification a forensic change. What is meant by these terms?
Point out some passages of Scripture filled with forensic scenery.
Explain clearly and exactly the various senses of righteousness in Rom. iii. 21, Phil. iii. 6–9.
Godet, a French commentator on the Epistle to the Romans, in opening up iii. 24, says: This notion, being justified, is qualified in three directions; in the mode, in the origin, and in the means. Apply the same analysis and qualification to this Answer.
Show from Scripture, and from the nature of the case, that not only our legal, but our evangelical righteousness also, is excluded from bearing any part in our justification.
Explain the saying, which Goodwin describes as no less solid than elegant: Justification is neither against the law nor according to the law, but above the law and for the sake of the law.
Exhibit and establish the scriptural and experimental consistency between the free grace of God, the satisfaction of Christ, and the necessity of good works in the believer. Reconcile Rom. iii. 28 with Jas. ii. 24.
Commit to memory Hooker’s famous sentence: There is a glorifying righteousness of men in the world to come, and there is a justifying and sanctifying righteousness here. The righteousness, wherewith we shall be clothed in the world to come, is both perfect and inherent; that wherewith we are justified is perfect, but not inherent; that by which we are sanctified, inherent, but not perfect.
Explain the allusions, and take to heart the comfort contained in the following passage from Donne’s Sermons:—There is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus—not if every grain of dust were an Ahithophel, and gave counsel against me: not if every sand upon the seashore were a Rabshakeh, and railed against me; not if every atom in the air were a Satan, an adversary, an accuser; not if every drop in the sea were an Abaddon, an Apollyon, a destroyer—there could be no condemnation if Christ is my witness.
Prove from Scripture that though justification is an act, it may be, and ought to be, a daily and hourly desired and renewed act.