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Archive for the ‘Justification’ Category

Made a Righteous Child of God

Posted in Adoption, Assurance, Baptist Catechism, Doctrine, Faith, Forgiveness, General, Grace, Justification, Salvation, tagged , , , , , on December 11, 2025| Leave a Comment »

”Be a good little boy (or girl),” we are apt to say. The problem is, even the best of children cannot be truly good. The purpose of the Law is to both to teach us what we should be and that we cannot be that. Many do not want to be good, but those effectually called (“Effectual Calling”) will persist in a desire to be good owing to the enabling indwelling of the Holy Spirit. This pushes them to Christ (Galatians 3:24) who is able to make them right. Justify is “1To demonstrate or prove to be just, right, or valid. 2To free (a human) of the guilt and penalty attached to grievous sin.” (1) Since no man or woman can prove him/herself just or right before God, the justification must come from without. “Who will bring a charge against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies.” (Romans 8:33) What we cannot do, God graciously does.

But how does He justify undeniable sinners? Does He merely overlook the sin and the guilt of the sinner? No, the price was paid in Christ’s death, and a glorious transfer is made. “He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (2 Corinthians 5:21) Without this transfer from Christ to us, God would in fact be unjust. With the transfer, His righteousness is demonstrated “so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.” (Romans 3:26) Trust Jesus Christ who alone can remove the source of your guilt, which is sin, and justify you in the eyes of God.

Justification is so great and gracious, but the goodness of God shines even brighter. What if I pulled someone out of a muddy ditch, cleaned them up, clothed him in clean garments, and then said, “I’ve cleaned you up. Now be on your way and have a good life.” I might even provide him with some food, a little starter money, and a place to live. But where is his sense of belonging, source of counsel, provision of friendship and mentorship? As a part of justifying the sinner, God adopts him into His spiritual family where He is his Eternal Father and other believers are his eternal and temporal, spiritual brothers and sisters. Emotional and spiritual belonging and provision are secured. He is not a cleaned-up orphan but a provisioned, protected, and purpose driven son of his Heavenly Father.

Oh, I give glory to God for justifying this sinner and adopting him into His family. I am blessed beyond understanding even as I seek to understand and pursue the God-given purpose in it all.

Question 37: What is justification?

Answer: Justification is an act of God’s free grace, by which he pardons all our sins, and accepts us as righteous in his sight, only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us, and received by faith alone.

Romans 3:24, 5:19; Ephesians 1:7; 2 Corinthians 5:21; Philippians 3:9; Galatians 2:16

Question 38: What is adoption?

Answer: Adoption is an act of God’s free grace, by which we are received into the company of God’s children and have a right to all the privileges of his sons.

1 John 3:1; John 1:12; Romans 8:16-17

  1. “The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition

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Real Life

Posted in Assurance, Faith, Freedom, God Thoughts, Justification, Piety, Resurrection, tagged , , , on April 9, 2023| Leave a Comment »

Christ is risen, He is risen indeed. May you have a blessed Resurrection Day and recall the benefits of Christ’s resurrection more in the coming year.

When we think of real life, it is usually to opine about the difficulties and discouragements of the daily mundane, stressful accidents, and unpleasant interactions of our lives so different from out desired and naive perceptions at an earlier time. We must live with and grow through these experiences, but that is not the type of real life to which I refer.

In the sermon this morning, the elder preached from Romans 4:23-25, of which verse 25 says, “He who was delivered over because of our transgressions, and was raised because of our justification.” He pointed out from this and other Scriptures that the resurrection is a necessary part of the Gospel, the good news about salvation. “If Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is vain, your faith also is vain.” (I Corinthians 15:14) Our justification was completed in Christ’s resurrection. I am not going to repreach his sermon, but if you are interested, it will be posted at https://www.christbiblechurchkingsport.com/media/ .

Rather, in the light of this sermon, the pastor closed the service urging us to go and live, quoting Romans 6:11: “Even so consider yourselves to be dead to sin, but alive to God in Christ Jesus.”

The wheels of my mind and my spirit began to whirl with thoughts concerning what this means. We as Christians define many words biblically which is different than the world. For example, The world ever increasingly defines freedom as license to do what the individual wants to do. Some will realize the folly of this unbridled license and add ‘if it doesn’t hurt anyone’. Christian freedom is wholly different. Biblical freedom is the enabling of God in the believer to do what is right, which will be both glorifying to God and right for others as well as beneficial to the believer.

In a similar fashion, life is usually considered to be the ability to exist, survive, or even thrive in a way agreeable to the individual. But life in the biblical sense is a progression toward more of God and less of me (John 3:30). There are only two perspectives in the world: Unbelief and belief in the truth. Those who reject the Triune God and the salvation He provides are in daily existence trending ever more deeply into death (Romans 6:23a). Believers trend daily toward life as they believe and act on biblical truth. When the pastor said go and live, I understood him to mean that we should believe in the resurrection as our justification and live victoriously in it. That will mean both rejecting what is not right, piety, and striving for what is good and glorifying to God. “Let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.” (Hebrews 12:1)… circumspectly, victoriously, publicly. He is risen! Live for Him and by Him.

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Righteousness Promoted

Posted in Doctrine, General, Glorification, Glory, Gospel, Justification, Salvation, Sanctification, Work of Jesus, tagged , , , , , , , , on January 20, 2020| Leave a Comment »

Preachers love “p’s”, because there are such a variety of meaningful words, and particularly theological words, that begin with p’s for those three point sermons. One of those very memorable “triple p’s” concerns the progress of salvation in a person’s life that is summarized in Romans 8:28-30. Salvation has sequential nature to it.* My experience of salvation is past, present, and future. At the moment of my believing in Jesus, God justified me. Now He is sanctifying me. In the future He will glorify me. In the Romans passage, Paul speaks of all three of these in the past tense. I think there are two possible reasons for the past tense. For one thing, these events are so certain that they are completed even though not presently carried out. Secondly, it seems like to me, that since God is eternal and timeless, He sees the whole progress of the salvation He is bringing about in us as one event. He has accomplished it, it is complete, and it stands fast. Frequently this sequence of salvation is taught as God saving us from the penalty of sin in the past, the power of sin in the present, and the presence of sin in the future.

As I was reading in the Scripture yesterday, this triplet of penalty, power, and presence came afresh to my mind. Then I paused for a moment and reflected on the fact that this view of the work of God centers on His process to remove sin from us and us from sin. That is a good emphasis and right. But with what was it replaced, I mused? The answer is not hard; it is righteousness. And how might we think of His imputation of righteousness to us in terms of the progress of salvation?

In the past, we were saved for (by) the provision of righteousness. “ He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” (2 Corinthians 5:21) This verse most clearly communicates the great transaction, the glorious transfer. Jesus provided me with His righteousness, therefore, I am justified in His sight.

In the present, we are saved for (by) practice of righteousness. “…work out your salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.” (Philippians 2:12-13) As God is at work, he calls us to work along side Him in the power that He provides. He gets all the glory and we get the benefit of being changed and participating. As one of my pastor’s favorite** verses says, “…seeing that His divine power has granted to us everything pertaining to life and godliness, through the true knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and excellence.” (2 Peter 1:3) Perseverance of the saints is not merely hanging on by fingertips, but the ability to fully succeed as a believer.*** God and we are active in our sanctification.

In the future, we are saved for (by) perfection of righteousness. “Beloved, now we are children of God, and it has not appeared as yet what we will be. We know that when He appears, we will be like Him, because we will see Him just as He is.” (1 John 3:2) If you want to understand better what glory and glorification will be like, dwell on Jesus. (John 1:16-18) This realization is a great motivation to live a more godly life, as the next verse in 1 John 3 confirms: “And everyone who has this hope fixed on Him purifies himself, just as He is pure.” (v.3) God will one day glorify us so that we may see Him (Matthew 5:8).

In summary, and more concisely,

     I am saved from the

            penalty of sin (past),

            power of sin (present),

            presence of sin (future),

                         and

     I am saved for (by)

            provision of righteousness (past),

            practice of righteousness (present),

            perfection of righteousness (future).

*I do not say a “time element” because God’s predestination before time and our life in Him for eternity are timeless. However, there is both an order (sequence) and a time element to the moment of salvation, the process of sanctification, and the inception of glorification.

**And it is quickly becoming one of mine, given the great encouragement it gives that God cares and has already cared enough to provide all that we need to please Him and succeed.

***Those few who would shame Him by consistently only surviving are disciplined. (1 Corinthians 11:27-32)

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