Justification = adoption

I think justification is an under-appreciated doctrine, and that's partly because it has been cut off from Jesus.

Justification is not just being forgiven and having the slate wiped clean. It is not only 'just-as-if-I've-never-sinned', but it is also not 'just-as-if-I-had-lived-a-perfect-life'. Actually, its 'just-as-if-I-was-Jesus'.

Among other things, this means that justification is not a necessary step to being adopted as sons. In fact, I may be as bold to say that justification = adoption.

Jesus was justified by God in his resurrection from the dead (Rom 4:25; 1 Tim 3:16). The Jews, and God the Father through them, declared him a sinner. God the Father by the Spirit then raised him from the dead, overturning their verdict and declaring him righteous (Acts 2:3-24).

But in the covenantal context righteousness is not just doing good according to the natural law (although it is not less than that), it is being the people God called Israel to be - and God called Israel to be his son (Ex 4:22; Rom 9:4). Sadly, instead they acted like sons of Satan and crucified the one who not only called God Father, but by his life showed himself to be God's only Son. So, when God the Father raised Jesus from the dead he declared him to be the Son of God in power (Rom 1:4).

If we are united in Christ by Baptism in faith then that same declaration of God the Father over Jesus as he came out of his water-Baptism 'grave' and his blood-Baptism grave is declared over us as well (Matt 3:17). We are sons in whom the Father is well pleased!

So, don't downplay justification, or teach it reductionistically, but celebrate it in all it's riches!

Law court metaphors

Sometimes people say that it is reductionist [...] to always talk about Christianity as a courtroom. Life is more than a courtroom, so why on earth would you always want to make everything about justification and exoneration and guilt and verdicts?

And the only response that we have to that is that is how life actually works. If you're not in a courtroom in your mind when it comes to your spouse, making up fake arguments after something has happened that has hurt you, then I can't relate to you at all.

Life is a courtroom. I wish it weren't that way, but we are arguing. We argue with ourselves, we argue with people that aren't there, we argue with parents that are long deceased. We are constantly arguing and trying to justify ourselves.

So that God should choose to work in that framework should be something that we see as a grace. Not that he is limited or somehow caged in by a legal framework, but that human beings are hard-wired for the law, [so] that God would somehow deal with legality is a good thing.

(David Zahl, Good News for People with Big Problems - Session 3 MP3, Cf. Oswald Bayer)

I'd put it slightly differently, but I wanted to note down what he says because I do think there is a lot of truth there.

The need for a clean break anthropology

The radical gospel of justification by faith alone simply does not fit, cannot be accepted by, and will not work with an anthropology which sees the human being as a continuously existing subject... The radical gospel is the end of that being and the beginning of a new being in faith and hope...

Virtually all the failures and shortcomings of Lutheranism [and any other Christian teaching] can be seen in the hesitancy to proclaim the gospel in uncompromising, unconditional fashion, to proclaim as though we were about the business of summoning the dead to life, calling new beings into existence. Most generally, it seems, the gospel is preached as though it were a repair job on old beings, a 'new patch on an old garment.' It is preached to old beings instead of for new beings.

(Gerhard Forde, "Radical Lutheranism", LQ Vol I (1987))

Justification as Creation; Creation as Justification

I think we have rediscovered in recent years that our salvation is our new creation. We are picking up and emphasising all those NT and Isaianic images of creation when describing our redemption. This is great. Lets celebrate it.

However, somehow in the process there seems to be a desire to shift justification to one side as one metaphor among many. Drawn from the legal context justification can be preferably pushed aside to make way creation which is more fundamental.

Oswald Bayer will not buy into this because to him what God says is fundamental to everything. Justification is what God declares in grace over us, it is also what he declared in grace over the whole of creation.

justification is not simply an isolated topic, next to which other topics can exist; it has essential importance and is connected with every topic. Justification does not affect just my individual life, not even just the history of the world, but impacts the history of nature as well; if affects all things. It is thus not sufficient to speak of the article on justification solely as the articulus stantis et cadentis ecclesiae - as the article on which the church stands and falls. Instead, the meaning of justification must be taken seriously in its breadth, with ramifications that have application for a theology of creation and for ontology. In a prominent position in the Smalcald Articles Luther says: "One cannot go soft or give way on this article, for then heaven and earth would fall." "Without the article on justification the world is nothing but death and darkness."

(p. 98, Oswald Bayer, Martin Luther's Theology: A Contemporary Interpretation)

God's word is 'the creative Word of God that justifies' (p.97, ibid). 'Creation is speech act' (p.103).

I should really comment more but I haven't got time. By the way, I have quoted Oswald Bayer before the fundamental nature of justification before.

God's righteous judgment is revealed

I have a theory, which could probably be shot down by someone who knows Greek and has read more books than me. Nevertheless I will be bold and share it.

I think the 'Righteousness of God' in Romans means something like 'God's righteous judgment' (ala Romans 2:5). I think this combines many of the strengths of the other interpretations being debated.

In what sense then is the the righteousness of God revealed? I think it is revealed in three ways (the colours tie into the senses in which God's righteous judgment is revealed in Romans 1-3 in the quotations below):

1. Present/visible
2. Future/final
3. In Christ's death and resurrection

When reading the OT you often feel that Israel is not the only party to the covenant who fails to keep to it. God says do this and you will live, fail to do this and you will destroyed (Deuteronomy 28; Galatians 3:10-12). However, Israel never fails to fail and yet God does not destroy them. He does reveal the righteous judgment and is not mocked but he always only partially reveals his judgment. This leads to Habakkuk, the Psalmists, Qoheleth, Job etc to be endlessly confused. Where is God's judgment?

Naturally this leads to a hope for a final judgment in which the law is fulfilled and God shows that he is righteous in judgment by punishing the wicked and acquitting the righteous (c.f. Leviticus 19:15; Deuteronomy 1:16).

Both of these judgments are according to the law, one is just the completion of the other. Paul in Romans 1 explains how God has been judging by 'giving over' people to their sinful desires. In Romans 2 he reminds everyone that this is only a partial judgment and there will be a final judgment at which everyone will be fully judged. But the law has shown (in its execution as well as its legislation) that all will be judged unfavourably on that day.

Thankfully though the final judgment has been brought forward and revealed for us in Jesus Christ. The curse of the law has been exhausted and displayed early in the public death of Jesus Christ. The law then has been fulfilled (fully executed) but apart from itself (in that it wasn't executed on who it was meant to be executed). But the judgment on Christ is two-fold: of condemnation in the cross; but also of justification in the resurrection. If we don't accept that condemnation as ours but instead look forward to being judged by ourselves, then we will not receive that justification which is joined to it.

Sorry that is not very polished, but I'm lacking in time. And although it is a conclusion that has been gradually forming in my mind it is still fairly nebulous and I'm aware that I probably need to make some serious changes. But I thought it was time I threw it out there for some comment.

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, "The righteous shall live by faith."

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. [...]

Therefore God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity [...]

For this reason God gave them up to dishonourable passions [...]

And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done [...]

We know that the judgment of God rightly falls on those who practice such things. Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God? [...] you are storing up wrath for yourself on the day of wrath when God's righteous judgment will be revealed.

He will render to each one according to his works: to those who by patience in well-doing seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; but for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek [...]

on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus [...]

But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Who's side is God on?

I have been refamiliarising myself with Tom Wright's stimulating reading of Paul in recent days by listening again to his series of lectures on Romans. I think I am clarifying more in my mind where I think he occasionally takes wrong turnings, and reminding myself again how I need to read Paul with much more focus on the OT background.

The most important wrong turn I think Wright makes is in deciding who's side God is on in the metaphorical law-court and is summarised in this quote:

...in Daniel chapter 7 you have exactly this scenario of God as the judge surprisingly vindicating Israel as his oppressed people and judging the wicked beasts who have been attacking her. That is the apocalyptic scenario of the covenantal law-court. Or if you like, the covenant scenario interpreted as a great law-suit. Now of course there are passages in the Old Testament which also speak of God and Israel being at law with one another, but that is essentially a secondary thing.

(Romans in a Week, Lecture 3: Romans 1:1-3:20, Part II)

Again and again, as I read the Prophets I am struck by the opposite. The Prophets, unlike so many other religious people, do not focus on condemning those outside their group and argue how God is on their side against those outside, but rather the opposite. Israel is singled out for the harshest criticism and the most devastating judgements.

Yes, God does promise to take Israel's side against her enemies, but only after he has judged them.

Wright in the same lecture helpfully draws attention to how the Isaiah/Ezekiel quote in 2:24 functions in Paul's argument. Paul backs up his argument that those 'who boast in the law dishonour God by breaking the law' by quoting the Prophets' statement that 'the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you' (Ez 36:23; Is 52:5). When you consider their original context we see that Paul is arguing that the Jews should know that they broke the law because they were sent into exile as judgment by God upon them. But in quoting this passage he is also alluding to God's message in both OT passages that for the sake of his name God is going to redeem his people from the place of being judged by him, to the place of restoration. There is hope on the other side of judgment which has to be grasped by faith.

In the law-court Paul is clear who's side God is on, and it is not ours. God inflicts wrath on us (3:5) not our oppressors. The 'but' of 3:21 is precious though. For God's judgment (his righteousness) is revealed apart from the law, in Christ who died for our trespasses (4:35). God is now 'for us' (8:31).

God's righteousness is a saving righteousness not because our enemies are judged but because we are judged in Christ who was raised for our justification.

Seifrid says it better than me:

justification comes only through condemnation, life only through death. The way in which Paul connects the opening discussion in verse 18 to verse 17 signals this relationship: '...the righteous one shall live by faith, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven ...' If he had been thinking of a strict antitheses, one would have expected here a concession, an 'even if'. God's saving righteousness is revealed in the gospel precisely because God himself comes to his own righteousness in the cross of Christ. This simultaneous justification of God and the sinner drives Paul's argument in 1:18-3:26. (p. 48, Christ Our Righteousness: Paul's Theology of Justification, Apollos)

Apologies to those who are fed up of me banging on about the same things. But I don't think I will ever tire of it (by God's grace).

Reflecting again on Tom Wright's Paul

Tom Wright has written a new book on Justification, in part to respond to John Piper.

I was listening to Tom Wright on Romans the other day and he observed that 'Righteousness of God' had three dimensions:

1. Covenant
2. Law-court
3. Eschatology

The key to the current debate is that he makes the covenantal dimension of Paul's Righteousness/Justification the 'fundamental' dimension (to quote his lecture). Most of the focus in debate has been on word studies of the dikaiosune (Righteousness/Justification) word group. There are places where this word group seems to be fundamentally covenantal (e.g. Second Isaiah) but the chips are (in my mind) stacked in the traditional interpretation's favour because the language is from the law-court in the first place (at least). To settle things though the debate has to be far wider and involve the whole of Paul's theology and ask: 'where is the centre of Paul's theology?' Once you have answered that as 'the covenant' then you can do as Wright does and 'translate back into covenantal categories' (p.43, Letter to the Romans) any language which is not covenantal in the first place. Of course if the law-court is central then you can do the same in the other direction.

I am persuaded for the moment to give the law-court pole position in this contest (see here for why) but suspect that the answer may be simpler. If you were to ask the mythical average man in the pew what was the centre of Paul's theology he would immediately answer Jesus Christ, or particularly Jesus Christ crucified. And here perhaps is the answer. Neither the law-court nor the covenant are central, they are both interdependent but separate metaphors which are trying to describe something bigger than both of them, that 'in Christ God was reconciling the world to himself'.

In my head I keep on coming back to Mark Seifrid's comment that only in Jesus is there synthesis when 'the election of Israel and the demand of the Law meet in Christ, the crucified and risen. The tension within early Jewish thought between grace and demand was resolved in an event, not a higher idea' (pp. 5-6, 'The "New Perspective on Paul" and Its Problems', Themelios, Issue 25-2). I don't know if Seifrid would agree with how I spin him but there we go.

Again and again, I learn that theologians (and more often I) sometimes lose the wood for the trees. We do so love to replace Christ with an idea.

Taking sides

In faith, one takes the side of God in his claim against one's self, giving God justice. At the same time, one takes hold of God's gift in Christ, whom he has 'put forward' as an atonement and in whom he has taken the side of the sinner. In Christ and in faith, the justification of God the Creator meets the justification of the godless.

(Mark A. Seifrid, p. 18, 'The "New Perspective on Paul" and Its Problems', Themelios, Issue 25-2

PS. I'm still hoping for book recommendations...

Justification: one metaphor among many?

I've often been one of those people trotting out that phrase of the moment in criticism of some exegesis that it is 'importing law court language' into passages where it doesn't belong. Behind that oft heard criticism of exegesis of individual passages and peoples theology in general is the assumption that the law court (justification, righteous, acquittal etc) is just one metaphor among many for describing our relationship with God. I have had that challenged recently in reading Oswald Bayer. He argues in short that the law court is just a heightened and formalised version of something that is all encompassing:

We cannot reject the question that others put to us: Why have you done this? What were you talking about? Might you not have done something else? In the other's view of us, and also in our own view we always find ourselves to be the ones who are already being questioned and who have to answer [...] We are forced to justify ourselves, and as we do so, we usually want to be right. Before the court of law, what constitutes our whole life is disclosed with particular clarity. The world of the court is not a special world of its own, but just a particular instance - a very striking one - of what is being done always and everywhere.

(p.1, Living by Faith: Justification and Sanctification (Lutheran Quarterly Books) by Oswald Bayer, translated by Geoffrey W. Bromiley)

Did Luther believe justification by faith was a legal fiction?

Paul Helm doesn't like a similarity in Richard Baxter and Tom Wright's theology of justification. He says that both believe "Justification is not a change of status, but of persons.". This may or may not be true, but consider Kolb and Arand on Martin Luther's theology of Justification:

Those who see this form of forensic justification as merely a legal fiction do not share Luther’s understanding of the power of the Word of God. The reformer knew that from the beginning of the world, God determined reality by speaking. Therefore, he was certain that God’s word of forgiveness created a new reality in the life of the sinner.

(I heard something similar in audio from them, but this is from their book, HT Shephard's Scrapbook)

So for Luther the key thing is not whether justification is a declaration or regeneration. It is both. The question is which comes first in priority.

There is a book out there by Lowell Green that argues that Melancthon "helped Luther discover the Gospel", by which he means forensic justification (or so I understand). In the Apology to the Augsburg Confession Melancthon states that:

by faith alone we obtain the remission of sins for Christ's sake, and that by faith alone we are justified, i.e., of unrighteous men made righteous, or regenerated.

Some connections could be drawn here with speech-act theory. Unsurprisingly though Anthony Thiselton got there first. He has an article called 'Justification by grace as legal fiction? : "language-games and 'seeing as' : a fresh approach to justification by faith in Paul and James"' (in Thiselton on Hermeneutics). I'll have to see if I can get hold of it.

Quotable: Das on attempts to understand second temple judaism

The essayists [in Justification and Variegated Nomism, vol. 1: The Complexities of Second Temple Judaism ed by DA Carson et al] offer a more nuanced view of the literature in question but do not return to the pre-Sanders caricature of Judaism as a religion of crass works righteousness and gross legalism. The essayists generally recognize the importance of election, covenant, sacrifice, and repentance in the Jewish systems of thought they discuss, even while reexamining the extent and role of God's grace. Greater and more sustained attention in the volume to the matter of strict and perfect obedience in Judaism would have been helpful since it is the denial of perfect obedience to the Law in Judaism that forms the basis for the new perspective reading of Paul. Further, the authors of the volume do not always recognize the significance of the tension they themselves highlight in Judaism (and Paul) between salvation by God's grace and a judgment according to works. Occasionally, when an essayist finds works and obedience extolled as necessary in Jewish literature, the essayist assumes a degree of works righteousness in spite of the presence of God's grace and mercy (e.g., Craig Evans's essay). The interplay between grace and demand is complex in both Judaism and Paul and need not equate to earning a place in the world to come entirely by one's own efforts. The apostle specifically qualifies the divine origin of human works in relation to salvation (Phil 2:12-13). Are not Jewish authors in his day capable of similar reasoning? Also, some of the essayists deem efforts to "stay in" the Jewish community, such as Law observance, instances of works righteousness. If so, should Christian acts of piety and avoidance of sin, all of which help maintain status within their community of faith, be analogously labelled as works righteousness? Greater sophistication in the analyses of these matters would have been helpful.

(p.11fn22, Paul and the Jews, A Andrew Das)

I also read recently (I can't remember where) that Sanders and his followers made the mistake of reading in grace whenever they read of election in the literature. However election need not be of grace as it has sometimes been seen as on the basis of God's foreknowledge of obedience (including in second temple Judaism).

You have to be so careful in reading.

A new identity and a new history

In our corporate worship, we sometimes sing this son:

I will give you all my worship,
I will give you all my praise,
You alone I long to worship,
You alone are worthy of my praise!

These words hhave at times bothered me: no one gives God all his worship and all his praise. But as I have sung them in the light of what we have been saying about newness [2 Cor 5:17 and Eph 4:24 stuff], I have seen something else. And that vision has led me more than once to pray aloud before the congregation something like this at the conclusion of the song:

Dear Lord, you know better than we do that, in one sense, these words are not true. We sing them with great religious feeling perhaps, but we don't live them. There are all sorts of things that we love more than we love you. This song condemns us. But there is another sense, gracious Redeemer, in which these words are in fact profoundly true of us. They are true because you have sent your Spirit to live in us - and there is no question but that he loves you this way. We praise you, dear Lord, that you are at work in us and that it is only a matter of time before you finish what you have begun.

(pp. 171-172, Charles Drew, A Journey Worth Taking: Finding Your Purpose in This World <- Recommended reading)

A reflection on my justification reading so far

The more I'm reading on justification the lines of debate are becoming clearer and clearer in my mind, although I haven't come to any conclusion yet. Also the more I read the more I'm struck by how a great many (from all sides of the debate) seem to cut off the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ from their thinking. I can't think of anything stranger but it increasingly seems to me that the choice to make is not between numerous carefully systematised doctrines emphasising faith or works in justification but between a doctrine focusing on the work of Christ against a doctrine which doesn't have faith that Jesus Christ died and that this should be our starting point.

For all of Mark Seifrid's lack of eloquence he doesn't seem to make this mistake. So I can't help coming back to his writing, and his closely argued lecture which you can find here.

Some quotations on Chapter 5 of 'The Way of Salvation' by Paul Rainbow

"Bede, in reconciling Paul and James on the justification of Abbraham, points out that what Paul denies is 'merit derived from works performed beforehand', while James sees that the patriarch 'performed good works in the light of his faith'" (p. 83)

"Luther and Calvin did not acknowledge the distinction between works of the law and good works. They tried to negate it.

In his lecture on Galatians 2:16, Luther defined 'works of the law' to encompass 'everything that can be done on the basis of the Law, whether by divine power or by human'" (p. 84)

"Ephesians 2:8-10 is paradigmatic for the difference between works (of the law) and good works" (p.87)

"Moo may harbour a theological assumption, common to the Reformation heritage, that God's grace triumphs over that which is human as such rather than over that which is corrupt in humanity." (p.88)

Death and the heart of Luther's understanding of justification

I have been listening to some great MP3s by Carl Trueman on the Reformation and Luther in particular (see here and here). They have taught me a lot, and reminded me of more. One of the greatest things he reminded me was how Luther began developing the doctrine of justification by faith alone initially by reflecting on baptism. Medieval Catholicism apparently saw baptism mainly as a washing/healing of people made dirty/sick by sin. Luther saw that baptism is more about death and resurrection and this profoundly affected how he then saw the human condition and justification. If we are dead we can do nothing. I remember now so clearly how this was central to Calvin too from when I read him a lot. The other day I was reading Romans and struck by how often death is mentioned in Romans. I did a search on an online bible and found these statistics:

• 'Death' is found 22 times in Romans
• 'Die' is found 21 times;
• 'mortal' is found 4 times;
• 'killed' is found 3 times;
• 'crucified' is found once;

Not that this means we should be the miserable caricature of Scotch Presbyterians that you read of in the media as the words 'live'/'life'/'resurrection'/'born' /'birth' can be found in a remarkably similar frequency. As Romans is not a very long book (433 verses) this is very significant (also worthy or reflection is that few of these references are in chapters 9-11).

Among other things this makes you wonder how often you hear preachers and ordinary Christians talking in this way. How often do you now hear of how the fall led to a 'messed up world' and a 'broken society' with 'fractured relationships'? Perhaps we ought to be more bleak in how we paint our current situation, and more bold in our description of the contrast of this with salvation.

Christ's life breaking in through faith

I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith— that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead. (Philippians 3:8-11)

How beautiful is that? If you ask how must I be justified then faith is necessary, but as the Luther always remembered this was not a special work that God accepted as a substitute for perfect obedience. 'Faith' is simply the way in which Christ (and all he experienced - suffering, rejection, death and ultimately resurrection) breaks into our lives.

Quotable: Calvin on Justification

faith without works justifies, although this needs prudence and a sound interpretation; for this proposition, that faith without works justifies is true and yet false, according to the different senses which it bears. The proposition, that faith without works justifies by itself, is false, because faith without works is void. But if the clause "without works" is joined with the word “justifies,” the proposition will be true, since faith cannot justify when it is without works, because it is dead, and a mere fiction. He who is born of God is just, as John says. (1Jo 5:18.) Thus faith can be no more separated from works than the sun from his heat yet faith justifies without works, because works form no reason for our justification; but faith alone reconciles us to God, and causes him to love us, not in ourselves, but in his only begotten Son.

(Commentary on Ezekiel 18:14-17)

Had he only said, that Christ by justifying us becomes ours by an essential union, and that he is our head not only in so far as he is man, but that as the essence of the divine nature is diffused into us, he might indulge his dreams with less harm, and, perhaps, it were less necessary to contest the matter with him; but since this principle is like a cuttle-fish, which, by the ejection of dark and inky blood, conceals its many tails,—But as the principle which he adopts is like a cuttlefish, which, casting out its blood, which is black as ink, troubles the water all around, to hide a great multitude of tails. if we would not knowingly and willingly allow ourselves to be robbed of that righteousness which alone gives us full assurance of our salvation, we must strenuously resist. For, in the whole of this discussion, the noun righteousness and the verb to justify, are extended by Osiander to two parts; to be justified being not only to be reconciled to God by a free pardon, but also to be made just; and righteousness being not a free imputation, but the holiness and integrity which the divine essence dwelling in us inspires. And he vehemently asserts (see sec. 8) that Christ is himself our righteousness, not in so far as he, by expiating sins, appeased the Father, but because he is the eternal God and life. To prove the first point—viz. that God justifies not only by pardoning but by regenerating, he asks, whether he leaves those whom he justifies as they were by nature, making no change upon their vices? The answer is very easy: as Christ cannot be divided into parts, so the two things, justification and sanctification, which we perceive to be united together in him, are inseparable. Whomsoever, therefore, God receives into his favor, he presents with the Spirit of adoption, whose agency forms them anew into his image. But if the brightness of the sun cannot be separated from its heat, are we therefore to say, that the earth is warmed by light and illumined by heat? Nothing can be more apposite to the matter in hand than this simile. The sun by its heat quickens and fertilizes the earth; by its rays enlightens and illumines it. Here is a mutual and undivided connection, and yet reason itself prohibits us from transferring the peculiar properties of the one to the other. In the confusion of a twofold grace, which Osiander obtrudes upon us, there is a similar absurdity. Because those whom God freely regards as righteous, he in fact renews to the cultivation of righteousness, Osiander confounds that free acceptance with this gift of regeneration, and contends that they are one and the same. But Scriptures while combining both, classes them separately, that it may the better display the manifold grace of God. Nor is Paul’s statement superfluous, that Christ is made unto us "righteousness and sanctification," (1 Cor. 1:30). And whenever he argues from the salvation procured for us, from the paternal love of God and the grace of Christ, that we are called to purity and holiness, he plainly intimates, that to be justified is something else than to be made new creatures. Osiander on coming to Scripture corrupts every passage which he quotes. Thus when Paul says, "to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness," he expounds justifying as making just. With the same rashness he perverts the whole of the fourth chapter to the Romans. He hesitates not to give a similar gloss to the passage which I lately quoted, “Who shall lay any thing to the charge of God’s elect? It is God that justifieth.” Here it is plain that guilt and acquittal simply are considered, and that the Apostle’s meaning depends on the antithesis. Therefore his futility is detected both in his argument and his quotations for support from Scripture. He is not a whit sounder in discussing the term righteousness, when it is said, that faith was imputed to Abraham for righteousness after he had embraced Christ (who is the righteousness of Gad and God himself) and was distinguished by excellent virtues. Hence it appears that two things which are perfect are viciously converted by him into one which is corrupt. For the righteousness which is there mentioned pertains not to the whole course of life; or rather, the Spirit testifies, that though Abraham greatly excelled in virtue, and by long perseverance in it had made so much progress, the only way in which he pleased God was by receiving the grace which was offered by the promise, in faith. From this it follows, that, as Paul justly maintains, there is no room for works in justification.

(Institutes 3.11.6)

Counting down

Most people are currently counting down to Christmas at the moment. I'm counting down to the New Year when I've got to start studying law again. Soon I'll be unable to read as much as I'm managing at the moment. My current wish list of things to read, on the doctrine of justification alone, include:

• The Way of Salvation: The role of Christian Obedience in Justification by Paul A. Rainbow
• Institutes of the Christian Religion by John Calvin
• "Reflections on Salvation and Justification in the New Testament" by D.A. Carson JETS 40/4 (December 1997) 581-608.
• Justification: The Reformers and Recent New Testament Scholarship" by Gerald Bray Churchman 109/2 1995
• "'The Gift of Salvation': Its Failure to Address the Crux of Justification" by Mark A. Seifrid JETS 42/4 (December 1999) 679-688
• Paul, Moses, and the History of Israel: The Letter/spirit Contrast and the Argument from Scripture in 2 Corinthians 3 by Scott J. Hafemann
• Paul and the Jews by Andrew Das

It's unlikely I'll get very far! And then there's all the more important things I have to be doing.... the trouble is the more you read the more you want to read.

Even more on Justification

• A gentleman called Mark Garcia has written a very helpful review article of two books with different views on justification. It argues that both make the mistake of assuming that there is one Protestant understanding of justification. It's very well written, and can be read here. Many moons ago I posted some quotes by Geerhardus Vos which seem to back up Mark Garcia's argument.

• John Piper has a book coming out on Tom Wright's theology of Justification and a 30min interview with him on the subject of the book can be accessed on Jacob Paul Breeze's blog. Piper seems to echo Howard Marshall in saying that Wright is correct in what he affirms but wrong in what he denies. I agree with Piper on this, although I had some concerns of my own about Piper's expression of the doctrine of justification. But when it comes down to it I'm with Jacob Paul Breeze...

  if you want to talk about who is "right"...that's fine. But, I eventually want to talk about the larger issue: how do we for the sake of unity and mission to the world, work together when we have different interpretations of Scripture (yet because of Justification by Faith [ironically] we are both full participants in God’s family?

On not being detached but being fearful

Whenever we approach a doctrine taught in Scripture it is important that we think about how we ought to approach it. And a weighty matter like justification is not something that we are at liberty to look upon in a detached way. After all, whether we like it or not, we are involved in it. The doctrine of justification sola fide presupposes the guilt of sin, and as we are sinners we are best off approaching it with a due recognition of our guilt coram Deo (before God). (Martin Downes)