Justification
Reading: Romans chapter 4 verses 1-25
Ill:
• Did you know that in the Bible book called Job (oldest of all books in the Bible);
• There are more than 300 questions?
• But the most important of all those questions is found in Job chapter 9 verse 2;
• Job asked the question: "How can a mortal be (righteous) before God?"
Ill:
• Move forward in time to the year 1515.
• An Augustinian monk called Martin Luther is lecturing on the Book of Romans.
• One verse leaps out of the pages of his Bible and comes to him with great power:
• "The (righteous) just shall live by faith" (Chapter 1 verse 17).
• This was the beginning of change in Martin Luther's life;
• And the beginning of the Protestant Reformation.
Ill:
• Move forward to May 24, 1738 and meet an Anglican missionary called John Wesley ;
• Who was not even sure of his own salvation, but that night he wrote these words in his journal:
"In the evening I went very unwillingly to a society in Aldersgate Street where one was reading Luther's Preface to the Epistle to the Romans.
About a quarter before nine while he was describing the change which God works in the heart through faith in Christ,
I felt my heart strangely warmed. I felt I did trust in Christ, Christ alone for salvation, and assurance was given me that He had taken away my sins, even mine, and saved me from the law of sin and death."
Question: How can a man be right before God?
Answer: Justification.
Question: What is justification?
Answer:
• By way of an illustration.
• In a court of law there will come a time in the proceedings:
• Especially if it is a serious case and there is a jury involved,
• There comes a point towards the end of the trial,
• When the foreman of the jury is asked a question,
• He or she is asked, "Is the prisoner guilty or not guilty"
• If the foreman of the jury says not guilty:
• What that man or woman is doing is, justifying the person in the dock.
That's precisely what the word 'justify' or 'justified' means:
• It is to tell out, to declare that;
• A person is not guilty, that the person who has been on trial is innocent.
• The foreman of the jury declares we have previously judged them to be wrong, guilty.
• But now we have discovered that they are right, they are innocent.
Now in the Bible, the teaching of justification means just that.
• But it also means a whole lot more.
• The book of Romans and other parts of the Bible teach that:
• Every human being who has ever been born,
• Apart from Jesus Christ was born guilty - guilty of sin.
Quote: Chapter 3 verse 23
“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”
NOW NOTE THIS:
• In a court of law.
• A person who is guilty can never be made not guilty!
ill:
• Suppose you commit a crime & it goes to court.
• Let’s say you steal something and you were caught red handed,
• But because it’s your first offence,
• Instead of sending you to prison, the court decide to fine you,
Now just suppose you cannot pay the fine, it's to much for you:
• But somebody else (Auntie Mable or ??????) comes along
• And pays the fine for you.
• Now you can leave that court room,
• And you can walk right past the policeman who arrested you,
• And he cannot touch you because the fine has been paid,
• The penalty of the law has been met, and therefore the law has been satisfied.
Now Christians often use that sort of situation as an illustration:
• To describe Jesus has done for us when he died on the cross.
• We say He has died as a substitute for us (He has paid the penalty for our sins).
• Now that is true.
• But it is not the whole truth!
You see if you are fined in a court of law:
• And that fine is paid by yourself or by someone else:
• The law has been satisfied,
• But you are still guilty of the crime!
• The guilt has not been taken away.
And if you commit another crime six months later and are caught again,
• You will probably find at the end of the trial,
• Someone will get up before the sentence is proclaimed, and they will say:
"This person has already committed an offence six months ago,
They were found guilty,
and the record of that guilt is still on the statute books".
• Although your fine was paid, you are still guilty of the crime.
• And you can never get rid of your guilt !
Yet the Bible teaches:
• That men and woman who have been declared guilty by God:
• Guilty because of their sin, can be justified.
• Just as though they had never done it (Committed their crime).
• Being justified is a recognition of innocence, Not guilty.
Never in a human court of law can someone guilty of the crime can be made innocent.
• Some one may be granted a pardon because of a mistake.
• But that is different.
• But a person whose guilt has been established,
• Can never be declared innocent.
• Yet, this is precisely what God has done!
• God can justify, make right a guilty sinner!
READING: ROMANS CHAPTER 4
• The book of Romans tells us that we have been justified in three ways.
• “By grace” Chapter 3 verse 24.
• “By faith” Chapter 5 verse 1.
• “By blood” Chapter 5 verse 9.
In this chapter (chapter 4) Paul continues this idea of justification:
• And he teaches that justification by faith is not a new idea.
• In fact it has always been God’s plan right from the beginning.
• And he uses the example of Abraham;
• To illustrate 3 great truths about justification.
• Chapter 4 actually divides up into three sections,
• In this first section Paul will contrast faith and works.
(2). Justification: Is by faith, not works (1-8)
“1Abraham was, humanly speaking, the founder of our Jewish nation. What were his experiences concerning this question of being saved by faith? 2Was it because of his good deeds that God accepted him? If so, he would have had something to boast about. But from God’s point of view Abraham had no basis at all for pride. 3For the Scriptures tell us, “Abraham believed God, so God declared him to be righteous.”
4When people work, their wages are not a gift. Workers earn what they receive. 5But people are declared righteous because of their faith, not because of their work.
6King David spoke of this, describing the happiness of an undeserving sinner who is declared to be righteous:
7 “Oh, what joy for those whose disobedience is forgiven,
whose sins are put out of sight.
8 Yes, what joy for those
whose sin is no longer counted against them by the Lord.”
ill:
• What Pele & George Best are to football;
• What Van Gogh is to painting,
• What Shakespeare is to English literature,
• So Abraham was to the Jews (and a whole lot more).
• Abraham was the founder of the Jewish race.
• And so he is often called “Father Abraham”.
• The Bible also calls him the ‘Friend of God’.
No Jew ever questioned the fact that Abraham was right (just) before God;
• It was considered such a basic fact that Abraham’s was accepted by God,
• That Jews referred to heaven as Abraham’s bosom.
KNOWING THIS:
• Paul points to Abraham and asks the question:
• How did Abraham enjoy such friendship with God?
• How was he justified?
• Was it by works?
Answer is no!
• Abraham never boasted before God,
• Because like the rest of us he had fallen short (Rom chapter 3 verse 23)
Ill:
• Twice he lied about Sarah being his wife (Genesis chapter 12 & 20)
• Which put himself, his wife and others in big trouble, hardly a perfect record.
Question: So how was Abraham justified?
Answer:
• Verse 3 is a quote from Genesis chapter 15 verse 6 and gives us the answer:
• “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness”.
God made Abraham a promise and he believed it:
• The Hebrew word translated believed means “to say amen.”
• God gave a promise, and Abraham responded with “Amen!”
• Abraham was saved:
• By faith in God’s word, not by works.
Notice the key word:
• Again and again in his argument Paul uses the same word;
• Actually in Greek it is the same word (used eleven times) in this chapter:
• Translated in English in three different ways:
• “Reckoned”; “Imputed”, as well as “Counted.”
Paul says in this section that is exactly what God did:
• Abraham and each true believer did not work for their salvation;
• They simply trusted God’s Word.
• It was Jesus Christ who did the work on the Cross,
• And His righteousness was transferred to Abraham’s account.
The theological jargon is “Righteousness imputed”:
• Christ’s righteousness put to our account.
• And this gives us a right standing before God.
Notice verse 5:
“However, to the man who does not work but trusts God who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited as righteousness”.
• The Jews believed that God justified religious people on the basis of their works;
• Yet Paul teaches the opposite.
(a).
• It is the wicked, the un-godly who can be justified,
• Not the religious people.
(b).
• It is not works
• But faith!
In verses 6 through 8,
Paul used David as a witness and contrasts him with Abraham:
• Abraham lived centuries before the law,
• David lived centuries after the law.
• Abraham was justified before he was circumcised.
• David was justified after he was circumcised.
• And as proof of his argument Paul quotes from one of King David’s great psalms;
• A psalm of confession after his terrible sin with Bathsheba (Ps. 32:1-2).
“David says the same thing when he speaks of the blessedness of the man to whom God credits righteousness apart from works:
7 “Blessed are they
whose transgressions are forgiven,
whose sins are covered.
8 Blessed is the man
whose sin the Lord will never count against him.”
• If you were Jewish then David’s words would have been quite remarkable;
• God forgives sins and imputes righteousness apart from works.
• In other words, once a person is made right with God, justified (converted).
• Their record ONLT contains Christ’s perfect righteousness & can never again contain their sins.
(2). Justification is by grace, not Law (9-17).
9Now then, is this blessing only for the Jews, or is it for Gentiles, too? Well, what about Abraham? We have been saying he was declared righteous by God because of his faith. 10But how did his faith help him? Was he declared righteous only after he had been circumcised, or was it before he was circumcised? The answer is that God accepted him first, and then he was circumcised later!
11The circumcision ceremony was a sign that Abraham already had faith and that God had already accepted him and declared him to be righteous—even before he was circumcised. So Abraham is the spiritual father of those who have faith but have not been circumcised. They are made right with God by faith. 12And Abraham is also the spiritual father of those who have been circumcised, but only if they have the same kind of faith Abraham had before he was circumcised.
13It is clear, then, that God’s promise to give the whole earth to Abraham and his descendants was not based on obedience to God’s law, but on the new relationship with God that comes by faith. 14So if you claim that God’s promise is for those who obey God’s law and think they are “good enough” in God’s sight, then you are saying that faith is useless. And in that case, the promise is also meaningless. 15But the law brings punishment on those who try to obey it. (The only way to avoid breaking the law is to have no law to break!)
16So that’s why faith is the key! God’s promise is given to us as a free gift. And we are certain to receive it, whether or not we follow Jewish customs, if we have faith like Abraham’s. For Abraham is the father of all who believe. 17That is what the Scriptures mean when God told him, “I have made you the father of many nations.” This happened because Abraham believed in the God who brings the dead back to life and who brings into existence what didn’t exist before.
• Another question that would arise in the mind of a Jew would be;
• “If salvation is by faith, then what about the Law?”
The Jews gloried in two things;
• Circumcision and the Law.
• If a Jew was to become righteous before God,
• He would have to be circumcised and obey the Law.
• After all Abraham was circumcised!
Pauls answers
• That question by saying “Yes he was”.
• But not until more than 14 years after the events of his call (Genesis 15).
• We know from Genesis chapter 17 verses 23-27 that;
• Abraham was 99 years old when he was circumcised.
• So Abraham was saved when he was still uncircumcised,
• God’s promise to Abraham was not dependent on some legal code.
Notice this incredible fact:
• Abraham the “Father” of the Jews
• Would have been a Gentile (i.e. uncircumcised) when he was saved.
• So Abraham is actually the “Father” of all believers,
• All who belong to the household of faith (Rom 2 vs 27-29).
• The apostle Paul’s conclusion is obvious:
• Circumcision had nothing to do with his justification.
• Question: Then why was circumcision given?
• Answer: It was a sign and a seal (Rom. 4:11).
• Circumcision did not add to Abraham’s salvation;
• It merely attested to it.
• As a sign, it was evidence that he belonged to God and believed His promise.
• As a seal, it was a reminder to him that God had given the promise and would keep it.
The key word in this section is promise:
• It is used three times;
• Verses 13,14 & 16.
• Abraham was justified by believing God’s promise, not by obeying God’s Law;
• For God’s Law through Moses had not yet been given.
• The promise to Abraham was given purely through God’s grace.
• Abraham did not earn it or merit it.
So In verse 16 Paul concludes:
• That justification comes by grace, through faith,
• And thus all Jews and Gentiles can be saved!
• Abraham is not only the father of the Jews,
• But of all who follow in the steps of faith (Galatians chapter 3).
(3). Justification is by resurrection power not human effort (verses 18-25)
• The first section contrasted faith and works.
• The second section contrasted law and grace.
• This third section contrasts life and death.
18When God promised Abraham that he would become the father of many nations, Abraham believed him. God had also said, “Your descendants will be as numerous as the stars,” even though such a promise seemed utterly impossible! 19And Abraham’s faith did not weaken, even though he knew that he was too old to be a father at the age of one hundred and that Sarah, his wife, had never been able to have children.
20Abraham never wavered in believing God’s promise. In fact, his faith grew stronger, and in this he brought glory to God. 21He was absolutely convinced that God was able to do anything he promised. 22And because of Abraham’s faith, God declared him to be righteous.
23Now this wonderful truth—that God declared him to be righteous—wasn’t just for Abraham’s benefit. 24It was for us, too, assuring us that God will also declare us to be righteous if we believe in God, who brought Jesus our Lord back from the dead. 25He was handed over to die because of our sins, and he was raised from the dead to make us right with God.
• A contrast between life and death.
• These verses are an expansion of one phrase found in verse 17: “Who gives life to the dead.”
When God made his great promise to Abraham (Gen 12:2-4) he was 75 years old:
• He was at this time still physically able to become a father,
• Because he slept with his servant Hagar and produced Ishmael (Gen 16:1-11).
But in this verse:
• Abraham & Sarah are beyond the age of child-bearing
• One was 90 and the other 100 (Gen 17: 15-21).
• Both Abraham and Sarah’s bodies were dead,
• From a reproductive point of view, they were finished.
• Yet despite the physical evidence of their bodies.
• Abraham kept on believing and he kept on trying for a son!
Paul saw the rejuvenation of Abraham’s body:
• As a picture of resurrection from the dead;
• And then he related it to the resurrection of Christ.
The application to salvation is clear:
• God must wait until the sinner is “dead” and unable to help himself;
• Before He can release His saving power.
• As long as the sinner thinks he is strong enough to do anything to please God,
• He cannot be saved by grace.
• It was when Abraham admitted that he was “dead”
• That God’s power went to work in his body.
• It is when the lost sinner confesses that he is spiritually dead and unable to help himself,
• That God can save him.
Someone might say perhaps God did that because Abraham was somebody important
Ill:
V.I.P & Celebes get preferential treatment.
• Verses 23-24: that is not true,
• All people (whoever) are saved exactly the same way by faith.
2”3The words "it was credited to him" were written not for him alone, 24but also for us, to whom God will credit righteousness”
Verse 25: explains the basis for justification:
“He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification.”
• The death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
• That is something Paul explains in detail in the next chapter.
• Ill: Chapter 5verse 1
• Further proof that justification is a matter of resurrection power not human effort.
