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What is justification? Or justification before God by faith? To quote, justification is “a forensic (legal) term related to the idea of acquittal, justification refers to the divine act whereby God makes humans, who are sinful and therefore worthy of condemnation, acceptable before a God who is holy and righteous. More appropriately described as “justification by grace through faith,” this key doctrine of the Reformation asserts that a sinner is justified (pardoned from the punishment and condemnation of sin) and brought into relationship with God by faith in God’s grace alone.”¹

Justification According to Apostle Paul’s Letter to the Romans

The walkthrough of Paul’s letter to the Romans concerning the doctrine of justification is especially helpful in reinforcing personal convictions about the truth of God’s Word and His covenant promises. The author, Andrew Naselli, offers an exceptional essay about what Paul meant about justification among crucial principles throughout his letter to the Romans. The theological messaging of Romans, as presented by Naselli, is thoroughly contextual as various relevant passages are traversed across both the Old and New Testaments. Moreover, as justification by grace is widely supported by the work of Christ and various New Testament writers, the author details how Paul’s theology contributes to the doctrine of justification.

Naselli’s paper isn’t an exposition of the book of Romans as a commentary or a comprehensive treatment of the subject matter it contains. The author sequentially takes large sections of the book to fully develop the meaning of justification to the church in Rome, but more widely to those of Asia-minor during the first century. Paul’s exhaustive letter concerning justification and soteriology applied to the early church just as it does today. To build the faith and development of believers, Paul makes a persuasive and compelling case about the differences between the Old Covenant and the New before he writes about implications beginning in chapter 5.

The condition and circumstances of sinful humanity condemned before righteous God characterizes the desperate situation relieved by the mercies of God through Christ Jesus, His Son (Matt 3:17). As Paul begins his letter about the sinful condition of people inclined to self-destructive and offensive behaviors, he further reveals the righteousness of God the further he progresses toward good news for those who believe and abide in Christ. Paul’s recitation of the Old Testament that all people are sinful and no one does good (Rom 3:10,12, Ps. 14:1–3; 53:1–3) shows that intervention apart from the law was clearly and desperately needed. The old covenant law has taught us that Christ was necessary to bring us to God so that we might be justified by faith (Gal 3:24). The need to transition from law to grace becomes apparent as people become justified by faith alone, just as Abraham was. As the spiritual children of Abraham, heirs to the Kingdom of God, attain justification just as he did by faith or believing in God. The Abrahamic covenant was fulfilled in Christ by His imputed righteousness to those who believe in Him by faith. Even the ungodly, as made clear from Romans 4:5.

Justification by Faith

The means by which God imputes righteousness for justification is through faith (Rom 3:25). Supported by how Abraham was justified and counted righteous by believing in God, Paul would have to assert that what applied to Abraham applies to his offspring (Gal 3:29). Specifically, external righteousness that comes from faith is transferrable to his offspring as the righteousness of Christ becomes imparted to believers. Even while Abraham was a wandering Aramean, his belief in God informed him and his family where to go and that pleased God, where righteousness was imputed or infused into an ungodly man. While there were various errant and sinful behaviors of Abraham during his journeys recorded in Genesis, there was the presence of grace upon him from God. Since he believed in God, Abraham was credited as righteous by grace through faith as a gift (Eph 2:8-9).

As Paul wrote to the Church in Rome, we can infer that he spoke to both Jews and Gentiles. Everyone was given a path to peace with God as reconciliation became possible through faith in Christ, who died for the ungodly (Rom 5:6). As justification was accomplished through Jesus’ blood, the Messiah’s sacrifice was pleasing to God (Isa 53:10; see BDAG) as believers in Christ were saved from His wrath (Rom 5:9). Naselli makes further observations about what Paul wrote about the outcome of justification. He indicates explicitly that believers have peace with God and access to Him through Christ. Those who abide in Jesus rejoice in the hope of the glory of God, their sufferings, and God Himself.

After Paul’s brief parenthetical account of the law and sin (chapter 7) and its devastating consequences, he pivoted to a theological understanding of condemnation and justification as opposites. Where Christ either perfectly fulfilled the law, or people keep the law through Spirit’s enabling, depending upon your perspective, the sovereignty of God is at work to call people to Him as justified and without condemnation. The certainty of believers before God includes their justification within an unbreakable chain of inevitability. Namely, the well-known golden chain of redemption from beginning to end assures the final eschatological completion of each person in Christ (Rom 8:28-30). God’s actions redeemed people are foreknown then predestined, called, justified, and glorified as an astonishing sequence of theological beauty. In fulfillment of total reconciliation, His people attain justification and are made righteous through faith to become secured in the love of Christ (Rom 8:35-39). No one can condemn His people redeemed to Him through Christ or bring a charge against them as the favor of God rests upon those reconciled (Rom 8:32-34).

Finally, Naselli focuses on a remaining section of Paul’s letter to the Romans concerning justification. Romans 9:30-10:13 specifically aims to contrast believing Gentiles to unbelieving Israel, who were God’s chosen people. To demonstrate the difference between a right standing by the faith of believers or alienation by works of righteousness, Israel tried to satisfy the Mosaic law. It was an impossible and futile effort as they had failed to satisfy all earlier covenants as a nation many times before. Israel did not believe in Jesus as their Messiah but rejected Him. In the Old Testament, God’s people of Israel didn’t accept His gift of righteousness and justification by faith.

Theological Facts of Justification

—Naselli’s narrative discourse on the theology of justification is adapted to a table assembled below for ease of review about theological facts.²

Jesus accomplished these feats of redemption to bring out immense heartfelt gratitude. Where we have nothing but surrender to His kindness and immeasurable love. The theological treatise Apostle Paul sets forward to the Romans applies to everyone today who would confess Christ, invite Him to live within, abide by His teachings, and every day abundant mercies.

The Means of Salvation

Author Brandon Crowe of Westminster Theological Seminary wrote a paper entitled, “By Grace You Have Been Saved through Faith.” This title corresponds to what Apostle Paul wrote in Ephesians 2:8a, “For by grace you have been saved through faith” (ESV), to echo how the whole passage begins. The remainder of the verse reads, “And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast” (Eph 2:8b-9). With complete clarity about what it means to be justified before God (i.e., “saved”), what God spoke through Apostle Paul’s words carries soteriological significance. Because of God’s active involvement among people, both grace and faith are together a gift for individual salvation resulting in eternal life with Him. To walk by faith while under grace as a means of justification is thoroughly supported by additional Pauline letters to the early church.

This very well-known passage concerning justification is supported by letters from Paul he wrote while traveling to developing churches along the Aegean sea and the surrounding interior cities of Asia Minor. He spoke of principles with confidence and authority about what it was to attain salvific standing before God from congregations, towns, homes, individuals, and while in prison. The principles were directly related to God’s acts of justifying the ungodly to return people to Him who were otherwise forever lost. Believers in Christ redeemed through His redemptive work who live lives of faith have the grace to attain salvation in life and from God’s wrath against sin.

Inclusive of all people, both Jews, and Gentiles, the spread of the gospel from Galatia to Corinth and back across the Mediterranean, the specifics involving the work of Christ are especially explicit from 1 Cor 15:1-4, where Paul writes of the gospel message that extends to everyone along his missionary journeys. This gospel message is about the ministry and sacrificial death of Jesus on a cross and His resurrection, ascension, and coronation. The gospel is about reconciliation to God through faith and repentance. Where faith is necessary for justification, Paul consistently spreads the gospel message to the churches in Galatia, Corinth, Thessalonica, Ephesus, Philippi, Colossae, and numerous specific individuals recorded within scripture. Not to mention the various unrecorded locations he visited and individuals he spoke to, there was a pattern of Paul’s gospel message reflected in scripture elsewhere (e.g., Troas, Berea, Tarsus). Everywhere he went, the point of the gospel was reconciliation and justification to involve numerous additional theological teachings such as sanctification, social inclusion, eschatology, church formation, and church discipline.

Of particular interest was Paul’s instruction concerning false teaching and the message of grace that did not include human merit or performance. In contradiction to works of the law, Paul spoke of God’s grace that characterized new covenant faith and practice. The new nature of people free from sin previously held captive by the law was now under grace to produce justification and sanctification through repentance. As Paul wrote each letter addressed to specific churches by geographical locale, the forgiveness of sins and deliverance from sinful living were brought out as a matter of pressing instruction and attention for corrective action or as an underlying subtext about fruitful living and more well informed theological understanding.

Crowe organizes his paper about salvation by grace through faith by each of Paul’s letters. He does that to highlight the point that the doctrine of justification is not a stand-alone perspective from his letter to the Romans. All of Paul’s letters as a corpus of doctrine are necessary for a robust and defensible understanding of justification. Each geographical category Paul addresses pertains to circumstances present during their ancient cultural context, but even today, intended for scriptural truth about God’s total redemptive work as a whole of humanity. Through sovereign intent, the principles that reinforce the work of justification through Christ involve the pastoral epistles and the non-Pauline texts of scripture.

The Doctrine of Justification to the Churches in Galatia

The formative churches within Galatia were East of the Aegean Sea and North of the Mediterranean coast, where modern-day Turkey is. The churches of Galatia included the locations where Paul traveled during his first and second missionary journeys from Antioch to bring the gospel to people. After establishing churches and fellowship of believers was formed among the towns, he wrote to them about various topics. A key among them was concerning justification by faith. The church then and today, informed by Galatians 2:16, reveals the most essential scriptural point that works of the law do not justify a person. While Paul’s message concerned works of the law about Jewish requirements of the Mosaic covenant, the reader of his letter further reads later, “for in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love” (Gal 5:6). Written or interpreted more concisely, only faith working through love counts for anything. As the basis for good works, love is not salvific but purely evidence of authentic faith that justifies a person before God.

Further, throughout the letter to the Galatians, Paul sets up an exhaustive refutation of works-righteousness to destroy its value of interest among people who may continue to think that salvation is achieved or earned. Justification is not a synergistic effort as one somehow “partners with God” to attain salvation. Salvation is given by grace through faith and not from “works” an individual does. A careful examination of Greek Lexicons (BDAG and LSJ)³ specific to the grammatical use of “works” within Ephesians 2:9 renders definition as an action, deed, duty, or accomplishment. Definitively, Paul completely removes any faint notion that justification, and therefore salvation, is merited by deeds, actions, fulfillment of duty, achievement, or accomplishment.

The Doctrine of Justification to the Churches in Corinth & Thessalonica

As previously noted above, it was to the Corinthian church that the gospel was again presented to readers who were not regenerated (1 Cor 15:1-4). The message of redemption that involved justification was stressed in Paul’s first letter to the church at Corinth as contentious issues were present from the leadership at the time. While the church was addressed with specific issues involving discipline and various doctrines of the faith, the matter of justification was touched upon as it was with the Galatians. A few sections of Paul’s letter bring further attention to justification by inference in various passages as follows.

A careful reading of 1 Corinthians 1:30 brings into view a phrase that is less than obvious about justification. The verse reading that includes the terms “in Christ” specifies a positional statement inferring justification.⁴ The text “in Christ” within 1 Cor 1:30 corresponds to the same language earlier in the letter as “the church of God that is in Corinth, to those sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints” (1 Cor 1:2). At both locations of the text, Paul uses the terms in Christ to indicate a unity with Jesus as saints are recognized, sanctified, and holy just as He is. Therefore, by inference and reason, it is concluded that justification is attributed to the representative righteousness of Christ to believers. While this is likely better suited to a discussion about the imputation of Christ’s righteousness upon believers, it doesn’t serve a reader well to miss the point of justification by indirect association.

In Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians, he does specifically use the term justification, nor does he use the language of the doctrine as he does later in his letters elsewhere. Current research indicates that 1 Thessalonians was one of the first letters he wrote.⁵ As Paul wrote to the church in Thessalonica, he spoke of the necessity of escaping God’s wrath to come (1 Thess. 1:9–10; 2:16; 4:6; 5:1–11; 2 Thess. 1:8–9). To infer the urgency of justification made secure from eternity past (Rom. 10:20–21; Eph. 1:4; 1:5; 1:11), the “brothers loved by God” (1 Thess 1:4) are sanctified by the Holy Spirit among God’s sovereignly elected by grace through faith. The justification of God’s chosen people by means of faith was established from eternity past as the firstfruits of a new humanity. Those divinely elected to be saved were marked as sanctified “by the Spirit and belief in the truth” (2 Thess 2:13). Therefore, this “marking” is the event or process of justification accompanied by sanctification to present God’s people holy before Him.            

Paul’s language in 2 Thessalonians 2:14 is key to the meaning and efficacy of salvation. More specifically, “To this” directly appeals to the crucial understanding of salvation appointed to Christians who were called and chosen through the gospel. Justification made certain through the course of redemptive events assured the calling of the saints to the glory and pleasing interests of God. The Father elects, the Son loves, and the Holy Spirit makes holy while unbelievers are marked and excluded from salvation.⁶ Accordingly, the means by which Christians were to escape God’s wrath involved the sovereign necessity and urgency of justification. The process God uses to bring His people to Him through Christ involves appointed belief and the work of the Spirit as necessary for salvation. In between the points of believer election and glorification are justification and sanctification.

The Doctrine of Justification from the Prison Epistles

Paul’s letters to the Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, and Philemon were written from prison while he was in captivity. By divine will, Paul underwent a period of trials and sufferings for the gospel (Acts 9:16), and the sovereign intent of Paul’s isolation while in prison included the work of his letters for formative instruction, theology, exhortation, training, and correction that would positively affect millions through time. Beginning with each church in Asia Minor, the development of the Kingdom of God grew from seeds of inspired truth to involve the doctrine of justification.

To the Church in Ephesus

To be delivered from the wrath of God, justification is necessary. And for justification to be accomplished, the forgiveness of sins is required to satisfy God’s justice (Eph 2:1-9). The gift of God is given to the elect who believe by both grace and faith in Christ. Christ Jesus claimed God’s people through His death and resurrection to make clear the gospel message where appointed people are brought to God to salvation by belief (i.e., grace through faith). Populating the Kingdom is the work of God (Eph 2:10) to justify those appointed to Him by His love, wisdom, and mercy. By faith alone, people are delivered from God’s wrath and made spiritually alive. As made possible by the forgiveness of sins by the atonement of Christ, the human contribution to this process is the gift of grace and faith. The gift accepted is a vehicle by which God justifies through Christ.

To the Church in Philippi

Technically speaking, the meaning of “justification” comes from a forensic (legal) term related to the notion of acquittal for a crime committed by divine act where God makes sinful humans subject to wrath acceptable before Him who is holy and righteous. The righteousness of God (Phil 3:9) stands separate from the righteousness of the law as the old covenant transitions to the new. Acceptable to God is only the righteousness that comes from God (i.e., faith in Christ) to justify believers. The righteousness attained by faith in Christ is the “righteousness from God” that justifies. There is no scriptural support to indicate any other contributing factors toward justification.

On the contrary, “righteousness from the law” serves to illuminate the inadequacy of works as people are entirely unable to satisfy its requirements. Christ has satisfied the law, and it is by His righteousness that His people become justified by faith in Him. For this reason, believers must reject their own works as having salvific merit and instead become “found in Him” (Phil 3:9) as Paul was to attain the forgiveness of sins and justification. To imitate Paul in this regard is to have one’s righteousness originate from Christ based on faith. Conformance to Christ in this way is to accept His righteousness and God’s forgiveness through Him to attain justification for salvation leading to eternal life.

To the Church in Colossae

Paul wrote at length about the forgiveness of sins as a requirement for acceptance before God. And Paul’s letter to the church at Colossae is no exception (Col 2:13-14, 3:13). He wrote of justification in this letter concerning the deliverance and the forgiveness of the sins (Col 1:14) of people appointed to eternal life through faith in Christ. Moreover, Paul speaks of deliverance from an evil age (Col 1:13) or “domain of darkness” (ESV) to Christ’s kingdom. As the process of redemption constitutes transfer from one state of being to another, the work of justification is necessary to undergo rebirth from being dead in sin to alive in Christ (Rom 6:11). Through Paul’s letter, he also stresses the need to put to death the work of sin as the deliverance concerns both an escape from death but also the wrath of God (Col 3:5-7).

The Doctrine of Justification from the Pastoral Epistles

The written work of Paul to the churches in Rome, Achaia, Macedonia, and Asia-Minor is a body of work about justification that must be taken together for a comprehensive meaning of the doctrine spanning hundreds of years. However, as scholars continue to pick at Paul’s written work and the authenticity of New Testament epistles, it is inexcusable to dismiss the letters to Timothy and Titus, who were both written about during his travels and missionary work. These letters carry the weight of canonicity and are a necessary contribution to the entire biblical testimony of Christ, faith, and practice.

Letters to Timothy & Titus

As Paul was a spiritual father to Timothy, he confided in him about his own sinfulness. Paul wrote of himself as the foremost of sinners. That is to say, he confessed to being the chief of sinners who blasphemed and violently persecuted the church (Acts 8:1-3, 1 Tim 1:13, 15; 1 Cor 15:9-10). In contrast, Paul also wrote that he was blameless regarding the law (Phil 3:6) and bore a clear conscience before God (Acts 23:1, 24:16). So what is the difference between the two?

On the one hand, he was chief of sinners, but on the other hand, he held a clear conscience before God. Was Paul sinless after his conversion on the Damascus road (Acts 9:1-8)? No, because he still contended with his flesh and was being made perfect. However, Paul was in perpetual grace, cleansed, forgiven, and justified before God through Christ. Not that Paul would then ignore the law or live a life of antinomianism, but he did believe in Jesus for eternal life to receive mercy. He was set free from sin, and Jesus selected him to become the Apostle to the Gentiles and serve as an example of Christ’s perfect patience to those who would believe in Him (1 Tim 1:16). Since Paul was the chief of sinners, Jesus makes a remarkable statement in the life of a highly sinful man about what He does to justify people for reconciliation and redemption by grace through faith apart from the works of the law.

Believers in Christ must abide in Him and persevere as He justifies everyone according to the Spirit who has vindicated Him (1 Tim 3:16). Said another way, you cannot out sin the grace of God and the perfect work of Christ by His death and resurrection. Putting to death sin and fighting it toward sanctification is made fruitful as believers who remain in Christ abide in Him. He has accomplished redemption and justification for everyone in Him as He lived a perfectly sinless life. Since He lived as Man who encountered temptation without sin, yet died to carry the sins of people to the grave while He was without sin, He rose from the dead to take with Him the sin He carried on behalf of everyone who believes for justification by faith.

It was Christ’s perfect obedience and holiness taken with Him to the cross where the sin of everyone who believes in Him would be abolished for all time (2 Tim 1:8-14). The forgiveness and abolition of sin make possible justification by faith in Christ Jesus, who reconciles believers to God. Furthermore, Jesus brought with Him the sin of believers where the spiritual consequences of death were crucified. Just as sin was abolished, so was death to produce spiritual immortality through the gospel (2 Tim 1:10). So anyone who believes in Christ and is found in Him benefits from His death and resurrection to eternal life (1 Cor 15:21).

Finally, Paul’s correspondence to Titus is consistent with previous letters carefully read to understand justification by grace through faith. To press the point further, Titus 3:7 specifically echoes the same terminology of Eph 2:8, “by grace,” as justification makes believers heirs of eternal life. According to the mercy of God, believers in Christ are saved not because of works, as earlier made clear, but by justification by grace through faith, for the washing of regeneration and renewal by the Holy Spirit (Titus 3:5).

Penal Substitutionary Atonement

The essay from Stephen J. Wellum entitled Behold, the Lamb of God is described as “Theology Proper and the Inseparability of Penal-Substitutionary Atonement from Forensic Justification and Imputation.” The author makes numerous scripturally supported claims that the atonement of Christ was a process of redemption that involved a payment of legal penalty by payment through substitution. Christ paid for people’s sins through His payment of the penalty to force an acquittal through declarative justification. The clear biblical support for Christ’s redemptive work as substitutionary support has Old Testament precedent and theological grounding. As justification is by faith in Christ (Rom. 3:28, 30; 5:1; Gal. 2:16; 3:8, 24), people escape condemnation and attain peace with God (Rom. 4:2; 5:1; 8:1).

The author makes the case that justification is possible through substitutionary atonement and the imputation of righteousness. The theory of penal substitutionary atonement (or “vicarious atonement”) is a theory prominent among protestant evangelicals who believe that Christ died in the place of sinful people to appease the wrath of God. Where the penalty of sin is death, Christ Jesus paid the penalty at His crucifixion on behalf of people guilty of sin who are subject to judgment. Another legal term, imputation, carries a meaning of credit or debit in a religious sense to believers who attain justification by atonement. As given by the biblical example of Leviticus 17:4, the death of an ox, lamb, or goat killed outside the camp was to become a bloodguilt imputed to the man guilty of the killing if the dead animal is not offered to the LORD as a gift. This imputation upon the guilty man represents the transferability of a debit to the man found in violation of God’s law concerning sacrificial offerings. Regulations concerning atonement in Leviticus are loaded with inferences concerning imputational atonement around sacrificial sin offerings.

A further point made is that justification and imputation go beyond the forgiveness of sins. There are two scriptural principles of justification that have a bearing on redemptive status and understanding beyond atonement. First, there is freedom and reconciliation where God has no further animosity or wrath toward sinful people whose sins are covered (Acts 13:39; Rom. 4:6–7; 5:9–21; 2 Cor. 5:19). Second, as justification involves redemption, there is a purpose to which believers become heirs as God’s children. The theological support from Paul’s letters to the church is clearly articulated for interpretation according to their intent. Romans 5:1-2 is a single pair of verses that reinforce both principles of justification to include access to God with joy through Christ Jesus.

The Reformers and some patristics held to substitutionary atonement among alternate atonement theories. Compared to the Governmental and Socinian views of the atonement, penal substitution is restorative to holy God who requires justice and truth to satisfy necessary retribution due to His nature. As full justification before God requires complete payment for sin, justice is satisfied by substitutionary for atonement, and Christ’s perfect obedience becomes imputed to believers for redemption and reconciliation. In the Arminian view, God could have chosen another method or means of justification other than through God as Christ Jesus having the blood of a perfectly innocent man to satisfy retributive justice from holy God by His nature. Perfect obedience and complete payment of sin are not required to satisfy God’s justice to prevent necessary wrath because of who He is. It is on these grounds that Christ’s imputed righteousness is rejected. To the Arminian (Methodist, Nazarene) view of justification, sinners are justified before God through Christ, satisfying God’s rectoral justice plus faith and repentance from a believer. Christ does not bear the penalty of divine retributive justice for us, nor is our guilt imputed to him and his righteousness to us (Wellum, 367). And Christ suffered and died, not as a satisfaction for the exact penalty, but as a token of God’s concern to uphold God’s moral law. The governmental view of atonement favors rectoral justice over retributive justice as it “dismisses the atonement of Christ as an exact payment of the penalty demanded by the retributive justice of God and His expressed law” (Wellum,368). This difference is a striking point of opposition as God withdraws the necessity of full payment and imputed righteousness and instead receives the repentance of believers directed toward Him by faith in Christ.

The penal-substitutionary position requires an inseparable relationship between it and forensic justification and imputation. In contrast, the Socinian-Classic Liberal Postmodern view of justice denies the sacrificial death of Jesus to satisfy fully God’s justice to prevent His due wrath against sin. The Socinian view also denies imputed righteousness to sinners. The repentance of believers is elevated over the position of Christ’s imputed righteousness as God forgives sinners and raises to eternal life believers who follow Christ and live virtuously. The Socinian view of Christ’s atonement emphasizes God’s love, mercy, and grace over justification. To Socinians, Christ died as a moral example, and there are various other reasons for His death other than to satisfy God’s retributive justice against sin.

There are three points of interest to consider for a plausible warrant and coherent view of penal substitution and the doctrine of justification. All three center around the triune God and the relationship that exists within His being. First, the trinity includes the Son, who is in eternal relationship with the Father and Holy Spirit. The Son has an immeasurable weight of significance as He redeems humanity to reclaim God’s chosen people through belief. Christ’s integral work within triune God demonstrates the love of God (John 3:16) and the presence of the Spirit at the cross. Second, the pactum salutis is the covenant of redemption that exists to fulfill the plan of salvation for those who would believe and become redeemed (Ps. 139:16; Eph. 1:4, 11; 1 Pet. 1:20). The satisfaction of justice the holiness of God requires is not detached from the trinitarian intent of redemption from His sovereign will. The existence of sin in its rebellion against God cannot be permitted to exist or remain through His creation. Third, the triune God is LORD over all the universe. Everything shall be in subjection to Him, and His righteousness demands the punishment of sin. His nature is holy, righteous, and just and while He keeps His promises, He must remain true to His name, glory, and essence. Everything and everyone shall honor and adhere to God’s moral standard. Yet, since He is kind, loving, and merciful, He redeems people through a process of justification that requires atonement for sin. The presence of sin and evil must be fully accounted for to satisfy the necessary removal and destruction of all rebellion and rejection of truth. Sin is enmity against God, and it must be removed from His people through faith in Christ and His process of justification through the atonement He ordained.

Catholic Doctrine of Justification

An understanding of the Roman Catholic doctrine of justification comes from a necessary awareness of what occurred at the Council of Trent (1545-1563) and the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification (JDDJ, 1999) that occurred much later. Ruptures of the catholic church during the Protestant Reformation and Eastern Orthodox separation were due to accretions in unbiblical doctrines. The grievances of Luther listed by the 95 theses nailed to the door at the church door of Wittenberg were indicative of the wild departures from apostolic tradition, doctrines, and faith practices. Through the centuries, Roman Catholic teachings about justification, Scripture, faith, sin, authority, and worship became contentious points of opposition insurmountable over the text of Scripture that informed and shaped Protestant theology.

The Council of Trent, or the Concilium Tridentium, was a gathering of the Roman Catholic authorities to establish a Counter-Reformation or response to Protestant theology emergent outside Catholicism. The Council of Trent was a 25-session council meeting held in Trento, Italy, situated squarely within the Reformation Era (1545-1699). Its objectives were to reaffirm and update Catholic doctrines to codify its views and traditions against Protestant beliefs and doctrines forming around Luther, Zwingli, Calvin, and others. While there were various points of contention, meritorious works were necessary as a part of saving grace. The doctrine of justification within the Catholic Church was a highly contested matter at the Council of Trent, where the teachings of Catholicism were affirmed along with various other matters of objection among the Reformers.

To elaborate further on the doctrine of justification within the Catholic Church, Trent referred to three stages or states of justification it held as necessary for salvation. First, human free will must assent to the grace God predisposes to people, which is only done through baptism or the desire for it. A person can either accept and cooperate with the grace of God to believe and become justified by faith or reject it. The second stage involves the work of a baptized believer who must work hard to maintain justification until the end of life. Faith and works accompany a person’s efforts to keep the commandments (free or forgiven of venial or mortal sin). That is to say, a person is not justified by faith alone, but a justification for salvific merit includes grace, faith, and good works. The third stage involves lapses in justification as persons fall into sin. The sacraments of penance, confession, priestly absolution, and making satisfaction remain necessary for continued justification that attains to salvation. From Trent, these three stages are the framework of the Catholic Church’s doctrine of salvation (i.e., to which a person is forgiven and placed into right standing before God and saved).

Before the JDDJ in 1999, the first and second Vatican councils convened as separate ecumenical efforts to soften its language and posture to evangelicalism, secularism, and modern culture itself. The first Vatican Council (Vatican I, 1869-1870) was called to deal with advances in science, liberalism, and rationalism. It sought to form a constitution (Dei Filius) around the divine inspiration of Scripture and the primacy of the Roman Catholic pope’s office and its infallibility (Pastor Aeternus). The second Vatican Council (Vatican II, 1962-1965) was assembled to promote the Catholic Church’s renewal and update its teachings, discipline, and organization. At the same time, the outcome of Vatican II involved changes to its liturgy and how it engaged with other churches within the covenant community. Moreover, the Roman Catholic Church Catechism on justification (Article II) specifies the necessity of faith as conferred in baptism (CCC 1992) and merit for the attainment of eternal life (CCC 2010), or by inference, the necessary justification to salvation.

The JDDJ was an event that sought to bring healing and unity to the Christian community. The joint declaration concerning the doctrine of justification involving both Lutheran and Catholic churches was not by consensus. There were numerous objections from those among the Catholic ranks. The Catholic Church needed to make various equivocations, concessions, and clarifications after the JDDJ was signed and put into effect. No change to the Roman Catholic doctrine on justification was made, while Lutherans made concessions about the necessity of baptism for justification (article 28 of the JDDJ). The grace of Jesus Christ is “imparted” at baptism according to article 30 to render a person eligible or open to accept or reject. Therefore, JDDJ, while it sought Christian unity and healing, it upheld the Trent declaration that grace is within a synergistic process of salvation.

According to Anthony N. S. Lane, in his book Justification by Faith in Catholic-Protestant Dialogue: An Evangelical Assessment, the following 15 issues were analyzed and identified between Catholics and Protestants. Among all of these issues, no changes or adjustments in Catholic doctrine were made from the JDDJ. Together they involve the doctrine of justification and the unreconciled differences between Catholics and Evangelicals.

Unresolved Differences of the JDDJ

For purposes of ecumenical unity, some interpret articles 5 and 11 of the JDDJ as complimentary, while others view them in tension with one another. Article 5 refers to the jointly accepted biblical doctrine of justification held by Protestants, but article 11 continues to recognize that cooperation of infused grace is necessary through baptism. More plainly, from the JDDJ, Catholics in article 5 recognize faith is necessary for justification, but it also accompanies a synergistic process of cooperation through baptism where a believer on his merit must perform. To conclude the difference between the Lutherans and Catholics who signed the JDDJ, justification is not by faith alone. Whereas Reformed theology maintains that salvation is attained by faith alone, Protestant interpretation of Scripture does not support the doctrine of justification as held by the Roman Catholic Church.

Second Temple Works Righteousness

The perspective that Second Temple Judaism was a grace soteriology runs counter to what Paul and the author of Hebrews wrote about old covenant stipulations concerning Mosaic Law that involved obedience, ritual sacrifices, and ceremonial obligations. In contrast, as the Abrahamic covenant included offspring and land, and his belief was counted as righteousness (Gen 15:6), there was later the period of levitical sacrificial offerings for remediation of sin and uncleanliness as a limited Old Testament form of atonement. Yet Old Testament sacrificial offerings could never take away sins, and the only thing that justifies people before God is Jesus Christ (Heb 10:1-18). The period of the law before Jesus’ ministry work was thoroughly about works of the law as the people of Northern and Southern Israel paid heavily for covenant disobedience as they would not return to God in repentance from idolatry, religious ritualism, and social injustice. The period of judgment was a means to demonstrate Israel’s inability to keep the law and that a new covenant would become necessary as foretold within the Adamic covenant (Gen 3:15).

The period of second temple Judaism overlapped with the arrival of Christ and His ministry during the first century. It was then the prophet’s message would become fulfilled about God’s law written on the hearts of His people (Ezek 11:19, 36:26, Jer 31:33, Heb 8:10). The fulfillment of the law arrived through Christ, who would usher in a covenant of grace to rest upon the Kingdom of God on Earth for those who would believe by faith in Him. Christ was the fulfillment of the law and prophets (Matt 5:17) so that grace, not law, would prevail within the hearts of His people as believers who love Him does what He says.

Writers and advocates of the New Perspective on Paul (NPP) follow E.P. Sanders’ work of “covenantal nomism.” First introduced in 1977, Sanders’ work entitled “Paul and Palestinian Judaism” offered the terms Covenantal and Nomism to claim that second temple Judaism accepts salvation by grace as valid, but its maintenance was through Mosaic Law. Specifically, the Mosaic covenant involved the free grace of God, as shown to Israel, but it was necessary to sustain law-keeping and keep oneself in the covenant to inherit salvation. The term nomism (from the Greek nomos, law) originates from the notion that ethical and moral observance of the law involves personal conduct. In his Systematic Theology, Grudem defines Covenantal Nomism as the belief of Jews during the time of Christ who obeyed Mosaic laws out of gratitude to remain God’s people. Still, an initial inheritance of salvation was by election and grace. To remain the people of God, it was necessary to “stay in” or continue in the faith by satisfying the Mosaic law to maintain the covenant. Covenantal Nomism is correlated to a marriage covenant where marriage is maintained by effort, continued intimacy, and consummation once vows are made.

In contrast to Covenantal Nomism, Variegated Nomism involves Jews within 2nd temple Judaism who held that salvation was through law-keeping by various ideas. To both attain and maintain salvation, legalism extended through the lives of individuals by different means of covenantal adherence. The distinction between the two rests upon the various forms of Judaism that held a keeping of the law by covenant, gratitude, and faith, to set a person on a path of justification involving progressive sanctification for final eschatological salvation. Both reject the imputation of Christ’s righteousness and personal belief (union with Christ) as considered righteousness.

As Robert J. Cara sets the record straight about grace and works righteousness within the second temple period, he calls attention to numerous extra-biblical and ancient rabbinic sources. Writings discovered among the Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS), pseudepigraphical literature, the Mishna (rabbinic oral traditions foundational to Judaism), and the Tosefta (supplemental to the Mishna) offered exhaustive evidence about the necessity of righteous acts and merit by law-keeping to attain eschatological salvation. Cara further contests James Dunn’s views about “covenantal faithfulness” as he refers to the scheme of works righteousness contrary to biblical principles of salvation by grace through faith.

Cara further elaborates upon N.T. Wright’s perspective about “getting in” and “staying in” the new covenant provided you perform what is right and good before God.” (Cara, 163) N.T. Wright specifically writes (4QMMT C 30-32):

“If through prayer and the moral strength that God supplies (C 28–29) you keep these precepts, you will rejoice at the end of time, in finding that the advice given, this selection of commands, was on the right track. That is when (C 31) ‘it will be reckoned to you as righteousness when you perform what is right and good before him.’”

This position is works-righteousness theology. It contradicts the verbiage written concerning Abraham and God’s covenant with him, “And he believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness” (Gen 15:6, Rom 4:9). This “believed” the LORD is explicitly defined by the root manuscript Hebrew language to “have trust in, to believe in, God.” Moreover, Paul’s use of the term “faith” for justification coincides with that type of belief resulting in eschatological salvation.

For further in-depth review, see James D. G. Dunn, “4QMMT and Galatians,” concerning The New Perspective on Paul, 339–45 (originally published in NTS 43, no. 1, 1997); and N. T. Wright, “4QMMT and Paul: Justification, ‘Works,’ and Eschatology,” in History and Exegesis ed. Sand-Won Son (New York: T&T Clark, 2006). Root rationale concerning works-righteousness theology stems from the contributions of Dunn and Wright as they build upon Sander’s insistence on justification through initial covenantal grace followed by required merit and performance for salvation.

Augustine of Hippo vigorously opposed the views of Sanders, Dunn, and Wright as the New Perspective on Paul advocates for a covenantal faithfulness to earn salvation. As the British monk Pelagius believed people were able to live holy lives to merit salvation by good works, Augustine recognized the theological error in contradiction to the authoritative perspective of Paul concerning salvation by grace through faith alone. While NPP adherents are not full-blown Pelagians, they are semi-Pelagians as they advocate a synergistic approach to the salvation of humanity. The synergistic work of God and mankind for individuals to attain salvation by works-righteousness infers a partial efficacy of Christ’s sacrificial work at His execution. Jesus fulfilled the law, and believers by faith who love Him live by the Spirit to abide in Him and do what He wants under the new covenant of grace.

Inseparability of Justification and Sanctification

The essay from R. Lucas Stamps entitled Faith Works is subtitled as “Properly Understanding the Relationship between Justification and Sanctification.” The paper examines three views of the relationship between justification and sanctification. Conflation, separation, and integration of the two are examined for their scriptural merit for understanding and practical rationale. First, to understand sanctification, a theological definition is in order. Sanctification is a process of being brought into complete conformity with Christ. It is the mode of being by which a person is set apart and made more holy. Christians spiritually transformed by justification are rendered holy through Christ but continually grow in sanctification as they strive toward holiness. Sanctification involves cooperation with the indwelling Holy Spirit within a believer’s life with participation in the disciplines of Godly living. To include immersion in the Word of God, prayer, fellowship, worship, training, outreach, charity, and more, the life of a believer becomes less in conformance to the values of the world to live a holy and moral life in honor of God. Further removed from sin, believers are sanctified in pursuit of holiness, as described by the Westminster confession.

Westminster Confession of Faith Definition of Sanctification

They, who are once effectually called, and regenerated, having a new heart, and a new spirit created in them, are further sanctified, really and personally, through the virtue of Christ’s death and resurrection, by His Word and Spirit dwelling in them: the dominion of the whole body of sin is destroyed, and the several lusts thereof are more and more weakened and mortified; and they more and more quickened and strengthened in all saving graces, to the practice of true holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.

With an understanding of the different perspectives around broad and coarse relationships between justification and sanctification, it’s necessary to recognize that Reformed soteriology is a distinct soteriological position where both are separated to achieve an intended purpose. Reformers separate the remission of sin and imputation of Christ’s righteousness (justification) from the practice of personal righteousness and the holy pursuit of living (sanctification). To the Reformers, justification is a conversion event for a change of positional status, while sanctification is a washing of regeneration and renewal of the inner person by the indwelling Spirit.

Reformers’ objections to the Augustinian tradition about justification brought strong opposition from the Catholic Church at the Council of Trent. While the Reformers held to a forensic (legal) understanding of justification for the remission of sins, the Tridentine model of atonement was, by contrast, an entirely different perspective from the Catholic Church. The Roman Catholic Church (RCC) from the Council of Trent saw justification as a curative or healing event or process to restore a person’s status before God. The canons and decrees from Trent that RCC adopted involved the following understandings about soteriological atonement: ⁷

“Justification translation from that state in which man is born a child of the first Adam, to the state of grace and of the adoption of the sons of God through the second Adam, Jesus Christ our Saviour.” [This movement from sinful nature to grace] “cannot, since the promulgation of the Gospel, be effected except through the laver of regeneration or its desire.”

In this definition, a “laver” refers to a bowl of rinsing and washing for ritual use by a priest. And the author draws attention to the RCC’s adherence to Trent as it adopted its position of justification around regeneration as a curative matter that involved a spiritual washing at conversion. As Titus 3:5 makes use of the phrase, “by the washing of regeneration,” or more fully and explicitly, “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by His grace we would be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life.” It is, therefore, apparent that justification and regeneration by washing are combined or fused into a single redemptive meaning. However, as Paul wrote to the Corinthian church, he separated the terms “washed,” “sanctified,” and “justified” by the Spirit of God to make a point that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor 6:11, 1-11). Therefore, the discontinuity between Scripture and the declaration of Trent that conflates the relationship between justification and sanctification does not appear to hold an exclusive claim on the nature of the relationship other than tradition in the absence of scriptural authority.

The second perspective on the relationship between justification and sanctification entirely severs the correlated necessity between them. Antinomian rejection of requirements of the new covenant responsibilities ignores the inner working purpose of sanctification and works of grace for personal holiness. A process of sanctification separate from saving faith renders it unnecessary in the mind of an Antinomian believer who holds to a “free grace” conviction. Saving faith from an Antinomian perspective views faith as mental assent to the truth of God. At the same time, the work of Christ for justification is limited in reach without concern for personal holiness and perseverance. Without a heart’s desire to live in holiness according to Christ’s instructions, the severed relationship between justification and sanctification contradicts what Scripture says about holiness or sanctification (Heb 12:14) that follows justification.

 Finally, Stamps brings attention to the integration between justification and sanctification from a position of Reformed theology. He notes that Calvin asserted that justification and sanctification are not separate. However, Calvin also maintained they are yet distinct. He went on to claim that justification holds a higher priority than sanctification. He viewed justification as foundational toward sanctification as salvation is necessary to assure a meaningful life of sanctified living. Union with Christ is necessary as a foundational position in which growth or a life course in sanctification takes place with necessary grounding. In this way, Calvin refers to both justification and sanctification as a double grace by necessity in which both are at work in a believer (Stamps, 518). As God is holy, He instructs His redeemed people to be holy (Lev 19:2).

The Ordo Salutis

Under the tradition of Reformed soteriology, the golden chain of redemption (ordo salutis) articulated in Romans 8:29-30 offers a sequence of thought around Pauline theology:

“For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.” 

The clear separation between “conformance to the image of the Son” (sanctification) and “he also justified” indicates a functional partitioning by a definition of terms in this passage to indicate linear activity. Or the presence of concurrent and overlapping work to satisfy Christ’s desire to become firstborn among God’s offspring. In a sense, the salvific work of Christ is both from spiritual death and from captivity to sin after justification. There is a unity in the saving work of God that is inseparable.            

A believer that becomes born-again has a transformative experience that is followed by necessary work from the indwelling Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit’s presence within a person isn’t passive but active to assure spiritual formation toward increasing sanctification for the interests of God where people progressively become satisfied in Him. From a careful reading of Ephesian 2:10, it is abundantly apparent that we are created as the workmanship of God to perform good works and so that Christ Jesus would “show the immeasurable riches of His grace in kindness toward us” (Eph 2:7). God wants to be in fellowship with His people. He loves His children, and He wants to dwell among us. To do that, He has informed us about how He intends to do that through both justification and sanctification.

Citations

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1} Stanley Grenz, David Guretzki, and Cherith Fee Nordling, Pocket Dictionary of Theological Terms (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 1999), 69.
² Andrew David Naselli, “The Righteous God Righteously Righteouses the Unrighteous: Justification according to Romans,” in The Doctrine on Which the Church Stands or Falls: Justification in Biblical, Theological, Historical, and Pastoral Perspective, ed. Matthew Barrett (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019), 230-235.
³ Henry George Liddell et al., A Greek-English Lexicon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996), 683.; William Arndt et al., A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000), 390.
⁴ G. K. Beale, A New Testament Biblical Theology: The Unfolding of the Old Testament in the New (GrandRapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2011), 475.
⁵ Brandon Crowe, “‘By Grace You Have Been Saved through Faith’: Justification in the Pauline Epistles,” in The Doctrine on Which the Church Stands or Falls: Justification in Biblical, Theological, Historical, and Pastoral Perspective, ed. Matthew Barrett (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2019), 261.
⁶ Crossway Bibles, The ESV Study Bible (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Bibles, 2008), 2318.
⁷ The Canons and Decrees of the Council of Trent, trans. H. J. Schroeder (Charlotte, NC: TAN Books, 1978), 31.