Great Doctrines of Salvation

Okay, I passed out the sheet. Today we're going to talk about justification. Now, just to see if you guys are on top of your game, let's review. What does repentance mean? What's that? To agree. To agree. Repentance. Everybody agree? I disagree. What does repentance mean? It means to have a change of mind. That's all it means. Just to have a change of mind or maybe put it different, to think differently. OK? But could you say that you're sorry? No. Well, you could be sorry. Because you could repent. You might not have been sorry five minutes ago, but you're really sorry now.

That's a change of mind. But sorrow, I think it's very important that we understand that sorrow, I can't say it, sorrow has nothing to do with repentance. How sorry you are is of no consequence. It may influence your change of mind, but God is not going to react to you because you're more sorry than the person sitting next to you. Right?

And we've attached sorrow to repentance in our society. You know, when I had the privilege of teaching all those ladies down in Parker, I said to them, do you think God forgives your sins faster if you're sorry than if you're not? And let me have a show of hands. Eighty percent of them put up their hand. I said, well, if your sorrow was the basis on which He forgave you, I guess you'd be right.

But it isn't. So change of mind. That's all repentance means. And it's important to keep that definition closed in. Alright, conversion. Turn or have a change of direction. So conversion or repentance is a change of mind. Conversion is a change in direction.

Regeneration. Coming to a new state of being. Again birth, a new state of being. And then the last couple of weeks which Craig did a great job on, redemption. This means to buy back. Alright, so today we are going to talk about justification. What does it mean? I hope some of you read the chapter. The word is dichotomy, the Greek word. What's it mean?

To regard righteous? To declare righteous? OK. It means to pronounce somebody righteous. OK. But it does not mean to make somebody righteous. Can you can you get in your mind the difference? To be justified means that the believer is viewed in Christ as righteous and he is treated as such by God, but he may not be justified in himself. Does he understand? This is an important part.

Justification is to pronounce one righteous, but not to make them righteous. It's a judicial act. You understand? You'll hear this term sometimes about judicial acts. Maybe we ought to talk about that a little bit because that's kind of important. Let's pick a contemporary situation. There's a trial going on downtown. There's a trial going on downtown.

And let's say that the defendant in the trial is absolutely guilty, right? He did it. But somehow he gets acquitted. Is he still guilty of the crime? He still did it. But let's say he's found guilty and they sentence him to death. And they take him down to the gallows and they string him up, right? We could say he's been justified. Couldn't we? Did anything change about him? No, there's just a declaration about him. If he was found innocent, even though he did the crime, he would be declared innocent, but he'd still be guilty. So a judicial pronouncement is a pronouncement by a judge whether it accrues to you in fact or not.

Are you a sinner? Have you been a sinner? Yeah, you did. The people on this side of the room did less sinning than the people on this side of the room. But, you're all sinners, right? But because of your faith in Christ, God has declared you or he has justified you, okay? It's his declaration that has nothing to do with what you've done. So what's imputed to you is not necessarily imparted to you.

I want you to understand that point. Do you get it? If you don't get it, raise your hand. Talk about it more. Say it again. It's to pronounce one righteous, it's not to make one righteous. And it'll be really important here in a few minutes, hopefully, to understand that why When you're justified, you are not made righteous, you're just pronounced righteous. But I think it's okay, because if God says you're righteous, who's going to argue?

Right? If he says, okay, you're righteous in my sight. Merle Unger set a divine act whereby an infinitely holy God judicially declares a believing sinner to be righteous and acceptable before because Christ has borne the sinner's sin on the cross. Okay? So if justification means to be declared righteous, what does righteous mean?

You now have a right standing with God because of Christ. Okay. You have a right standing with God. So let's talk about God for a minute. Would you say that God is righteous? In an absolute term, he is righteous, his character, he is transparently holy and righteous in all of his acts. When combined with his love, his righteousness results in grace. He is perfect, he is absolute, he is infinite. So when God being righteous, being that kind of a character, When he says, I declare you, I justify you, it isn't because he's up the bar a little bit, what has he done? Here's my best example that I've used.

How many of you have dogs as pets? So is your dog, your dog is pretty cool, he does dog stuff, but you're not going to go home and marry him, are you? Are you? Or maybe some of you are, I don't know. Why wouldn't you marry your dog? Because he's a dog. Because he's a dog and you're a human being.

That's right. When God says, I'm righteous, and he looks at us, we're not on the same level as God, are we? But when he declares us to be righteous, what does he do? He raises us up. Now go home and declare your dog righteous. Are we righteous because of Christ's work on the cross? The question is, are we only righteous because of Christ's work on the cross? The answer is yes. Yes we are.

It's only because of Him, it's not because of you. And so when God declares you righteous, or He justifies you, He raises you up to the level of Christ standing before Him. So you can't look for righteousness in yourself, it's in Christ. Jesus Christ represents the righteousness of God and the believer becomes what Christ is at the moment that he believes. Do you see that?

So what's the difference between justification and righteousness? The Declaration. Okay. And righteousness is the purity with which the Father sees us when he views us through his Son. You just gave me two definitions of the same word, justification. Well, we are righteous in Christ. Okay. It's because we're seen through his filter. Okay, that's justification. Anybody else want to take a shot at this?

What's the difference between righteousness and justification? Nothing. Look, it says here to justify means to render in regard as righteous. So you can put those two together? Well, let me tell you what Vine says it is. See if you can understand what he says. His answer is more complicated than the question.

Justification means a state of being right. Righteousness means the character or quality of being right or just. So what's the difference between a state and a character or quality? You have to keep justification in mind as that it's a declaration. That God says, you're righteous and that is justification. Righteousness is the quality or character of the being that you are. But your righteousness is not your own, it's in Christ only.

As we spend more time this morning on justification, I think we're going to find it's really important that we understand it, because it's the hallmark of the grace we live under. And if you understand why and the subject of justification, you're much more ready to enter into a more expanded understanding of what grace is. So my question number two is then, does justification mean that one has been made righteous?

No. Romans 3.24, being justified as a gift of his grace through what? The redemption that's in Christ Jesus.

Acts 13.39, and through him everyone who believes is freed from all things from which he could not be freed through the law of Moses. Justification doesn't cause you to be righteous, it just proclaims you to be righteous.

I'm going to probably repeat that a lot. And you have to keep that in mind. It's a declaration by God alone. Okay? Is justification a position or a conditional truth? Everybody say it's position. Everybody say, well, no, it's got to be conditional. If it was conditional, it would be something that was inherent in you.

So tell me what, who doesn't understand position and condition? Come on cowards, put up your hands. Wait, what did you ask? Who doesn't understand position and condition? Oh, thank you. Position never changes. Your position never changes. Your position is what the declaration of God says about who you are in Christ. When he justifies you, it has to be a position. Because it isn't true of you conditionally, but it is true of you in your position in Christ. So what you'll find as you go forward, especially when you're reading Paul's epistles, you're going to find an awful lot of information that is positional. As an example, my old man was crucified with him. How was your crucifixion? Kind of a cool experience? You remember when that happened? Tell me about it.

It's a positional truth. You were crucified with Christ. It's a position, right? But Carole King's position right now, her position and condition are aligned. Everybody hear that? Carole King's position and her condition are now the same thing. Right? How cool is that? Pretty neat, isn't it?

So we have this position, and so it's really important as we study the Word of God, especially Paul's epistles, as you read and study, your mind should occasionally trigger, am I reading about my position here? or my condition. Paul writes every single one of his epistles this way. The first half is position. Here's your position, my brothers. Now, based on your position, here's what your condition should look like. And when you set it up that way, it has to be a grace system. If it was a law system, it would be, here's your condition, and work really hard so you can make it your position. Now, in grace, God gives you the position first. He gives you righteousness. He declares you righteous first. He places you in Christ.

That's the focus of your faith, right? So your condition is not the focus of your faith. The position of truth is the focus of your faith. So you walk around all day long feeling justified, right? initially. Since justification is in Christ and not in ourselves, it has to be a truth of position. 130 some times you read in Paul's epistles this term, in Christ, in the beloved, in, in, in. Whenever you see that, he's talking about a positional truth. Just to repeat, justification is in Christ and it's not in yourself. So it's a truth of position. So just because it isn't in yourself, maybe it's a little shaky.

What do you think? So how then am I assured that I'm justified? How am I going to be sure of that just because that idiot Doyle told me? Or I read it in a Bible somewhere? Or gee, all these people are talking and walking around talking about being justified. They must know something I don't know. How am I assured that I'm justified? Or maybe ask it another way. When does the assurance of justification kick in? When you believe. Really? That easy, huh? Now think about it.

Assurance of justification, when we realize what our Father has done and said, so we read the Word, we understand what God has done and what He said. It's never based on feeling, right? What his testimony says. So it's based on what the Word of God says, right? And someone has said, because God spoke it, I'm sure, because I'm sure I feel at rest. But let's see how honest you are. How many of you know a positional truth, but you've tried to feel it to make it real? I woke up this morning and I didn't feel.

So why is it important that the truths of our new birth and justification become crystal clear to us? Why are those things really important to us? Why should they be important to us? Does God intend for us to live our Christian life based on this lofty position we have? Or does he intend for us to eventuate into experience? What do you think? Are we all supposed to be theologians? Or are we supposed to actually experience this life? We are to experience it, but you have to understand the steps. The first thing is position. The first thing is understanding who you are.

Once you believe, and you're right, once you believe in your position, then the Holy Spirit is going to work that into your condition, into your experience. You only know that by the Word of God. That's the only way. The only place you know about your position is in the Word of God. So, when it comes to superficiality in your life, it can be in this foundational step, and Eboli makes it shallowness and immaturity through your walk. How important is it to understand then, position? It's really important. But you become stronger in your faith the more you're in it, don't you think? And the Spirit of God's job is to make your position clear to you. One of the things that we do is that we try to take that position and instantly make it an experience for us. Now let me read a scenario for you.

One of the first major problems of spiritual growth comes when we've taken our position of justification in Christ by faith. We begin to see a marked difference in our condition. So we see some real progress at the beginning. Because of this we begin to shift our focus of assurance from our eternal position to our temporal condition. Do you understand what I just said? Here you have this position and you bought it, you believed it, and there was a change. But slowly but surely your focus goes off of your position and now you're starting to focus in on your condition.

So, we looked and felt and sounded saved, hence we were assured of our salvage. next morning. But the next morning came the dawn and we didn't look very saved and we didn't feel very saved and we didn't sound very saved either. All day long everything and everybody went wrong and by nightfall we found ourselves at the end of our assurance. Thoroughly shaken we determined to rectify the matter on tomorrow. We're going to fix it tomorrow. The next day we strove to look saved, feel saved, and sound saved, but because we were centered in our condition, all was wretched failure. We even begin to question our salvation. Nobody in this room has ever gone through that scenario, right?

No, yes you have. So, enter the Holy Spirit. What's His job? He's to refocus you on your faith and on the position that's true of you, not how you feel about it. So, back to the Word of God, you go. And so, is that a necessary experience for believers? How many think it probably is? Sure it is. Absolutely. How do you get solidified?

So it's necessary, the necessity of knowing and abiding in your position. The Lord is so gracious to us that we say to Him, I've had enough of this position, I'm going conditional. He says, okay, have fun. And then you learn and you come back and you say, you know what, I think I'm going to stick with position from now on. We go and we receive with meekness the engrafted word. We begin to trust what God tells us in spite of how we feel about it.

In spite of the circumstances we live in. I'll quote a poem by John Wesley. Frames and feelings fluctuate. These can never thy Savior be. Learn thyself in Christ to see. Then, by befeelings what they will, Jesus is still my Savior. Everybody understand the little lesson on position and condition?

You read the Word of God, you find out in the Word of God that you have been justified, you have been declared righteous. Whether you function righteously or not is not the point. Eventually it will be, but initially it's what God's declaration is about you. That's really important and that's what you hang with. and you trust the Spirit of God to work that position into your condition.

He's the only one that can. You can't speed it up or slow it down. Is that righteousness the same as Abraham's righteousness? Okay. Abraham was declared righteous because he believed God. Is that the same righteousness you and I have? What do you think? Is Abraham saved?

Yes. Absolutely. He's not? He is. Abraham was saved. How did he get saved? He had a conversion. Turn off your hearing aid. You know what I bought? I bought one of those things to watch TV so I can hear. I probably ought to go get some hearing aids. My sanity keeps me from doing that. Abraham is saved, right? Is his righteousness and yours the same? How many think yeah? How many think no, maybe it's a little different?

It's believing God. He believed God, that was the catalyst that got him in. What's that method of getting there? The method's the same. But I mean from the standpoint that we believe in the finished work Right? He just believed what God told him. See, the believer, because he is positioned in Christ, and you won't find any language that says Abraham was in Christ. Because the believer is in Christ, now whose righteousness does he have? Christ. We are God's righteousness in Christ. Your standing, your justification, your righteousness is His. But you have it because of your position in Christ.

But Abraham, Christ was nowhere to be found than Abraham. That's right. The information was different. But because God came to him and said, Hey Abraham, I'm going to do these things. And Abraham said, Okay, I believe you. He made him, he gave him standing before himself.

But that standing is not the same standing as Christ has before the Father, is it? Is Christ standing before the Father greater than Abraham's? Yes. So where would you rather be, in Christ or in Abraham? In Christ. Absolutely. And that's where you are. But as far as his eternal destiny, was he just as secure as we are? Totally secure.

Because once God makes a declaration, He makes it from an eternal standpoint. He doesn't make it from a time-space standpoint. He doesn't say, okay, Thursday you're justified, but we're going to check back on Wednesday, next week. No. Once he makes the declaration, it's done.

It's the same method of being declared righteous before God. The standing of righteousness itself is different. Because the righteousness you and I have is the very righteousness of Christ. What's the verse? He who knew no sin was made sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in Christ. See how that goes? It's God's very righteousness in Christ that we have been made. Alright with that? That's different.

What about Adam? Before his fall, there wasn't an issue of righteousness because he was innocent. So after his fall, where did his righteousness plug in? That's one of my questions. No, it's good. We'll talk about it now. That's the very next question. You need a guy like him. It keeps you moving along.

What's the difference between Adam before he sinned and the justification of the Christian? What is the difference? So Adam before he sinned, now here he is, he's in the garden, no sin, no death, has a relationship with God, doesn't he? He walks with him in the cool of the evening. How cool is that? That's better than going to a And so, what's Adam's relationship with God? Let's talk about who Adam is.

He's created. He's in the image and liveness of God. He's got life in him. He's innocent. What's innocence mean? He doesn't know good from evil. But he has a standing. He doesn't have, notice that the hook was, what was the tree called in the garden? The tree that caused this? The tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Do you think Adam understood evil? Nah. Do you think he understood good?

To some degree he did because God, when God finished creating Adam he said it's good. But there was no contrast. And Adam was innocent, which meant that he didn't have experience, and he didn't have to exercise his will to pick. God said, why don't you name the animals? He said, okay. But he didn't have to decide.

Let's see, you look like a Bruce, and you look like a, you know. I mean, he just named them. And whatever they were, they still are today. And he had this relationship. So, does he have righteousness? Does he have a right standing before God? No, before he fell. Yeah, he had a right standing. He has a relationship. Yeah, he couldn't walk in the pool of the evening without it. Well, maybe put it this way.

Does Adam need justifying? No, he doesn't. He doesn't. He didn't need to be justified because he didn't do anything yet. Okay? He was innocent and he was good. So, you could say, well, we need to be justified, don't we? Because we don't have anything. Maybe answer it this way. Was Adam holy? Let's talk about that. Set apart. He was holy before you threw him along. That dirty dog. Here's the thing about holiness.

Does innocence equate to righteousness? Yeah, does innocence equate to righteousness? No, it doesn't. No. Because you can be created by God and not have a righteous standing before him. God created Adam, he was good and he hung out with him and talked to him, but he didn't have a standing other than just being a creature. He created Satan too. Lucifer, yeah. But he had a soul already, a spirit. Sure did. So... That's the part of you that would be declared righteous. If you needed it. If you needed it. If you didn't need it. And without sin you don't need it. I would say he had a standing until... Doesn't he have a right standing in the position he's in? created man at that point.

And that's the difference. That's why all this came to understanding. He is a created being. He has right standing in his creation. And before the fall, he has right standing in what he is. He's a created man. And what God created him to be. So he has right standing there. But it's not on the level that we now have as you know, the whole thing about my understanding finally why he needed somebody when he's, you know, needed Eve, because he wasn't on the same level. But I think he has right standing in his position as a created being. So he has right standing. So he has righteousness in him. Right standing as created head of the race, dominion over the race and all those things.

Right, he has that, but it's not the same righteousness that we have now, which is in Christ, which is on a level minus deity with Christ. I have always equated or contrasted innocence with holiness. Holiness is to be set apart, but there is another aspect of holiness. God is holy, which means he loves good and he hates evil.

Understand that? He loves good and righteousness. He hates evil. But he cannot do wrong. That's part of his holiness. Yeah. Adam didn't have that understanding. He didn't love the good and hate evil. He didn't know what evil was. He didn't really understand what good was.

See? So, when God declares you righteous in Christ, you become holy positionally. So you, in fact, as Carol King right now, loves goodness, hates evil, with a godly hatred. Do you think she remembers evil? I don't think so. Well, I think so. Because he has the mind of Christ and God doesn't, you know, he doesn't say, well, I'm not going to look at evil when it's there. I mean, he's still got the holes in his hands and in his side, which demonstrates that he understood what evil was and what it cost.

There's no focus on evil. So where did Adam function from with his relationship to God? Was it out of love or obedience? Yeah, I think Adam loved God. I think he liked hanging around with him. But God wasn't enough for him, was he? And who knew that? Adam or God? God knew it.

And he said, it's not good for man to be alone. Because Adam is naming all these animals, you know, and they're coming up, male and female, male and female. And I don't see any of these females that look like me. And so God created Eve. to fulfill Adam and to be a helpmate for him, right? And God saw that it wasn't good that Adam should be alone.

But the difference between that and us is that God is enough for us because our being recreated in Christ, when you get to heaven, are you going to be married? How many think, yeah, I am? How many think, no, I won't be? you're going to be the bride of Christ. So all that is lacking in you, which is everything, will be fulfilled by your union, which is now true of us now, by our union with Christ. So marriage is really the symbol of your union with Christ. That's really what it is.

So Adam, before he falls, It's not that God gives him a helpmate. Does he have a relationship? Oh, he certainly does. He recognizes God. He has communication with Him. He can think. He can discuss. He can love God and be loved by God. But when he sins, all that changes. He becomes afraid because he's dealing with a holy and righteous God.

Okay, Steve? So is justification something that man does or God does? Wait a minute, let me ask you what you just said. What do you mean he's afraid? You mean he was afraid after he took a bite? That's right. But not before? No, that's right. So it's an undertaking by God. Why would it have to be an undertaking by God and not man? We don't have the ability to do that.

Now it's interesting, Romans 5.1 says that, therefore having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. That having been justified, in Greek is an eris passive. Eris means it's a completed act in the past. You know what a passive voice means? You didn't participate. It just came your way. So you have been justified by God and it's all His undertaking. So let's look at some verses.

Let's look at Romans 8.28-30. I want to point out something there. So when somebody gets there, go ahead and read it.

And we know that all things work together to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose, For whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Moreover, whom he predestined, these he also called. Whom he called, these he also justified. And whom he justified, these he also glorified." Okay, so I want you to look at the progression there. Justification is the last and consummating work for the believer while he's still in the world.

What I love about this verse is that we are called, we are justified, and we are glorified, and all of those are Aristenses. Now the latest person I know that has been glorified is Carole King. Have you guys been glorified? Well, why would it be Aristenses? Yeah, because from God's perspective, it's as good as done. Now, I'm going to do something without interjecting into the Word.

If you couldn't find cause for justification because you've come short of the glory of God, let me reverse the order. Because of the redemption which is secured in Christ Jesus, God is free to exercise His grace towards ungodly sinners. even justifying them eternally, though finding no cause for justification in the sinner outside the fact that the righteousness of God has been bestowed upon all who believe. So, the undertaking of God to cause us to be righteous is something that only He could do. Why only Him? Because there was no sin. No sin?

I mean, God could only do it because it had to be a spotless sacrifice. If you're God, and you want human beings to have a relationship with human beings, and because of Adam's fall, there's no chance in any of them that they could ever come to this line, then you have to take it upon yourself to do it.

So, if you're going to redeem mankind, it's got to be a man who does it, right? Because it's a man who blew it. So it's got to be a man who redeems it. So who's the redeemer? Christ himself, the God-man. So he's the one that comes, and he's the only one that can make satisfaction to God regarding man's lost position. lost position.

Hear the word? So he does. He satisfies all of the demands of God's holiness and his righteousness. And so what happens? God raises him from the dead and now God deals with mankind through a new man, a different man. He used to be Adam, now it's Christ. So Christ has, because of what he's done, he has this entirely new, there now is a man who has an entirely new relationship with God that the old man, even before he fell, didn't have.

Because he has satisfied all of God's demands, regarding the sin, and you have to look at sin from God's side of the table. From God's side of the table, how does he view sin? It's an offense against his holiness and his righteousness, and he can't let it go, because he is holy. He has to be satisfied about the sin, and he's the one that set the rules. What did he tell Adam about sin?

The soul that sins, what happens to it? It's going to die. It's going to be separated. So what happens to Christ? He dies. He fulfills the requirement. But because he does fulfill the requirement, God raises him from the dead. And once he does that, he raises him from the dead and now he has a standing before God as a man that no other man has ever had before. So from that position now he can deal with men because he looks at Christ and says, well you know, like he looked at Adam and the whole race fell, now he can look at Christ and say, wow, through Christ here, now this new man, I can now deal with the whole race through him.

So he can do this declaring process, he can declare me righteous He can justify me, what do I have to do to get in that loop? What's he require of me? It's all he requires, that I believe. And why faith? Why that loop? I mean, why didn't he say 15 cents is enough? Or walk on your knees up to Calvary? Or I don't know, pick something. You know, go without food for a week. That would be kind of a work.

That's right. You see, because he is God, he wants all the glory. Not selfishly, but just because he is God. What's the one thing you and I can do that gives him all the glory? We can believe in what he's done. See? It's an act we do that we get no credit for. Because we believe in what somebody else did. He still maintains the glory. So he can say, I've called you, I've justified you, I've glorified you. And you know what's interesting about Romans 8, 28, 29, and 30?

Notice it doesn't say in there, and I've sanctified you. It doesn't say somewhere in there, and I sanctified you. Why doesn't it say that? Because sanctification is a process of your condition. These other things are pronouncements of your position. Sanctification isn't over until you check out. And then you're totally sanctified. Positionally you are now, but not conditionally. So did I make myself perfectly unclear? Okay. Why does it take Calvary in order to allow... No, I'm not done yet.

So on what grounds are you said to be justified? What are the grounds? God's ground rules, ground work. What does he say, I'll justify you based on? The work of Christ. That's right, the work of Christ on the cross. It's the redeeming death of Christ by which you believe in that God says, that's the ground. What's the proof or the guarantee that God accepts that work?

What's the guarantee? No? Resurrection is the guarantee. Why? Why would resurrection be the guarantee? It proves God is satisfied. You see that? If God is not satisfied with what Christ did, guess what? No resurrection. It proves that sin was conquered. It proves the entire work of the cross was totally satisfying to God. It took care of every issue. So he raised Christ from the dead. That's the guarantee.

But the one who does not, Romans 4, 5 says, but the one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies, there's that word, the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness. How cool is that? I mean, there is one of the most gracious statements in all of the Word of God. but to the one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly."

And oh by the way, in order to qualify for justification, you have to be ungodly. How come? You wouldn't need it. You wouldn't need it if you weren't ungodly. So he justifies my faith. So why does man need justification and righteousness? And this is about where we're going to pick up next week, because I'm going to expand on what wonderful people you are.

Ecclesiastes 7.20 says, Indeed, there is not a righteous man on earth who continually does good and who never sins. Except for Monique.

Romans 3.10-20 is the verse that's the most condemning verse. It is written, there is none righteous, not even one. There is none that understands. There is none who speaks for God.

So we'll pick up there next week, which is why you need justification. Okay, let's close. Father, how we thank you for your righteous act on the cross in Christ Jesus, and that you raised him from the dead, and that you ask us, invite us to believe in his person and work, and when we do, you justify us, you declare us righteous before you. We thank you, Father, we pray in your Son's precious name. Amen.