"Be it known unto you therefore, brethren, that through this man is proclaimed unto you, remission of sins: and by him every one that believeth is justified from all things, from which he could not be justified by the law of Moses."—Acts 13:38, 39.
"But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is reckoned for righteousness."—Rom. 4:5.
These are two remarkable passages and this chapter will be occupied with an exposition of them. Our subject this morning is, The Distinctive Doctrine of Protestantism: Justification by Faith. The doctrine of Justification by Faith was the doctrine that made the Reformation. It is to-day one of the cardinal doctrines of the Evangelical Faith. This doctrine, though first fully expounded and constantly emphasised by Paul, runs throughout the entire Bible from Genesis to Revelation. It is in the first book of the Bible, the book of Genesis, that we read, +"Abraham believed in the Lord; and he counted it to him for righteousness."+ (Gen. 15:6.) In these words in the very first book in the Bible we have the germ of the whole gracious and precious doctrine of Justification by Faith.