308 ON JUSTIFICATION.
eousness of God by three properties: — 1. That it is %wp/$ voi^ov, — " without the law," verse 21 ; separated iu all its concerns from the law ; not attainable by it, nor any works of it, which they have no influence into. It is neither our obedience unto the law, nor attain- able thereby. Nor can any expression more separate and exclude the works of obedience unto the law from any concernment in it than this doth. Wherefore, whatever is, or can be, performed by ourselves in obedience unto the law, is rejected from any interest in this ri'diteousness of God, or the procurement of it to be made ours. 2. Tliat yet it " is witnessed unto by the law," verse 21 : " The law and the prophets."
The apostle, by this distinction of the books of the Old Testament into " the law and the prophets," manifests that by the " law" he un- derstands the books of Moses. And in them testimony is given unto this righteousness of God four ways : —
(1.) By a declaration of the causes of the necessity of it unto our justification. This is done in the account given of our apostasy from God, of the loss of his image, and the state of sin that ensued thereon; for hereby an end was put unto all possibility and hope of acceptance with God by our own personal righteousness. By the entrance of sin our own righteousness went out of the world ; so that there must be another righteousness prepared and approved of God, and called " the righteousness of God," in opposition unto our own, or all rela- tion of love and favour between God and man must cease for ever.
(2.) In the way of recovery from this state, generally declared in the first promise of the blessed seed, by whom this righteousness of God was to be wrought and introduced ; for he alone was " to make an end of sin, and to bring in everlasting righteousness," D"'ppy P'lV, Dan. ix, 24 ; that righteousness of God that should be the means of the justification of the church in all ages, and under all dispensa- tions.
(3.) By stopping up the way unto any other righteousness, through the threatenings of the law, and that curse which every transgi'ession of it was attended withal. Hereby it was plainly and fully declai'ed that there must be such a righteousness provided for our justification before men as would answer and remove that curse.
(4.) In the prefiguration and representation of that only way and means whereby this righteousness of God was to be wrought. This it did in all its sacrifices, especially in the gi'eat anniversary sacrifice on the day of expiation, wherein all the sins of the church were laid on the head of the sacrifice, and so carried away.
3. He describes it by the only way of our participation of it, the only means on our part of the communication of it unto us. And this is by faith alone : " The righteousness of God which is by the
JUSTIFICATION AS DECLAEED BY PAUL. 309
faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe ; for there is no difference," Eona. iii. 22. Faith in Christ Jesus is so the only way and means whereby this righteousness of God comes upon us, or is communicated unto us, that it is so unto all that have this faith, and only unto them; and that without difference on the consi- deration of any thing else besides. And although faith, taken abso- lutely, may be used in various senses, yet, as thus specified and limited, the faith of Christ Jesus, or, as he calls it, " the faith that is in me," Acts xxvi. ] 8, it can intend nothing but the reception of him, and trust in him, as the ordinance of God for righteousness and sal- vation.
This description of the righteousness of God revealed in the gospel, which the apostle asserts as the only means and cause of our justifi- cation before God, with the only way of its participation and com- munication unto us, by the faith of Christ Jesus, fully confirms the truth we plead for. For if the righteousness wherewith we must be justified before God be not our own, but the righteousness of God, as these things are directly opposed, Phil. iii. 9 ; and the only way whereby it comes upon us, or we are made partakers of it, is by the faith of Jesus Christ; then our own personal, inherent righteous- ness or obedience hath no interest in our justification before God : which argument is insoluble, nor is the force of it to be waived by any distinctions whatever, if we keep our hearts unto a due rever- ence of the authority of God m his word.
Having fully proved that no men living have any righteousness of their own whereby they may be justified, but are all shut up imder the guilt of sin; and having declared that there is a righteousness of God now fully revealed in the gospel, whereby alone we may be so, leaving all men in themselves unto their own lot, inasmuch as " all have sinned and come short of the glory of God;" — he proceeds to declare the nature of our justification before God in all the causes of it, Rom. iii. 24-26, " Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus : whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sms that are past, through the forbearance of God, to declare. I say, at this time his righteousness ; that he might be just, and the justifier of them that believe in Jesus."