Chapter II: The Method of Justification

1. NEGATIVELY: NOT BY WORKS OF THE LAW.

Rom. 3:20--"Therefore by the deeds of the law there shall no flesh be justified in his sight; for by the law is the knowledge of sin." "Therefore" implies that a judicial trial has taken place and a judgment pronounced. At the bar of God no man can be counted righteous in His sight because of his obedience to law. The burden of the Epistle to the Romans is to set forth this great truth. As a means of establishing right relations with God the law is totally insufficient. There is no salvation _by_ character. What men need is salvation _from_ character.

The reason why the law cannot justify is here stated: "For by the law is the knowledge of sin." The law can open the sinner's eyes to his sin, but it cannot remove it. Indeed, it was never intended to remove it, but to intensify it. The law simply defines sin, and makes it sinful, yea, exceedingly sinful, but it does not emancipate from it. Gal. 3:10 gives us a further reason why justification cannot take place by obedience to the law. The law demands perfect and continual obedience: "Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them." No man can render a perfect and perpetual obedience, therefore justification by obedience to the law is impossible. The only thing the law can do is to stop the mouth of every man, and declare him guilty before God (Rom. 3:19, 20).

Gal. 2:16, and 3:10, Rom. 3:28, are very explicit in their denial of justification by law. It is a question of Moses or Christ, works or faith, law or promise, doing or believing, wages or a free gift.

2. POSITIVELY: BY GOD'S PEEE GRACE--THE ORIGIN OR SOURCE OF JUSTIFICATION.

Rom. 3:24--"Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." "Freely" denotes that it is granted without anything done on our part to merit or deserve it. From the contents of the epistle up to this point it must be clearly evident that if men, sinful and sinning, are to be justified at all, it must be "by his free grace."

3. BY THE BLOOD OF JESUS CHRIST--THE GROUND OF JUSTIFICATION.

Rom. 3:24--"Being justified . . . . through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." 5:9--"Much more then, being now justified by his blood." 2 Cor. 5:21 (R. V.)--"Him who knew no sin he made to be sin on our behalf; that we might become the righteousness of God in him." The bloodshedding of Christ is here connected with justification. It is impossible to get rid of this double idea from this passage. The sacrifices of the Old Testament were more than a meaningless butchery--"Without shedding of blood is no remission" of sin (Heb. 9:22). The great sacrifice of the New Testament, the death of Jesus Christ, was something more than the death of a martyr--men are "justified by his blood" (Rom. 5:9).

4. BY BELIEVING IN JESUS CHRIST--THE CONDITION OF JUSTIFICATION.

Gal. 2:16--"Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ," or as the Revised Version margin has it: "But only through faith in Jesus Christ." Rom. 3:26--"To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness; that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus." "Him that believeth in Jesus" is contrasted with "as many as are of the works of the law" (Gal. 3:10). When Paul in Romans 4:5 says: "Now to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly," he gives the death-blow to Jewish righteousness. "His faith is counted for righteousness;" that pictures the man who, despairing of all dependence upon his works, casts himself unreservedly upon the mercy of God, as set forth in Jesus Christ, for his justification. Thus it come to pass that "all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses" (Acts 13:39). The best of men need to be saved by faith in Jesus Christ, and the worst need only that. As there is no difference in the need, neither is there in the method of its application. On this common ground all saved sinners meet, and will stand forever. The first step, then, in justification is to despair of works; the second, to believe on him that justifieth the ungodly.

We are not to slight good works, for they have their place, but they follow, not precede justification. The workingman is not the justified man, but the justified man is the workingman. Works are not meritorious, but they meet with their reward in the life of the justified. The tree _shows_ its life by its fruits, but it was alive before the fruit or even the leaves appeared. (See under Faith, II. 3, p. 148, for further suggestions regarding the relation between faith and works.)

Summing up we may say that men are justified _judicially_ by God. (Rom. 8:33); _meritoriously_ by Christ, (Isa. 53:11); _mediately_ by _faith_, (Rom. 5:1); _evidentially_ by works, (James 2:14, 18-24).

THE DOCTRINES OF SALVATION

E. ADOPTION.

I. THE MEANING OF ADOPTION.

1. ETYMOLOGICALLY.
2. SCRIPTURALLY.

II. THE TIME OF ADOPTION.

1. ETERNAL.
2. WHEN ONE BELIEVES.
3. COMPLETE AT RESURRECTION.

III. THE BLESSINGS OF ADOPTION.

1. FILIAL.
2. EXPERIMENTAL.

IV. SOME EVIDENCES OF SONSHIP.

1. GUIDANCE.
2. CONFIDENCE.
3. ACCESS.
4. LOVE FOR THE BRETHREN.
5. OBEDIENCE.

E. ADOPTION.

Regeneration begins the new life in the soul; justification deals with the new attitude of God towards that soul, or perhaps better, of that soul towards God; adoption admits man into the family of God with filial joy. Regeneration has to do with our change in nature; justification, with our change in standing; sanctification, with our change in character; adoption, with our change in position. In regeneration the believer becomes a child of God (John 1:12,13); in adoption, the believer, already a child, receives a place as an adult son; thus the child becomes a son, the minor becomes an adult (Gal. 4:1-7).

I. THE MEANING OF ADOPTION.

Adoption means _ the placing of a son_. It is a legal metaphor as regeneration is a physical one. It is a Roman word, for adoption was hardly, if at all, known among the Jews. It means the taking by one man of the son of another to be his son, so that that son has the same position and all the advantages of a son by birth. The word is Pauline, not Johannine. The word is never once used of Christ. It is used of the believer when the question of rights, privileges, and heirship are involved. It is peculiarly a Pauline word (Gal. 4:5; Rom. 8:15, 23; 9:4; Eph. 1:5). John uses the word "children," not "sons," because he is always speaking of sonship from the standpoint of nature, growth, and likeness (cf. 1 John 3:1, R. V.).

Exodus 2:10 and Heb. 11:24, furnish two splendid illustrations of the Scriptural sense and use of adoption.