(CONTINUED)

Christ fulfilled all the Law and the Prophets by living a life of perfect obedience. For although Christ was tempted in all things just as we are, He was without sin (Heb. 4:15); thus, He is and was without blemish. In His death, Christ took on the sin of all believers and bore the wrath of God in their place (2 Cor. 5:21, Isa. 53). Mirroring the Levitical sacrificial system, Christ became our Great High Priest and the perfect and final sacrificial lamb; the substitute for all who believe, shedding His blood for them and atoning for their sins in the process. In this act of salvific work, Christ fully discharged the debt of all who believe and fully satisfied God the Father’s justice on their behalf. In His resurrection, God the Father signifies His acceptance of the complete atonement made by Christ for the sins of all believers, and guarantees the resurrection of His people (1 Cor. 15:21-23).

 

Phrased differently “[f]or those He foreknew He also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brothers and sisters. And those He predestined, He also called; and those He called, He also justified; and those He justified, He also glorified” (Rom. 8:29-30). Whereas, foreknew denotes “before the foundation of the world” (Eph. 1:4), and predestined refers “[to] adoption” (Eph. 1:5), and called means by evangelism through the preaching of the Word of God (Rom. 10:14-15; John 6), which is heard in general by all peoples and which particularly draws specific individuals unto salvation. 

 

Thus, man is and can only be saved and justified by grace, through faith, in Christ Jesus. Now faith is the reality of what is hoped for, the proof of what is not seen (Heb. 11:1); that is to say, receiving by grace and resting through faith on Christ and his righteousness, is the sole instrument of justification. It is through that faith that God in a specific moment imputes the obedience and satisfaction of Christ unto the believer and justifies them in and for his only Son Jesus Christ. He makes them partakers of the grace of adoption; by which they are taken into the number and enjoy the liberties and privileges of the children of God; have His name put upon them; receive the Spirit of adoption; have access to the throne of grace with boldness; are enabled to cry, Abba, Father; are pitied, protected, provided for, and chastened by Him as by a father; never cast off, but are sealed until the day of redemption, and inherit the promises as heirs of everlasting salvation. To the praise of His glorious name. 

 

This justification is not of works but rather for works in love. As we cannot, by our best works, merit pardon of sin, or eternal life at the hand of God, by reason of the great disproportion that is between them and the glory to come, and the infinite distance that is between us and God, whom by them we can neither profit nor satisfy for the debt of our former sins.

 

At the same time, believers are His creation, created  in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared ahead of time so that they should walk in them (Eph. 2:10). These good works, done in obedience to God’s commandments, are the fruits and evidence of a true and lively faith. Thus, by grace, and through our alive faith, as shown through these good works we are being sanctified, that is, “are looking as in a mirror at the glory of the Lord and are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory” (2 Cor. 3).

 

Therefore, those who are justified, having a new heart and a new spirit created in them, are further sanctified, really and personally, through the virtue of Christ’s death and resurrection, by his Word and Spirit dwelling in them; the dominion of the whole body of sin is destroyed. Therefore, the grip of sin over the believer will be more and more weakened as the believer matures more and more into the fullness of Christ.

 

While throughout life man must still war with his flesh, at the consummation of all things those who are found alive shall not die but will be changed (1 Thess. 4:17; 1 Cor. 15:51-52), and all the dead shall be raised up and united again to their souls forever (Job 19:26-27; 1 Cor. 15:42-44). With the bodies of the unjust, by the power of Christ, being raised to dishonor, and the bodies of the just, by His Spirit, unto honor; being made conformable to His own glorious body (Acts 24:15; John 5:28-29; 1 Cor. 15:43; Phil. 3:21), thus ending man’s bodily war with sin forevermore.  

 

God’s providential work in salvation from “calling to glorification” allows the fullness of all glory and honor and praise to rest upon Him as the initiating Author, ongoing Sustainer, and final Accomplisher concerning the redemption of man. His work is also obvious throughout the whole of redemptive history: from before creation, and into the goodness of creation, and through the corporate election of Israel and His Church, and into depravity through the Fall, and into redemption of individuals being called unto salvation through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. 

 

Stated simply, Christ says to Zacchaeus in Luke Chapter 19, Verse 10, “[f]or the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.” Those who are called by this initiating grace of God respond through faith (Eph. 2:8-9); both believing in their hearts that God raised Christ from the dead and confessing Jesus as Lord with their mouths, with the belief resulting in his righteousness being imputed to them and confession bringing forth salvation (Rom. 10:9-10). As belief and confession arrive, so does the act of turning from sin, for without repentance, there is no salvation (Luke 13:3). Those who do receive Jesus as Savior and believe upon Him as Lord will be given the right of spiritual adoption as sons and daughters into His Family of Faith, His Church (John 1:12). As those saved peoples worship God, they are sanctified further into the holy image of Christ, persevering in their gift of faith, and they eagerly await the full redemption of their bodies in future glory with God (1 Cor. 15:49, 52-54; 2 Cor. 3:18).