justification by faith



  Justification by Faith



The subjective principle of Protestantism is the doctrine of justification and salvation by faith in Christ; as distinct from the doctrine of justification by faith and works or salvation by grace and human merit. Luther’s formula is sola fide. Calvin goes further back to God’s eternal election, as the ultimate ground of salvation and comfort in life and in death. But Luther and Calvin meant substantially the same thing, and agree in the more general proposition of salvation by free grace through living faith in Christ (Acts 4:12), in opposition to any Pelagian or Semi-pelagian compromise which divides the work and merit between God and man. And this is the very soul of evangelical Protestantism.



Pelagianism. Theologically, Pelagianism is the heresy which holds that man can take the initial and fundamental steps towards salvation by his own efforts, apart from Divine grace. *

Luther assigned to his solifidian doctrine of justification, the Reformation doctrine of justification by faith alone  the central position in the Christian system, declared it to be the article of the standing or falling (Lutheran) church, and was unwilling to yield an inch from it, though heaven and earth should collapse. This exaggeration is due to his personal experience during his convent life. The central article of the Christian faith on which the church is built, is not any specific dogma of the Protestant, or Roman, or Greek church, but the broader and deeper truth held by all, namely, the divine-human personality and atoning work of Christ, the Lord and Saviour. This was the confession of Peter, the first creed of Christendom.

The Protestant doctrine of justification differs from the Roman Catholic, as defined (very circumspectly) by the Council of Trent, chiefly in two points. Justification is conceived as a declaratory and judicial act of God, in distinction from sanctification, which is a gradual growth; and faith is conceived as a fiducial act of the heart and will, in distinction from theoretical belief and blind submission to the church. The Reformers derived their idea from Paul, the Romanists appealed chiefly to (James 2:17–26); but Paul suggests the solution of the apparent contradiction by his sentence, that “in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision, but faith working through love.”

Faith, in the biblical and evangelical sense, is a vital force which engages all the powers of man and apprehends and appropriates the very life of Christ and all his benefits. It is the child of grace and the mother of good works. It is the pioneer of all great thoughts and deeds.

By faith Abraham became the father of nations; by faith Moses became the liberator and legislator of Israel; by faith the Galilean fishermen became fishers of men; and by faith the noble army of martyrs endured tortures and triumphed in death; without faith in the risen Saviour the church could not have been founded.

Faith is a saving power



It unites us to Christ. Whosoever believeth in Christ “hath eternal life.” “We believe,” said Peter at the Council of Jerusalem, “that we shall be saved through the grace of God,” like the Gentiles who come to Christ by faith without the works and ceremonies of the law.


“Believe in the Lord Jesus, and thou shalt be saved,” was Paul’s answer to the question of the jailor: “What must I do to be saved?”

 *  Cross, F. L., & Livingstone, E. A. (Eds.). (2005). In The Oxford dictionary of the Christian Church (3rd ed. rev., p. 1257). Oxford;  New York: Oxford University Press.

Schaff, P., & Schaff, D. S. (1910). History of the Christian church (Vol. 7, pp. 20–22). New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons.

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