iii. Spirituality and absoluteness. — Justifi- cation is a purely religious problem. The apostolic solution is purely religious. Its spirituality may be vindicated by reference to its source, its ground, its results.
(a) Grace the source. — Justification presupposes the election of grace {q.v.), to which is traced its unconditional freeness (Ro 3^S Eph V), its plenitude (Col P^ Ro 5", etc.), its Divine provision (1 Jn 41", Ro b^' ^<'). The riches and freeness of God's grace are manifested in the redemption they provide. It is a manifestation in which there is nothing else than a free, unprompted, unsolicited expression of God's own nature and love to man- kind. It is conditioned by nothing in man but man's clamant need, by nothing in God but His own holy love. Men are not pardoned on account of their faith or by their faith. Pardon already is in God's attitude toward them ; what they have to do is to realize it by faith, and enjoy its bless- ing.* Nor does God pardon because of Christ's satisfaction. Christ's sacrifice is the outcome of His forgiving mercy. It does not create or impel God's love, it displays it (Ro 5*- ^''). The Atonement, so far from being inconsistent with the Fatherhood of God, is its most distinct proof. Faith in Christ's atoning love only makes more conspicuously clear God's paternal love, for it is the marvellous way He took to struggle down through human experi- ence to give us healing. This assured love of God is the living root of the justified life ; f in its ampli- tude all are pardoned if they would only realize it in actual standing. It is the cause also of con- fident and bold access to God (Eph 312, 1 Jn 2=8 3-^) and the ceasing from confidence in the flesh (Ph 3^). Assurance of the Divine love in the forgiveness of sins already contained in it the whole idea of salvation, and holds together all the parts of the Divine life in their necessary nexus : the justifica- tion of the sinner before God and the princijile of freedom for the consciousness of the justified subject
• Theology even in its most dreary day never made faith the operative but simply the instrumental cause of justification.
t Cf. Calvin's Institutes, in whioli justification is related to predestination : ' comprehension of tlie divine purpose creating confidence in the elect ' (bk. iii. ch. 2).
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himself in all his relations.* In that principle lies securely embedded, along Avith our acceptance by God, our assurance of salvation, t Starting from God, who from eternity has been beforehand with us, held by His predestinating love, creating, calling, pardoning, we raise our fabric of life in continual groM'th for eternal glory (Ro 8^^'^^). All along it is of God's initiative, of grace ; all along it is an appeal to faith ; man's dependence is absolute.
(b) Christ's mediation the ground. — Here the apostolic teaching assumes the form of a three-fold presentation : (a) Christ's righteousness is made peace ; (/3) Christ's blood is made obedience ; (7) Christ's life is made presence. The first is Pauline, the second that of Hebrews, the third Johannine — in such a way that, while each of the three has its predominant element as thus classitied, we are not to suppose that each has no afhnities with the others ; on the contrary, the fullness of truth is in each, but ranged around the predominant element of each type.
(a) The new righteousness. — ' Christ is made unto us righteousness' (1 Co P") ; 'he is our peace' (Eph 2's-i8). The argument is in Ro 3i»- 1«-^^ and proceeds by a winding course through the following chapters to the eighth. There are three kinds of rigliteousness : ' God's righteousness,' ' our own righteousness,' and ' the righteousness of faith.' Before God's righteousness no man can stand. The attempt was made through His Law, given by Moses. The result was a self-righteousness that failed to bring peace between God and man for two reasons — firstly, the righteousness of the Law consisted in our own unaided obedience ; and secondly, that self-righteousness was the condition of our acceptance with God. It contained all the elements of uncertainty of salvation. It was in- etl'ectual. There is another righteousness never lost sight of under the Old Law, which has now appeared in Jesus Christ. By Him it is made ours. Presented in Him, it awakes in the sinner peni- tence and faith — a love of Christ's holiness, a hatred of his own sinfulness ; this by God's gi-ace. There is nothing in the self-righteousness of the righteous- ness of the Law to bridge the chasm between God and sin. The provision for that end is the very thing provided in Christ. How so? In Christ God gives His own righteousness, which is the end and meaning of all faith. He who receives it in initio receives it virtually in extenso ; such is the mode of God's gift of it. The condition of possible or future righteousness is the right attitude or in- tention of mind towards actual present unright- eousness. It is possible to justify or accept as right only that attitude which at the time is the nearest right possible for the person. In the initial moment of contrition, the only possible and right posture of the sinner is that consciousness of himself which could not be the beginning of his hatred of sin if it were not to the same extent the beginning of a love of holiness. Where this exists in truth and sincerity, even though it be but the beginning of an infinite process, it is possible and right to accept and treat as right that which as yet is only a first turning to and direction towards right (cf, 1 Jn p-io)_ Thus the righteousness of faith begins with our sense of sin and experience of impotence, and God's loving acceptance of this repentance in us is the condition, starting-point, and earnest of a righteousness in us which is maintained and in- creased through Christ's, in whom we see revealed all the presence and power of God in us, and in consequence all the power in ourselves necessary