A Four-point Summary of Reformation Justification

Volume Two — Article 5

We present hereunder a four-point contrast of the basic differences between the Roman and Reformation doctrines of justification:

Romanism

1. Justified by God’s work of grace in a man.
2. Justified by faith that has become active by love.
3. Justified by infused righteousness.
4. Justification means making a man righteous in his own person.

Reformation

1. Justified by God’s work of grace in Christ.
2. Justified by faith alone in the sinless life and atoning death of Christ on the cross.
3. Justified by imputed righteousness.
4. Justification means that a man is accounted righteous.

Number 1 — Justified by God’s Work of Grace in Christ alone .

Christian doctrine has two poles:

1. “in Christ” and
2. “Christ in you.”

Or we can express it this way:

1. Christ’s work for us.
2. Christ’s work in us.

In the matter of justification, we must never confuse these two aspects of redemption.

By Number 1 we mean the doing (sinless life) and dying (atoning death) of Christ for us.

By Number 2 we mean the work that the Holy Spirit does in the believer’s heart.

The Reformers maintained the Pauline position that we are justified solely on account of Number 1 – Christ’s work for us.

Number 2 — Justified by Faith Alone.

God’s redemptive act for all men in the Person of Christ has already taken place at the cross. The empty tomb is the seal to Christ’s perfect atonement for all sin. Humanity has already been justified in its great Head (objective justification). This means that in order to receive the blessing of justification (subjective justification), man has only to submit himself to God’s verdict passed upon him in the Person of Christ. “Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.” Rom. 3:28.

“By faith alone” (sola fide) became the slogan and war cry of the Reformation. And the Reformers meant that nothing else was required for justification save that a man believe in what God had done for him. In this context, they saw that faith was not an act which initiates a man’s justification, but a becoming conscious of something already in existence.

The papists were willing to concede that a man could be justified by faith if that faith were clothed with love. But since love is the fulfilling of the law, the Reformers recognized that the papal view was a veiled attempt to support righteousness by the fulfillment of law. Hence Protestantism insisted on sola fide, for they saw that love would be the fruit in man’s experience of sanctification. According to Romans 5:1-5, love is the fruit of justification.

Number 3 — Justified by Imputed Righteousness.

The Reformers merely re-emphasized the clear teaching of Paul, especially as set forth in Romans 4. In this chapter the words translated “accounted,” “reckoned” and “imputed” all come from the same Greek word.

“For what saith the Scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness.” Verse 3.

“But to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. Even as David also describeth the blessedness of the man, unto whom God imputeth righteousness without works. …Cometh this blessedness then upon the circumcision only, or upon the uncircumcision also? for we say that faith was reckoned to Abraham for righteousness.” Verses 5, 6, 9.

“... and [Abraham] being fully persuaded that, what He [God] had promised, He was able also to perform. And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; but for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on Him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead.” Verses 21-24.

The word “impute” means that the righteousness by which we are justified is outside of us. Instead of being poured into us, as the Catholics teach, the sinless perfect life of Christ is credited, or accounted, to the believer in Jesus. The Concise Oxford Dictionary gives both the Protestant and Catholic definitions of justification as follows:

“justify . . . (Theol.) declare (person) free from penalty of sin on ground of Christ’s righteousness or (Rom. Cath.) of the infusion of grace ...”

The Roman Catholic Council of Trent pronounced a curse on anyone who would teach that justification comes “through the imputation of Christ’s righteousness alone.”

There is full assurance and freedom in the truth. Justification by righteousness wholly outside of us means that we do not have to look within our own hearts to see a certain amount of infused righteousness. Rather, we go to Christ just as we are, realizing that in our Substitute there is righteousness enough to give us favor and right standing with God.

Number 4 — Justification Means Being Accounted and Declared Righteous.

The Roman Church contended that “justification” means making a man righteous in his own person. The Catholic reasons, “How can God pronounce a man to be righteous in His sight unless he is actually righteous?” He therefore thinks that a man must be born again and transformed before he can have right standing with God. In this system of thought, a man can have no real assurance of justification, for he can never be sure whether the Holy Spirit has made him righteous enough to be accepted of God.

In contrast, the Reformation theology says with Paul, “But to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.” Rom. 4:5. God justifies sinners, and sinners of all sorts, not on the condition of any preceding righteousness, but on the condition that they believe with their whole heart what God has done for them, namely, that He has already reconciled and accepted them in the Substitute.

The Reformers pointed out that the words “justify” and “justification” are legal and judicial words, closely related to the idea of trial and judgment (Deut. 25:1; 1 Kings 8:32; 1 Cor. 4:3, 4; Matt. 12:37; Rom. 3:4). The words imply a declaration and pronouncement from the divine court of the believer’s right standing with God. “Justification” in itself does not mean a change in the man, but a declaration of how he appears in God’s sight.

Divine “justification” does not mean to actually make a believer righteous as an empirical reality, but it means to account him as righteous. And God does this for the believing sinner before he has been sanctified by the Holy Spirit. Paul illustrates this from the experience of Abraham:

“... (as it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before Him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were.” Rom. 4:17.

God did not pronounce Abraham a father after Isaac was born, but while Sarah was still barren. By faith Abraham accepted that he was a father because it was so in the Word of God rather than by empirical reality. In the same way, we are to believe when the gospel tells us that we have been reckoned righteous in Christ. If we stop to consider what we are, faith staggers as Abraham’s faith would have staggered if he had considered his own dead body and the deadness of Sarah’s womb. Therefore, in justification God “calleth those things which be not as though they were.”

Thus the believer is secure only in the merciful reckoning of God. The Lord accounts him as having more moral worth than the angels who have never sinned. But the believer knows that in himself he is not as he appears before God in His exalted Substitute. Indeed, his nature is still sinful, and the nearer he comes to Christ, the more sinful he sees himself to be. This keeps him humble, utterly dependent upon his Substitute in whom he stands wholly righteous, wholly acceptable in the sight of God.