Day of Judgment

The final demonstration from the third group of witnesses to Christ's deity: He performs the work of raising the dead and executing final judgment, a work only God can perform. Pastor Martin expounds John 5:17-29 as the central passage, shows how all the resurrection and judgment texts attribute to Christ the power to raise the dead by a word, the omniscience to judge secret deeds and thoughts in their full context, and the omnipotence to execute the sentence. He closes with solemn warning to the impenitent and blessed assurance for believers who are acquitted by the Judge who bore their hell.

Pastor Martin sets the doctrine of justification within the supportive framework of three indispensable truths without which it cannot be rightly understood: the character and position of God as holy and just Creator and Judge, the character and position of man as accountable creature and guilty sinner, and God's overall ultimate purpose to conform His people to the image of His Son. He warns that whenever justification has been wrenched out of this larger context, it has suffered grievously even at the hands of its friends.

Pastor Martin establishes from Scripture that the word 'justify' is forensic and declarative - to pronounce, accept, and treat someone as righteous in relation to a standard of law - never to make personally righteous. He traces four lines of biblical evidence: passages where any other meaning is impossible, contexts where it is the opposite of 'condemn', equivalent expressions, and the formal usage in Romans and Galatians. Justification is therefore God's judicial verdict, not an inward transformation, and that distinction is essential to gospel comfort.

Pastor Martin expounds Psalm 1:5 -- 'Therefore the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment, nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous.' He shows this conclusion flows from the fact that the wicked are like chaff. He examines the source of the psalmist's knowledge (divine revelation confirmed by conscience), the meaning of 'shall not stand' (not abide or endure, not merely appear), and the substance of the conclusion: the wicked will be crushed under divine judgment and excluded from the congregation of the righteous. He closes with the solemn prospect of judgment as a day of surprising discovery, fixed distinction, and final division.