Baptist Biographies

Jon Akin over at Baptist 21 has started a series of biographical sketches entitled SBC Heroes. In the first installment, Akin covers one of the unheralded heroes in SBC life, Robert Greene (R.G.) Lee. Unless you grew up at Bellevue Baptist in Memphis, TN or attended Union University in Jackson, TN, you may have never heard of Lee.

Akin draws application from the life and preaching of Lee that is valuable for all preachers, young (like him) and old (like me, though young in the pulpit). I encourage you to read and consider – and I look forward to future sketches.

The Marrow of True Justification (1.6)

Having provided the context for his argument from Romans 3:10-4:4, Keach proceeds now to Romans 4:5, his text of exposition.

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– Pages 26-28 –

And now I come to my text, ver. 5.

And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.

To the one who does not work. That is, the one who does not work thinking to be justified and saved by his own works. Though he might work, i.e. lead a holy and righteous life, he does not do so for merit. No, he is a wicked and ungodly person, and so does not work, or have any moral righteousness. Yet, if he believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted or imputed as righteousness. This is not a simple act, as a quality or habit, or something already in us, as the Papists teach. Ipsa fides, says Bellarmine, censetur esse justitia, “Faith itself is counted to be a justice” and is itself imputed unto righteousness. This is not so, nor in respect to the fruits of it, for the fruits are part of our sanctification.

But faith is a hand to take hold of, or receive, or apply Christ and his righteousness. Manus accipientis, says Dr. Downham, the hand of the receiver is the grace of justifying faith. It is not faith itself, but the object of righteousness that faith apprehends or takes hold of that justifies the ungodly.

By these words Paul does not mean that if a man has these works he cannot be justified unless he throws them away, and become openly wicked and profane, and sin more so that grace might abound more. No, he says, By no means! Rom. 6:1-2. But what he means is that the absence or lack of good works, or moral righteousness, cannot hinder a man’s justification if he believes in Jesus Christ, even though he is wicked and ungodly.

Who justifies the ungodly. Every man is ungodly before he is acquitted and justified, having until that moment a great mountain of guilt and filth resting on him.

Justifie; it is Verbum forense, a judicial word used in the courts, or a legal term, which is usually opposed to condemnation. It means to absolve, to acquit from guilt, to pardon, and to accept or pronounce a man just and righteous, there by sentencing him (Deut. 25:1; Prov. 17:15). This does not make him inherently righteous, but righteousness is counted or imputed to one who is in himself a sinner, or as the text says, ungodly.

The Marrow of True Divinity (1.5)

Keach continues his brief exposition of Romans 3:10ff:

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– Pages 25-26 –

No wonder there is no difference, when both Jews and Gentiles lie under the guilt of Adam’s sin.  His sin is imputed to them and he is the head and representative of the entire human race, Rom. 5:12. Therefore they all partake of the same original corruption or depraved nature, inherent in them, from which proceeds all actual sins, through which means it appears that all come short of the glory of God, in which they were first created, and also the eternal glory from above. Yet to the praise of his glorious grace, the lost world is not left in a hopeless condition, God sent his Son to satisfy the Law and his divine justice, or to be a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins, Rom. 3:25.

4. In verse 27 he adds a God-honoring and a self-confounding inference from what he had said, Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? By a law of works? No, but by the law of faith.

5. And so he draws another conclusion, viz. v. 28, For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law. Then in the 4th chapter he proceeds to move to his main argument, i.e., That a sinner is justified by faith without works, Abraham as an example, For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God, chap. 4:2.

6. This is Paul’s argument: If Abraham was justified by works, he had something by which he might boast and glory. But Abraham had nothing by which to boast and glory–therefore he was not justified by works.

But to prove it even more, he affirms what the Scripture says, viz. That Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness, v. 3.

7. In the next place, he proceeds to prove his blessed doctrine from the nature of works and grace, they being quite opposite and contrary to one another, Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due,v. 4. If then it was granted that even if a man could fulfill the condition of perfect obedience, he still could not be justified.

1. Because (as he showed before) all have sinned.

2. Because there is no reward as a due debt from God because, being the Lord’s, we can do no more than our duty. All of our abilities and services can never repay the wrong we have done against the Law, and the holiness and justice of God.

The Marrow of True Justification (1.4)

– Pages 23-25 –

In Romans 3:19, Paul answers an objection that he anticipates the Jews might bring against what he had said. They might suggest, “What you say does not concern us but the profane Gentiles. We have the Law, and that relieves us and we can be justified by it.” Paul’s answer, in an effort to cut off all their false hopes, Now we know that whatever the law says it speaks to those who are under the law, so that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God.

1. By the Law is not only meant the Law as it was given to Israel on the two tablets of stone, but the substance of that Law written on the hearts of all men, the Law of the first covenant, which was broken by our first parents, the consequence being all the world became guilty before God, both by having their origin in them and by actually breaking the Law themselves. This was true of Jews and Gentiles alike, since neither lived without sin–both were guilty of breaking the Law that they lived under. But even though the world was under the Law of the first covenant, and had the same substance of that Law as a rule of life. yet the Jews had the upper hand over the world by their having the oracles of God committed to them. They therefore had a greater advantage to come to the knowledge of sin, even more to the knowledge of the Messiah through the different figures and prophecies given to them.

So what did this mean to the Jew? Paul shows them that the Law on which they rested not only did not relieve them but served mainly to show them their guilt and condemnation.  They and all the world were subject to the just judgment of God and all were under His curse and wrath because of sin.

2. He infers, then, that no man, Jew or Gentile, can be justified by the Law (either the Law as it was written on the two tablets or the Law as written on the heart, which the Gentiles had as well as the Jews), verse 20, For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.

3. But lest the world by this be left in utter despair, Paul proceeds to show us there is a way for us to be delivered from sin and its guilt and consequently justified before God, this according to the infinite wisdom of God and according to His unspeakable grace and goodness, verses 21-24, ²¹But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— ²²the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: ²³for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, ²⁴ and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.

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Keach draws attention to Paul’s teaching that all men, both by birth and in practice, are guilty of breaking the Law of God written on their hearts.  The Law serves the same purpose in all men, Jew and Gentile alike, to show man his guilt. No man, Jew or Gentile, can then rely on the Law to justify them. Justification is according to God’s wisdom, grace and mercy alone — and that is through the redemption found in Christ alone.

The Marrow of True Justification (Chapter 1.2)

The following is the conclusion of Keach’s reasons for this treatise.

– Pages 19-21 –

5. Because this doctrine (the doctrine of justification) consists of so much of the glory of God, and the magnifying of His infinite wisdom and free grace, and mercy in Jesus Christ, and also the humiliation of the creature: Was it not the exaltation of the glory of God in all His attributes and blessed perfections that resulted in that glorious counsel, held above between the Father and the Son before the world began, that established the covenant of grace? What was God’s design or purpose at in that covenant but His own glory and the humiliation of man? And if this be true, is it not to our advantage to see to it that this sovereign grace run freely, without any obstruction in the minds or hearts of men, who by their cursed notions and errors seek to hide the doctrine of God’s free grace?

6. Because from this doctrine proceeds all the hope we have of eternal life. If this foundation be destroyed, what can the righteous do? I say of justification through the imputation of Christ’s righteousness as David did of the covenant of grace: This is all our salvation and hoe, etc. 2 Sam. 23:5. If we do not come to heaven this way, I know no other way, For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ, [1 Cor. 3:11, ESV].

7. Because it is a doctrine that offers so much sweet and divine comfort to our souls when it is rightly understood and apprehended.  I am persuade it is through the need of Light and clear knowledge of this doctrine that so many doubts and fears attend many good Christians. For (as I have told some of you lately) weaker saints often judge their justification according to the degree and measure of their sanctification. These can hardly believe that such vile creatures, who have such evil and deceit in their hearts and so many evils and infirmities in their lives, can be justified in God’s sight. I have not and do not deny that sanctification and holiness is a mark or evidence of a justified person. But I do deny that justification is a gradual act (progressive) as sanctification is in us. Likewise, I also deny that a person is not perfectly justified until he is perfectly sanctified or actually free of the pollution and presence and defilement of sin. If this were true, it would follow that no believer is actually or fully justified in this life.  But what I intend, and hint at, is this: That some weaker Christians think it is by their own works of sanctification that they achieve holiness and receive power over their corruptions, and in doing so think they have good grounds to believe and hope that they are justified, as if it were by inherent grace and holiness that they are justified in God’s sight.

So much, then, as to the grounds and reasons which led me to answer the call to consider this text and subject.