Archive for the ‘Justification’ Category

Faith as an Instrument

My favorite illustration of what faith does in justification is tongs. Let’s say you are canning green beans. You’ve got your jars in the boiling pot, and it’s time to take out the jars. With what do you remove them? Your bare hands? Not likely, unless you are a leper and cannot feel it. You [...]

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From What Does Justification Free Us?

My apologies to the readers, and especially to Bill for waiting this long for the next post on justification. My last post dealt with where our sin problem leaves us. It leaves us with a two-fold problem. The first aspect of the problem is our guilt due to the law’s accusation. The second aspect is [...]

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The Sinners Emancipation Proclamation

On January 1, 1863 President Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation became law by executive order. It liberated slaves in certain southern states. After the war, the 13th amendment to the Constitution abolished slavery in the United States of America. Approximately four million former slaves became legally free. No longer were they the property of another man. [...]

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Where That Leaves Us

We have seen that God is holy, and that the same holiness pervades the law of God. So, where does that leave us?
Romans 1-3 has a very carefully laid out answer to this question. It can be paraphrased this way: in deep doo-doo. That’s where we are, in deep trouble.
In order to flesh out this [...]

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The Holiness of the Law

Previously, we explored the holiness of God, and the problems that raised. Now, we need to flesh that out a bit in terms of the law.
The holiness of the Law-Giver means that the law itself is also holy. The law is holy, just, and good, as Paul says. Furthermore, the law requires perfection. Paul says [...]

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Introducing Myself, a Sinner, Contrasted With the Holiness of God

Hello, dear readers. My name is Rev. Lane Keister. I am on the Puritan Board as a fellow moderator with Bill, and I have a blog at Green Baggins. Bill graciously asked me to be a part of his blog, and I have accepted. He specifically asked me to post about justification by faith, as [...]

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