In a previous article, we asked the question, “How can man be right with God?” How you answer this question is a matter of eternal importance. It is precisely for this reason that one of Satan’s primary aims is to undermine the Bible’s teaching on justification, for it is this doctrine that explains how a person can be right with God and know that he is right with God.
When we speak of “justification,” we are referring to God’s act of declaring a person fully forgiven and righteous in his sight. Rightly understanding this doctrine is essential for individual and corporate spiritual health. The doctrine is, as John Calvin stated centuries ago, “the main hinge on which religion turns.”1 How could he make such a claim? Because we cannot think or feel rightly about God until our guilt is decisively and fully removed. People may have thoughts about God, talk about God, and write about God, but no person can think or feel appropriately about God until they have their judicial guilt removed and they are assured of their right standing with God. Only those who fear the Lord can truly know God (Prov 1:7), and only those who are forgiven of their sins can truly fear the Lord (Ps 130:4). Getting justification right is necessary for understanding other essential aspects of the Christian faith. If we go wrong here, we are likely to go wrong elsewhere.
Understanding Justification in its Historical Context
For some of us, any discussion of justification may lead us to think about the Reformation. This association makes sense because justification was the doctrine that ignited the Reformation in Europe during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. But the truth is that the church has always taught justification by faith alone.2 In turning to the Scriptures as the sole source of infallible theological knowledge, the Reformers were not concocting doctrinal innovations, they were rediscovering truths that had been hidden under centuries of Roman Catholic tradition. Martin Luther’s conversion is a graphic picture of what happens when the light of the gospel breaks into a legalistic, self-righteous, religious heart.3
Martin Luther was a Roman Catholic friar and priest who wrestled mightily with God and with his guilty conscience. Yet, despite his great efforts, he couldn’t find relief in any amount of rituals or acts of piety. When he finally came to a breaking point, he admitted that he didn’t love God—he hated him. Luther had been reading the Bible, but as he read the book of Romans, he understood the phrase “the righteousness of God” to refer to the righteousness by which God judges guilty sinners. Luther believed this meant that God not only required perfect righteousness in the Law; he intensified his demands and required perfect righteousness in the gospel as well.
But light was about to break. As Luther wrestled with God and with his conscience, he also continued to wrestle with Paul’s letter to the Romans. Finally, after meditating day and night, he had a breakthrough. He saw that the righteousness of God that Paul discussed in Romans was the gift of righteousness that God gives freely to those who believe in Jesus.
At last, by the mercy of God, meditating day and night, I gave heed to the context of the words, namely, “In it the righteousness of God is revealed, as it is written, ‘He who through faith is righteous shall live.’” There I began to understand [that] the righteousness of God is that by which the righteous lives by a gift of God, namely by faith. And this is the meaning: the righteousness of God is revealed by the gospel, namely, the passive righteousness with which [the] merciful God justifies us by faith, as it is written, “He who through faith is righteous shall live.” Here I felt that I was altogether born again and had entered paradise itself through open gates….Thus that place in Paul was for me truly the gate to paradise.4
Luther would have a powerful impact in his homeland of Germany and beyond as the truth of the gospel spread throughout Europe through his pen and his preaching. Men and women had for centuries been in bondage to a legalistic Roman Catholic system where final salvation was secured by acquiring grace throughout one’s lifetime. According to this system, God would declare people righteous at the final judgment if they possessed sufficient merit. In such a framework, no one could have the assurance that they were right with God, for no one could be sure that they possessed sufficient grace for final justification. Luther’s rediscovery that we are justified at the moment of faith apart from our works came as a welcome relief among those who had endured this legalistic system for centuries.
This gospel flame would grow into a spiritual conflagration throughout Europe, having already begun elsewhere in England and on the continent, independently of Luther. As we consider the Reformation retrospectively, it is clear that God was graciously pouring his Spirit upon a land that had suffered countless years of spiritual drought.
Is this history relevant to us? Yes, the Roman Catholic Church—an institution that boasts over 1.3 billion baptized members globally—still formally rejects justification by faith alone. While there have been attempts in recent years to reconcile the Evangelical and Roman Catholic positions on the doctrine of justification, such a reconciliation is theologically impossible because the respective positions are mutually exclusive. Evangelical theology teaches that we are justified by faith in Christ alone apart from any of our works. The RCC teaches that such a view is anathema (condemned to hell). While there may be some folks who are genuinely saved in the Catholic Church, it is despite the church’s teaching, not because of it. As it stands today, the Roman Catholic’s doctrine of justification is a damnable heresy.
But even some contemporary Christian scholars who many evangelicals look up to have injected confusion into the church regarding this doctrine, arguing that Luther’s understanding of justification was shaped by his conflict with the Roman Catholic church and, due to his intense personal struggles, missed what Paul was really saying. Through this new lens, scholars who claim they are providing a “New Perspective on Paul” have called into question key doctrines (e.g., imputation) that relate directly to the doctrine of justification and thus diluted the glorious gospel that Paul and the Reformers proclaimed. When these kinds of tweaks are introduced into the doctrine of justification, spiritual regress, both individually and corporately, is inevitable (see Gal 3:1-5).
We must continually proclaim this doctrine in all of its glorious biblical and theological detail so we can stand firmly on Christ and experience the joy he intends for us to have.
Understanding Justification in its Contemporary Context
We also need to bring the doctrine of justification into our contemporary context, specifically our local church context and our broader cultural context. Regarding the church, it is often the case that Christians struggle in their spiritual lives because they have not fully grasped the doctrine of justification by faith alone and all its implications. The truths entailed in the doctrine of justification are foundational to our assurance, joy, and fruitfulness, yet many professing believers limp on through their Christian life because they haven’t fully imbibed the glorious truths of justification.
The doctrine of justification also goes to the root of our religious motives and spiritual troubles.
- Our Motives for Spiritual Duty and Activity – Why do we serve God and engage in church, ministry, and worship? Do we pursue these activities to be saved, or because we are saved? Do we obey God out of a slavish fear he might condemn us if we don’t or because we love him? The doctrine of justification frees us from the need to secure our salvation by our works and thus enables us to serve God in joy, freedom, and genuine love.
- Our Need of People’s Approval – Justification deals with our approval before God and therefore cuts the root of our enslavement to the need of people’s approval, or, what Scripture calls, the fear of man (Prov 29:25). When we have God’s approval, we need man’s approval less and less.
- Anxiety – The greatest source of our anxiety is our fear eternal condemnation (Heb 2:14-15). The doctrine of justification teaches us that we are now free from condemnation, thus relieving the greatest source of our anxiety. Now relived of our greatest source of anxiety, we are enabled to effectively deal with lesser sources of anxiety.
- Perfectionism – Many of us may struggle with perfectionism, and the incessant need to have everything perfectly completed or in its place. The doctrine of justification enables us to rest upon the perfections of Christ and our perfect eternal future, thus relieving us of the need to have everything perfectly in its place in this life.
But it’s not just Christians who struggle with these inward motivations and troubles. All people are seeking approval from those whom they respect, admire, fear, and like. The doctrine of justification frees us from the enslaving need for other people’s approval because it gives us the approval of the most important Person in the Universe. This is good news for all people.
Unbelievers are also seeking to alleviate their guilt before God through religion, philanthropy, substance abuse, and naturalistic philosophy. Justification provides the answer to guilt and delivers people from bondage to fig-leaf religion and attempts to appease their conscience.
Justification answers directly how one can be right with God and relieves the greatest source of our anxiety.
People are anxious because they do not know what will happen when they die and whether they are right with God. Justification answers directly how one can be right with God and relieves the greatest source of our anxiety. Once the greatest source of our anxiety is dealt with, we can begin to overcome lesser sources of anxiety (Matt 6:25ff; Phil 4:6).
My Personal Context
Finally, I can’t help but also place this doctrine within my own personal context. The doctrine of justification by faith alone in Christ alone has been for me a source of joy, spiritual stability, freedom, and close communion with God. It has helped deliver me from much legalism and enabled me to be fruitful in serving Christ. I’ve also seen it transform people in my pastoral ministry as they see with increasing clarity that their right standing is not based on what they do nor do not do, but in Christ’s righteousness alone, received by grace alone. This stability gives rise to genuine obedience and the pursuit of holiness.
Now, with this context in place, we will examine the doctrine of justification under five essential theological points in the next article.
NOTES
1John Calvin, The Institutes of the Christian Religion, 3.11.1.
2See Nathan Busenitz, Long Before Luther: Tracing the Heart of the Gospel from Christ to the Reformation (Chicago: Moody, 2017). You can read my review of Busenitz’s excellent book here.
3See Ronald H. Bainton, Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther (New York: Abingdon, 1950). For a shorter version, see John Piper, The Legacy of Sovereign Joy: God’s Triumphant Grace in the Lives of Augustine, Luther, and Calvin (Wheaton: Crossway, 2000), 77-111.
4John Piper, Legacy of Sovereign Joy, 91-92.
