Romans 4:25 Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification.

While yesterday I spoke about restoration allow me to point out that before there can be restoration there has to be justification. Without justification we would all be restored to our sinful state and nothing would be gained by that.

If it never occurred to you, allow me to point out that if Christ had not risen from the grave none of us would be justified. At the cross Christ’s final words were it is finished. Do you understand what He meant? If justification had not come at the time of His death, then what was finished?

Romans 5:10 For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life.

Now we have a comparative term, reconciliation. Reconciled by His death and justified by His resurrection. Two terms, two conditions and a need for us to distinguish one from the other. Clarity is required.

The Hebrew word of reconcile is kaw-far’; a primitive root; to cover (specifically with bitumen) Bitumen is tar. The issue here is that God would no longer see our sins.

Justification in the Greek is dikaiosis which denotes “the act of pronouncing righteous, justification, acquittal;” its precise meaning is determined by that of the verb dikaioo, “to justify”.

Seeing that His death on the cross removes sin as the reason for God’s wrath, it is necessary for us to distinguish these two terms in terms of accusation and judgment. If our acquittal is based on His resurrection how do we move from reconciliation to justification since the two are separate in the view of God?

Romans 3:28 Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law.

What was finished that day when Jesus said, “It is finished.”; was adherence to the law as a means of justification. God having put sin to death on the cross, now looks at the risen Christ as the only means of acquittal from those sins.

Jeremiah 30:6-7 Ask ye now, and see whether a man doth travail with child? wherefore do I see every man with his hands on his loins, as a woman in travail, and all faces are turned into paleness? Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob’s trouble, but he shall be saved out of it.

God has given Jeremiah a word of restoration but this came first. Does your sin and rebellious heart cause you this much pain? Probably not. We have this defensive mechanism that wants to protect our sanity so we justify our actions or blame others. We want to believe that our actions are not worthy of such great travail. What we fail to remember is that all sin no matter how we feel about them are equal in the sight of God.

I lied but I am not a thief. I stole but I didn’t kill. I killed but it wasn’t murder. I murdered but I had to do it. What we don’t want to admit to ourselves is that all sin requires travail before restoration can be accomplished.

Some of us would rather suffer loss than to admit our rebellious heart caused us to sin. Repentance is painful and none of us like pain but without it we are only lying to ourselves.

Lying to yourself is still a lie and as bad as any other sin because it frees you up to continue in sin.

John 8:44 Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.

Would you like to hear that you are the spawn of Satan just because you lied?

I didn’t think so.