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I had a tough dialogue with a former friend concerning the Supreme Court’s Dodd decision. We disagree on the fundamental aspects of the issue and the discussion has been eye-opening. As teenagers we were both raised in very conservative milieus. I had a loving home with loving parents. When my mother passed away, my father found a wonderful woman who has been a great stepmother. Unfortunately, I have no idea of my friend’s home life. Having a good home to grow up in, with a dedicated mother who chose to stay at home, resulted in my friend spending time at...

The words justification and sanctification have largely fallen out of use in Western culture. Sadly, they are also fading from sight in the Christian church. One reason this decline is distressing is that the Bible uses the words justification and sanctification to express the saving work of Christ for sinners. That is to say, both terms lie at the heart of the biblical gospel. So, what does the Bible teach about justification and sanctification? How do they differ from one another? How do they help us understand better the believer’s relationship with Jesus Christ? Justification is as simple as A-B-C-D....

For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus: (Romans 3:23-24)The subject of Romans chapter three has been thus far, All. All of us are under a Divine sentence of condemnation, All of us like sheep have gone astray from God. There are no exceptions, not even Israel, All of us have defected from God. Yet to that same ALL, God has provided a gift, even the very Righteousness that He demands of us, in the person of Jesus Christ. The gift is...

ristians throughout the ages have noticed that Paul and James, at the word level, use the verb “to justify” (dikaio ) differently relative to “faith” and “works.” Paul writes, “One is justified by faith apart from the works of the law” (Rom. 3:28). James writes, “A person is justified by works and not by faith alone” (James 2:24). Since God is the ultimate Author of both Romans and James, this cannot be a concept-level contradiction. But how do we put these two verses together? In the 1500s, portions of the Roman Catholic Church were insisting that the verb “to justify”...

At about 8 p.m. on 5 October, 2018, 27-year-old Keven Custer went to his girlfriend's apartment to pick up some clothes that had been washed for him. The clothes were not sorted, so to avoid an issue, he did not go through his girlfriend's laundry, and started to leave the apartment.On the way out, 46-year-old Chris Gunderson stopped Keven, forced him to empty his pockets, and refused to let him leave the apartment. Gunderson then struck Keven Custer and knocked out a tooth, cracking two others, knocking Custer to the floor.   From cdapress.com: Custer said Gunderson told him multiple...

Francis's Abortion Lullaby will Promote a even greater Abortion Holocaust Pope Francis according to the Tablet advises women who have aborted their unborn babies to "sing them a lullaby." (Tablet, "Pope offers new pastoral strategy on abortion by calling for consolation and reconciliation," January 28, 2019) Francis's abortion lullaby of removing shame will promote a even greater abortion holocaust. Why? Philosopher Edward Feser explains: [P]eople have gotten used to giving in to the temptation so quickly and so readily now that they're ready to kill the innocent, indeed their own flesh and blood - i.e. via abortion - in...

Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.Is he the God of the Jews only? is he not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also:Seeing it is one God, which shall justify the circumcision by faith, and uncircumcision through faith.Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we establish the law.(Romans 3:28-31)The good news of God’s willingness to justify sinners who put all of their faith in Jesus, is not based upon their adherence to the “deeds of the Law”. But this gospel of Jesus, God’s...

Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay: but by the law of faith.Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.(Romans 3:27-28)Why is it that God requires faith and not works? Why is it that God’s salvation is only accessible to those who believe in His gospel ? Part of the answer to this question is in the quote above. We have seen that man is so bankrupt, he is so estranged from God and corrupted, that there is no way that he can save himself. He...

Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God . To declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just, and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus.(Romans 3:24-26)God is Holy. That means that He has an infinite aversion to sin, evil, sinners, and all that is false. He utterly hates rebellion, unbelief, immorality, in short, all forms of sin....

Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;(Romans 3:24-25)How can fallen, sinful, rebellious man ever be reconciled to the Infinite, personal and Holy God ? The solution to the problem as described by the apostle Paul cannot possibly come from man himself. All have sinned and are coming short of the glory of God. The gospel is that God himself, has given us a...

But now the righteousness of God without the law is manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets;Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference:For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:(Romans 3;21-24)Man is fallen. All of us are under a sentence of condemnation, according to the Gospel as explained in the letter to the Romans. All of us have committed that primal sin,...

As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one:There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God.They are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable; there is none that doeth good, no, not one.Their throat is an open sepulchre; with their tongues they have used deceit; the poison of asps is under their lips: Whose mouth is full of cursing and bitterness: Their feet are swift to shed blood:Destruction and misery are in their ways:And the way of peace have they not known: There is no fear of God before their...

What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision?Much every way: chiefly, because that unto them were committed the oracles of God.For what if some did not believe? shall their unbelief make the faith of God without effect?God forbid: yea, let God be true, but every man a liar; as it is written, That thou mightest be justified in thy sayings, and mightest overcome when thou art judged. (Romans 3:1-4)In Romans 1 and 2, Paul has shown that all men, godless and pious, gentile and Jew, pagan and religious, are in desperate need of Righteousness with...

Some time ago, I read the short book Are We Together? A Protestant Analyzes Catholicism written by the late Reformed preacher R.C. Sproul. It was a good read; I thought that Sproul treated this controversy with a degree of fairness and accuracy that was not present in other books that I have read on this subject. He basically laid the Catechism of the Catholic Church and the Westminster Confession side-by-side as he worked through the major differences. Sure, there were some snarky comments here and there but I overlooked these since it was clear that the book was being targeted...

Free speech is under assault because of a three-step argument made by the advocates and justifiers of violence. The first step is they say that the validity or invalidity of an argument can be judged solely by the ethnic, sexual, racial, or cultural identity of the person making the argument. The second step is that they claim those who say otherwise are engaging in what they call “verbal violence,” and the final step is they conclude that physical violence is sometimes justified in order to stop such verbal violence. So let’s examine each of these three steps in turn. First,...

A worldwide coalition of Reformed churches representing approximately 80 million Christians has signed onto an ecumenical statement with the Roman Catholic Church to "overcome divisions" from the time of the Protestant Reformation.The World Communion of Reformed Churches signed a "Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification" with Catholic, Lutheran, and Methodist leaders last week at a church in Wittenberg, Germany. According to a WCRC press release, "The declaration stated that mutual condemnations pronounced by the two sides during the Reformation do not apply to their current teaching on justification." (Photo: Wikipedia Commons)Portrait of Martin Luther, the founder of the Protestant Reformation,...

The World Communion of Reformed Churches has accepted that Joint Declaration on Justification that was originally signed by the Catholic Church and the World Lutheran Federation in 1999, and later by the World Methodist Council in 2016. The World Communion of Reformed Churches will formalize its assent to the statement at an ecumenical prayer service to be held in Wittenberg, Germany, on July 5. The Pontifical Council for Christian Unity welcomed the acceptance of the statement by the Reformed Churches as an “important milestone” in ecumenical affairs. The Vatican body said: One of the crucial issues of dissent between the...

In my last column before a brief hiatus (to attend the important Roman Forum Conference at Lake Garda, Italy), I promised further discussion of Pope Francis’ latest scandalous inflight press conference, this time on the return to Rome from an utterly pointless (and needlessly expensive) trip to Armenia. At the risk of being facetious, it would appear that at this point in the Bergoglian pontificate one can speak of a Rule of Bergoglio: No Papal Press Conference Shall Be Without at Least One Major Error Against the Faith. This time we had the following whopper concerning Luther, who literally invented...

For those who are circumcised do not even keep the Law themselves, but they desire to have you circumcised so that they may boast in your flesh. But may it never be that I would boast, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. - Galatians 6:13, 14Ideas have consequences. So does doctrine. That there are true Christians who trust the blood of Jesus Christ alone to make their garments white who worship in the Roman Catholic church is no less extraordinary for being true. They...

Before I give details concerning justification, I would like to tell you what justification is.  Justification is a forensic event in which God declares the once-hell bound believing sinner as righteous because of the grounds of imputed righteousness of Christ.  This imputed righteousness is also not understood properly if one does not take into account the active obedience of Christ’s full obedience to “all” that God the Father willed for Him to fulfill in this earth.  Justification is not based upon our works or righteousness; and not even our faith.  Faith is only the means or the instrument that allows...