JUSTIFICATION: JUDGE OF UNIVERSE SAYS ‘NOT GUILTY’,part 2

Luther came to the conclusion that the ‘justice of God’ mentioned in Romans 1: 17, “For in it the righteousness(justice) of God is revealed from faith to faith, as it is written ‘the righteous shall live by faith.’ “, does not refer to the punishment of sinners! Rather that the ‘righteousness’(justice) of the righteous is not their own, but God’s. His righteousness is given to those who live by faith and it is given because He wishes to do so. According to Justo L. Gonzales 1, “Thus, Luther’s doctrine of ‘justification by faith’ does not mean that what God demands of us is faith as if this were something we have to do or achieve, and which God then rewards. It means rather that both faith and justification are the work of God, a free gift to sinners.” Biblical witness indicates that while faith is what leads to justification, justification must and will produce works that are appropriate to the new ‘born-again’ creature! So the genuineness of the faith that leads to justification becomes apparent by the works that result from it! It seems that both faith and works are given by God, they are gifts, as we see in the following Scripture: “ For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are God’s workmanship, creatures in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” Ephesians 2:8-10.

According to Vinson Synan 2 ,Wesley’s idea on theology which shaped the Methodist Movement around 1740’s, involved two separate phases of experience for the believer: the first, conversion or what he called justification; the second, Christian perfection, or sanctification. From the Methodist Movement came the roots of the Pentecostal Movement in the 20th century, which started the Asuza Street Revival, whose leader, William J. Seymour, had been taught by Charles Fox Parham who said that first , there was justification , then sanctification and then the baptism of the Holy Spirit whose evidence was speaking in tongues! I see the term conversion being used interchangeably with justification. I have seen conversion defined as the act of man turning from sin or self, that is, of repenting or turning to God and justification as the act of God in declaring man ‘not guilty’. So do not know if Wesley meant justification to mean both the sinner turning from sin to God and God declaring him ‘not guilty’ at the same time?

NOTES
1 Justo L Gonzalez, The Story of Christianity, V.2 (San Francisco: Harper Pub., 1985),19.
2 Vinson Synan, The Holiness-Pentecostal Tradition, ( Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Pub., 1997),6.