Although the Protestant Reformation dealt with many deviations from the Roman Catholic Church at the time, one of the most important problems was the discovery of the treasure of justification only by faith (single fide). Buried under indulgences, the merits of the saints, the sacrament of penance, and other distortions of the Gospel, Martin Luther discovered a pearl of great value when he realized that the righteousness of God revealed in the Gospel (Romans 1:17) was not the righteousness of his character that condemns sinners, but the righteousness with which God justifies sinners without the works of the law.
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- Luther’s first biography was written by his friend Philip Melanchthon in 1549.
- Melanchthon tells us that after graduating.
- Luther began to study law.
- His family and friends confidently hoped that the bright young Luther would make a great contribution to family heritage.
- But he entered the Augustinus.
- Monastery instead.
Upon entering, he not only devoted himself with the greatest diligence to ecclesiastical studies, but also, with great rigor in discipline, exercised his autonomy and far surpassed all other colleagues in the wide range of readings and disputes, with zealous observation of fasting and prayer. [I]
However, all his religious efforts could not give Luther any security. When a close friend died, Luther was terrified by the idea of God’s judgment. And it only got worse in the face of the theology of the time. Medieval theology viewed sin as sin. problem of being that required healing. And this healing was done through the sacraments. In this life, the Christian is suspended between the grace of God (mediated by the sacraments) and the judgment of God. Medieval theology also added a distinction between current and habitual grace. Present grace forgave sins, provided they were confessed.
Has the usual grace changed people more deeply, in their own being?Overcome the problem of original sin.
Luther’s problem was that because only the sins confessed in the present were forgiven, he was obsessed with not ignoring the sins committed, and decided to confess to his superior in the Augustinian order, and then run back with a new mistake he remembered. At one point, his superior said, “Look, Brother Martinho!If you’re going to confess so much, why don’t you do something worth confessing?Kill your mother or father, commit adultery!But stop coming here,” with trifles and false sins?[He]
In 1512, at the age of 26, Luther was sent by his order as professor of biblical studies at the new University of Wittenberg. It was there that, as he studied Augustine and taught the Psalms, Romans, and Galatians, that Luther came to a radical new understanding of the gospel.
Highlighting luther’s development of thought is notoriously difficult. Luther’s new convictions took a long time to form. There’s a lot of debate among scholars about what he believes and when he came to believe it. Therefore, we will present it in a simplified way, such as a double movement. It’s more complex than that, with significant overlays, but this shape will help us understand what was happening in theological terms.
A key moment is known as the ‘Tower experience’. The date of Luther. La is in dispute, and may have taken a longer process than a single time of “Eureca”. Luther described his experience as follows:
Meanwhile, in the same year 1519, I had resumed the interpretation of the Psalms, I felt confident that I now had more experience, having worked in university courses with St Paul’s letters to the Romans, galatians and the Letter to the Hebrews. He had conceived the burning desire to understand what Paul meant in his letter to the Romans, but until then it was not prevented by the cold blood of my heart, but by a single word found in chapter 1:?God’s righteousness is revealed there?. I hated the word, “God’s righteousness?”(Iustitia Dei), who, through the use and custom of all my teachers, has learned to understand philosophically as a reference to formal or active justice, as it is called, that is, the righteousness for which God is just and for which he punishes sinners and the unjust.
But I, an irreproachable monk, thought that, before God, I was a sinner with an extremely troubled conscience. I couldn’t be sure that God had been appeased by my satisfaction. I did not like; on the contrary, I hated the just God who punishes sinners. In silence, if I did not blaspheme, I would certainly murmur vehemently and be angry at God. And he said, “Isn’t it enough that we are miserable sinners, lost for all eternity because of original sin, to be oppressed by all kinds of calamities through the Ten Commandments?” Why does God pile sadness upon sadness through the gospel and, along with the gospel, threaten us with his righteousness and anger? This is how I got angry with an untamed and troubled conscience. He constantly tormented São Paulo with this work by Romans 1, eager to know what he meant by it. I meditated day and night on these words until finally, by the mercy of God, I paid attention to their context: “The justice of God is revealed there, as it is written:” The just shall live by faith. “I began to understand that in this verse, the justice of God is what the righteous live by the gift of God, that is, by faith. I began to understand that this verse means that the justice of God is revealed by the Gospel, but it is passive justice, that is, by which the merciful God justifies us by faith, as it is written: “The just lives by faith. ” Suddenly I felt that I had been born again and entered heaven itself through its open portals. I saw all the scriptures from a different perspective. I searched the scriptures by heart and discovered that other terms had a similar meaning, that is, the work of God, which is what God works in us; the power of God, which makes us powerful the wisdom of God, with which he makes us wise; the strength of D God, the salvation of God, the glory of God.
I exalted my sweetest words: “The righteousness of God?With as much love as I’d ever hated them before. For me, this phrase from Paulo was the very gateway to paradise. Then I read The Spirit and the letter of Augustine, where I found what I would not have dared to expect, I found that he too interpreted God’s righteousness in the same way, that is, as what God puts in mind when he justifies us, although Augustine imperfectly said it and did not explain in detail how God imputed justice to us, however, I was glad that He taught the righteousness of God for which we are justified.
In Romans 1:17, Paul writes, “For in the gospel the righteousness of God is revealed from faith in faith, as it is written,” but the righteous by faith will live. “Couldn’t Luther understand how this righteousness of God could be the gospel?Good news. He seemed to offer only a threat of judgment. The law not only condemns us, but the gospel condemns us!”Why is God’s righteousness revealed in the gospel?”But did Luther begin to see the righteousness of God revealed in the gospel not only as a quality of God?His impartial justice, by which he judges sinners. Instead, he saw it as a gift Dios. La god’s righteousness is the righteousness He gives us to be righteous before Him. God’s righteousness is not an attribute of God, who is above and against humanity, judging us on the basis of our merits. It is God’s gift, by which God declares that we are righteous, even if we are not ourselves. Luther says:
[Paul] says that they are all sinners, unable to glorify God. However, they must be justified by faith in Christ, who deserved it for us, by his blood, and became the throne of propitiation for us [compare Exodus 25. 17; Leviticus 16: 14-15; 1 John 2:2] in the presence of God, who forgives all our ancient sins. In doing so, God proves that it is only His righteousness, which bestows upon us by faith, that helps us, a righteousness that, in the appointed time, was revealed by the gospel and, before that, witnessed by the Law. and the prophets. [iv]
This first step in Luther’s thinking came from a disturbed consciousness, created by medieval theology, to the rediscovery of Augustine’s point of view?And Augustine’s vision of sin. lack of good, but as a rebellion against God. It was a relationship problem. Moreover, the man who blushed to Deo (before God) had no resources. Luther said, “If anyone wanted to feel the greatness of sin, he could not remain alive for a moment, so great is the power of sin. “
However, Luther would go beyond Augustine. Augustine had said that when the sinner recognizes his own need for salvation, he returns in faith to God; God gives you the Holy Spirit, who then begins to transform you; According to Augustine’s vision, God’s righteousness is the gift of transformative grace in us. . And justification is the healing process that the Spirit operates in us. God transforms us from selfish to loving people, so that we may obey Him with all our hearts. Justification is a gift, but it always requires a process of change on our part in response.
The second step in Luther’s thinking led him from Augustinian thought to a clearly evangelical position. If this first step of thought was a rediscovery of Augustine, the second movement can be seen as a rediscovery of Paul. Luther’s getting to see this? This does not mean making a person righteous or changing, but recognizing or considering as just, declaring righteous, acquitting. Justification is my status before God, not what God does in me.
Medieval theology believed that grace was a quality that works in us and that justice would be done to justify ourselves. We would be healed by God’s grace, so that we may be righteous before Him.
However, Luther said that grace is not something that works in us, but the unmerited favor of God that works for us. The cause of justification is the righteousness of Christ outside of us. It is by no means something inherent or belonging to people. not intrinsic. Luther spoke of God accepting the righteousness of Christ as our righteousness, even though it is alien to our nature. We are declared righteous not on the basis of a gradual and future healing process, but on the basis of the complete work of Christ.
Melanchthon, in particular, developed the idea of extrinsic justice according to the idea of “imputation” (although Luther also used this term to describe his experience in the tower). The medieval theology (and Luther’s at the beginning) spoke of the manifestation, or infusion, of the justice that carried out our justification. But Melanchthon said that the righteousness of Christ, having been years, is regarded by God as ours. Our sins are not suppressed, but they are not counted against us. , does not refer to God who makes us righteous, but declares us righteous. It’s the language of a court, not a hospital. Justification is not a healing process, but a declaration that we have a just and positive position before God.
In this way, we are declared righteous only by faith. Luther saw people as passive in this process of justification. We can’t start the process. We don’t have that power and we’re enslaved; we have nothing to contribute to our salvation. So the justification is? And it can only be through faith and only through faith. Here, faith is trust, trust, or personal dependence. In medieval times, faith was often considered a virtue (in the sense of “loyalty” or “loyalty”). For Luther, faith simply takes possession of Christ. It is to receive what Christ did.
If such distinctions are thought to be subtle or that differences in Catholicism are exaggerated, consider the statements made in the Council of Trent (1545-1563). The Council of Trent was Catholicism’s response to the Reformation, a response that was never retracted. This response was quite explicit in his condemnation of justification only by faith:
If someone says that by faith, only the wicked are justified, so that nothing else is required to cooperate to receive the grace of justification, and that it is not necessary for a man to be prepared and willing to act of his own free will, to be anathema (Section 6, Canon 9). If someone says that justifying faith is nothing more than trust in divine mercy that forgives sins for Christ’s sake; or that we are only justified by this trust; is anathema (Section 6, Canon 12)
The contrast with Luther is marked. Luther says: “If faith is not in everything, even in the smallest works, it does not justify; In fact, isn’t it even faith?[Vi] Luther, as we shall see, has made it clear that faith continues to produce good works in his life, but any hope of salvation based on good works, even partial works, denies the suitability of our one true hope: Jesus Christ.
Since in Catholicism salvation depends on faith in works, the Council has denied the possibility of salvation. For reformers, expressing one’s security means boasting about Christ and his complete work. For Catholicism, expressing security was a source of pride and vanity in yours. Good job.
If anyone says that a born-again and justified man is bound by faith to believe that he is certainly part of the number of predestined [?] And he has the gift of perseverance to the end (unless he has learned it by revelation) Special); anathema (Section 6, Canons 15-16).
Catholics contributing to ecumenical discussions have recently made statements on the justification of faith that some evangelicals believe they can affirm; however, these statements generally lack precision on the main problems of the Reformation. Council of Trent.
At first, Luther regarded Christians as part sinners and partly righteous. The Latin phrase is simul iustus and sinner, “both righteous and sinful”. Luther continued to use this phrase, but understood it differently. . ” The Christian was always righteous (in terms of status) and always a sinner (in terms of lifestyle). We’re not in a gradual process from one thing to another. We are sinners because we remain in old sinful habits. But we have already done so, they appeared before the court of God and were declared righteous.
We are, in fact, totally sinners, in terms of ourselves and our first birth. Conversely, although Christ was given by us, we are totally holy and righteous. Therefore, in different ways, it is said that we are righteous and sinful. [Vii]
We can summarize Luther’s theology on justification as follows
Erasmo, a great humanist scholar, objected to all this by saying: “Lutherans seek only two things: wealth and wives [?] Does the gospel mean the right to live as they please?However, Luther argues that although we are not justified by works, works must follow faith as their fruit. Saving faith will always be active in love. This love is expressed not in religious duties to gain merit before God, but in the practical service of others. . We free ourselves from the burden of self-adjustment to serve one another in love. In the medieval system, justification was sought by retreating from the world in a monastery, in which time would be devoted to confession and religious discipline. it meant that the person was free to go into the world and devote his time to serving others, without always looking over his shoulder to see what God would think of him.
However, there were differences between reformers. Melanchthon and later Lutheranism made a marked distinction between justification and sanctification (here, “sanctification” is the theological term for our growth in holiness and our gradual transformation to the image of Christ). to protect against the Catholic idea that justification begins with regeneration and is complemented by sanctification. Luther himself did not make such an intense distinction. Martin Bucer (1491-1551), Franco-Swiss theologian of the Alsace region, and one of the trainers of the reformed tradition, thought of a “double justification”: first, in the “primary justification”, we are declared righteous by the imputed justice of Christ, and secondly, by the “secondary justification”, are we righteous facts?an activity that includes effort.
Joel Calvino, the principal formulator of the reformed tradition, had a clear concept of forensic or legal justification, but avoided making a strong distinction between justification and sanctification (or secondary justification), placing both under the previous concept and under the arc of the believer’s union with Christ himself through faith. Then, although Calvin called justification the “main axis” on which religion revolves and the “sum of all piety,” [ix] he dealt with justification in institutes under the theme of the Holy Ghost. Justification and sanctification are two fruits that flow from our union with Christ, which we experience through the Spirit. Calvin thus claims Luther’s relational dimension, while protecting the legal nature of Melanchthon’s explicit justification.
So the justification is still important? The answer must be a resounding “yes. “Nothing is more important than justification only by Christ and only by faith. If the justification for faith seems obvious to you, it’s Luther. But we can’t just assume his legacy.
There have been many attempts to move the central terrain of Christianity elsewhere; However, the fact is that the greatest problem for humanity is the righteousness of God, who is dedicated to judging sin. This means that he is committed to judging my sin. This is our greatest problem, because it means an eternity excluded from the glory of God.
This is Paul’s argument in Romans 1. 18-3. 20. Step by step, Paul establishes the fact that we are all guilty. Romans 2. 5 said, “But because of your hardness and your unrepentant heart, you have dedicated yourself to the day of anger and revelation of God’s righteous judgment. “It concludes in Romans 3:20: “For by the works of the law no human being shall be justified before him; Why, by law, does knowledge of sin come?. Christianity brings many blessings It is true that Christians are involved in the search for renewal of their environment and social justice, but if one day God’s righteous judgment is revealed, and in the meantime, we keep God’s wrath upon us, if no one can be declared just by His own righteousness, then everyone on earth faces a great problem : the judgment of God. This problem makes all the other problems we might face small. Therefore, nothing is more important than justification.
That is why Luther describes justification as “the summary of Christian doctrine?”And “the article by which the church remains or falls. “[X]
It is not only at the doctrinal or ecclesiastical level that this is so important, it is a deeply personal doctrine. Every time I sin, I create a reason to doubt that I have been accepted by God, and I question my future with God; However, day after day, the doctrine of justification speaks to my soul of peace.
This is particularly true in the case of imputed justice: if justification describes a process of change, as Catholicism teaches, even if initiated by grace, each failure casts doubts about my future; But if I were created before God through the complete work of Christ, nothing can undo this reality, so I can have security, even in the face of my sin.
Paul takes his argument of justification for faith in Romans 1-4 at the climax in 4. 25: “[Jesus, our Lord] who was delivered because of our transgressions and was resurrected because of our justification. “What does it say next?Paul continues: “Justified, therefore, by faith, we have peace with God for our Lord Jesus Christ; for whom we have also obtained entry, by faith, into this grace in which we are; and glorify us in the hope of God’s glory?(Romans 5. 1-2). Justification is what reminds us that we have peace with God and hope for glory. We need this reminder not only on the day of our conversion, but also on the next day. Day.
The peoples of this world have a mission: the mission to prove their worth. Perhaps the main reason people are too busy is because they are trying to prove their worth. Being busy has become a mark of honor in our culture. Take, for example, an expression like, “I’m a very busy man. “What does this mean in our culture? That doesn’t mean, “My life is out of control. “You mean, “Am I a very important person?The result is a level of overwork that harms our health and homes.
We don’t need the 500th anniversary of the Reformation to talk to people about justification. Every day you will find people who are trying to prove themselves. Some people try to prove themselves before God. Many try to prove themselves to others in order to establish their own identity And all these vain attempts at self-justification push people to the point of breaking down.
And first and foremosl this frenzy, Jesus said, “Come unto me [?] And I’m going to relieve you?(Matthew 11:28). We have good news for our busy culture. Proving yourself is just something else. deadline to justify and we have the good news of justification by grace.
If you’re busy trying to prove your worth, you’re always busy, can’t you ever complete the task?Because you can’t prove your worth, it’ll be like a dog chasing his tail. Jesus said on the cross, “Is it over? (John, 7:30 p. m. M. ). The work is done. The task is over. The Atonement is complete. You have nothing left to do. “
The great importance of justification for evangelical Christians can be seen in their prominence in worship and in the Gospel hymn. Throughout history, it is common to see evangelical believers transforming the doctrine of justification by Christ only through faith into a service of worship. It is quite clear that justification is not simply a doctrine that marks the true church, nor is it just a doctrine to be preached to non-believers, it is the source of comfort and hope in the midst of life’s struggles.
We have many options here, but let us take, for example, “Jesus, Your Blood and Your Righteousness”, by Nicholas Von Zinzendorf (1700-1760), translated by John Wesley (1703-1791):
Jesus, your blood and your righteousness are my beauty, my glorious mantle; in the midst of fiery worlds, in these joyfully manifested, I will raise my head.
When I rise from the dust of death to assume my house beyond heaven, this will be my only request: Jesus lived and died for me.
Bold, I will endure this great day, and no one will be able to condemn me, however hard they try; I am totally acquitted by you of sin and fear, guilt and shame.
Oh, let the dead hear your voice now; May those who have been lost in sin come to rejoice!Here is his beauty, his glorious garments: Jesus, your blood and your righteousness.
John Wesley’s brother Charles (1707–1788) expressed this same pleasure in our justification in his famous hymn, “And Can It Be?(Can it be like this?):
I will not fear any condemnation now; Jesus is mine, and everything it contains!I live in it, my head alive, Dressed in divine justice, Brave, I approach the eternal throne, and I claim the crown, for Christ, as mine.
Or finally, let’s see Edward Mote’s “I Didn’t Put My Faith in Anything” (1797-1874). Like others, it beautifully embodies the trust we can have before God in Christ, as opposed to our own actions:
I put my faith only in the grace of Jesus; in the redeeming sacrifice, in the blood of the good Redeemer.
When the trumpet sounds, I will go with him to meet him and with the saved I will sing eternal praises to the great king.
Dressed only with your righteousness, I will be innocent before the throne; On Christ, the solid rock, I am standing; all other terrains are quicksand.
[i] Philip Melanchthon, The Life and Deeds of Martin Luther (1549). Retrieved 15 May 2015. In sources / text / wittenberg / melan / lifea-01. txt.
[ii] Luther’s Works, 33: 191, quoted in Timothy George, Theology of the Reformers (Nashville: Broadman; Leicester: Apollos, 1988), 65.
[iii] “Martin Luther discovers the true meaning of justice”, excerpt from “Preface to the complete edition of Luther’s Latin works?” (1545), Andrew Thornton’s translation of? Vorrede zu Band I der Opera Latina der Wittenberger Ausgabe, 1545 ?, Vol. 4 by Luthers Werke in Auswahl, ed. Otto Lemen, 6th ed. (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1967), 421-28.
[iv] Martin Luther, “Preface to the Letter of St. Paul to the Romans”, trad. Brother Andrew Thornton OSB. Retrieved: 9 May 2015. Available at: www. ccel. org/ccel/luther/prefacetoromans (emphasis added); also available at www. yale. edu/adhoc/etexts/ luther_preface. html.
[v] Werke by D. Martin Luther: Kritische Gesamtausgabe (Weimar: Bohlau, 1833-), 39:210. Quoted in Paul Althaus, Theology of Martin Luther (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1966), 142.
[vi] Werke by D. Martin Luther, 7:231. Cité in George, Theology of the Reformers, p. 71.
[vii] D. Martin Luthers Werke, 39:523, quoted in George, Theology of the Reformers, p. 71.
[viii] PSAllen and HMAllen, ed. , Opus Epistolarum Des. Erasmi Roterodami (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1928), 7: 366, letter (born 1977), 20 March 1528, to Willibald Pirkheimer, quoted in George, Theology of Reformers, 72.
[ix] Calvin, Institutes, 3. 11. 1, 3. 15. 7
[x] Douglas J. Moo, The Epistle to the Romans (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996), 242, says that Lutherans later coined this motto and that Luther would have said, “If this object is standing, the church remains upwards; If it falls, will the church fall?(Luther, psalm 130. 4 exhibition).