Justification

I want to begin tonight. Thank you for the opportunity to continue in our study in theology. I'm going to start with my best imitation of Brother David Parker and say, "Flip over to the other side." (Laughter) You'll flip over to the other side here of your handout.

You will see on the top left corner there, it has 10 different units of study. There on unit number 8, which is Soteriology, which is a fancy word that stands for, of course, the Doctrine of Salvation. And just below that, you have the 12 lessons that are contained within the unit of study on Soteriology. Now, a few weeks ago, Brother David Parker led us in a study on Lesson 3. Look at Lesson 3.

You see what it says? "Union with Christ." Union with Christ.

That is the fountain from which every other spiritual blessing flows. If you look at 4, 5, 6, go right on down through 12, we are the beneficiaries of none of those, except for our union with Christ. And that's where it begins, is our union with Christ, Lesson 3.

We're going to see very shortly how justification is completely and totally wedded to our union with Christ. That's the only way a person is made just. And then a couple of weeks ago, Regeneration, which speaks, of course, of the spiritual surgery that only God can do, where He does surgery on the soul and brings to life, to spiritual life, a person who is spiritually dead in their trespasses and sins. In Ephesians 2, it says, "He has made us alive together with Christ." And so that, of course, is the new birth, being born again, Regeneration, and we are in union with Christ.

And then last week, the study in conversion, which is God's gift of faith and repentance in conversion, when we come into union with Christ, right? And we're baptized and we're raised to walk in newness of life. And then tonight, we come to the study of justification. It's a big word, isn't it? I think it's five syllables. All right.

Some of you probably have continuing education in your various areas of work. And if you do, you know that you start with some learning objectives. And I was thinking about that on the way up here. If we had some learning objectives tonight, I would say this. When we walk out of here, I would hope that every one of us would have a basic understanding of the nature of justification, the doctrine of justification, what it is, what's the definition, what does that mean, justification? So it's nature, right? I would hope also that when we walk out of here, we know what the grounds of justification are, the basis for justification, how a person is made right with God. Then thirdly, the means of justification. How do I become a beneficiary of what God has done? And then lastly, we're just going to touch on some of the implications and glorious benefits of justification. And the reason we're only going to touch on that is if you look back at your outline, look what's coming down the road. Adoption, liberty, and assurance, which all are the fruits of justification being made right with God. All right? So that's kind of the roadmap for tonight, the nature of justification. It's meaning, and that's where we're going to start, is its meaning first.

All right? I said Sunday at the end of the service. Justification deals with the most basic theological question that people ask themselves.

And that is, how can I as a sinner be made right before a wholly perfect and just God?

And that's the question that religion has always sought to answer.

And if you consider all of the religions of human achievement apart from biblical Christianity, they all have their various formulas or rituals or beliefs that they might adhere to in the hopes that those things might avail in God's courtroom, that they might avail to righteousness that's acceptable to God in His courtroom. But of course they all fail, don't they? You remember what Jesus said in Matthew chapter 5? He was talking to the people and He said, "Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the Pharisees," that is the most religious people that you can find in the world, okay, you're not fit for the kingdom.

In fact, He then explicitly announced the standard, "Be ye therefore perfect." All right? So the standard to being right with God, the standard for being fit for fellowship with God is absolute perfection. How you measuring up?

"Work in progress."

We'll see. All right? This is where the doctrine of justification comes in. Salvation at its core is a matter of righteousness. How can you and I be made righteous? This is justification. All right? Let's begin with the definition.

Flipping over to the first page, of course, of our outline, number one, we have a definition for justification. I'm going to go ahead and read it to you and you can fill in the blank as we go.

Justification is that judicial act of God by which on account of Christ, to whom the sinner is united by faith, He declares that sinner to be no longer exposed to the penalty of law, but instead restores the sinner to the fullness of His holy love and favor. All right, I want to go to the very beginning of that definition, okay? We're going to break this down. Justification is that judicial act of God whereby He declares — if you continue on, the judicial act whereby He declares. So justification is a declaration. It's not an imputation or an impartation. It is God's declaration. It's His verdict, and it's a verdict of not guilty. We're not talking here about sanctification. That's separate from justification, all right? This is describing what God is declaring about a believer, all right? It's a declaration, and it's instantaneous.

We have verdicts in secular courts, right? Jury comes in, and let's just say that the jury foreman or the court or whatever announces not guilty. With that pronouncement, the status of the accused instantly changes. He is no longer accused. He is acquitted. He is not guilty, and because of double jeopardy, he's never to be tried again, all right? It is a declaration. Now, does that mean that that accused was innocent?

Not necessarily, and probably not. All right, now, I'm on tape, right? (Laughter)

Probably not, all right? It has nothing to do with that person's character, but the verdict, the pronouncement of the verdict determines what his position is now before the law. He's not guilty. He's been acquitted. And in much the same way, in a spiritual way, when God declares you and I, when He does declare you and I to be not guilty, our status instantly changes. Of course, the only reason it changes, which we're going to get to, is because our penalty's been paid, right? That's a little difference between the metaphor, all right? But we have to understand, this is a declaration. This is not something that's progressive, all right? This is instantaneous when God declares us not guilty.

And the wonderful thing is there's no appellate court, right? When God declares you not guilty, you are not guilty indeed, right? That's good news. Now, it's important to understand this, that it's a declaration, because there is a difference between what I will call biblical Christianity and some teachings that I've heard of in the Roman Catholic Church, for example, where sanctification is sometimes collapsed into justification. And the notion is that what God does is He infuses us with His righteousness when we're converted, that we're infused with His righteousness. And that really goes to — it attacks the heart of the gospel, because then what that ultimately leads to, when you take it to its fullest conclusion, is we're depending upon ourselves. And it's Christ alone, okay? It's the basis upon which we can be declared righteous, okay? And so that is the nature of justification. It is a declaration where He, by His grace, declares the believer to be righteous.

You're going to tilt your head at me like this, be a Berean and go home and look, but I'm telling you, it has nothing to do with God changing our character or changing our nature. It's His declaration. Now changing nature is regeneration, right? Okay? But this is not talking about that progressive sanctification declaration, right? So justification is the judicial act of God.

Now that leads to a question, doesn't it? Is this just some legal fiction?

We started this with the whole premise that we're not perfect. We're sinners.

So how can a holy God declare us to be righteous and not be fibbing? I'm not righteous, right? In fact, there's a proverb that says, "He who justifies the wicked is an abomination."

And yet Romans chapter 4, verse 5 says this, "God justifies the ungodly."

So how do we square these two things? And this is what brings us to the glorious — to the gospel really, but to the doctrine of imputation, the doctrine of imputation. Look at the verse of Scripture under 1, 2 Corinthians 5 and verse 21. This little verse in itself speaks of the twofold aspect of imputation. Let's read that together. 2 Corinthians 5:21. "For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." You got that? Break that beautiful verse down. "For He," now He is God, God made who? Jesus. God made Jesus who knew no sin to be sin for us.

God made Jesus to be sin for us.

In what sense did God make Jesus to be sin? Only in one sense.

When Jesus was absorbing the wrath of God on the cross, He was not absorbing that wrath for His own sin, but for the sin of every believer who would repent and put their faith in Christ.

And so He made Him sin, not because He — I heard it once told, you know, when Jesus was on the cross, He became a robber, He became a homosexual, He became — that's blasphemous. But what did He do? He imputed our sin to Christ.

As the scapegoat in the Old Testament bore the guilt of Israel when Aaron confessed the sins of the people, the Bible says — and Isaiah is speaking prophetically about Jesus — the Lord laid upon Him the iniquity of us all, right?

The goat that was offered as a sin offering in the Old Testament as a propitiation for the people, for the wrath of God — the Scripture, the verses here on our outline — that Christ was put forth as a propitiation by His blood. And so we have the imputation where God put our sin on Jesus. He bore the penalty for our sin. That's why there's forgiveness. That's why there's forgiveness, because Christ bore our sin. The imputation, our sin, was put on Christ.

You see, it's not a legal fiction. Our sin wasn't swept under the rug. All unrighteousness will be punished. For the believer who's united in Christ, He bore that punishment, but every sin will be punished. And so our sin wasn't swept under the rug. Christ bore our sins on the cross.

Now, if that were all there were to justification, we would have forgiveness because the penalty has been paid. And yet, do you know, we would still be lacking. We would still be lacking. I suggest we would not be saved. If we're merely forgiven for our sin, then you could say we're kind of morally neutral because what has not happened? We haven't kept all of the demands of the law, have we? You see, the law has two components to it. We've already talked about kind of the penal standards in the law. That is, sin must be punished. But the law also has its positive demands, right? Let me ask you, are you perfectly walking obediently to the Lord day by day and moment by moment? We quote the wonderful verse, but I would ask, can we claim in good faith that we are constantly loving the Lord our God with all of our heart, with all of our soul, with all of our mind, and all of our strength? Or do we have some lapses? All right?

And so what we need is we need a substitute who not only takes the penalty for our sin, but we need a substitute who has met all of the demands of the law positively, right? Completely fulfilled the demands of the law. And that's exactly what Jesus did. And so this is the second part of imputation that you see in 2 Corinthians 5:21. "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness" — not our righteousness — "the righteousness of God in Him." You see that?

And so that's that second aspect of imputation where Jesus took our sin, God put our sin on Jesus, and He paid that penalty. And then the life that Jesus lived is imparted to us, His righteousness. And that's the righteousness that we need, because ours doesn't meet the standard. All right?

Now that's also not a legal fiction, the impartation of righteousness. In Romans — I believe it's in chapter 5, I mean it's Romans chapter — yeah, Romans chapter 5. Let me give you one more of those. Flip over to the back. Flip over to the back. Look at number 2, down under the reference verses, Romans 5:18–19. Actually, if you have your Bibles open, I'm not going to flip back to 17. He says, "Therefore, as through one man's offense, judgment came to all men," now who's that talking about? Adam, right? "Just as through one man, Adam, offense, judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation" — there is a sense, you know, original sin, there is a sense in which there's an imputation there. "Even so through one man's righteous act, the free gift came to all men, in justification of life." All right? And so Christ's very righteousness is imputed to us, and it's not a legal fiction. It is the life that He lived. It's a reality because of the life that He lived.

All right? Are we good? All right. Any thoughts, commentary on that? All right. That's glorious, but you know what? It's not glorious if you're not the beneficiary. It's one thing to ace a test on theology. It's another thing to be saved, right? That should have been one of the learning objectives. If you're not saved, get saved. That's a good learning objective, isn't it?

We need to look at the means of justification. How is it that I can receive this glorious benefit of having my sins forgiven because of what Christ did on the cross and having His righteousness imputed to me? And that's going to be on your outline under number three. But you know what? I need to back up and we need to fill in some blanks.

So under number one, justification is the judicial act of God by which on account of Christ, to whom the sinner is united by faith, He declares that sinner to be no longer exposed to the penalty of law, but instead restores the sinner to the fullness of His holy love and favor. All right?

Number two, application. The judge sets His own righteousness in the place of our sin. It's one thing to have your neighbor thinking highly of you, you got a good reputation. Isn't it another thing for God to say you're righteous? That's pretty good. But the judge sets His own righteousness in the place of our sin because of Christ.

All right? And then number two, the moment of our union with Christ is also the moment we are regenerated, converted, and justified. The communion of benefits which results from this union involves a change — that's the fill-in-the-blank — change of state or relation which is called justification. Justification is the reversal of God's attitude toward the sinner because of the sinner's new relation to Christ. Again, this is going back to the unity we have in Christ. A sinner is justified before God only because he is united to Jesus Christ, the righteous one, the righteous one.

All right? And I do want to read the three verses below that because it amplifies what we've already spoken of. And by the way, the only reason these wonderful theology outlines are so incredibly valuable to us is because they're wedded to Scripture. These are not the outlines of David Parker or Hal Epperson or Kayla Brown or David Colson. These are wedded to Scripture. And that's what's important. Right? Systematic theology is taking the whole of Scripture, right, and then organizing them so we can understand these great truths of Scripture.

All right, so 1 Corinthians 1:30, "But of Him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God and righteousness and sanctification and redemption." There you have in Christ, we have righteousness. Colossians 3:3, "For you died and your life is hidden with Christ in God." When I read that verse, I immediately thought of standing there in front of the judgment seat and as a believer, knowing that when He looks at me, He's looking at Christ right on that day of judgment. And that's who I want Him to see. That's who I want Him to see.

Romans 3:24–26, "Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness. Because in His forbearance God has passed over the sins that were previously committed, to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus."

You see, when it says He is both the just and the justifier, it's speaking of the fact that what He's done for us in declaring us righteous is totally consistent with His holy and righteous character and who He is. It's not inconsistent. He's not fibbing to us. Jesus paid it all. And Jesus did it all. Right? And that's why we won't have to pay. And that's why we have what He did put in our account.

All right? So that's glorious, right? So we are truly righteous. Application: we are truly righteous because we are truly in Christ. And the flip side of that is true, the converse. If we're not in Christ, we are truly unrighteous. And we all know that, I trust. All right?

All right. So now, back to the means by which we receive this justification. All right? We don't want to just be academic students of the Word and pass a test. We want to apply it to our hearts and we want to be the beneficiaries of God's grace and what He's done for us. So let's see how it is that a person receives this justification. Let's fill in the blanks on number three and then we'll discuss.

Number three, the only condition of justification is the sinner's faith in Jesus. The word is faith, which merges the life of the sinner into the life of Christ. While God's grace is — and I have some big words for you, but these are theology words for sure. All right? We're going to talk about the efficient cause and the immediate cause and the instrumental cause. All right? Here we go. You ready?

While God's grace is the efficient cause of justification and the obedience and sufferings of Christ are the meritorious and procuring cause, faith is the immediate or instrumental cause. Faith gives ourselves to Christ and receives Him as Savior. Faith counts all that Christ is and does as our own, connecting man with life in Christ. Faith is thus the instrument or medium by which we receive Christ and are united to Him.

So how can the work of Christ be applied to me personally? By what means are my sins imputed to Christ and His righteousness imputed to me? We are justified by faith alone apart from works. All right? Faith alone apart from works. Faith unites us to Christ and His death and resurrection.

Look at the verses below that. Galatians 2:16, "Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Christ Jesus that we might be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the law, for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified."

And then Romans 4:5 and 8, "But to him who does not work but believes on Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. Just as David also describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputes righteousness apart from works, blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord shall not impute sin."

The clearest exposition of justification by faith is certainly in the book of Romans in many places, also in the Epistle to the Galatians. And there are some scriptures here on the back under section 3 that flesh this out as well.

When you read these verses of Scripture that make it clear that it is faith alone — sola fide, of course, faith alone — then we come to understand that we must look at the notion that somehow we can earn our salvation, right? It is totally trusting in the work of Christ.

Some have said, "Well, justification by faith, that's a Pauline doctrine that he emphasizes over and over again in Romans and Galatians, but Christ doesn't talk about that." Well, while it's true that Christ didn't author a treatise on justification, it permeates His gospel when you go to the Gospels. You think of the tax collector and the Pharisee. You remember that recorded narrative? The Pharisee who was checking all the religious boxes and proud of his righteousness when compared to others, compared to the tax collector — of course, the sinner — and the tax collector cried out to God, "Lord, be merciful to me a sinner." And Jesus said it was the tax collector who went home justified, who went home justified.

And then another affirmation of justification by faith is in Romans chapter 4 where Paul goes all the way back to Abraham in the Old Testament, before the law was even given, goes back to Abraham, and he says of Abraham, "His faith was credited to him as righteousness." In other words, he believed in the promise of God, all right? Showing that the gospel and salvation by faith has ancient roots. It's always been the means of salvation — is faith. All right, so salvation is not earned.

Salvation, faith is an extended arm with empty hands saying, "God, I have nothing. Give me Christ and Christ alone. I've got nothing to offer." That's what's demanded, the recognition that I'm bankrupt. I'm spiritually zero.

Now, one of the things to guard against — why do we use these words efficient cause, instrumental cause? Well, not just for those seminarians. These distinctions are very important.

You see, we are not declared righteous because of our faith. In other words, we didn't earn righteousness because of our faith. Our faith is not the currency that purchases righteousness. It's Christ's righteousness, right? So faith is the means by which we access the righteousness of Christ by believing Him and putting our faith in Him and trusting in Him. But that's an important distinction to understand. It's not because I had the good sense to respond to the altar call. It's because of what God did on my behalf and what He did in drawing me to Christ, and that alone, all right? Because if you're not careful, people can make a work out of faith, right? And in fact, they can have a false sense of salvation or assurance because of something they did. I walked down that aisle when I was a teenager. I signed that card. I cried, right? But it's all about saving faith, recognizing one's poverty before God and crying out to Christ, trusting in Him.

All right, very important distinction. All right, have I — application number four, have I missed anything up to that point? Okay, application number four, can a man stand before the Holy One apart from faith? Why don't you all answer that for me?

Huh? Nope, very good. Olivia, thank you. The children always answer and they always answer correctly. Around here anyway. Thank you, Olivia.

All right, let's go to number four. Oh, this is so important. We talked about hermeneutics, Cayley talked about hermeneutics, and we're going to talk about hermeneutics now. Let's go to number four. The doctrine taught by James does not contradict this. James does not deny justification by faith, but false professors of it. James denounces a dead faith as opposed to true faith in Christ. Now, why do we even go here?

Well, if you go to James — and I doubt anyone here remembers this, but I don't know, a year ago, we did a unit or a study on hermeneutics, and I was blessed to lead that study on hermeneutics, and I played a dirty trick on you, and here's what I did. I said, true or false? And then I made a statement that was a verbatim quote from James, from the Bible.

That one might have actually tripped a few of our children. So I read a statement from the Scripture, and I said, true or false? And we got some falses. And it's because I had extracted from Chapter 2 one verse that says a man is justified by works. Right? Well, from what we studied tonight, we're all going to say, well, that's false. Right?

And so the notion is James and Paul here are having a debate. They seem to contradict one another. James says we're justified by works. Paul says we're justified by faith. Which is it? And this is where we get to hermeneutics. Context is king. Is that right, Kay? The context is king. There we go.

When you read Chapter 2, it is absolutely obvious, if you read Chapter 2, that what James is dealing with is not the imputation of righteousness. Right? What he's dealing with is the evidence of salvation, that a man has been justified — not the ground of salvation. All right? How it is that one is justified. In fact, he talks about a dead faith.

A dead faith — just an empty profession. He talks about a demonic faith. Even the demons believe and shudder. Right? But then he says, no, no, no, a saving faith is a dynamic faith, which shows itself, which shows itself in a changed life. And Abraham is an exemplar of that, how he offered up his son Isaac. But he only did that because he believed in the promises of God and his faith was credited to him as righteousness. All right?

So James and Paul are not contradicting one another. They don't have swords fighting. They're standing back to back and they're fighting different heresies. What is Paul dealing with? Paul is dealing with those that think they can meet God's righteous standard by their own works. And so he's driving home, we are saved by faith and faith alone. James is dealing with those who would strip Christ of His efficacy and say it makes no difference as long as you profess a belief — you can live how you want to live. And James drives a stake through that.

In fact, Calvin — John Calvin — actually was referring to James chapter 2. He said this, he said, "It is faith alone that justifies, but a faith that justifies is never alone." That's a good quote, right? It's faith alone that justifies, but a faith that justifies is never alone. In other words, it results, of course, in good deeds.

All right? In fact, in Ephesians chapter 2, verses 8 and 9, it says, "For you were saved" — what?

"By grace through faith and not of your own works, lest any man should boast." But then what's the very next sentence? "For we are His workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do the works that He's prepared in advance for us to do." Right? I believe Titus 2:14, He has saved us for a purpose, right? He has created us to be a people for Himself, zealous for good works. All right? But these are not the grounds of justification. These are the fruit of justification, right?

All right. Any questions on that, James and Paul? Give us the blanks one more time. Okay, that is important. All right. So, number four, "The doctrine taught by James does not contradict this." That is justification by faith. "James does not deny justification by faith, but false professors of it." James denounces a dead faith as opposed to true faith in Christ. And as we were taught earlier, context is king. And if you read James 2 in its entirety, it'll be very clear that that's what James is dealing with.

It's called antinomianism, big fancy word, antinomianism. It's the idea that I can profess Christ and just live a godless life. I'm free. I'm saved. The penalty's been paid. Doesn't matter how I live. That's what James was dealing with. All right? Number five.

Application in James 2:26, "We are justified by faith alone, but true faith is never..." You tell me. Alone. All right? "True faith is never..." That's almost a Calvin quote there. All right? Really close. John MacArthur wrote a book. It's on my shelf at home. It's called Faith Works. That's a good title, isn't it? Faith Works.

That has a couple of dimensions to it. You know, "faith works." All right, number five.

In justification, God treats us just as if we had never sinned. God acquits the ungodly who have placed their trust in Christ. God declares the guilty to be just in Christ. This is based solely in the bearing of penalty by Christ, to whom the sinner is united by faith. The demands of the law have been fully satisfied, and the believer is now free from all guilt and all condemnation.

This is something you probably, like me, don't grasp the way we ought to.

Right? I mean, we sometimes walk around and feel like failures when we weren't as righteous as we should have been in our own, right? But the thing is, man, when you've been declared not guilty, you're acquitted. You're free from condemnation.

Look at Romans 8:1–4. This is a great chapter, Romans 8. It talks of all of the blessings we have. "There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit. For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh." There's our substitute. "On account of sin, He condemned sin in the flesh, that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who do not walk according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit."

You have double imputation in there again. You've heard of a double amputee? I want to be a double imputee. Fully justified. Imputation. He took my sin and He gives me His righteousness. The application: do you live as a free man?

Or are you shackled with guilt?

That's a good question. Only you can answer that. Do you live as a free man? Or are you shackled with guilt? All right. We've been set free. There's no condemnation in Christ. It doesn't mean that we don't confess our sins when we do sin and have that joy of our fellowship restored.

But when we're saved, we're saved. And that acquittal stands. You're not guilty. All right. Number six.

In justification, God treats us just as if we had perfectly obeyed and fulfilled all of the law. I'm so glad that "just as if" was put there as well. Thank you, David Parker. You see how in number six it says justification is just as if we've never sinned? Usually people stop there and that's how they define justification. But it's also just as if we perfectly obeyed and fulfilled the law. And I won't belabor that. We've already done that, right? But we need both. And that's what we have in Christ.

God treats believing sinners as being personally righteous. That's how He treats us, on the basis of Christ. We thus receive the rewards promised to obedience. This is based solely in the perfect obedience of Christ, to whom the sinner is united by faith. On account of Christ, our relation to God is restored in friendship and adoption. We are elevated through union with Christ into the blessed communion of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Yes, sorry about that. Here's the blanks. The first blank is "obeyed" — perfectly obeyed and fulfilled all the law. Number two is "righteous" — God treats believing sinners as being personally righteous. Number three, the blank is "our relation to God is restored in friendship and adoption."

We are elevated through union with Christ into the blessed communion of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And so we're going to be talking more in the coming weeks about adoption, which is a result of justification, and friendship with God. What's the opposite of friendship?

Enmity or enemy, right? And in Christ, we go from enemy to friend. Enmity to friendship. And then adoption — we're His child now. Before we were children of wrath. Now we're a child of God. We're going to hear more about that, so I'm going to stop. Do we have all the blanks? All right.

Let's jump to number seven. In number seven, actually I'm going to read James 2:23 under six, and the Scripture was fulfilled which says, "Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness, and he was called the friend of God."

And then John 1:12–13, "But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name, who were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." All right.

We became children of God, not of blood, not because of who my daddy is or my mommy, not of the flesh because I gritted my teeth and did good enough, or not of the will of man, but of God.

And then the application, "Do you obey Christ in love or in fear of punishment?"

Do you obey Christ in love or in fear of punishment? That's the difference between the way the slave obeys — you know, if you went back to the slave trade a few hundred, a couple hundred years ago in our history, a slave obeyed his master, but why?

Because he didn't want the whip on his back. He was afraid. He was afraid he was going to get struck. Right?

The question is, "Do you obey Christ in love or in fear of judgment?" You ought to obey Him because of the gratitude for what He's done for us. He paid the penalty for my sin and gave me Christ's righteousness, and that's why I want to live for Him because I love Him and what He did for me.

Number seven, "In justification, remission of sins is never separated from restoration." The two go together. Right? The failure to apprehend this favor is the reason why so many Christians have little joy and enthusiasm in their daily life. The gospel truly is good news. The preaching of the magnanimity and generosity of God makes the gospel the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes.

I've seen a hundred times, a thousand times in a courtroom, a verdict of not guilty come back and just see a defendant and his family just collapse in tears of joy. It's just like they're overwhelmed. They can hardly stand.

That's puny compared to our acquittal.

You know? Compared to the acquittal that God grants to us, that we can stand before Him in judgment in the righteousness of Christ. That ought to make us collapse. You know?

Matthew 3:17, "And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, 'This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.'" If you're righteous in Christ, the Lord is well pleased with you.

First Corinthians 3:21, "Therefore let no one boast in men, for all things are yours, whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas or the world or life or death or things present or things to come, all are yours, and you are Christ's and Christ is God's." The application, do you believe that you have inherited all things in Christ?

If you were here a couple of months ago, you heard about those things, the spiritual blessings that we have in Christ in Ephesians chapter 1.

In Christ we have inherited all spiritual blessings, right, that we have in Him.

For number 7, the third blank — I only have two blanks, okay? So let me read it slowly. In justification — I'm sorry, there's three. In justification, remission of sins is never separated from restoration.

Remission of sins is never separated from restoration, okay?

And then number 8.

In number 8, justification is instantaneous, complete, and final, all right? Instantaneous, complete, and final.

The verdict isn't slow and drawn out. It's not guilty — pardoned, acquitted, free, all right? Justification is instantaneous, complete, and final. The moment we are united to Christ, we enter the Father's full approval and love. There's nothing to earn. All our sins are buried in the grave of God's forgetfulness — I added that. All of the sins are buried in the grave with Christ, and Christ's resurrection is our own. We are made new and complete in Christ. Our union with Christ is indissoluble. That's why we say when we come out of the baptismal waters, raised to walk in newness of life, right? There's new life. It changes everything. Nothing to earn, complete and final, no appeals.

Colossians 2:9–10, "For in Him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, and you are complete in Him who is the head of all principality and power." And "I give them eternal life," notice it says, "I give them eternal life."

Not sporadic life, or spasmodic life. "I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish. Neither shall anyone snatch them out of My hand. My Father who has given them to Me is greater than all, and no one is able to snatch them out of My Father's hand."

All right, so now you can answer these two last questions, and so I want you to answer them, all right? Number one, because these have empirical answers, right? This is not a subjective application. Number one, is justification a process?

No, right. It is an instantaneous declaration of God at conversion, right? Instantaneous declaration. Can your justification be rescinded? No. It's full and it's final, all right? No appeals. Who's going to reverse God? All right? All right. Brother David, I want to thank you for the outline on justification. Did we miss any blanks?

Okay. In the coming weeks, we are going to be looking at really some of the fruit of justification. On the back there, we have next week liberty, and then adoption, and then assurance. And then number ten, we get to sanctification. That is progressive. That is progressive. All right, once we've been justified.

All right, that's a fire hose. It always is, but that's why you have the scriptures on your outline. Take them home and soak them in. All right, take them home and soak them in.