Justification, Part 2

Review of the Parable and the Meaning of Justification

0:04 encourage you to turn in your own Bibles to the 18th chapter of the Gospel according to Luke as we continue our studies in this very, I don't know what adjective to use, I was thinking of the word helpful, but that was rather anemic, strategic, and that didn't say everything, but this wonderful and instructive parable of our Lord concerning the publican and the Pharisee, and particularly as this parable sets before us, God's answer to the most profound religious question that any person

0:43 can ask, namely, how can sinful men find acceptance with a holy God? There is no more profound a religious question than that. How can sinful men find acceptance with a holy God? And this parable,

1:06 the word of God in the Gospel, speaks directly, explicitly, clearly to that very point. I shall read the parable briefly, catch up the threads of the main thoughts that we've studied together in our previous five studies, and then we shall launch upon the sixth in this series of studies tonight. Verse 9, And he spake also this parable unto certain who trusted in themselves that they were righteous.

1:36 And set all others at naught. Two men went up into the temple to pray, the one a Pharisee and the other a publican. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee that I am not as the rest of men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I give.

2:07 But the publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote his breast, saying, God, be thou merciful to me, the sinner. I say unto you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other, for every one that exalteth himself shall be humble. But he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.

2:47 Just a word again about the occasion of this parable. Our Lord, having detected a spirit of self-trust, detecting that some were trusting in themselves that they were righteous, speaks this parable in order to expose the fallacy of any hope of seeking acceptance with God which is based upon what we are or what we are not. We have done. And so in the prayer of the Pharisee, our Lord underscores what it is to seek acceptance on the basis of what we are in our characters or what we have done in our religious performance.

3:27 When the Pharisee says, I thank thee I am not his other man, what he is saying in essence is God, there is that in my character which is the basis of my commending myself to you. Accept me in your sight as righteous. He is righteous because of what I am. I am not as the rest of men, these sinners. I have a righteous character which in itself is adequate to find acceptance. And then secondly, as though he had second thoughts, well there may be a little lacking in my character.

3:58 And if so, my religious performance will sort of be putty in the holes. It will somehow fill up the cracks in my hull that I might go sailing into the presence of God. And therefore he says, Something about his religious performance. I fast and I tithe. And when you boil it all down, you have in its most elementary essence a man who thinks he will find acceptance before God on the basis of what he is in himself and on the basis of what he performs in the way of religious exercises.

4:31 Would to God this spirit had died when this man died. But that spirit lived long before he lived and it lives to this day. Had the eyes of God to be omissioned, I'm sure I could find that spirit in the hearts of some of you here this very night who think that you will find acceptance before God in some way on the basis of what you are and on the basis of what you are able to perform. But in direct contrast to this, we have the prayer of the publican, a beautiful embodiment of a man who feels and owns his sinfulness, who's standing off at a distance.

5:12 Shamed at the sense of his sin in the presence of a holy God. Looks completely out of himself for the grounds of his acceptance. Probably with his eye that would not look up to heaven, the place of God's dwelling. Probably, I say, that eye fixed upon the altar of sacrifice. He pleads that God would be propitious to him, a sinner. Literally, the sinner.

5:38 He does not in any way commend his character, his performance. As the basis of acceptance, but looking wholly out of himself, he looks unto the living God and to the way of God's provision that he might be accepted. The result of the different prayers our Lord clearly indicates in verse 14. I say unto you, regardless of what religion may say, regardless of what man's instincts of what will be the basis of acceptance may say, Jesus says, It is only the publican.

6:12 It is only the publican, the man who looks out of himself to another, the one who owns his sinfulness and doesn't veil that sinfulness. He, our Lord says, went down to his house justified rather than the other. And then he clinches it with this parabolic-like statement, Everyone that exalteth himself shall be humbled, but he that humbleth himself shall be exalted. And there is nothing so humbling as the Bible way of acceptance.

6:42 Nothing so humbling as the way that says we must look wholly out of ourselves to another for our acceptance. Hence it is a fitting conclusion to the parable. Now, that in seven minutes is the substance of five hours of exposition and application. And what we are doing tonight, and it's the second of our studies, having confronted this key biblical word in verse 14, I say unto you, this man went down to his house justified.

7:16 We're going to park there for a while. And what I'm doing is giving you somewhat of a rearranged and more popular presentation of the series of lecture sermons that I gave at the Reformed Baptist Pastors Conference a few months ago. And since I spent a number of work days that you were paying for as a congregation, I felt it only right that you should reap the fruit of your investment. Hence, I've reworked some of this material.

7:42 And for the next couple of Lord's Day evenings, we're going to be focusing upon what Jesus meant when he said, I say unto you, this man went down to his house justified. When that publican found acceptance before God, that acceptance is described in the word justified. What does that word mean? What was the precise condition of that man who, pleading nothing but his sinfulness, went down to his house?

8:12 In this state and in this condition. Well, last week, we spent the entire time simply trying to show the meaning of the word justify from a biblical perspective. Bible words must be defined biblically. And we saw that the meaning of the word justify throughout the scriptures is basically this.

8:36 It means to declare or to pronounce just. To declare or to pronounce just. To declare or to pronounce just. To pronounce right before the standard of God's law.

8:46 It is a legal term. It has to do with the courtroom. It has to do with a man standing before the law to which he is obligated and by which he is bound. And we saw that this must be the biblical meaning of the biblical word because there are many contexts in which any other meaning is absolutely impossible.

9:08 In which the opposite word, condemn, is often joined to it. And to condemn someone is a legal declaration. We saw that parallel terms have the whole concept of a legal declaration. And then the context in which the doctrine of justification is stated is always the context in which man is being treated as one who is created by God, who is subject to the law of God and answerable to the court of God.

9:39 And we concluded then, and this concludes our review, with stating that when Jesus said of the publican that he went down to his house justified, our Lord was assuming that there was a real God and a real court of heaven to which both the publican and the Pharisee were answerable. If the one man went down to his house justified and the other man unjustified, then there must have been some true court of heaven before which that sentence came forth. No justification. No justification justified before God.

10:15 And we closed with that sobering note that this parable then no longer becomes something detached from us. We are no longer standing as it were in the outer court of the temple looking in, listening to the prayers, analyzing the prayers. It comes home squarely to our own hearts because you are answerable to the same court of heaven to which the publican and the Pharisee were answerable and you tonight sit in this court of heaven. This place either justified, declared righteous, accepted before God or you're in the state of condemnation and liable to his wrath and to his judgment.

The Substance of Justification: An Overview from the Westminster Standards

10:54 Now then, having established the meaning of the word justify from the scriptures, we move now to a fleshing out of the grand doctrine of justification. Having, I trust, established that the word means, basically, to declare or to...

11:11 or to pronounce righteous, what I wish to do tonight is to give a broad overview of the substance of this great biblical doctrine. The substance of the biblical doctrine of justification. How shall we come at it? Well, after reading at least some 1,500 plus pages on the doctrine and the major theology books on it and checking all of the relevant or most of the relevant passages in scripture and feeling hopelessly confused before such a massive, the doctrine in so much material, I finally ended up doing what I did a few years ago when I conducted a study on the doctrine of sanctification with you, namely, going to the Westminster Standards and using the catechisms and confession

11:56 as a guide as to what the scriptures teach in this vital area. And that's what I want to do tonight. I don't think I'll have much more time than to do this. I want us to look, first of all, at the shorter catechism, the larger, and then the confession, but now aware that there may be amongst us some people who are not familiar with confessions and creeds and who perhaps are rather shocked that someone who is known to be an expounder of the word of God would actually quote non-inspired sources from the pulpit.

12:31 And may I just say a word for your sake about the use of confessions and catechisms, and I think the best thing I can do is just to quote from Spurgeon in his introduction to the baptism, which was an adaptation of the Westminster Confession with minor changes in several areas. Spurgeon says, upon initiating a reprinting of this, this little volume is not issued as an authoritative rule or code of faith, whereby you are to be fettered, but as an assistance to you in controversy, I'm sure Spurgeon would have said controversy, being a good Britisher, a confirmation in faith, and a means of edification in righteousness.

13:14 Here, the younger members of our church will have a body of divinity, that is, a system of theology in small compass, and by means of the scriptural proofs will be ready to give reason for the hope that is in there. And so the great Baptist preacher, and many Baptists ignorantly say, we Baptists have no creed but Christ. Well, that may be modern-day Baptist, but that's not historical Baptist. There has been a great strain of creedal and confessional standards within the historic Baptist movement.

13:48 And so the great help, then, of a confession is that it is a guide to us, it is an aid to us in seeing the truth of God in a succinct way. And then, of course, it is such an aid because it is the fruit of the most mature reflections of the most sanctified and able minds and hearts of God's servants. One of the richest periods in the history of the church. If we believe that the Holy Spirit has indwelt the church of Christ throughout its entire history, then He is present to illuminate the minds of His people as to the truth of Scripture.

14:26 And when you come to that mother of all confessions, the Westminster Confession, you have there the cream of the devout minds of godly, scholarly servants of Christ who, as it were, with one eye upward, to the Lord for light upon the sacred page to state the truth of God accurately, and then one eye over the shoulder looking down through the history of the church and seeing the errors into which the people of God had fallen in past days, stated the doctrine in such a way that it embodied all the major strands of biblical truth and then it set up barriers against all the major heresies of the past. Now, any such product,

15:10 no, no intelligent Christian will despise or in a smart-alecky way say, well, I just got my Bible and the Holy Ghost and that's all I need. Dear ones, that's pure ignorance. And, I might add, impudence as well. And so, I am using the confessional standards because they are a cream, the cream of the insights of the people of God concerning the biblical truth and we hold to them only so far as they accurately state the truth of the Scripture and the truth of the Bible.

15:41 And help us to understand it. Now, let me begin, as I did with the doctrine of sanctification, with the shorter catechism. Because the shorter catechism is like looking at a scene from 500 yards. You'll see the biggest objects, you'll get the general overview.

15:56 The larger catechism is like moving up and looking at it from 100 yards. You see more detail. None of what you saw at 500 yards is gone, you just see a lot more. And there's more definition.

16:09 Then when you go to the confession, that's like going over, the scene with the magnifying glass. And you look at each part of it. Now, it's the same scene, same ingredients, same stones, flowers, people. But you see there is that progression, starting from a distance with the shorter catechism, moving to the more defined, to the most defined.

Justification in the Shorter Catechism: Six Key Elements

16:28 And as we do this, I hope you'll find this interesting and in the truest sense, spiritually thrilling. I find it every time I go over this material and I hope it will be the same to you. Listen now, and grasp the main lines of thought that are set before us. What does it mean to have God declare me righteous?

16:51 Well, the shorter catechism, and I quote now from the Baptist catechism compiled by Spurgeon, which again, follows word for word the shorter catechism except in several areas. Question number 32. What is justification? The answer?

17:08 Justification is an act of God's free grace wherein He pardons all our sins and accepts us as righteous in His sight only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us and received by faith alone. Six main objects stand out as we look at the doctrine of justification from the shorter catechism. Here they are. God is the author.

17:39 Justification is an act of God. Secondly, free grace is the source. It is an act of God's free grace. And the very mention of that term makes me want to preach, but I won't.

17:53 I'll stop there. But its source is God's free grace. Thirdly, the essence wherein He pardons all our sins and accepts us as righteous in His sight. The essence of justification is pardon and acceptance in the sight of God.

18:13 This man went down to his house justified. He went down pardoned. He went down accepted in the sight of God. Three things thus far.

18:23 God's the author. Free grace the source. Pardon and acceptance the essence. Now what is the ground of it?

18:31 Only for the righteousness of Christ. The ground of that pardon, the ground of that acceptance is Christ's righteousness. Now what is the method? How does that righteousness become ours?

18:47 Is it infused? No. Listen. Imputed to us.

18:53 Imputation is the method. And dear ones, though that's a big word, that's the heart of the doctrine. If you miss the method, you miss the truth. How did that man go down to his house justified?

19:05 Did God work something in him that made his character so perfect that God looked down from heaven and saw him? And saw the naked character of that man such as to say, I will now accept him and pardon him because of what I've wrought in him? No, no. No, no.

19:22 He went down to his house justified because God imputed or put to his account the righteousness of another. Imputation is the method. Sixth line of thought in the shorter catechism. Received by faith alone.

19:38 Faith alone is the means of reception. That's it. Now you've got those six lines of thought. There they are beautifully stated.

Justification in the Larger Catechism: Added Detail and Heresy Barriers

19:46 Justification, act of God's free grace. God the author, free grace the source, pardon and acceptance the essence, the righteousness of Christ the grounds, imputation the method, faith the way of reception. Now let's move up to a hundred yards and turn to the larger catechism. And I read now from the larger catechism and under the questions, what is justification?

20:14 This is the answer. Justification is an act of God's free grace. Nothing different than the beginning. God's the author, free grace the source, but now something is added.

20:28 Unto sinners. Who are the objects? Sinners. When Jesus said this man went down to his house justified, what had been his plea?

20:43 God be merciful to me, the man who used to be a sinner, but who's already sinned. All cleaned up now? Now his plea was God be merciful to me, the what? Sinner.

20:53 He made his plea as a sinner. Sinner determined to go on a sinner. Not a sinner determined still to be wedded to his sins. No doubt the work of grace had produced repentance, but his plea was that he might receive mercy as a sinner.

21:10 And so as we move up to a hundred yards, we see the larger catechism emphasizing this added thought. God the author, free grace the source, but sinners the object, in which he pardoneth all their sins, and accepteth and accounteth their persons righteous in his sight. That's the essence. Now we have a negative statement.

21:32 Not for anything wrought in them or done by them, but only for the perfect obedience and full satisfaction of Christ. The righteousness of Christ the grounds, but they want underscored, so they state it negatively first. Not for anything wrought in them. Not because God saw that he worked something in that publican, that now he could smile.

21:58 No, no, no, no. That wasn't the way, the reason he went down to his house justified. Nothing done by them. It wasn't his prayer.

22:05 It wasn't his humility that was the ground of his acceptance, but the perfect obedience and full satisfaction of Christ. This tells us how the righteousness of Christ is wrought out. The shorter catechism. says the ground is the righteousness of Christ alone.

22:22 What is that righteousness? It's the righteousness of his obedience and his satisfaction. That is his death upon the cross in the place of sinners. By God imputed to them the same thought, imputation, the method, and received by faith alone.

22:39 However, the larger catechism then goes on, looking back now over their shoulders, the framers of the catechism and the confession, realize there were past heresies and past objections to this doctrine. So the next question is this. How is justification an act of God's free grace? If a man is justified on the basis of the fact that Christ fully kept the law for him and fully paid the punishment of a broken law on his behalf, isn't that a matter of pure justice now that God would forgive the sinner?

23:15 How can you call justification on the grounds, of that kind of righteousness, a justification of grace? Well, they answer that objection in this question. It's not my purpose to answer it tonight, but just to point out that they faced the objection and they answered. Then they go on to enlarge on another area where there's been great confusion, past and present.

23:36 What is justifying faith? If that publican went down to his house justified because he believed in the living God and in his salvation, what was the nature of that? What was the nature of that faith by which he believed? And so the larger catechism takes up the nature of justifying faith.

23:56 And then it goes on in the next question to say, how does faith justify the sinner in the sight of God? And again, they're looking in the church history and they see heresies. You know what some people have taught and they teach to this day? God says to the sinner, keep my law perfectly or you die.

24:12 But what he says in the gospel is, here's a lesser law, the law of faith, just believe, and your faith will be accounted as perfect. That's what he says. It is perfect obedience and I will justify you on the ground of your faith. And they answer that objection.

24:25 We're not justified on the ground of our faith. We're justified on the ground of Christ's righteousness. We come into possession of that righteousness by faith. But they saw that heresy.

24:35 They were jealous for the souls of men. So they put a question in the paragraph in the answer to guard the precious biblical truth. And then, because there is so much confusion on the relationship between justification and sanctification, the last question in the larger catechism dealing with this subject is this, wherein do justification and sanctification differ? And they give a classic answer to this question.

25:02 So you see what we've done? Shorter catechism, we've looked at the broad outline from a distance. Larger catechism, we've seen other details filled in. Then as we were, we looked behind the scenes and we see all the enemies of this doctrine and four questions.

Justification in the Confession of Faith: Magnifying Glass Detail

25:17 And the answers to those questions set up barriers to hedge us up from falling into the same errors. Now turn in your hymnals, please, to the statement in the confession of faith. Now we're up close with a magnifying glass, 679 in your hymnals, 679 in your hymnals. And here you have six brief paragraphs on the subject of justification.

25:51 Paragraph one. Paragraph one. What does it tell us? Those whom God effectually calleth.

25:56 Ah, here's something added. Though God is the author and free grace the source, who are the ones who come into this blessing? Those whom God calls by His grace. Those whom He effectually draws out of a state of nature into a state of grace.

26:14 He freely justifies negative statement, not by infusing righteousness into them, but by pardoning them. Not for their sins and accounting and accepting their persons as righteous, not for anything wrought in them or done by them, but for Christ's sake alone. That's the shorter catechism. Nor by imputing faith itself, the act of believing, or any other evangelical obedience to them.

26:41 That's one of the questions in the larger catechism. But by imputing the obedience and the satisfaction of Christ unto them, they receiving and resting on Him and His righteousness. By faith, which faith they have not of themselves, it is the gift of God. And here they hedge up the graciousness of justification.

27:02 Even the faith by which we lay hold of it is God's gift. And then they go on to describe the nature of saving faith in paragraph two. In paragraph three, how Christ becomes the ground of our acceptance. Paragraph four, they hedge up from another heresy.

27:21 The heresy of eternal justification. Paragraph number five, that though we are justified once for all, the sins of justified people are true sins that need repentance and forgiveness and may incur God's frown. What are they doing? They're hedging up another heresy.

27:41 Throughout the history of the church, people said, well look, if we're declared righteous once for all, we're accepted in Christ, then God doesn't see sin in believers. I've heard people say that. I've heard that with my own ears. I've heard them say it.

27:54 God doesn't see sin in believers anymore. And so therefore there's no need for continuing repentance, continuing confession. Ah no, they've seen this heresy. They've read their church history books.

28:05 They've seen the souls of men deluded and damned by that heresy. So they're guarding us by this statement. And then last of all, the justification of believers under the Old Testament was in all these respects, one and the same. Same with the justification of believers under the New Testament.

28:26 The errors of that system that would say God accepted people on a little different grounds in another age or dispensation than in our own is no new thing. It's been sharpened and defined in more detail in recent years, the past hundred. But the elements of it were present throughout the history of the church. So they're hedging up another heresy.

28:46 God has one way of saving sinners. Did the publican go down to his house? Was he justified when he looked out of himself unto God and to his provision for acceptance? If Adam was justified, that's exactly how he was justified.

29:02 When Abel was justified, and I know Abel was a justified man because Hebrews tells us that he was, he is called righteous Abel. How did he come that way? The same way you do. The same way I do.

29:14 We have much more light, a much clearer definition of the ground of acceptance. Because Christ has now come and brought life and immortality to light through the gospel, but God has had but one way of accepting sinners. Well, I hope all that material so quickly and gone over so hurriedly has not confused, but I hope it's had an overall impression. And that overall impression being that when Jesus used this simple little word, this man went down to his house justified.

Application: Engaging with Confessional Standards

29:46 There was compressed into that word. This grand expression. This expansive, beautiful, glorious doctrine of justification by the grace of God. Now, by way of application, before we, and we do have time to move on to begin to break this down in detail, let me say several things.

30:08 If I'm speaking tonight to any who have been ignorant of or indifferent to confessions of faith and catechisms, may I urge you to give up that sinful indifference. With some of you, perhaps it's just been ignorance that there were such wonderful things. I'll never forget the first time I found the Westminster Confession of Faith. I was down in Augusta, Georgia for a summer, laboring in a little church in a poor section, and I somehow got hold of one from John Knox Press.

30:39 I'll never forget the experience of reading that thing. I didn't know such a thing existed. I came through four years of Christian schools. Have you ever encouraged me to look into a confession of faith?

30:50 No. No. No. This is a terrible thing.

30:54 And there may be some of you who have come by that same route. And I do not scold you tonight. All I say is if God's brought you here and your heart and mind have been enriched and warmed as I've read from these standards, buy yourself a confession of faith. And get one off our book table.

31:11 Have Ralph Orner some. Get some catechisms. Get our own confessional standard. And with your Bible open to check the Scriptural proofs, begin to read to sharpen your perspective And let your mind and spirit be honed by the great minds and spirits of past days who have labored to present the truth of God in a clear manner.

31:33 Let me say to you young men, of which we have several here tonight, who aspire to the work of the ministry, make much of confessional standards. Make it obvious to men that you're not preaching any Johnny-come-lately doctrine. Stand with a proper sense, not of fleshly pride, but that sense of great privilege that you are but echoing to your generation what the church of God has said in all her generations. You do not come with some new thing.

32:04 You speak the truth of the Bible. Yes, everyone claims to speak the truth of the Bible. But what is the truth of the Bible? Here's where the confessions help us.

32:12 To state that truth accurately and succinctly and comprehensively. So my word of exhortation would be directed not only to individuals, who are ignorant of these things that you get acquainted, but to all who aspire to the work of the ministry. And also I speak now in the third place a word to parents. We make available what I think is one of the finest little catechisms for young children, the one put out by the Hayes Evangelical Church in England, which is a modification of the old children's catechism of the Southern Presbyterian Church.

32:48 At least that's as far back as I've been able to trace it. And it's beautiful in its treatment. What is the statement of these statements? What is justification?

32:55 It is God forgiving sinners and treating them as righteous in His sight. That's the statement in that little children's catechism. Catechize your children. Instruct them long before they have any inward perception of what this means.

33:13 It's setting the categories that when the heresies come, the mind is at least in some measure immunized against the heresy. The barrier has been raised, at least intellectually, and I'm amazed at how many of the heresies in our present day are simply old heresies dressed up and everybody treats them like some new thing. When, as Solomon says, there is no new thing under the sun, heresy included. And then my last word of exhortation would be to anyone who sits here tonight and is saying in his mind or heart, what in the world is all this fuss about?

Application: The Weight of Sin and the Answer of Justification

33:49 That man up there working up a sweat on a hot night about justification and reading. From confessions, what's the reason for all this? My friend, listen to me. You begin to feel the weight of your sin, and all this will make sense.

34:06 You begin to have as your greatest problem in life how you, a guilty sinner, can find acceptance with God. And you'll hang on every word.

34:17 Because we're dealing with God's answer to that problem. Now, you may be like the fellow that a friend of mine picked up one time in a car, and was hitchhiking, and driving along the road, and he saw a sign which said, Christ is the answer. And the fellow turned to my friend and said, Sir, what's the question? Christ is the answer.

34:39 Yeah, but what's the question? Well, you see, until this fellow felt something of the burden of the question, telling him Christ is the answer was mere religious drivel. And there may be some here tonight, I would be greatly surprised if there were not some, who really have sat there wondering, what in the world is all this to do about one little word, this man, who went down to his house, justifying, talking about confessions, and catechisms, and 500 yards, and 100...

35:04 What's all this? Ah, my friend, listen. Listen, I'll tell you what it's all about. Some of us have stood where that publican has stood.

35:15 Through the Scriptures, we've come to see that God is our Creator. He has bound us to perfect obedience to His law. And by the same Scriptures, we've come to see that we've broken His law. We've trampled underfoot, we've trampled underfoot, we've trampled underfoot, we've trampled underfoot, we've trampled underfoot, we've trampled underfoot, we've trampled underfoot, we are polluted in our natures, we have nothing to commend ourselves to God, and we've cried out, where, oh where, is there a refuge for my guilty soul?

35:42 And we found the answer in the biblical doctrine of justification by faith alone through the imputation of the righteousness of Jesus Christ. That's why we got excited when we sang tonight, On Christ the solid rock I stand, and all other ground is sinking. Sam, we didn't sing that. We sang the other one, but we could just as well have sung that one.

36:07 I dare not trust the sweetest frame, that is, the time when I feel most devotional and most earnest. I dare trust nothing in myself but wholly lean on Jesus' name. Ah, my friend, you begin to feel what some of us have felt. And I use the word feel deliberately.

36:27 You begin to feel what we have felt as you come to understand what we have understood of our sinfulness in God's holiness and our fearful state by nature. And then it will be good news to be told that justification is an act of God's free grace, whereby He pardoneth our sins and accepteth us as righteous in His sight,

36:54 a righteousness grounded on the Lord Jesus, imputed and received by faith alone. Well, so much for that. Brief overview of the confessions. Now what I propose to do, and we'll just start tonight, is go back over, using the larger catechism as a framework, and take each of those six main thoughts, substantiate them from Scripture, and then apply them to our own hearts and consciences.

The Author of Justification: God Himself

37:22 First of all, then, the confession, the larger and the shorter catechism are careful to begin their definition of justification with this concept, that the author... The author of justification is the living God Himself.

37:38 Listen as I read again from the larger catechism. Justification is an act of God's free grace. I believe that's the proper reading. Let me find it again here in the catechism.

37:58 Well, I'm sure it's there in the shorter. I lost my page number, but God is the author. Justification is an act of God's free grace. Now look with me very quickly at five or six biblical statements in which this is substantiated very, very clearly, that only a man who's willing to be misled can miss it.

38:21 Turn to Romans chapter 8, first of all. Romans chapter 8. Who is the author of this great grace of justification?

38:33 When the publican went down to his house justified, who was the author of that declaration that he was pardoned and accepted? Romans 8, verses 29 and 30. Speaking of the people of God who are called according to purpose, verse 29, for whom He, that is God, foreknew, He, God, also foreordained to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren, and whom He, God, foreordained, then He, God, also called, and whom He called,

39:17 then He also justified, and whom He justified, then He also glorified. What then shall we say to these things if God is for us, who is against us? Now do you see the emphasis? The Apostle Paul, is not content to say, whom He foreordained, He called, justified, and glorified.

39:44 That would have been good Greek, and it's good English. But he comes back and keeps emphasizing the pronoun. Whom He predestinated, He called. Whom He called, He justified.

40:00 Whom He justified, He glorified, is God before us. You see the accumulation of emphasis? He wants the people of Rome to understand that their salvation from beginning to end, from God's foreknowledge, that is, His distinguishing love and affection set upon His people in eternity, to the accomplishment of what He purposed in eternity, entire conformity to His Son, that from beginning to end, salvation is of the Lord. Jonah 2 and verse 6.

40:37 So then, when our Lord declares that that man, that publican, went down to his house justified, He declares him to go down to his house, the object of a declaration made by the living God Himself. And this is tremendously important. I might be able to get half the world's population to declare me righteous. Suppose by some means I could get every last human being who ever lived to declare myself, my character, such as to be worthy of acceptance before God, to declare my religious performance such as to be acceptable before God.

41:17 What good will it do when I'm not answerable to the court of men, but to the court of God?

41:24 And it will do you no good. Should your own conscience declare perfect innocence? Should the whole world declare perfect innocence? What will you do when you stand before God and God declares you guilty?

41:37 So it's important that we understand that justification has God as its author, for if He is the author, then we should be content with no other justification than that which comes from Him. But bless God when we have that which comes from Him. We need none other. That's why true Christians have always had a disdain, a blessed indifference, to the praise and to the blame of men.

42:04 They've found acceptance with their God, and this has made them bold to face the frowns of men. Well, turn back to Romans 3. We see again the emphasis that the author of justification is the living God Himself. Verses 26 and 30.

42:25 We could back up to verse 25. Whom God set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to show His righteousness, because of the passing over of sins done aforetime in the forbearance of God, for the showing, I say, of His righteousness, that at this present, at this present time, at this present season, that He Himself might be just, and the justifier of him that hath faith in Jesus. Here again the emphasis is upon He. God Himself is the justifier of him that hath faith.

43:03 It's not a matter of me saying, well, I think I've got religious faith now, so I must be all right. That's a form of self-justification. It wasn't that the publicans said, you know, I've prayed, and I've got this guilt off my chest. I really feel good now.

43:15 I must be all right. There are multitudes mistaking that for biblical justification. They go to a meeting where there's religious excitement, and people talk about, smile, God loves you, and I found Jesus to meet all my needs and take away all my hang-ups, and in the midst of a crowd atmosphere, they get some kind of a nice feeling, and their sense of frustration and burden and guilt is gone. They've heard nothing of God, of law, of the cross, of substitution, of repentance, of faith, but they feel great now, and they go down to their house justifying themselves, saying, I must be justified, I feel good.

43:53 Not so that publican. He went down to his house because God had done something. God had declared him righteous, that he might be the justifier of him that hath faith. Look at verse 30.

Implications of God's Authorship of Justification

44:06 Same emphasis in the same chapter. If so be that God is one, and he shall justify the circumstances, circumcision by faith, and the uncircumcision through faith, he shall justify. Now, 1 Corinthians 1.30.

44:23 And these are just random texts, every one of which would be worthy of many, many minutes of exposition, but I want you to sense something of the overriding thrust and dominant emphasis of the scriptures in this area. 1 Corinthians 1.30. But of him, that is, God, the last proper noun, verse 29, that no flesh should glory before God, but of him, that is, of that God, are ye in Christ Jesus, who was made unto us wisdom from God, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption, that according as it is written,

45:08 he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. When any man has come to know Christ as his righteousness, why is it? It's because there has been something wrought of Bob. But of him are ye in union with Christ Jesus.

45:25 Bringing a man into the justified state is God's act, and God's act alone. Philippians chapter 3 and verse 9. The apostle Paul, about to lose his life for Christ's sake, as a martyr,

45:44 says in chapter 3 of Philippians, that I might, verse 9, that I may be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own. There's the negative statement. Even that which is of the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God. You see how explicit the reference is?

46:10 It's a righteousness that comes from a source outside of myself. It is a righteousness from God. But, since it is God who justifies, several things are true. One, it is a declaration which none other can cancel or alter.

46:29 Since all sin is against God, and all judgment will be by God, when that God has declared a person righteous, when that God has declared a man as possessing a title to life and acceptance, who will override God's declaration? One of the curses of our present court system is an abuse of a blessing, namely, the right of appeal. And though I'm not making pronouncements, though I'd like to, on the abuse of that system, when appeals have reached the Supreme Court of the United States and a declaration has been made,

47:12 indeed, there is no higher court to which an appeal can be made. That's the end of the road. That's the end of the road. Why?

47:22 Because that's the highest court in the areas of its legitimate jurisdiction.

47:28 Now, this is true of God. The highest court is God's court. God the Creator. God the Lawgiver.

47:35 God the Judge. And if the sentences come from the highest court to that publican,

47:42 accept it. You are entitled to life and all the blessings of a man who had fully kept the law. Who will override that decision? The decision of God.

47:52 Now, do you see why this doctrine causes some people to be brought to a state of near distraction because of the glory of it? Why Luther became such a different man when this truth broke in upon his spirit? What are popes to cause me to quake into fear? My God has declared me righteous and so a humble Augustinian monk can send up the popes into councils.

48:18 Why? Because their courts were little puppet, mini-courts. He had stood before the court of God for years, trembling and tortured with the sense of his sin. Then when God the Holy Ghost broke in upon his heart with the truth that just shall live by faith, there is a righteousness from God by faith, he had found himself absolved before the court of God and he feared no other court.

48:45 That's the first practical implication of the doctrine and why we must have embedded in our hearts and in our hearts embedded in our hearts before understanding the truth, the first aspect of the confessional statements, the author of justification, God himself. Second implication is this. It is a declaration which must be founded on truth and reality if God makes it. Since God himself condemns the judge who pronounces the guilty innocent and pronounces the innocent guilty, God will not be guilty of the same sin.

49:21 In Proverbs 17.15, God pronounces the guilty innocent and pronounces the innocent guilty. He pronounces a woe, a curse upon the judge who says to the guilty you're innocent and says to the innocent you're guilty. Now if God is saying to sinners who in themselves are sinful and guilty, if God is saying I declare you righteous, I declare you no longer liable to the punishment of a broken law and I declare you in a state of being worthy of all the positive benefits of what you do, if it's of one who kept the law, this must be a declaration founded upon truth if God makes it.

50:00 He doesn't violate his own law.

50:03 That's the wonder then of where Christ comes into all of this. Because God's declarative act is rooted in what Professor Murray calls so beautifully a constitutive act. And what God does, and this is the wonder and the mystery of the gospel, by his grace and through the Spirit he brings a synopsis into such a relationship with Christ that Christ's righteousness actually becomes his. So that when God says you are righteous, he's not playing games or blinking his eyes and seeing mirages.

50:41 He is clothing us in the very righteousness of his own dear Son. And we'll go into that in more detail, but we must see that if this very first point tonight, if the author of justification is God, then it must be a declaration according to truth and reality. And that's the wonder of it. God's just not shuffling the books in heaven.

51:04 God's doing something to bring sinners into such a relationship with his Son that as Paul says, that I may be found in him having his very righteousness. He has made unto us righteousness.

51:19 And then the third implication is this. Since it is the very God against whom we have so foully and wickedly rebuked, bolted, since it is that God who declares the wicked sinner justified, we should be prepared at the outset to realize that we're in the realm of grace and of undeserved mercy.

51:42 If it's the God to whom we're answerable, from whom the sentence comes not guilty, fully pardoned, fully accepted, why, it can't be like that poor Pharisee thought. It can't be on the basis of anything in me. What I am, what I've done. For all that can do is provoke God to judge me.

52:05 The foulness of my character is an offense to him. The wickedness of my misdeeds are an aggravation to his justice and to his holiness. And therefore if that very God before whom I stand a sinner is declaring me righteous, I must be prepared at the outset to move out of the realm of works and marriage. To direct and personal worth and into the realm of grace and mercy and promise.

Final Exhortation: Are You Justified?

52:39 I think that's far enough to go tonight. God willing we'll pick up in our next study with the source of this justification. God's free grace. But as I close, I do wish to bring this all home to the individual consciences of those gathered here tonight.

52:59 Jesus could say of that, this man went down to his house, that is down from the temple to his dwelling place there in Jerusalem wherever it was. He went down to his house justified. A declaration had come forth from the court of heaven. A declaration from God himself.

53:23 A declaration that would never be reversed. A declaration that was the highest court, that was according to truth. A declaration, a declaration which none could cancel or alter. Let me ask you tonight, as you go down from this place to your dwelling, do you go down as the publican went down,

53:47 justified? Or do you go down to your house as the Pharisee, still under the frown and the wrath of a holy God? In the light of our study this morning, there's no neutral ground. He that is not with me is against me.

54:04 He that does, gathereth not with me, scattereth. You go down to your house justified in all the wonder and the glory of it. And I hope God by his grace will open it up until some of these nights we all feel so caught up and out of ourselves that I'll have to stop preaching and we all just burst into praise and to worship.

54:27 But my friend, we may not come to those studies.

54:31 You have no assurance that you'll see another dawn. Nor do I. And I must entreat you and plead with you as one who stands in the middle of the world and pleads with you as one who stands against the backdrop of eternity and judgment and that court which is a glorious court when it's giving the sentence or the declaration justified. But oh, the horror of it when the sentence comes forth, depart from me, cursed.

54:55 I plead with you tonight, if you have no biblical grounds to believe that God has done for you what he did for the publican, that he himself has declared you righteous for the sake of Christ, then flee to Christ. You don't need to understand all about justification to be justified. Thank God you need to understand just enough of who God is and his holiness and his claims upon you. Just enough of what you are in your native sin and rebellion and just enough to know that there's no hope in you but there's every hope in him and that almighty God himself sets his beloved son before you in the gospel and says, look unto him, believe upon him, trust him, embrace him,

55:40 and all is well. God grant that you shall embrace him even now as he is set before you in the gospel. Let us pray.