(a) Outline Paul's message on justification. (b) State two conditions for the attainment of justification.

Answer Details

(a) Paul's message on justification (Romans 3:21-31; 4; 5:1; Galatians 2:16)

• Paul taught that all people, both Jews and Gentiles, have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, so none is righteous before Him by his own effort.
• No one is justified (declared righteous) by the works of the law, because the law only makes people conscious of sin; through the law comes knowledge of sin, not deliverance from it.
• Justification is a free gift of God's grace, offered apart from the law and undeserved by the sinner.
• It is received by faith in Jesus Christ, whom God set forth as a propitiation (sacrifice of atonement) through His blood.
• By His death and resurrection, Christ paid the penalty for sin, so that the guilty who believe are accounted righteous before God.
• Paul used Abraham as his example: Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness, before circumcision and before the law, proving that righteousness comes by faith.
• Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, and boasting in oneself is excluded.

(b) Two conditions for the attainment of justification

• Faith in Jesus Christ: genuine belief and trust in Christ and His atoning death and resurrection.
• The grace of God: justification is God's free, unmerited favour, received through repentance from sin and not earned by works.