RSSMore on justification
At the risk of bringing discomfort to Darryl, I admit that my work on justification has done more than “restate” traditional Protestant formulations. My defense is that I think the Bible has more to say on the subject than Protestant formulations have typically captured.
My work on justification has focused on passages where the Bible uses “justification” terminology to apply to delivering acts of God. In these passages, “justify” is still a judicial term and describes a judicial act. God is acting as judge. But the verdict that He gives is an enacted verdict, a verdict that takes the form of deliverance from enemies and death. I’ve coined the term “deliverdict” to capture the two sides of this. Some evidence:
1) Romans 4:25 says that Jesus was raised for our justification. I accept Richard Gaffin’s exegesis of this passage, in which he argues that Paul implies that Jesus’ resurrection was His justification, and that we share in that verdict by union with Christ. Jesus’ resurrection is the ground of our justification, and the prototype justification. And it’s certainly not a “bare verdict.” God declared Jesus “righteous” by delivering Him from death and raising Him to new life.
2) This is, I think, what Paul means in Romans 6:7 when He says - in a context having to do with deliverance from the power of sin, and, not incidentally, with baptism - that we are “justified from sin.” That is, God delivers a verdict of righteous that takes the form of liberation from sin’s power. (This is how John Murray understands Romans 6:7 as well.)
3) Behind these Pauline uses are various passages in the Psalms and prophets where judicial language is used in contexts where it refers to deliverance from enemies, from death, from national catastrophe. Jerusalem’s restoration is “their justification [vindication]” in Isaiah 54:17. David seeks deliverance from enemies when He calls on God to “judge me” (Psalm 7:6-11; 35:27-28).
That’s the basic thesis.
D Hart
September 22nd, 2007 at 8:38 am
Peter, how pastoral is it to suggest to people that the Reformed doctrine of justification is not biblical? This is exactly what many conclude, especially those advocates of biblical theology who become impatient with 16th or 17th c. formulations for not attending to the nuances of Pauline eschatology. You don’t say directly that the old doctrine isn’t biblical. But you do say that the Bible says so much more, so that now you are biblical and the other is less biblical.
I believe efforts like this reflect an inability to understand what systematic theology and confessions try to do — which is to summarize ALL of what the Bible has to say on a subject, and to recognize the historical developments that would lead the church to formulate its system and creeds in a certain way. But by your reckoning the Apostles Creed and Nicene Creed are hopelessly unbiblical. Look at all that they leave out.
Also, to bring up that troubled topic of tradition again, it would make a lot more sense to me if you were trying to build on the tradition that you would connect the dots between what you’re doing and what those have done who went before you in the Reformed faith. Which is to say that constructions like yours seem to me to start with Vos, Ridderbos, and Gaffin and then read the 16th and 17th centuries in the light of BT when in fact this is anachronistic. You don’t read Vos to make sense of Ursinus. You read Ursinus to make sense of Vos. And if you can’t see the connections between Ursinus and Vos then we have entered stage “tradition-breakdown.”
Please forgive all the “yous.” They are not singular but plural and reflect my own frustrations with the triumph of BT over ST.
DWilson
September 22nd, 2007 at 10:16 am
Darryl, to say that the Reformed tradition has somehow not “arrived” is only a criticism if there were an a priori assumption that we must have already reached our high water mark. “More to be gathered from the Bible’s teaching” is not the same thing as “less biblical.” To say (as I would say) that Reformed tradition is correct as far as it goes, and it goes farther than any other theological tradition, is not tantamount to claiming that our theology is now lying on the ground, panting and exhausted, incapable of going any further.
JMeyers
September 22nd, 2007 at 10:53 am
What’s pastoral to one man may seem quite unpastoral to another. And yet we can all surely agree that teaching people to think in biblical categories is about the most pastoral thing a minister can do.
Peter did not say imply that the AC or the NC were “unbiblical.” He didn’t even suggest that the confessional and catechetical Reformed formulations were unbiblical. What he said was that the Bible says more than these summary formulations.
Do we really believe that nothing else can be said about anything the WCF addresses? Will we be using the WCF two thousand years from now? I hope not.
And for the record, as pastor I am much more concerned that people learn the language of the Bible itself—learn to sing it, pray it, reflect on it, apply it, etc.—than that they memorize scholastic formulas from the 17th century. I agree that they ought to be learned. I agree that they are meaningful part of our tradition. I require ordinands to memorize the SC for their ordination trials. They have to know the WCF. But it would be a distortion for them to think that faithful pastoral ministry involves making sure that all their parishioners memorize these and think in these categories.
I am more concerned that God use me to create a community of people shaped by the Bible’s story and language. When Christians are more concerned about past formulations they easily slip into thinking that their identity with tradition is more important than their identity as biblical Christians. In our circles they become Reformed partisans.
I think my parishioners are smart enough to know the difference between a summary definition of justification and the richer way in which the justify/justification word group is used in the Bible. And I am delighted when they begin to understand the riches of God’s Word even if that means that they become more humble and critical of our own traditional formulations.
D Hart
September 22nd, 2007 at 11:08 am
Doug, but Peter’s project is to be pastoral. His views on justification give little comfort to this sinner who would like to stand on God’s holy hill and who believes that only an alien righteousness will get me there. For you to regard FV on justification to be an improvement, the proof can’t simply be it’s more biblical. For one thing, it’s contested whether Peter’s view is more biblical. For another, it doesn’t resolve the criteria by which we would regard it an improvement. And while we’re at it, it’s not entirely clear that it does justice to Protestant teaching on justification.
Peter
September 22nd, 2007 at 11:13 am
You seem to have miswritten in your second paragraph. You didn’t mean to say that the confessions and creeds “summarize ALL of what the Bible has to say,” did you? If so, I’m confused, since you go on to say at the end of the paragraph that they “leave out” things. So, I take you to mean that I’m misunderstanding creeds and confessions because I accuse them of not including everything when they never intended to include everything.
If that’s your claim, I don’t believe it hits home. I’ve got no problems with summaries of the Bible for particular purposes on particular topics. I know that’s what creeds and confessions are. I’m concerned, though, when Reformed people act as if the Confession DOES include everything there is to say on a topic. Sure, the Nicene Creed leaves a lot out. No complaint from me. But would it be right for someone to say in the fifth century that all we need to do is “restate” what the Creed says? Didn’t Augustine say a lot more on the Trinity than was in the Creed?
On the point about building on the tradition: I’m not reading Vos to make sense of Ursinus. I’m reading Vos and Gaffin to make sense of Paul. You’re right that I’ve not connected all the dots in the tradition. That’s a limitation of my research on justification that I’d like to correct. But what does that have to do with whether or not my interpretation of Paul is correct?
Which brings me back to the point: I really don’t want this thread to become yet another tussle about tradition. Might someone be willing to interact with the biblical arguments I presented?
Peter
September 22nd, 2007 at 11:37 am
Darryl, I don’t get where you’re coming from at all.
First, it makes no sense to me to say that a theological position can more fully express the Bible’s teaching and yet NOT be an improvement. What is your standard of theological improvement? (Of course, my work on justification may not more fully express biblical teaching, but that would have to be argued from the Bible, no?)
Second, I don’t understand at all how what I’ve written on justification makes the sinner any less confident that he can stand on God’s holy hill. I haven’t denied that we stand in Christ’s righteousness. I’m not saying that we stand on God’s holy hill by our own righteousness. Where have I said that?
I’m saying that in declaring us just in Christ, God also delivers us from the power of sin. To put it in Murray’s terms, justification and definitive sanctification are not only simultaneous (which Murray said) but the same act. NB: I said DEFINITIVE sanctification.
W.H. Chellis
September 22nd, 2007 at 12:27 pm
I will ask another question.
I am not sure that I fully understand Peter’s theology of justification yet.
But, within the Reformed tradition there is support for the idea that adoption is a part of our justification. Francis Turretin deals with adoption ast the 6th Question under the 16th Topic: Justification.
Turretin begins:
“I. The other part of justification is adoption or betowal of a right to life, flowing from Christ’s righteousness, which acquired for us not only deliverance from death, but also a right to life by the adoption which he endows us (Vol. 2; pg. 666).”
also
VII. From these positions, it is gathered that to no purpose do some anxiously ask here how justification and adoption differ from each other, and whether adoption is by nature prior to justification (as some hold, who think it is the first and immediate fruit of faith by which we are united and joined to Christ; or whether posterior to and consequent upon it, as others). For it is evident from what has been said that justification is a benefit by which God (being reconciled to us in Christ) absolves us from the guilt of sins and gives us a right to life, it follows that adoption is included in justification intself as a part which, with the remission of sins, constitutes the whole of this benefit.
IX. From this adoption springs Christian liberty, which is not an immunity from all laws (divine and human) and a licence to live according to our pleasure and to indulge the lusts of the fless…. but it is a spiritual and mystical manumission obtained for us by the blood of Christ, by which from the spiritual bondage of the law, of sin, of the world, and Satan we are brought into the liberty of the sons of God through which being called into fellowship with God (as our Father) and with Christ (as our brother), we obtain dominion over the creatures and are heirs of the kingdom of Heaven. (pg. 669).
What say you?
D Hart
September 22nd, 2007 at 12:35 pm
Peter, the point of this discussion was about FV’s relationship to the Reformed tradition and what FV was doing to try to fix what ails Reformed churches. That’s what the tussle has been about the whole time. So it is not a side issue.
As to the question of expressing the Bible’s teaching more fully, that’s an impressive claim. Someone with a high ecclesiology might let the church decide whether that claim is accurate. The one claiming to make the improvement may not be the best judge and jury.
And the problem of standing on God’s holy hill comes when you suggest that the Reformed doctrine of justification is inadequate, as if the way it formulates Christ’s righteousness gets the Bible wrong. Lots of people take comfort in faith alone being the instrument by which we receive Christ’s alien righteousness. Now the BTer’s are saying that that is not exactly what Paul meant. They like N. T. Wright and Norman Sheperd’s formulations. (I seem to recall that you have some interest in Wright; I’m not sure where you came down on Sheperd.) Yet, for some reason those people think they can have Wright, Sheperd, and Paul, and oh the Divines and Calvin and Ursinus are back there somewhere making some kind of contribution.
The problem is that the different intepreters of Paul are in disagreement about what Paul and the rest of the Bible teaches on justification(since when did Paul’s writings receive red-letter treatment, anyway?). And yet because Ursinus, and Calvin and the Divines are man-made interpretations, they seem to be less reliable than the Bible. What seems to go unnoticed is that Vos, Ridderbos, and even Leithart are man-made interpretations also.
So who sorts out this mess? Doesn’t FV affirm that the church should? And hasn’t the church rendered its judgment on the FV on justification?
Peter
September 22nd, 2007 at 1:16 pm
I understand the issue a bit better from this. What do you suggest that we do when we think we’ve found something in the Bible that hasn’t gotten sufficient attention in Reformed theology?
As for the rest, a few scattered responses:
I never claimed to be judge and jury, as my post made plenty clear. I’m happy to be shown that the Reformed tradition has fully accounted for the passages I’ve pointed to in its formulation of the doctrine of justification. Maybe you can show me where Romans 4:25 and 6:7 have been worked into Reformed soteriology; it’s a sincere question. I’m also happy to be told that I got Paul wrong. But if I’m going to be convinced, it’s going to have to come from Scripture.
As for Paul and red-letter: Where do you think the Reformed doctrine came from in the first place? James? 2 Chronicles? The debate, for better or worse, has always centered on Paul. Besides, my argument - which you haven’t addressed at all - rests on passages from the Psalms and prophets as well as Paul.
As I said before, I haven’t said that the Reformed tradition gets the Bible wrong. I’m saying that the Bible says more than the Reformed formulations capture.
As for people taking comfort in “faith alone being an instrument by which we receive Christ’s alien righteousness,” I submit that such people are taking comfort in an idol. Our comfort is in the God of comfort, not in our theological formulations. Surely I’ve misunderstood you.
Nicholas T. Batzig
September 22nd, 2007 at 5:45 pm
Peter,
Are you saying that Christ, who the Bible says is “The LORD our Righteousness” is an idol, or are you saying that by believing and taking comfort in the fact that justification is by “faith alone” we have worshiped a false god? I’m a little confused. Jesus said, “You shall know that truth and the truth shall make you free? Are we not then to take comfort in Gospel truths such as justification by faith alone?
In regard to your comment above:
“I’m saying that in declaring us just in Christ, God also delivers us from the power of sin. To put it in Murray’s terms, justification and definitive sanctification are not only simultaneous (which Murray said) but the same act. NB: I said DEFINITIVE sanctification.”
Where is the biblical proof that justification and definitive sanctification are the same thing? I’m willing to go as far as saying that regeneration and definitive sanctification are the same thing but you seem to be redefining justification to have an aspect of renewal. This is not the historical Reformed view on justification. Could you explain this further?
Terry W. West
September 23rd, 2007 at 9:12 am
I found the following quote by John Calvin a few days ago while reading the Institutes. In this quote Calvin is describing the relationship between justification and sanctification. From my reading of Calvin here it seems that he is saying what I read Dr. Leithart as saying as well. Especially when Calvin say that to be justified we “…must previously possess Christ. But you cannot possess him without being made a partaker of his sanctification: for Christ
cannot be divided.” I would be interested to know if I am reading both Calvin and Dr. Leithart correctly and is so, would all who are involved in this discussion be in agreement with Calvin here?
Calvin:
We dream not of a faith which is devoid of good works, nor of a justification which can exist without them: the only difference is, that while we acknowledge that faith and works are necessarily connected, we, however, place justification in faith, not in works. How this is done is easily explained, if we turn to Christ only, to whom our faith is directed and from whom it derives all its power. Why, then, are we justified by faith? Because by faith we apprehend the righteousness of Christ, which alone reconciles us to God. This faith, however, you cannot apprehend without at the same time apprehending sanctification; for Christ “is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption,†(1 Cor. 1:30). Christ, therefore, justifies no man without also sanctifying him. These blessings are conjoined by a perpetual and inseparable tie. Those whom he enlightens by his wisdom he redeems; whom he redeems he justifies; whom he justifies he sanctifies. But as the question relates only to justification and sanctification, to them let us confine ourselves. Though we distinguish between them, they are both inseparably comprehended in Christ. Would ye then obtain justification in Christ? You must previously possess Christ. But you cannot possess him without being made a partaker of his sanctification: for Christ cannot be divided. Since the Lord, therefore, does not grant us the enjoyment of these blessings without bestowing himself, he bestows both at once but never the one without the other. Thus it appears how true it is that we are justified not without, and yet not by works, since in the participation of Christ, by which we are justified, is contained not less sanctification than justification.
John Calvin - From INSTITUTES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION, Book 3, Chapter 16, Section 1
James Jordan
September 23rd, 2007 at 1:02 pm
I Numbers 19 there are two justifications, two cleansings, two resurrections. We have here ritually directed the Biblical philosophy of history, one that every Jew of Jesus’ day would know very well from having to experience if ofttimes. The first justification, on the 3d day, is totally apart from any works we can have done, for we are dead (unclean = symbolically dead, having contracted the death that spreads to all). But after the first resurrection, we are now partly alive and can do good works, leading to the second justification of the 7th day.
It can be no surprise then that the foundational justification is by faith alone, and yet there is a future justification in which God says that He likes us, likes what we’ve become, approves of us, and says “well done.” All the good stuff we do (WCF 16) is in union with Jesus and by the Spirit, but it is still we who do it. The Judge approves of US and justifies US, not merely sees Jesus through us as if we don’t exist.
The first justification is by faith alone, and we return to that at the beginning of the liturgy each Day of the Lord. The final justification is God’s approval of who we have become in union with Christ and through faith.
There is no justification of “works” or “merits” because there is no merit theology in the Bible anywhere at all. God approves or disapproves of persons, not of merits.
W.H. Chellis
September 23rd, 2007 at 1:24 pm
I can wholeheartidly affirm the quote from Calvin.
D Hart
September 23rd, 2007 at 2:02 pm
Well, for what it’s worth, I can also live with Calvin here as long as he is not being interpreted to flatten out justification and sanctification, as if there is no priority to justification. Here is how the OPC report put the relationship:
“. . . justification is prior to sanctification. This is not priority in the sense that one is somehow more important than the other. Neither is it a temporal priority, strictly speaking, for there is no such thing as a justified person who is not also being sanctified. But while justification is the necessary prerequisite of the process of sanctification, that process is not the necessary prerequisite of justification. It is true to say that one must be justified in order to be sanctified; but it is untrue to say that one must be sanctified in order to be justified.”
I believe this priority of justification was what Calvin was getting at in the following questions and answers from his 1536 Catechism:
Master. - But after we have once been embraced by God, are not the works which we do under the direction of his Holy Spirit accepted by him?
Scholar. - They please him, not however in virtue of their own worthiness, but as he liberally honours them with his favour.
Master. - But seeing they proceed from the Holy Spirit, do they not merit favour?
Scholar. - They are always mixed up with some defilement from the weakness of the flesh, and thereby vitiated.
Master. - Whence then or how can it be that they please God?
Scholar. - It is faith alone which procures favour for them, as we rest with assured confidence on this-that God wills not to try them by his strict rule, but covering their defects and impurities as buried in the purity of Christ, he regards them in the same light as if they were absolutely perfect.
Master. - But can we infer from this that a Christian man is justified by works after he has been called by God, or that by the merit of works he makes himself loved by God, whose love is eternal life to us?
Scholar. - By no means. We rather hold what is written-that no man can be justified in his sight, and we therefore pray, Enter not into judgment with us.” (Ps. cxliii. 2.)
Peter
September 24th, 2007 at 12:46 pm
Responses to questions from Batzig and West:
1) Regarding idolatry, I was saying that we should take comfort in God, not in our theological formulations. The God in whom we take comfort says, Trust me, I’ve made you righteous in my Son. So, we do trust in the words that our God speaks because for the trustworthiness of the One who speaks. But that’s different from taking comfort in a Confession, which I what I heard Darryl doing. I may have misunderstood what he was getting at.
2) Romans 6:7 is one of the key texts for saying that “justify” includes “liberation.” Also Romans 4:25 and 1 Timothy 3:16, where Jesus is said to be “justified” by the resurrection (I’m accepting Gaffin’s exegesis here). The Father’s justification/vindication of Jesus takes the form of raising Him from the dead.
3) I agree with Calvin in that justification and sanctification are both benefits of union with the one Christ. But I am saying more: I’m saying that the NT sometimes uses the terminology of “justification” to describe what our systematics calls “definitive sanctification.”
P. Andrew Sandlin
September 24th, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Peter,
I too agree with Gaffin, and I’m sympathetic with your trajectory here.
I wouldn’t want definitive sanctification (yes, I agree with Murray) to diminish final justification. I agree that Rom. 6:7 connotes definitive sanctificaion, but I want to preserve the redemptive-historical distinction in 5:9 — “saved from eschatological wrath.â€
The real question, it seems me, is the relation between definitive sanctification and final justification, not between justification and sanctification as such. It seems to me that the verdict of deliverance in time and history that you have thoughtfully noted in some way secures the final verdict (Rom. 2:13), but it must do this in such a way as to not diminish the awareness of the necessity of good works, without which none will be justified in the final day (2:6-7).
The verdict of deliverance in history is definitive, not just potential (as act, not a process); but the final justification will take into account good works.
Nicholas T. Batzig
October 2nd, 2007 at 8:03 am
Peter,
In volume 2 of his collected writings Murray has a short article on justification. How does he define this saving benefit? He writes:
“Justification is that aspect of the application of redemption whereby God delivers us from condemnation, and accepting us as righteous in his sight receives us into His favor and fellowship. It is a blessing of which Isaiah speaks ‘And in that day shalt thou say, O LORD I will praise Thee; for though Thou wast angry with me thine anger is turned away and Thou comfortedst me. Behold God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid; for the Lord Jehovah is my strength and my song; he also is become my salvation.’
Justification IS NOT the eternal decree of God with respect to us, nor is it the finished work of Christ for us, when once-for-all He reconciled us to God by His death; NOR is it the regenerative work of God in us, NOR is it any activity on our part in response to and embrace of the Gospel, but IT IS an act of God, accomplished in time wherein God passes judgment with respect to us as individuals.
It may be safe to say that the greatest event for Christendom in the last 1500 years was the Protestant Reformation. What was the spark that lit the flame of evangelical passion? It was, by the grace of God, the discovery on the part of Luther, stricken with a sense of his estrangement from God and feeling in his inmost soul the sting of His wrath and the remorse of a terrified conscience, of the true and only way whereby a man can be just with God. To him, the truth of justification by free grace through faith lifted him from the depths of the forebodings of hell to the ecstasy of peace with God and the hope of glory.†(Collected Writings of John Murray, vol. 2, pp. 202-203)
In the context of Romans 6:3-5, with regard to definitive sanctification’s relation to justification, Murray writes:
“No fact is of more basic importance in connection with the death to sin and commitment to holiness than that of identification with Christ in His death and resurrection. And this relation of Jesus’ death and resurrection to the believer is introduced at this point in the development of Paul’s Gospel, be it noted, NOT WITH REFERENCE TO JUSTIFICATION, but in connection with deliverance from the power and defilement of sin. So IT IS THE RELATION TO SANCTIFICATION that is in the focus of thought.†(Collected Writings of John Murray, vol. 2, p. 286)
I would really like to know where Murray says “justification and definitive sanctification are not only simultaneous but are the same act?” I can’t seem to find that in his writings. I keep looking and looking but can’t find it. Maybe you could help me out on this one.