Romans 13:11 | What’s in the Word, “Saved” Part 1: A Salvation Paradigm
“You were purchased and the sale if final. Christ did not purchase you on a Reformed installment plan. We wait for redemption when Christ comes to claim what He purchased.”
“Moreover, if justification and sanctification are not separate, and are the same thing the Bible must be interpreted through the prism of justification only and in fact that is the very interpretive craze of our day; i.e., every verse in the Bible is about Jesus. Unfortunately, this would not explain the interpretive dichotomies of the Bible and would instead make them contradictions. There are many, many examples of this throughout the Bible, but the primary one is works. On the one hand, the Bible continually calls for faith alone without works, but on the other hand, it also calls for vigorous labor and obedience to the law. How can these be reconciled? Answer: some verses are talking about justification while others are talking about sanctification. If justification and sanctification are not separate, the Bible is nothing more than a book of confusion.”
Click to enlarge illustrations if needed.
I am very happy that we have arrived at Romans 13:11 because what Paul states here is the source of much misunderstanding in our day. As a pastor, I have said it: “We were saved, are being saved, and will be completely saved.” What was I thinking when I used to say things like that? I really don’t know. But isn’t that what Paul is saying here in Romans 13:11?
Besides this you know the time, that the hour has come for you to wake from sleep. For salvation is nearer to us now than when we first believed.
Paul seems to be saying what I used to say: our original salvation culminates into a final salvation. At TANC LLC, our research institute, we call that the “linear gospel.” In Reformed circles it is called the “golden chain of salvation.” Now listen, this is a really big deal. One must choose between the linear gospel and the parallel gospel. Let’s look at the illustrations below:
Illustration A
Illustration B
I have been making these illustrations for some time, and was surprised to find the following like-illustrations in the archives of the Australian Forum, the reformed think tank that spawned the present-day neo Calvinist movement:
Illustration C
Illustration D
Illustration E
The Australian forum used these illustrations to convince the church that the true gospel of the Reformation had been lost. These illustrations were key in clarifying what the Reformers really believed. And, though the recent Neo-Calvinist movement parrots much of the Forum’s dialect and other illustrations to teach authentic Reformed doctrine, they avoid these illustrations like a plague. Why? Because these concepts are the most clarifying, and what was used to clarify can also be used to refute the same doctrine.
I agree with the Forum, my illustration B and their Illustration C was the model that the church, for the most part, was teaching when the Australian Forum showed up in 1970 (Hereafter: AF). Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think the church was applying the model, but it is what they held to. They were actually functioning like model A and E.
Model A combines salvation with the Christian life. That may sound like a statement in regard to the obvious, but it really isn’t. When someone asks us if we are saved, we say yes, but the answer is in regard to models B and C. We were saved, so we are now saved. It was a onetime permanent act. Valerie, the family dog was born in the past, but her dogness is permanent. Valerie is not in the process of becoming a complete dog, she is a dog, she is perfect dogness. The AF would agree with my assessment here. Note in model C that justification is “finished.” When Valerie was born, her doghood was finished. Valerie will now start acting like a dog because that is her nature.
Not so with the Reformed models A and E. If someone asks a Reformed person if they are saved, they most say, “already—not yet” which is the nomenclature of an official Reformed doctrine. It means that one is in the process of BEING saved—their complete salvation is future. Again, the AF would have agreed with this assessment. Note the following illustration published by them:
Illustration F
I would also like to use their illustration to make a point. They, in representing the Reformed view take issue with justification being finished. They believe it is ongoing, but look what they call it: “sanctification.” Why wouldn’t they call it “ongoing justification”? Normally, the term for the Christian life is progressive sanctification, but Reformed theologians stay well clear of the term progressive justification. The only exception is in the Calvin Institutes (3.14.title). At issue is what they illustrate with model E—justification and sanctification are combined. Salvation is a progression and worse yet, we are in the midst of the progression. That means we can mess up the progression, this is an unavoidable inference, and is indeed an element of Reformed thinking.
This is where I want to make a point about illustration D. The AF, like all of the Reformed, refutes this model as Christ plus something. Salvation only covers past sins, but we have to do something in our sanctification to maintain our righteous standing. In both models justification (salvation) is not finished, but the Reformers say that is ok for their model because justification is finished by justification.
But yet, this is the problem with all linear gospels like model A: we are in the middle of the process, so the question must be answered; “what is our role?” And that very question is a huge problem because mankind has NO role in being justified. No man other than Christ could pay the penalty for our sins. However, the Reformed answer is, “The Vital Union.” Basically, it is ok for us to be in the midst of the unfinished justification process because we participate in the same way that we were saved; viz, by faith alone. So models A, D, and E are the same thing, but the Reformed say that is ok for their model because it is Christ plus faith alone in Christ. In order to keep justification moving along properly, we must live our lives by faith alone.
Personally, I contend that if we have ANY role in our salvation other than the decision that brought the death of the old us and the birth of a new us, that’s works salvation by doing nothing with intentionality. In fact, it’s called abstaining and that’s a verb. Salvation by Christ plus doing nothing is still model D. Calvinist Tullian Tchividjian wrote a book titled Jesus plus nothing equals everything, but in a linear gospel where justification and sanctification are fused together, IT’S IMPOSSIBLE TO DO NOTHING because doing nothing is something. The only way that we can do nothing is if …
1. The work itself is finished. You can’t do anything to finish a finished work.
2. You are not present to do anything. The work is not located in your realm of operation.
This requires a discussion regarding the separation of justification and sanctification which is anathema to the Reformed thinker. They say, “Justification and sanctification are never separate, but distinct.” However, because of the terms used by Scripture, the Reformers are forced to do something with sanctification, especially in light of 1Thess 4:3,4, so the progression of justification falls under the auspices of progressive sanctification. This brings us back to illustration F. If Valerie, a dog, specifically a beagle, is justification, why would we call her something different because she gets up and starts walking? Is that cause to call her a duck? Indeed, a Valerie sitting is “distinct” from Valerie walking, but does that make her something other than a dog? If Calvin himself spoke of justification as being progressive in the title of chapter 14 | book 3, and that in fact is what you deem it to be, why not call it progressive justification and be done with it?
We hold that justification is a finished work and completely separate from the Christian life. Model B is the ONLY “plus nothing” model because you cannot add to a finished work nor can you work on something that is otherworldly. Christ came to finish a work that we cannot touch. Justification declares that the law that would judge us has no jurisdiction over us. Our sanctification comes from the regeneration of the new birth, not the finished work of justification. This was the rhetorical question that Paul asked of the Galatians:
3:2 – this only do I wish to learn from you—by works of law the Spirit did ye receive, or by the hearing of faith?
3 so thoughtless are ye! having begun in the Spirit, now in the flesh do ye end?
(YLT).
In other words, after receiving the Spirit, do you finish a finished work by circumcision? Note the previous verse:
3:1 – O thoughtless Galatians, who did bewitch you, not to obey the truth—before whose eyes Jesus Christ was described before among you crucified? (YLT).
Christ’s death on the cross finished the work of justification.
But doesn’t Paul say that our salvation is future? The question is salvation from what? We know it is not salvation from sin that would condemn us for sin is not counted where there is no law (Rom 4:15, 5:13) and Christ put an end to the law (Rom 10:4). However, it is clear that the world will be judged by the law (Rom 3:19, 20). It is not salvation from sin that would condemn us.
While the believer is born again and truly righteous, we must carry around the old us that was crucified with Christ. The things Christ died for are still with us (2Cor 4:7-18). As Christians, we await a deliverance from this body of death. (Rom 7:25). Clearly, salvation from condemnation is finished (Rom 8:34), salvation from the sin that condemns is past and complete, but there is left a salvation from sin that harasses us daily. If the gospel is linear, and justification is not finished, Paul is speaking of a future salvation from condemnation—we reject that idea with prejudice, Paul is talking about the other salvation from the sin of our mortality.
The Bible also refers to that as redemption. Remember last week and our discussion of the exchange of slavery? We were purchased from the other slave owner by the blood of Christ (1Cor 6:19,20, 7:22,23), and Christ will one day return to redeem His purchase (Gal 3:13, Luke 21:28). In the linear model, there can be no exchange of slavery because we are not finally free till the end. Neither is there an exchange of law because faith only is required to maintain the “vital union” that keeps our original justification moving forward.
Moreover, if justification and sanctification are not separate, and are the same thing the Bible must be interpreted through the prism of justification only and in fact that is the very interpretive craze of our day; i.e., every verse in the Bible is about Jesus. Unfortunately, this would not explain the interpretive dichotomies of the Bible and would instead make them contradictions. There are many, many examples of this throughout the Bible, but the primary one is works. On the one hand, the Bible continually calls for faith alone without works, but on the other hand, it also calls for vigorous labor and obedience to the law. How can these be reconciled? Answer: some verses are talking about justification while others are talking about sanctification. If justification and sanctification are not separate, the Bible is nothing more than a book of confusion.
The linear gospel also leads to all sorts of confusing doctrines that make doing nothing in our Christian life feasible. One is double imputation. This is the belief that Christ died for our justification and lived a perfect life of obedience for our sanctification. That way, Christ’s perfect obedience to the law is imputed to our Christian life as we live by faith alone.
Illustration G
This Reformed doctrine also makes law the standard for justification in regard to Christians. Since perfect adherence to law remains the standard, but Christ fulfilled and keeps it for us, neither is an exchange of law needed in salvation as we discussed last week—the relationship to the law doesn’t change.
This results in an attempt to reduce sanctification to a mere “awareness” or “experience” with all kinds of mystic doctrines following of which there is no shortage in Reformed circles. An excellent example is the following excerpt from a sermon I heard recently:
Years ago, there was a pastor named Ichabod Spencer, and he was talking to a young student who was convicted of a sin and wasn’t a believer but wanted to come to Christ. And he wrote of the conversation, and it’s in a book called Pastoral Sketches, and Ichabod Spencer’s section in there has this conversation. And it’s fascinating because it’s called “I Can’t Feel.” Listen to this interchange. Ichabod Spencer said,
“I don’t know, my dear sir, what more can be said to you. I’ve told you all that I know. Your state as a sinner, lost, exposed to the righteous penalty of God’s law and having a heart alienated from God and the free offer of redemption by Christ, I’ve told you those things, and your instant duty to repent of sin and give up the world and give God your heart and the source of your help through the power of the Holy Spirit assured to you if you will receive Christ.” In other words, self-empty, and believe it, all these things have become as familiar to you as household words. What more can I say? I know not more what there is to be said.” He said, “I cannot read your heart. God can. And you can by his aid. Some things you’ve said almost made me think you a Christian, and other things again have destroyed that hope. I now put it to your own heart. If you’re not a Christian, what hinders you?”
And he thought for a moment, and he said, “I can’t feel.” “Well, why didn’t you tell me this before?” He said, “I never thought of it before, sir.” “Well, how do you know this hinders you?” “I can’t think of nothing else. I’m sure I shall never be converted to God if I have no more feeling than I have now. That is my own fault. I know you can’t help me.” And he said, “No, sir, I cannot, nor can you help yourself. Your heart will not feel at your bidding.” “What then can I do?” said he with much anxiety. “Come to Christ now. Trust him. Give up your darling world. Repent so inequity shall not be your ruin.” Well, he seemed perplexed, annoyed, vexed. And with an accent of impatience such as I had never witnessed in him before, he replied, “That is impossible. I want the feeling to bring me to that, and I can’t feel.”
And Spencer said, “Hear me, sir, and heed well what I say. I have several points. Number one, the Bible never tells you you must feel, but you must repent and believe. Number two, your complaint that you cannot feel,” listen to this, “is just an excuse by which your wicked heart will justify you for not coming to Christ now.”
First of all, this idea that we cannot command our feelings is something that I hear often and is not biblical. The apostle Paul instructed us to keep a clear conscience before God. Elsewhere, we find that our consciences either accuse us or excuse us. We all know how bad we feel when our consciences accuse us; therefore, we may assume that the opposite is true when we do right. We are also instructed by Paul as well to make it our goal to please God; certainly, a feeling of accomplishment can be expected here as well.
Clearly, we can command our feelings by doing what is right. In contrast, the above dialogue is the result of the linear gospel where an act of grace must precede all feelings. Again, if we are in the middle of a process that saves us, and we are good Reformed thinkers with faith alone always in the forefront, we must only believe and merely be a witness to “grace.” Can you see this in the above dialogue? Only believe is the exhortation of the pastor, and we cannot command our feelings anyway.
In contrast, this young man isn’t going feel any different UNTIL he makes a decision to follow Christ. Why? Because he is under judgment! When you are under law, all that awaits you is a fearful judgment under the law. Why would he feel any different until he is no longer under threat of judgment? This would have been my counsel to this young man. At the very least, the vacancy of fear and the knowledge that you are going to spend eternity in heaven will produce good feelings on some level.
Yes, this leads into all kinds of Reformed wackiness that I believe shuts up the door of heaven to many. I myself know of a young man that wouldn’t make a commitment to Christ because he was yet to see Christ as a “treasure chest of joy.” This all speaks to the Reformed concern that man is able to make an intellectual decision that is part of the salvation process. Yea, we must have some kind of sign that we were enlightened first before we make the decision. But why would it be delight? What of a fear of judgment that we know we deserve?
The fact that the aforementioned young man was vexed and in turmoil is a sure sign from heaven that he understand that he is under the law. Good grief! Lord come quickly and deliver us from this ignorance dressed in academic garb! Remember what we have learned previously in this Romans study? Our service to God is a what? Right, “reasonable service.” Remember what that word means? It means “rational.” My father was an intellectual who always had an interest in God throughout his whole life, but in the end, he assured me that he had made a personal commitment to Christ. But be sure of this, my dad would not have made a commitment to mystic nonsense coming from the Reformed crowd. The decision to be saved is a rational decision, and our service to Christ is rational.
“Just believe” is no answer, we must tell people WHY they mustn’t wait on a feeling. It is because feelings follow thinking and doing. For the most part, feelings are a choice. What do you do if you feel unsafe? You make a decision to change your circumstance to something safer, and then you feel safer. My friends, this is hardly rocket science.
But this can now bring us to another consideration of linear versus parallel—that of end times. The linear gospel can only speak of one final judgment where the children of God are “manifested.” If you look at the parallel gospel, it supplies the possibility of two judgments. Note the illustration below:
What comfort is there in thinking that our “final justification” will be confirmed at some plenary judgment at the end of the age? We should take comfort in the fact that we will not stand in that judgment at all! And again, this points to the need for interpretation according to the following interpretive question: Is it a justification verse, or a sanctification verse? In the linear construct, it must always be a justification verse; either a sitting still dog or a walking dog that is apparently a duck because he is now walking. But in the parallel construct, I can point to numerous biblical dichotomies that are defined by parallelism. Let’s look at a couple.
In 1John, John tells us there is no fear in love and fear has to do with “judgment.” But then Paul tells us to work out our own salvation with trembling and fear. This is not the same salvation being spoken of. John is writing of the difference between the law of sin and death that will judge us, and the law of love which is the difference between being under law and under grace. Paul is writing of having a sober stance towards our sanctification. The Christian life isn’t a birthday party; it’s a many-faceted intellectual warfare. “Salvation” in the Bible doesn’t always speak of salvation from eternal judgment, there is yet a salvation for God’s people—the salvation from carrying about in our bodies all of the things that Christ died for. Let’s close by looking at an example of how the linear perspective gets us into difficulty. In the Reformed scholarly work “The Race Set Before Us,” the authors cite Matthew 24:13 as proof that salvation is future and that Christians must persevere till the end of their life:
But the one who endures to the end will be saved.
Again, the assumption is that “saved” always means eternal salvation. But let’s qualify that with Matthew 10:
21 Brother will deliver brother over to death, and the father his child, and children will rise against parents and have them put to death, 22 and you will be hated by all for my name’s sake. But the one who endures to the end will be saved. 23 When they persecute you in one town, flee to the next, for truly, I say to you, you will not have gone through all the towns of Israel before the Son of Man comes.
What is Christ saying? He is saying that when you see certain things happen during the tribulation period, you will be able to save yourself from physical death by fleeing from town to town because the Lord’s return is near. He is talking about saving yourself from physical death, not eternal salvation.
“Saved” has more than one meaning. In verse 11, Paul is talking about salvation from this present warfare against evil within and evil without. In the same way Christ stated that those who see certain things in the tribulation period draw near to their “redemption.” That word refers to a ransom that has already been paid on the cross.
You were purchased and the sale if final. Christ did not purchase you on a Reformed installment plan. We wait for redemption when Christ comes to claim what He purchased.
Why Catholicism and Protestantism Both are False Gospels
“This is not mere semantics concerning the best way to grow spiritually; what we believe about sanctification shows what we believe about justification. Is it a finished work or not? And if it isn’t, what we believe about sanctification is a purely salvific discussion by default anyway. The Reformers, new and old, do not frame sanctification in salvific terms; this is disingenuous and they know it. Confusion in regard to sanctification enables them to speak of sanctification in a justification way.”
“According to the Reformers, contemplative repentance is the fuel that powers our car on the justification highway to heaven. If we try to get to heaven any other way; i.e., some sort of belief that the highway is not a highway at all but a finished declaration and present reality, we lose justification and sanctification both (Michael Horton: Christless Christianity; p. 62).
In other words, contemplative repentance as a work that we do is the only way to heaven. Reformers like Tullian Tchividjian insist that it is Christ + Nothing = Everything; but again, that is because, like Calvin, he deems contemplative repentance as a non-work in sanctification that doesn’t cause our justification car to run out of gas. In fact, the think tank that launched the present-day Reformation resurgence framed it in those exact terms.”
Protestantism, which came from Catholicism, is also a false gospel. This is because Protestantism only reformed the means of progressive justification and didn’t reject it. Both are guilty of fusing justification and sanctification together. Therefore, both are false gospels because according to both, justification is not a finished work and progresses through sanctification. Therefore, the question of what man must believe so that justification is properly finished is the difference between heaven and hell. Salvation becomes a matter of the right justification process as opposed to simply believing on a finished work by God.
If sanctification (the Christian life) is the progressive expression of justification, man is involved in the justification process, and when this is the case, it is salvation by works because doing is involved even if the doing is believing only. Sanctification becomes a discussion about what is works in sanctification and what isn’t a work in sanctification, but doing something, whether believing or breathing, is a work; it’s all work. Hence, all of the confusion, and if you will, denominations. The propagation of sanctification by faith alone is always indicative of a justification that is not finished.
In truth, nothing we do in sanctification is a work for justification because that work is already finished. And this is the crux in regard to what Paul wrote to the Galatians:
Gal 3:1 – O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. 2 Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? 3 Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?
“Being perfected” can be a little misleading if one does not examine this text carefully. The word for “perfected” is epiteleō which means “to complete, bring to an end.” This is why Young’s Literal Translation has it this way:
O thoughtless Galatians, who did bewitch you, not to obey the truth — before whose eyes Jesus Christ was described before among you crucified? 2 this only do I wish to learn from you — by works of law the Spirit did ye receive, or by the hearing of faith? 3 so thoughtless are ye! having begun in the Spirit, now in the flesh do ye end? [ESV Olive Tree footnote: “Or now ending with”].
The issue at hand was the fact that the Galatians were being influenced by the “circumcision party” (Gal 2:12). They taught salvation by circumcision. Paul called it justification by the law, but understand what he meant by that. The circumcision party emphasized justification by circumcision, but relaxed the rest of the law. Christ referred to this same sort of theology in the Sermon on the Mount (Matt 5:19). Paul’s point is that if you want to be justified by the law, all of the law must be kept perfectly in order to do so (Gal 4:2-4).
Freedom to obey the law aggressively (as love) in sanctification points to our view of justification. Aggressive obedience in sanctification points to the belief that justification is a finished work and unrelated to our work for God and others. It embraces the whole law and pursues righteousness for the sake of loving God and others truthfully. Though we fall short and that is disappointing, it cannot affect a work that is already finished: justification. Those misleading the Galatians taught that circumcision finished justification, and perhaps, as well, that any focus on the finer points of the law would circumvent the circumcision. In essence, those leading the Galatians astray were antinomians:
Gal 2:15 – We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners; 16 yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.
17 But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not! 18 For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor. [parabatēs “lawbreaker”].
When justification and sanctification are fused together and sanctification is the progression of justification, invariably, some tradition or combination of traditions replaces a literal adherence to law. In other words, the law needs to be dumbed down because it is part of the justification process. So, mark it well: our attitude towards the law in sanctification reveals what we believe about justification:
Gal 5:7 – You were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth? 8 This persuasion is not from him who calls you.
They were “running” well. “Well” (kalōs) carries the idea of good morals. Paul was certainly NOT commending them for “running well” for justification. They replaced the law keeping of love in sanctification with the supposed fulfilment of justification by the traditions of men and their interpretation of the law. In this case, the primary tradition was circumcision. This is how the Amplified Bible states it:
Gal 3:2 – Let me ask you this one question: Did you receive the [Holy] Spirit as the result of obeying the Law and doing its works, or was it by hearing [the message of the Gospel] and believing [it]? [Was it from observing a law of rituals or from a message of faith?]
The paraphrase, “observing a law of rituals” is a good one. The Galatian error involved the necessary dumbing down of the law because the Christian life is seen as an extension of justification. To the contrary, there is NO law in justification because no man can withstand its judgment for righteousness (Rom 2:12, 3:19-21, 28, 4:15, 5:13, 6:14,15, 7:1, 6, 8 “Apart from the law, sin lies dead”). However, a relaxed view of the law of love in sanctification points to a law in justification that must be fulfilled by some sort of tradition:
Gal 5:6 – For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love. 7 You were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth?
Notice that faith works (Jms 2:22) “through love,” and love fulfills the law (Rom13:8). This is a “running” by “obeying the truth.” This is why justification and sanctification must be completely separate. Justification is a finished work, and sanctification is a progressive work of love through obedience to the word of God.
Gospels that fuse justification and sanctification together always posit the idea that a striving to keep God’s law truthfully, as a way to earn salvation, is the pandemic of the day. That is not true at all. An effort to “run well” is always associated with the idea that the running has nothing to do with justification at all. Justification is God’s love to us and is finished; our love towards God and others is sanctification.
1Jn 4:19 – We love because he first loved us.
“We love” is sanctification. “He first loved us” is justification.
In both Romanism and Protestantism, justification is progressive, and sanctification is the progression of justification. This calls for a special formula that keeps us from circumventing the process. It also requires that we do something to maintain the process. “But Paul, doesn’t justification have a finished aspect and also a progressive aspect?” No, but even if that point is conceded, if justification isn’t properly finished, the beginning of it is for naught. In fact, this is exactly what John Calvin taught in regard to the perseverance of the saints. He stated that all who were chosen would not necessarily persevere to the end. Hence, their initial justification was for naught (CI 3.24.6-8).
The Protestant special formula is best exemplified in the writings of John Calvin. First, he made a perfect keeping of law the standard for justification. Justification was defined by a law standard. In the Calvin Institutes (CI), Calvin claimed that Christ obtained justification “by the whole course of his obedience” (CI 2.16.5). In the same section, Calvin interprets Christ’s one act of obedience (Rom 5:19) to the cross as pertaining to his whole life (that only refers to His obedience to the cross Pil 2:8). He also notes that Christ was “born under the law” (Gal 4:4,5) and offers that “proof” as well. But all that is saying is that Christ was born into the world like all other men: under the law. Christ is the only man born into the world that could withstand a judgment by the law—that doesn’t mean he had to keep it in order to fulfill all righteousness. For that matter, all righteousness was fulfilled when He was baptized by John the Baptist (Matt 3:15).
Calvin then goes on to explain that any law-keeping by the Christian is futile because we cannot keep it perfectly (CI 3.14. 10), and no Christian has ever done a work pleasing to God (CI 3.14.11). According to Calvin, the obedience of Christ must be continually applied to our lives until we get to heaven (Ibid). Furthermore, we must continually return to the same gospel that saved us for the forgiveness of new sins committed in the Christian life (Ibid, and CI 4.1.21,22).
So, the Protestant formula is returning to the same gospel that saved us in order to maintain our justification. Supposedly, it’s not of works because the initial repentance that saved us was by faith alone, so a perpetual returning to the same gospel maintains our justification while qualifying as faith alone. This, according to Calvin, does not circumvent the “Progressive” “Sense” of justification (see title: CI 3.14).
In this Protestant construct, Martin Luther’s alien righteousness was very important. This teaches that ALL righteousness remains outside of the believer. The believer has no righteousness of his own. This is important if you are on the justification bus going to glorification. Your inner righteousness would be part of the process that keeps the progression moving forward, perseverance if you will. This version of the Protestant formula to reach heaven by the same faith alone without works that saved/justified us can be seen in the Protestant concept of Sabbath Salvation. In the same way that the Israelites were not allowed to work on the Sabbath upon pain of death, anyone who works in their Christian life will suffer eternal death. Said Calvin:
Ezekiel is still more full, but the sum of what he says amounts to this: that the Sabbath is a sign by which Israel might know God is their sanctifier. If our sanctification consists in the mortification of our own will, the analogy between the external sign and the thing signified is most appropriate. We must rest entirely, in order that God may work in us; we must resign our own will, yield up our heart, and abandon all the lusts of the flesh. In short, we must desist from all the acts of our mind, that God working in us, we may rest in him (CI 2.8.29).
Calvin was adamant that none of God’s righteousness could be transferred to the believer (CI 3.14.11) in the “two-fold grace”(i.e., two-fold justification: Calvin deliberately used perceived synonyms to nuance what he believed) of justification and sanctification. All righteousness must remain outside of the believer. If the believer has no righteousness that is his/hers, they can continually affirm their belief in justification by faith alone and continue to receive forgiveness based on faith alone. In this way, Christ’s death and obedient life is perpetually applied to the believer in sanctification until they get to heaven (Ibid).
Therefore, it stands to reason that the only duty of the believer is to see their own sinfulness in sanctification; by doing this, they affirm they have no righteousness that is their own, and can do no work pleasing to God. According to the Protestant formula, this is the only work that is not a work. It is the “mortification of the will.” So, all work in sanctification must be the same repentance that originally saved us—this keeps us in the saving graces of God.
Contemporary Calvinists like John Piper refer to this as the Gospel continuing to save us IF we continue to “live by the gospel.” In a sermon titled, How Does the Gospel Save Believers? Part 2 Piper made the following statement:
We are asking the question, How does the gospel save believers?, not: How does the gospel get people to be believers? (August 16, 1998 by John Piper | Scripture: Romans 1:16-17 | Series: Romans: The Greatest Letter Ever Written).
So, let’s be clear, what we believe the gospel is, keeps us saved. The Protestant gospel is a sanctification defined by repentance only that keeps us saved. If we believe we have a righteousness of our own, all bets are off. Because sanctification is part of the “two-fold” grace (singular) of justification, man’s righteousness cannot participate. This is opposed to another view of the gospel that we are born again of God literally (1Jn 3:9, 5:18) and therefore righteous, and in fact full of goodness (Rom 15:14).
The fact that Christians still sin as mortals does not negate the fact that they are inherently righteous as proven by a change of direction. Certainly, perfection is the goal in sanctification, but not the standard for justification. The Bible explains it as an exchange of slavery. Those “under the law” and not “under grace” are free to do good, but enslaved to unrighteousness (Rom 6:20-22). Those under grace are enslaved to righteousness, but also free to sin (Rom 7:25). The chart below may help illustrate how this results in a change of life direction.
There is no law in justification, and it is a finished work apart from sanctification which fulfils the law by love. The law is now the standard for love in sanctification. As mentioned before, gospels that fuse justification and sanctification together in order to make justification an unfinished work often teach that obedience to the word of God circumvents the formula of salvation. In the case of Protestantism, a belief that we can please God by obeying His word assumes a righteousness that circumvents their gospel.
Hence, anything except repentance or mortification of the flesh assumes righteousness on our part. Regeneration (the new birth) must be manifested by the works of Christ alone in sanctification. There is no room here to expound on the point, but “obedience” in this construct is only an experience specifically called “vivification.” The “heart” of the believer is only changed in regard to its increased ability to experience Christ’s obedience. We experience the “active” obedience of Christ imputed to our sanctification (His “passive” obedience was His death on the cross), but we are not the ones doing it. This protestant idea can be seen in a statement by Calvinist Paul David Tripp:
When we think, desire, speak, or act in a right way, it isn’t time to pat ourselves on the back or cross it off our To Do List. Each time we do what is right, we are experiencing [underline added] what Christ has supplied for us (Paul David Tripp: How People Change; Punch Press 2006, p. 215).
John Calvin, as you will notice if you read his writings carefully, often replaced the idea of direct obedience to God with experiencing God’s works. This is very similar to the Gnostic idea of experiencing objective, or pure good subjectively. There are many variations of this throughout Protestantism, but at the very least, and in all cases, it will instigate a relaxed attitude towards the law.
And how does this relaxing of the law that Christ warned of take place? Simply stated, it takes the two-fold act of love which is sanctification, put off and put on (Eph 4:20-24), and makes them both the responsibility of Christ while we are mere experiencers of the manifestation. This is done by primarily making sanctification ALL about repentance only, but even then, it is for the purpose of more “seeing” via the “heart.” Hence, spiritual growth is defined by an increased capacity to experience Christ as opposed to being able to actually follow Him.
Therefore, the word of God is for gospel contemplationism, or better stated, repentive contemplationism, and is not actually applied to life by the kingdom citizen; that would be working for our justification. So, life application is defined as a work, and not working is defined as not a work; i.e., contemplationism is not a work. Essentially, this is the very construct Christ attacked in the Sermon on the Mount.
The Reformers, old and new, have always tried to do a metaphysical end around on this with “distinction without separation.” Unfortunately, Bible students who formidably challenged the Reformers and elicited this rebuttal in regard to the juxtaposing of justification and sanctification have been expunged from church history. The only detractors who get press were chosen by the Reformers because they had other problems theologically.
As a way to simplify this as much as possible, let’s focus on the fact that the likes of Calvin defined sanctification by repentance only. And remember, that repentance is only contemplationism as well. I will be using an article written by Cornelis P. Venema in the Mid-America Journal of Theology to make my points (Calvin’s Understanding of the “Two-Fold Grace of God” and Contemporary Ecumenical Discussion of the Gospel MJT 2007). I will underline what I want to emphasize.
The first part of Calvin’s basic formula for relating these two aspects of God’s grace [justification and sanctification] in Christ reflects his judgment that justification and sanctification concern two different questions, and denote two distinct facets of God’s relation to us. Whereas justification concerns the basis or reason for our salvation, sanctification concerns the way in which our life is converted to God (p. 79).
Note that justification is the beginning point of a “way” to “conversion” (salvation). Sanctification is the justification highway that leads to final salvation. Justification is not a finished work, it’s a starting point. The “distinction” is the beginning, or name of the highway project, and sanctification is the building project. But the Bible states that justification cannot be a building project because it is a finished work. This is not mere semantics concerning the best way to grow spiritually; what we believe about sanctification shows what we believe about justification. Is it a finished work or not? And if it isn’t, what we believe about sanctification is a purely salvific discussion by default anyway. The Reformers, new and old, do not frame sanctification in salvific terms; this is disingenuous and they know it. Confusion in regard to sanctification enables them to speak of sanctification in a justification way.
In addition, Calvin not only made repentive contemplationism the sum and substance of sanctification, but…
Throughout all of his writings—in his Institutes, commentaries, and sermons—Calvin consistently refers to this “double grace” or twofold benefit of our reception of the grace of God in Christ as comprising the “sum of the gospel.” These two benefits, justification and sanctification (or repentance) are the “two parts” of our redemption, both of which are bestowed upon us by Christ through faith. Together they form the two ways in which the “justice of God” is communicated to us, and in which we are cleansed by the holiness of Christ and made partakers of it. They constitute that “twofold cleansing” (double lavement), or “twofold purification” (duplex purgandi), which are granted to us by the Spirit of Christ. The “twofold grace of God” answers to the two ways in which Christ lives in us, and forms the invariable content of all Christian preaching about redemption in Christ and its application to human existence (p. 70).
Calvin usually terms the second benefit of our reception of God’s grace in Christ, “regeneration” (regeneratio) or “repentance” (poenitentia). Though inseparably joined with justification and faith, this benefit must not be confused with it. “As faith is not without hope, yet faith and hope are different things, so repentance and faith, although they are held together by a permanent bond, require to be joined rather than confused” (p. 76).
The author’s heavily footnoted assertions are correct (see source), Calvin, as with all of the Reformers, made repentance (actually, repentive contemplationism/contemplative repentance) synonymous with faith, grace, redemption, justification, sanctification, hope, purification, viz, a perpetual “’justice of God’…communicated to us.”
According to the Reformers, contemplative repentance is the fuel that powers our car on the justification highway to heaven. If we try to get to heaven any other way; i.e., some sort of belief that the highway is not a highway at all but a finished declaration and present reality, we lose justification and sanctification both (Michael Horton: Christless Christianity; p. 62).
In other words, contemplative repentance as a work that we do is the only way to heaven. It’s salvation by Christ plus contemplative repentance. Reformers like Tullian Tchividjian insist that it is Christ + Nothing = Everything, but again, that is because like Calvin, he deems contemplative repentance as a non-work in sanctification that doesn’t cause our justification car to run out of gas. In fact, the think tank that launched the present-day Reformation resurgence framed it in those exact terms.
We repeat, Justification is not a thing that we pass and get behind us. As Barth rightly said, it is not like a filling station that we pass but once. As we hold to its eschatological implications, justification by faith can never become static but must remain the dynamic center of Christian existence, the continuous present. We are always sinners in our eyes, but we are always standing on God’s justification and, perhaps more importantly, moving toward it. To be justified is a present-continuous miracle to the man who present-continuously believes, knowing that he who believes possesses all things, and he who does not believe possesses nothing. Such a life is only possible where the gospel of justification is continually heard and where God’s verdict of acquittal is like those mercies which Jeremiah declared were new every morning—”great is Thy faithfulness” (Lam. 3:22-23) [Present Truth Magazine: Righteousness by Faith (Part 4) Chapter 8 — The Eschatological Meaning of Justification; Volume Thirty-Five — Article 3].
In regard to another topic in which there is no room here, said think tank criticized contemporary Reformed thinkers for moving away from the original Reformation gospel which was salvation by justification plus contemplative repentance in sanctification. The specific criticism was against a gospel that perceived justification as being a finished work. Throughout the years, due to a misunderstanding of Reformed epistemology, those who fancied themselves as being of the Reformed camp gravitated to a separation of justification and sanctification, and justification being a finished work, and sanctification a progressive work by the believer and the Holy Spirit.
It has often been said, especially in the Reformed stream of thought, that justification is a once-and-for-all, nonrepeatable act… What inevitably happens in this way of viewing things is that justification becomes static. It becomes relegated (as far as the believing community is concerned) to a thing of the past. There is a tendency for it to become a warm memory (Ibid).
This has led to many contemporary quarrels between “Old” Calvinists and “New” Calvinists due to the fact that New Calvinism is a return to the authentic article. Most notably, the “Sonship” debate within Presbyterian circles and the New Covenant Theology debate within Reformed Baptist circles. This misunderstanding also led to debate in the contemporary biblical counseling movement where some Calvinists heavily emphasized obedience to the word of God, while Calvinists being influenced by the Resurgence called such emphasis in sanctification, “Phariseeism.”
Does the new birth make Christians righteous? Is the Holy Spirit’s power displayed in sanctification through our cooperative obedience and following? Is justification finished or not? Does sanctification have any connection to justification? And if it does, what? These questions, and the answers should be a line in the sand between the two gospels in our day.
In the summation of this point, what Calvin wrote specifically at times is very telling. Emphasis by underline added:
“…by new sins we continually separate ourselves, as far as we can, from the grace of God… Thus it is, that all the saints have need of the daily forgiveness of sins; for this alone keeps us in the family of God” (John Calvin: Commentaries on the Catholic Epistles; The Calvin Translation Society 1855. Editor: John Owen, p. 165 ¶4).
Nor by remission of sins does the Lord only once for all elect and admit us into the Church, but by the same means he preserves and defends us in it. For what would it avail us to receive a pardon of which we were afterwards to have no use? That the mercy of the Lord would be vain and delusive if only granted once, all the godly can bear witness; for there is none who is not conscious, during his whole life, of many infirmities which stand in need of divine mercy. And truly it is not without cause that the Lord promises this gift specially to his own household, nor in vain that he orders the same message of reconciliation to be daily delivered to them” (The Calvin Institutes: 4.1.21).
Calvin plainly states that “reconciliation” must be continually applied to cover new sins. Therefore, justification must be progressive; reconciliation IS justification—there is no justification without it. Instead of making peace with God once and entering into His family, reconciliation must be perpetual. At any given time that you think justification is a onetime event, you separate yourself from the “vital union” with Christ.
However, the Reformed end around on that is the idea that justification is a onetime event because it is both a declaration and a process. In one regard, it happened once, but in another regard, it keeps happening: “it’s a basis.” So, progressive justification is deceptively called “progressive sanctification.” Or, “Justification is the ground (basis) of our sanctification.” Right, because as stated also, “Sanctification is the fruit of justification.” This is deliberate deception. Certain words are used to mask the real Protestant gospel: salvation must be earned and maintained by a continual return to the same gospel that originally saved you.
The following chart published by those of Reformed thought illustrates how contemplative repentance works:
Notice the emphasis on merely seeing (i.e., contemplationism). Furthermore, it’s antithetical to the biblical putting off and putting on prescribed by the Scriptures.
Catholicism is little different, it also fuses justification and sanctification together; justification is not a finished work. The following are excerpts from Catechism of the Catholic Church | Part 3, Life in Christ | Section 1, Man’s Vocation Life in the Spirit | Chapter 3, God’s Salvation: Law and Grace | Article 2, Grace and Justification: section…
1987: The grace of the Holy Spirit has the power to justify us, that is, to cleanse us from our sins and to communicate to us “the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ” and through Baptism.
Notice that there is an ongoing communication of righteousness to the believer which is Protestantesque. This is a perpetual imputation of justification. In theology, “righteousness” and “justification” are used interchangeably.
1988: Through the power of the Holy Spirit we take part in Christ’s Passion by dying to sin, and in his Resurrection by being born to a new life; we are members of his Body which is the Church, branches grafted onto the vine which is himself.
This is nothing more or less than the Protestant doctrine of mortification and vivification (see CI 3.3.2,9). Through confession, (mortification/repentance), we partake again in Christ’s passion resulting in a perpetual new birth experience symbolized/imputed initially by water baptism.
1989: The first work of the grace of the Holy Spirit is conversion, effecting justification in accordance with Jesus’ proclamation at the beginning of the Gospel: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” Moved by grace, man turns toward God and away from sin, thus accepting forgiveness and righteousness from on high. Justification is not only the remission of sins, but also the sanctification and renewal of the interior man.
There is little ambiguity here; in Catholicism, like Protestantism, you are sanctified by justification…
1995: The Holy Spirit is the master of the interior life. By giving birth to the “inner man,” justification entails the sanctification of his whole being.
So, why the major beef between Catholicism and Protestantism? It boils down to “infused righteousness.” Romanism holds to the idea that the believer is enabled to participate in his/her final justification via confession and ritual. In the minds of Protestant theologians, that makes man a participant in justification. However, if all righteousness is outside of the believer and remains so, he/she is not a participant in the justification process. The same means, through contemplative repentance to communicate justification as an ongoing process is ok, but not the idea that the righteousness of God indwells the believer. It must be Luther’s alien righteousness. This is the way Calvinist John Piper presents the argument:
This meant the reversal of the relationship of sanctification to justification. Infused grace, beginning with baptismal regeneration, internalized the Gospel and made sanctification the basis of justification. This is an upside down Gospel (Desiring God blog: June 25, 2009; Goldsworthy on Why the Reformation Was Necessary).
When the ground of justification moves from Christ outside of us to the work of Christ inside of us, the gospel (and the human soul) is imperiled. It is an upside down gospel (Ibid).
In it [Goldsworthy’s lecture at Southern] it gave one of the clearest statements of why the Reformation was needed and what the problem was in the way the Roman Catholic church had conceived of the gospel….I would add that this ‘upside down’ gospel has not gone away—neither from Catholicism nor from Protestants (Ibid).
Romanism believes in an infused grace that enables the believer to partake in the justification process which is condoned because the beginning of justification is purely of God. The beginning of justification is pure grace, but sanctification is a “help”:
2025: We can have merit in God’s sight only because of God’s free plan to associate man with the work of his grace. Merit is to be ascribed in the first place to the grace of God, and secondly to man’s collaboration. Man’s merit is due to God.
2027: No one can merit the initial grace which is at the origin of conversion. Moved by the Holy Spirit, we can merit for ourselves and for others all the graces needed to attain eternal life, as well as necessary temporal goods.
This drove the Reformers berserk. In their construct, man, saved or otherwise, can have NO merit. It is fair to say that the main contention between the Reformers and Rome was metaphysical in nature. The crux of the contention was/is: How can man be found righteous at the end of his/her salvation journey?
This paper contends that there is NO salvation journey in regard to justification; it is a finished work. Only our lives as God’s children progress; the fact that we are part of God’s family is a complete, and settled issue. A person is born into a family once, and their growth does not increase their status as a family member; that was settled the day they were born.
Any gospel that posits justification as part of the sanctification process must necessarily involve man in the justification process, and the exclusion of works salvation is impossible. Everything becomes a work or doing something to MAINTAIN our justification. Even doing something passive that is not considered a work like thinking has a purpose, and that purpose can never be to complete a work that Christ has completed.
This is why Protestantism and Catholicism are both false gospels. It is a return to the Galatian error. Protestantism relaxes the law in sanctification to finish the finished work of justification by saying Christ obeys the law for us in sanctification if we live by faith alone in sanctification. Catholicism does its part in relaxing the law of love by replacing it with rituals in sanctification. Different means with the same purpose: to cooperate in the finishing of a finished work. That’s a false gospel.
Romans 13:8-10; The Law in Sanctification and Justification
This series began on September 29th 2012, and we are on lesson # 50. The series has been heavily predicated on interpreting the Bible with the Bible, drawing conclusions from the literal grammatical sense, and prayer. This approach has paid off abundantly. More than anything, I hope it inspires Christians to know that they can study and understand the Scriptures for themselves. In fact, that is their calling.
Romans 13:8 should get waaaaay more press than it does. It should truly be one of the John 3:16s of the Bible. This is the love side of the law. Justification takes care of the judgment side of the law, sanctification takes care of the love side of the law. Woe unto us because many Christians in our day do not understand the difference between justification and sanctification. Those are supposedly words that are “50-cent theology terms.” God help us. Not only are those specific Bible words, but the two together define LOVE! Oh my! Where are we as Christians if we don’t understand love? But yet, it is impossible to understand love if you don’t understand the difference between justification and sanctification. Does there seem to be a problem with the church today? By the grace of God it is not much worse!
Let’s begin by reading verses 8:
Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.
In this life, there is one debt that will never be paid between believers: love. The ability to love each other was not free, God sacrificed His only Son to make love between us possible. Also note: Christ died in this realm, and it was no less grievous to the Father accordingly. Christ was not sacrificed in heaven, He was sacrificed on earth. Hence, this realm has spiritual value. Hence, this realm matters. God will dwell with us on earth. This life has value. It will be redeemed by God. Watch out for any man who deems this life as worthless—mark him and be wary of him.
Pivotal to understanding verse 8 is the antonymic James 2:10. Let’s read it now:
For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it.
Stop right there. This is where we plunge the depths of salvation. It encompasses a full understanding of law; i.e., accountability, justification, and sanctification. First, what is “law”? Certainly it includes the Ten Commandments, but when we speak of the law, we are really using a term that describes the full counsel of God encompassed in the Scriptures. We do not live by bread alone, but by EVERY word that comes from the mouth of God (Matthew 4:4). That is not only the Ten Commandments or the law of Moses, that is the whole Bible. Another point here is Matthew 5:17,18;
17 Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. 18 For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished.
Here Christ unites the prophets and the law under “law.” In Luke 24:27, He unites the writings of Moses and the prophets with “all the Scriptures.” Also note that Christ didn’t come to fulfill the law during His earthly ministry as some teach, for nothing of the law will be lost “until all is accomplished.” Obviously, there is prophecy yet to be fulfilled and heaven and earth hasn’t passed away yet. We will yet discuss what Christ meant by “fulfilling” the law.
Back to James 2:10. If one breaks one element of the law of God, he is guilty of breaking all of it, and he is “accountable” to the whole law. In other words, he is under it. He is convicted as a “transgressor,” or a “lawbreaker.” James’ primary point is those who take a lax view of the law show themselves as still under the law. Christ agreed:
Matthew 5:19 – Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. 20 For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
Christ came to die on the cross to release us from “accountability” to the law. But, He also came to die on the cross to fulfill the law through us. His death declared us righteous apart from the law and released us from the accountability to it in order to be justified. That’s justification. Believing in Christ’s death on the cross justifies us apart from the law. Christ is the end of the law for justification…
Roman 10:4 – For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.
This verse could be well worded in this way: “For Christ is the end of the law for justification to everyone who believes. Be sure of this: interpreting all of Scripture in regard to …for justification and …for sanctification is a key method for understanding the Bible. Be also sure of this: many Christians in our day do not understand their Bibles because they don’t understand the difference between justification and sanctification. The institutional church has deliberately excluded this teaching so that congregants have to depend on men to understand their Bibles. You can quote me on that—it is a deliberate control ploy. Please quote me accordingly. I stand by the statement 200%.
This is justification. It was accomplished by the imputation of all of our law-breaking to Christ. He who knew no sin became sin for us, and bore the penalty for us on the cross so that we would become the righteousness of God (2Corithians 5:21). And by the way, when we believe in Christ, it’s the righteousness of God the Father that is imputed to us, not Christ’s righteousness. Of course, Christ is no less righteous, but to say that it is the righteousness of Christ that was imputed to us, something the Bible NEVER states, is to confound Trinitarian salvation—it is Christ’s death and the imputation of our sins to Him, and the Imputation of the Father’s righteousness to us—this is an important distinction because that is technically how the Bible states it.
This is justification, the epic act of love towards us by God. It is a debt of sin that has been paid in full by Christ. There is no way we can repay it. We come and drink of these living waters for free. It is free to us, but it required the sacrifice of God’s Son. Christ paid the debt of sin for us. We are no longer accountable to the law. The law has been ended by Christ…FOR JUSTIFCATION. Justification is apart from the law.
But the story now continues in regard to sanctification. Something else besides our sin died with Christ when our sins were imputed to Him: us. When we believe in Christ the old us and our accountability to the law dies. But something was also resurrected with Christ when He arose from the dead on the third day: us. The new us finds life and love in the law. Accountability to the law before salvation could only bring death, but now the law is our standard for love. We love God through obedience to the law as an outflow of our new nature, and we are indebted to each other in love. In the same way that breaking the law at one point violated all of the law, one act of love fulfills the whole law. That’s verse 8. I don’t understand it, but it is no less true: every time you love someone—you fulfil the whole law. By DISOBEYING the law at one point before salvation, you were guilty of breaking all of it. Justification saved us from that. By one act of obedience to the law in sanctification, you fulfill the whole law.
Fulfilling the law by loving God and others, that’s sanctification. Our attitude towards Scripture indicates whether we are under law or under grace. We are learners in regard to discovering new ways in the Bible to love God and others—that’s discipleship. Obedience to the law reflected on justification will hinder love—it is not the perfect law of liberty that James wrote of. The law is different in sanctification. We love the law because it teaches us to love God and others. It puts deeds of darkness to death and fulfills the law through us, hence:
Romans 8:1 – There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. 2 For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. 3 For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, 4 in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 5 For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. 6 For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. 7 For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law; indeed, it cannot. 8 Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
Before salvation, the law is the “law of sin and death” that condemns. After salvation, it is the “law of the Spirit of life” and the “perfect law of liberty.” It is a law that gives life—it is the Spirit’s law. It is a law that informs our love and can no longer condemn us. It is a law that judges our love in sanctification, but not for justification.
It reverses our life direction because it reverses our slavery. Before salvation, we were enslaved to sin while able to do good or enslaved to sin and free in regard to righteousness (Rom 6:20). With those under law, perfect righteousness is a demand; with those under grace, perfect righteousness is the goal because love is the goal. No person sins perfectly before salvation, and no person loves perfectly after salvation; change of overall direction and attitudes towards the law is the issue. A lax attitude towards the law is not indicative of the new birth. We now love the law that we are no longer accountable to for justification.
So, in justification: we are no longer accountable to the law; we have the righteousness of God imputed to us; our sins are imputed to Christ, and He paid the penalty for them, and we died with Him; we are quickened—made alive by the Holy Spirit, and regenerated with the same power that raised Christ from the dead (Eph 1:19, 20, Jn 3: 4-8). We are declared righteous by the Father, our sins are imputed to Christ, and we are born again by the Spirit. This is not only a positional righteousness, we are in fact righteous. Being yet in a mortal body harassed by sinful desires does not negate the fact that we are born of God:
1John 3:7 – Little children, let no one deceive you. Whoever practices righteousness is righteous, as he is righteous. 8 Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil. 9 No one born of God makes a practice of sinning, for God’s seed abides in him, and he cannot keep on sinning because he has been born of God. 10 By this it is evident who are the children of God, and who are the children of the devil: whoever does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor is the one who does not love his brother.
“Seed” in verse 9 is the following word:
g4690. σπέρμα sperma; from 4687; something sown, i. e. seed (including the male “sperm”); by implication, offspring; specially, a remnant (figuratively, as if kept over for planting):— issue, seed.
We are God’s offspring in the truest sense though in mortal bodies. This life in us cannot help but to bring about the different direction. The “flesh” no longer enslaves us because the former self died with Christ. In regard to justification, we no longer live, and therefore are not under the law:
Romans 7:1 – Or do you not know, brothers—for I am speaking to those who know the law—that the law is binding on a person only as long as he lives? 2 For a married woman is bound by law to her husband while he lives, but if her husband dies she is released from the law of marriage. 3 Accordingly, she will be called an adulteress if she lives with another man while her husband is alive. But if her husband dies, she is free from that law, and if she marries another man she is not an adulteress.
4 Likewise, my brothers, you also have died to the law through the body of Christ, so that you may belong to another, to him who has been raised from the dead, in order that we may bear fruit for God. 5 For while we were living in the flesh, our sinful passions, aroused by the law, were at work in our members to bear fruit for death. 6 But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.
As we learned earlier in the book of Romans, being under the law provokes us to sin against the law. The flesh, which was alive, provoked us to sin against the law leading up to the day when we would be judged by the law. This is what Paul is talking about in one of the most abused portions of Scripture in our day:
Galatians 2:20 – I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.
“See, see, we live by faith alone in the Christian life. We are still spiritually dead in our Christian life, and it is only Christ who lives in us.” That notion needs to be answered with Romans 7:1-6. Dying with Christ made us dead to the law, but alive to the law of the Spirit which is the same law that formally brought forth fruits of death. Let’s look at Galatians 2:20 in the larger context:
15 We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners; 16 yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.
17 But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not! 18 For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor. 19 For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. 20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. 21 I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness [earlier ESV “justification”] were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.
What do you notice in context regarding the underlined words? The context is clearly justification. Galatians 2:20 is just another way of stating Romans 7:1-6. Paul is saying that it is impossible to be justified by the law because when we died with Christ, we died to the law which made us alive to God and the law of the Spirit. The law was letters of death while we were under it. Hence, Paul concludes his thought in Gal 2:21 by saying that if we are still under the law, Christ died for nothing. We were made dead to the law and alive to God by faith alone in Christ. That’s what that verse is stating. Again, it’s another way of stating Romans 7:1-6.
In regard to justification, it is not us who live, but Christ. That doesn’t mean we are also dead to the law in sanctification.
When someone using Gal 2:20 to teach a sanctification by faith alone, you need to correct them with Rom 7:1-6. You should also inform them that they do not know the difference between justification and sanctification. We are justified by faith alone, but sanctification (discipleship) is not by faith alone. James wrote to the 12 tribes of Israel to refute that very idea.
Now, in sanctification, we love God by obeying the law, and the Holy Spirit is our Helper in doing so. This is sanctification, not justification:
John 14:12 – “Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I am going to the Father. 13 Whatever you ask in my name, this I will do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 If you ask me anything in my name, I will do it. 15 “If you love me, you will keep my commandments. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Helper, to be with you forever, 17 even the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees him nor knows him. You know him, for he dwells with you and will be in you.
Notice that Christ did not come to fulfill the law on His own. Notice that the exact works of Christ are not imputed to us for justification; in fact, He states that we will do greater works than He did! And know what the Spirit of truth uses to sanctify us:
John 17:16 – They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. 17 Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. 18 As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. 19 And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.
Learning and obeying truth is the only way to love God and His people. What we have today is a lot of discussion about loving each other without the knowledge to do so. Love among the doctrinally illiterate is an oxymoron. Replacing the hard work of discipleship in the church with love bombing is an epidemic. Undoubtedly, the main point of this message focuses on the paramount importance of the law in sanctification for effectively loving each other. Devaluing the law in sanctification is the very essence of antinomianism, and Christ said that the hearts of many will wax cold in the last days “because of anomia.” And we are in those days.
“The Challenge” Group Discussion Series
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Paul's Passing Thoughts 
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