I am, it surely goes without saying, talking about justification by
faith. And when I ask is justification a fact or a feeling, the
answer, of course, is that it is both. That is to say, God declares
that the sinner who trusts Christ is, from that moment, perfectly
righteous in his sight, and free of all condemnation. This is a
glorious fact, a staggering statement which is true of every
believer. But it is equally true that the believer, now that he is
justified, ought to enjoy the felt-sense of his justification. After
all, the Holy Spirit witnesses to the believer, reminding him of his
free justification in Christ, and thus assuring him of his standing
before God. This magnificent truth cannot be dismissed as a legal
nicety, relegated to the role of a legal fact – true, but abstract and
distant. Justification by faith is far too wonderful for that. What is
more, the sense of his free justification in Christ is one of the
main drivers in the believer’s progressive sanctification. Having
dealt with these vital issues in several of my works, 1 in this short
article I want to stress the ‘feeling-ness’ of free justification. I do
so because I fear that for many believers justification has become
rather a dry, theoretical term, one which gives them little real
enjoyment. And this is a sad loss indeed. |
