“1st. That I shall be again daily defiled with sin;
“2d. That I shall have a sinful heart within me until the day of my death;
“3d. That until then, I shall never be able to accomplish the keeping of the whole law;
“4th. That, since I am already condemned and sentenced, I can not do business in the
Kingdom of God as an honorable man.”
The answer of justification, such as Scripture reveals and our Church confesses it, covers
these four points most satisfactorily. It accepts you not as a saint, with a self-assumed holiness,
but as one who confesses: “My conscience accuses me that I have grossly transgressed all
the commandments of God, and have kept none of them, and that I am still inclined to all
evil”; and yet, you are not cast out. It tells you that you can not depend upon any merit of
your own, but must rely on grace alone. Wherefore it begins with putting you in the ranks
of the law-abiding, of them that are declared good and righteous, “even so as if you never
had had nor committed any sin.” As the ground of godliness it does not require of you the
keeping of the law, but it imputes and imparts to you Christ’s fulfilment of the law; esteeming
you as if you had fully accomplished all that obedience which Christ has accomplished for
you. And effacing hereby the difference of your past and future sin, it imputes and grants
unto you not only Christ’s satisfaction and holiness, but even His original righteousness, in
such a manner that you stand before God once more righteous and honorable, and as tho
the whole history of your sin had been a dream only.
But the closing sentence of the Catechism should be noticed: “Inasmuch as I embrace
such benefit with a believing heart.” And that “believing heart,” and that “embracing”—be-
hold, that is the very work of the Holy Spirit.
XXXIII. Certainty of Our Justification.