"Ye Are Justified!"
I Corinthians 6:11
Perhaps the most important fact about the
character of God revealed in Holy Scripture is the one which men and women most
presumptuously ignore, the fact that God is just. Justice and truth are the
habitation of his throne (Psa. 97:2). It is not possible for a person to
understand the works of God in providence, redemption, grace, or judgment until
he has some understanding of the justice of God.
Because the Lord our God is just, he must
deal with all men upon the grounds of strict justice. The justice of God is the
rectitude and righteousness of his character which compels him to deal with all
rational creatures in strict accordance with their deserts. Justice and
holiness are as essential to the character of God as love and mercy. The holy
Lord God can no more lay aside his justice in dealing with men than he can
cease being omnipotent.
Because God is just, the only way he can
save a guilty sinner, the only way he can bring a sinner into an eternal union
of life with himself, is if he can make that sinner quiltless and sinless in
the eyes of his own law and justice. This work of God's matchless grace, by
which he declares guilty sinners to be guiltless and sinless
is what the Apostle Paul calls "justification" (Rom.
How is this great work of justification
accomplished? This is the question of the ages. "How can a man be
justified with God?" (Job 25:4). How can God be just and yet justify the ungodly? Find the answer to that question and
you have learned the gospel. If you have not found the answer to that question,
you do not yet know the gospel. How does God justify sinners? Paul tells us
that we are "justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is
in Christ Jesus."
Don Fortner