The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1908, Page 66

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66

whenever it may please God to take me, or Christ
“may come for me, I shall be “with Himself above,
which is far better.” Yes, it is settled.

“T rest upon the ground
Of Jesus and His blood,
It is through Him that I have found
My soul’s eternal good.”

Justification Before God.

(A paper read before Immanuel Lutheran Conference, and
published by its request.)

IV.
Forgiveness of sins is proclaimed and proffered
in the Bible, and whoever accepts it is by his faith
justified in the sight of God.

2.

We have seen that forgiveness of sins is offered
to us in Scripture and is accepted by faith. The
believer takes and trusts in the precious gift of
righteousness. Over against misrepresentations we
must emphasize this point. It will not be necessary
to prove to any fair-minded, intelligent person that
we do not consider a man saved if he merely says
that he believes. He will not deem us so ignorant
as not to know that there are people who profess
that which they do not believe; he will not con-
sider us 50 foolish as to call upon men to become
hypocrites. But even some intelligent persons seem
to overlook the fact that, when we call upon men
to believe in the redemption in Christ, we are
‘urging them to accept it. Perhaps there are many

among those professing to be Lutherans who think -

that people truly believe when they have heard the
doctrine of justification and have been convinced

“by quotations from the Bible that it is the teaching -

of Scripture, which they must acknowledge as truth.
When we speak of saving faith, we mean the actual

acceptance of salvation, and-not everyone whose’

_ mind is satisfied by the evidence presented does
‘really take what is offered. As we do not think
a man repents of his sin when he knows that he has

‘sinned, but is not concerned about it, so we should -

neither suppose that a man believes in the forgive-
ness of sins if he does not care for it. It is only
“Took and live,” but there is longing in that look;
it is a look different from that with which you
examine a toy. And when people are not terrified
on account of their sins, they do not really desire
forgiveness, nor do they actually receive it. A per-
son does not take what he does not want. We do

The Lutheran Pioneer.

not treat faith merely as a matter of the mind or
understanding, so that a man might believe while
his heart is rejoicing in iniquity.

From the very moment a person believes, that
is to say, accepts the redemption proclaimed and
offered him, he is in possession of that great treas-
ure, the forgiveness of sins. God counts him just
and righteous. And God continues to justify him
as long as he believes. By faith man is justified;
his faith is counted for righteousness. Whoever
goes about to establish his own righteousness, how-
ever, by obeying the Law, is under the curse; for
it is written: “Cursed is every one that continueth
not in all things which are written in the book of
the Law to do them.” No matter how great man’s
zeal may be, he cannot attain the sentence of
righteousness, but the moment he believes he has
secured that which otherwise is hopelessly beyond
his reach. But why should faith be counted for
more than all other works or virtues of man put
together? This question contains a serious mistake.
We have no right to speak of “other” works and
virtues here besides faith. Scripture does not say
that we are justified by faith, without the other
deeds of the Law. It does not teach that Abraham
was justified, not by other works, but by faith. It
says, “By faith, without the deeds of the Law,”
and thus is not treating faith as one of the deeds
of the Law. It teaches that Abraham was not
justified “by works,” and so it does not treat faith
as a work. It expréssly declares, Rom. 4, 5: “But
to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him
that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted
for righteousness.” The believer does not work
for this righteousness, and so his faith should not
be treated as a work. If you want.to treat faith
as a good work here, you must deny that Christ has
redeemed us and thus done all the works that need
to be done to merit forgiveness for us; that “by
grace” means, “Then is it no more of works;” that
believing is accepting —all this cannot be true if
faith is a work performed to merit forgiveness of
sins. It is wrong to ask, Why- faith more than
other works? But we may ask, Why is faith
counted for righteousness? In answering, let me
ask another question, Why does eating nourish the
body? - Because, is your answer, in eating you take
the food that nourishes. Why does believing make
you righteous in the sight of God? Because in be-

lieving you take the righteousness of Christ which

is proffered and given you in the Gospel, and this
righteousness of Christ makes you righteous in the