The Twenty-third Lord’s Day

23 The Twenty-third Lord’s Day
Romans 3:24-25
Being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Jesus Christ,  whom God has 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.
The Apostle had before proved that all mankind was under the most grievous guilt of sin, and therefore needed justification so that they might be saved. This justification he had also shown could not be had from any creature, nor from the Law. He had set this down as the conclusion of his discourse in Romans 1:20.  From this he further concludes that justification is of necessity to be sought in that way of the Gospel which is proposed in Christ Jesus. The whole dispute may be summed up in this Syllogism: Men are either justified by Nature, or by Law, or by the Gospel. But he is neither justified by Nature nor by the Law; and therefore of necessity, it must be by the Gospel. The Proposition is presupposed and tacitly understood as manifest in itself. The Assumption is proved in the first part of the Epistle, up to Romans 1:21. The Conclusion is proposed and illustrated in Romans 1:21-32, and afterwards. The words set down in our Text, contain a description of this Gospel-justification. And it is described, 1. From its principal and highest cause, God: whom God appointed.2 2. From the manner of this cause — which does not consist in commutative justice that gives like for like, or so much for so much; nor yet from distributive justice, which looks at the worth of men, and deals with them in a proportionate manner — but in mere and pure grace, or free favour, as stated in these words: we are justified freely, of his free grace or free favour. A singular emphasis or force of speech is laid on this part of the description by this doubling or repetition, freely, and of his free favour. 3. It is described from its impulsive or meritorious cause, which also becomes in some sort the formal cause of our justification, namely, our redemption made by Jesus Christ. 4. From its instrumental cause, which is faith: by faith in his blood. 5. From its final cause, which is the manifestation of the justice and mercy of God: for showing his justice,3 etc.
Doctrine 1. It is God that justifies us.
He is said to justify us, not by infusing righteousness into us, or making us fit to do things that are just — this is the error of the Papists, placing justification first in the infusion of the habits of faith, hope, and charity; and next in the good works that come from those habits, which they mix with a certain sort of remission of sins. But instead God is said to justify us, because by his judicial sentence he absolves us from the guilt of all sin, and accepts or accounts us as fully just and righteous for eternal life, by the righteousness of Christ which he gives us. This appears from this: that this justification is used in Scripture as opposed to charging with crimes, and condemnation, Rom 8.33.1 And this is done by God, as it were, by degrees. 1. In his eternal counsel and decree, because from eternity he intended to justify us. 2. In our head Christ rising again from the dead, we were virtually justified, and in some sort actually justified; as in Adam sinning, all his posterity were virtually condemned to death by the Law, and in some sort actually condemned, because in some sort they were actual sinners. 3. He justifies us further actually and formally in ourselves, and not only in our head, when by his Spirit, and our faith — the work of his Spirit — he applies Christ to us, to our justification. 4. And further yet, he justifies us actually and formally to our sense and feeling, when by our own reflex knowledge and examination of our estate, he gives us to perceive this application of Christ that is made, and so to have peace and joy in him.
1 Romans 3:20 Therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. 
2 “whom God has set forth”.
3 “to declare his righteousness.”
Reason 1 . Because our sins from which we ought to be justified, are done against the majesty of God, 1 Samuel 2:25. And none can forgive an offence done against another, or an injury done to another, in a proper way of speaking.
Reason 2 . Because the guilt of sin depends on the obligation of the Law, and of divine justice and truth. And therefore it cannot be taken away except by him that is above the Law, and knows what is agreeable to his own truth and meaning, in first making it.
Reason 3 . Because by justification we are received into the favour of God, and life eternal, and God himself (in some sort) is given to us; all of which cannot otherwise be done, except by God himself alone.
Use 1 . Of Refutation: against Papists, who set down manners and means of justification from human tradition, and their own authority, to wretched men — as if it were in their power to justify men in whatever way they please, when it is God alone that justifies, and that alone therefore prescribes the manner and means of justification.
Use 2. Of Consolation: as it is set down in Romans 8:33, Who shall lay anything to our charge? It is God that justifies. And Romans 8:31, If God is for us, who can be against us?
Doctrine 2. This justification is fit, pure, and infinite grace or favour.
So in the Text, freely, his free favour. The grace of God in justification appears as it were, by these degrees: 1. In that God does not pursue his right against us and our sins, according to that rigour that his Law might have been taken in, and his revenging justice might have extended itself to; but he left room for some reconciliation. 2. In that being the offended party himself, yet of his own good-will he invented, appointed or ordered, and revealed both the manner and the means of this reconciliation. 3. In that he did not spare his only begotten son for procuring this reconciliation.2 4. That without any merits or worth of ours, he ingrafts us into his Son and our Lord Jesus Christ, and so makes us partakers of that reconciliation which is in him.3 This was altogether necessary, that our justification might be of free favour. 
Reason 1. Because it was impossible for the laws and the righteousness of them to justify sinners, Romans 8:3-39, Romans 4:1
1 Romans 8:33 Who shall bring a charge against God's elect? It is God who justifies. Also, Romans 8:1 There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus,
2 Romans 8:32.
3 2 Corinthians 5:18-19. 
Reason 2. Because in the justification of a sinner there is remission or pardon of sin; and all pardon is of free favour. 
Reason 3 . Because in justification there is a free Donation of righteousness, and of life eternal, which to sinners cannot be done except with special grace and favour. The satisfaction made by Christ for us, does not withstand the freeness of this favour of justification; this is because it was of free favour and grace that Christ himself was given to us, and by his calling was appointed to this satisfaction for us; and of his own free grace he also accepted that calling.
Use 1 . Of Refutation: against Papists and many others who would have our justification depend on our Works; yet everywhere by the Apostle, our works are opposed to this Free grace in our justification.
Use 2 . Of Consolation: to believers and repenters, against all those shakings of mind which they may feel (or can feel) from their own unworthiness that their consciences tell them of; it consoles because our whole justification hangs on the free favour or grace of God, and not upon our own worth or merits.
Use 3. Of Exhortation: 1. That we always flee to the Free-grace of God, as the only garrison of our souls. 2. That from admiration of this grace of God, we always study2 to be thankful to God. Doctrine 3. The obedience of Jesus Christ imputed to us, or given to us, and so accounted as ours, justifies or makes us righteous, and it is the foundation of all our righteousness.
It is in the Text, by the redemption made by Jesus Christ.3 1. For he that is justified by the Redemption of another, such as by paying a ransom — that price is conceived as it were, to be paid for the one who is redeemed. 2. If Christ is the pacification in our justification when we please God, as it is in the Text, then we please him for something which Christ has performed for our good. 3. If Faith justifies, as it is related to Christ and the shedding of his blood, then there is something in his blood thus shed, or in his obedience unto death, by virtue of which we are justified.
Now the obedience of Christ in respect to our justification holds two places. 1. The place of a meriting cause which obtains it for us, because it was the means that God’s justice required to be performed to God, before his grace could justify us. 2. The place of a formal cause in as much as it is accepted and taken as ours, being given to us as a free gift; and so it is made ours indeed, in that we are looked on by God as truly clothed with it, when he pronounces the sentence of our justification. This is the source of that phrase of the Apostle, Not having my own righteousness, but that which is Christ’s, Php_3:9.
Reason 1 . Because this is most agreeable both to the justice and mercy of God, jointly. For if our justification had stood in the bare remission of sin, without the imputation of a sufficient righteousness, or obedience, to satisfy his justice, then only God’s mercy and favour would have had a place in this business; there would have been no regard to the justice of God, that satisfaction might be made of it.
1 Romans 8:3 For what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, God did by sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, on account of sin:4 that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit.
2 That is, we are always careful and diligent.
3 “through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.”
Reason 2 . Because if we had been pronounced just, without any imputation of a satisfying righteousness, or obedience performed, then there could not have been any just ground for such a sentence — namely, that anyone should be pronounced just, who was in no way just, either by his own inherent justice or righteousness; or by another’s justification freely given to him.
Reason 3 . Because by this means we have in some manner a divine righteousness, or the righteousness of God himself; namely, that which Christ, who is God, performed for us as Godman in one person (not the essential righteousness of God, as Soliander dreamed). We may therefore rely on this, and with greater confidence appear before God, and because of it hope for all divine and good things at the hands of God.
Reason 4. Because in this manner we more own our salvation as wrought by Christ.
Use 1 . Of Refutation: against Papists, Anabaptists, Remonstrants or Arminians, and almost all Sects and Sectarians, who all agree in this error: that our justification depends on our works, and is not to be sought by the imputation of Christ’s righteousness to us, or accounting his obedience as ours.
Use 2 . Of Exhortation: unto due thankfulness to Christ by whose Redemption or ransoming of us we are justified, and set free from sin and death (the wages of sin); and adjudged to life and glory above what any mere creature’s righteousness could ever have deserved.
Doctrine 4. The obedience of Jesus Christ is powerful for justifying us by being accepted and laid hold on by our Faith. It is in the Text, Through Faith in his Blood. 
Reason 1. The very nature and duty of Faith is to rely on Christ, or on the favour and mercy of God in Christ, for pardon of sins. 
Reason 2. Because by Faith we are united to Christ, and ingrafted into him, so that we may be partakers of all the blessings that in him are prepared for men.
Reason 3. Because Faith receives, lays hold on, and embraces all the promises of God, and the things contained, offered, or proposed in them, among which pardon of sins and justification in Christ have a chief place.
Use . Of Direction: that it may be our only care in the business of our justification, to direct our Faith and confidence towards Christ, and to stir up and confirm it more and more, so that we may have firm and abundant 1 comfort from this.
1 Informatively, the original spelling of abundant was “aboundant.”