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As if I’d never sinned

When last we met, we worked through the restoration of a lost relationship with God through Christ’s work on the cross and the obedience it compels a Christian to in a journey of becoming more like Him.

As a Christian we desire, thanks to the work of the Holy Spirit, to grow in this new relationship with the God-head. It is justification that makes us a part of the family of God, an heir with our Messiah. We can now enter the presence of the creator God who sent away Adam and Eve from his presence.

A holy God loved His creation so much He made a way to satisfy His wrath against humanity’s sin and avert our judgement, all the while clothing us with righteousness which was not our own so that we could spend eternity worshiping Him! He is the only one in position and in power to change our position before Himself so He can declare us righteous.

That is justification, the changing of our position from sinful to righteous. The old saying is, “God sees me, his child, just-as-if-I’d never sinned.” And that justification is solely accomplished through Christ. Humanity has nothing to do with earning or making himself justified.

The Apostle Paul writes, “For He Himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in His flesh the dividing wall of hostility by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that He might create in Himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace. …” (Ephesians 2:14-15)

The Law — its ceremonies and commandments — was the barrier between Jew and Gentile. “When Jesus died on the cross He abolished every barrier between man and God and between man and his fellow man.” (Dr. John MacArthur)

The point is that justification comes by faith and faith alone. No works increase one’s position toward righteousness. (Ephesians 2:8-10) Works add to our sanctification, but not our justification. We must “work out our salvation” (Philippians 2:12) and understand that faith without works is dead (James 2:26) for this is one evidence of a true believer.

In Galatians 2 the Apostle Paul speaks plainly in verse 16 about the Law and justification, “yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.”

The Pharisees had distorted the truth of the Law by adding works to faith. Paul’s readership understood this point because in Galatians 3:17-18 he said, “This is what I mean: the law, which came 430 years afterward, does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void. For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise.”

Here he pointed to Genesis 15:6 where it is written, “And he believed [had faith in] the Lord, and he counted it [faith] to him as righteousness.”

The theological fact is the Gospel can never be Christ plus something else. The Apostle debunked the Pharisaical lie by evidencing justification by faith of Abraham more than 400 years before the Law was given to Moses. So convicted of this truth, the Apostle Paul proclaims that even an angel should be cursed if he were to add anything to the Gospel. (Galatians 1:8)

The truth of justification lives in the word “imputation.” This word defines the truth of this topic, for we have no grounds of righteousness on our own. (2 Corinthians 5:21, Titus 3:5-7, Romans 3:21-26, Romans 3:10 & 23) Imputation is the placement of one’s attributes onto another, therefore, when “God made him who knew no sin to be a sin-offering for us” Jesus’ righteousness was imputed to us “so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God.”

For the righteousness, the only righteousness, by which we are justified is “outside of ourselves,” which means “extra nos” in Latin. John Calvin said “justification is the hinge on which everything turns.” Martin Luther declared that justification by faith is “the summary of all Christian doctrine” and “the article on which the church stands or falls.” The Apostle Paul said “we are justified through faith in Christ,” and in this faith we are crucified with Christ –so it is He that lives in us and not ourselves. For it is written, “the righteous shall live by faith.”

The Church must never compromise the Gospel by adding anything to saving faith. For these reasons, it could be reasonably argued that justification is the pinnacle work of the cross.

— The Rev. L. Scott Hamby is senior pastor of the First Baptist Church of Elkins, and can be reached by calling 304-636-3448.

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