In this post I shall make an attempt to explain that justification is eschatological by using Scripture, reason and tradition – the three-legged-stool, as Anglicans like to call it.
Justification Is Eschatological
Christ says in Matthew 24:13 that “he who endures until the end shall be saved.” Why does he say this? as if salvation is not finished once we “receive” Him.
Bishop NT Wright:
“It’s best to begin at the end, with Paul’s view of the future.(a) The one true God will finally judge the whole world; on that day, some will be found guilty and others will be upheld (Rom. 2.1-16). God’s vindication of these latter on the last day is his act of final “justification” (Rom. 2.13).”Again, Bishop Wright on justification and time:“Justification in the present is based on God’s past accomplishment in Christ, and anticipates the future verdict. This present justification has exactly the same pattern.(a) God vindicates in the present, in advance of the last day, all those who believe in Jesus as Messiah and Lord (Rom. 3.21-31; 4.13-25; 10.9-13). …The “faith” in question is faith in “the God who raised Jesus from the dead’; It comes about through the announcement of God’s word, the gospel, which works powerfully in the hearts of hearers, “calling” them to believe, or indeed (as Paul often puts it) to “obey” the gospel (Rom. 1.16f.; 1 Thess. 1.3f., 2.13; 2 Thess. 1.8). This faith looks backwards to what God has done in Christ, by means of his own obedient faithfulness to God’s purpose (Rom. 5.19; Phil. 2.6), relying on that rather than on anything that is true of oneself. For Paul, this meant refusing to regard the badges of Jewish law-observance (”the works of the law”) as the decisive factor (Phil. 3.2-11). And it looks forward to the final day: because this faith is the first sign of new God-given life, it is the appropriate anticipation of the final verdict, which is guaranteed by the same Spirit who inspired faith (2 Cor. 1.22; Phil. 1.6).”
Justification does not disappear once one receives its grace. If it did, we would be in crisis. And likewise, justification’s requirements (that God actually justify a human being that lives a real life) needs to come to pass. The Christian needs to be rewarded eternity according to how God worked in him (Revelation 22:12). Justification never gives up. It is the lasting eschatological power that works within us. Dr. John Piper says this:
“[T]he same faith through which sanctifying power comes to the justified sinner. There are three assumptions here. The first assumption is that justifying faith is persevering faith. As Jonathan Edwards explained with careful and nuanced language, “Perseverance in faith is, in one sense, the condition of justification; that is, the promise of acceptance is made only to a preserving sort of faith, and the proper evidence of it being that sort is its actual perseverance Thus it is proper to speak of the moral effectiveness of justifying faith not merely because it brings us into a right standing with God at the first moment of its existence, but also because it is a persevering sort of faith, whose effectiveness resides also in its daily embrace of all that God is for us in Jesus….A second assumption is that justifying faith is not only a trusting in the past grace of God, but also a trusting in the future grace of God, secured by the past grace of Christ’s death and resurrection…”(Future Grace p. 27)
Dr. Alister McGrath brings Paul’s teaching into the eschatological picture by explaining how Paul’s language is grounded in the Old Testament and that the very word dikaioun (justification) is expressed by Paul not as a noun but as a verb. On page 23 of Iustitia Dei he mentions how Paul uses the word justification with a future and a past reference (Romans 2:13; 8:33; Galatians 5:4-5), and says, “Justification language appears in Paul with reference to both the inauguration of the life of faith, and also is final consummation. It is a complex and all-embracing notion, which anticipates the verdict of the final judgment (Romans 8:30-4), declaring in advance the verdict of ultimate acquittal. The believer’s present justified Christian existence is thus an anticipation of and advance participation in deliverance from the wrath to come, and an assurance in the present of the final eschatological verdict of acquittal (Romans 5: 9-10).” (Section 1.2 of Iustitia Dei)
The judicial acts of God are not over once one is “declared righteous.” Revelation 22:12 Christ says that we will finally be judged by our works. But weren’t we judged when grace was imputed to us? Yes, but we are talking about taking what is outside of time – in this case, God’s declaration – and bringing it into time, thus appearing to us as a process. In God’s economy it is already done, and we are predestined, but in our economy it is the ‘not yet’ done and thus pans out in time. This way God receives glory for every little thing he does on earth, in all time.
When one converts, one enters the reality of the eschaton. You can call this entrance justification,and you can call the eschatological working of this grace sanctification, but the reality is that it is all the same power: God’s grace! Also, as we mentioned earlier, judgment is not finished until after our last day. We still have a very serious judgment to look forward to where God judges us according to our works and separates the sheep from the goats.
Borrowed Righteousness
This all presupposes that we are not completely righteous until the last day, right? Yes and No! We can see in Romans that we are indeed righteous through Christ, but our righteousness is a borrowed righteousness. After we pass the eschaton we become glorified and receive our sinless bodies, becoming, as Calvin puts it, “like Angels.”
Romans 3;24-26 says this:
“being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a propitiation by His blood, through faith, to demonstrate His righteousness, because in His forbearance God had passed over the sins that were previously committed, to demonstrate at the present time His righteousness, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”
This righteousness is Christ’s righteousness that enabled/proved him to be the spotless lamb to cover our sins. It is not ours, and so in this borrowing we begin to emulate his righteousness to the point of being glorified (Romans 8:30). Not that we merit glorification but that Christ does since he is the justifier of the one whom is receiving (has faith in Jesus). As Augustine puts it, “when God crowns our merits, he crowns nothing but his own gifts.” This means that grace is both imparted and infused. It is imparted since God had to be the propitiation as well as “become sin” for us (1 Cor. 5:21). He historically passed over our future sins (Romans 3:25; 1 Cor. 5:7). But that is the sticking point: from the standpoint in time of the atonement, our sins are future. They have to be covered eschatologically. The power was given to us at the cross but is distributed throughout our lives (justification-sanctification-glorification).
Our Works In Christ Are Meritorious!
But our works outside of Christ are filthy rags, right? Right, but there is a real and definite heart change in Christ’s elect, and this heart change, at times, produces the working of the Holy Spirit (I should not have to proof-text that one). Either it is the work of the Holy Spirit or it is not. There is no in middle ground.
Dr. Piper attempts to clear this confusion of whether or not there are actually good works in our lives:
“It is terribly confusing when people say that the only righteousness that has any value is the imputed righteousness of Christ. I agree that justification is not grounded on any of our righteousness, but only the righteousness of of Christ imputed to us. But sometimes people are careless and speak despairingly of all human righteousness, as if there were no such thing that pleased God. They often cite Isaiah 64:6 which says our righteousness is as filthy rags…But that does not mean that God does not produce in those “justified” people (before and after the cross) an experiential righteousness that is not “filthy rags”…(p. 151) [the term "filthy rags" is tantamount to worthlessness in many circles today. This denies sanctification all together]“
We have seen how Augustine declares our works to be the meritorious works of Christ, but let us look at a snapshot of his entire view of Justification, as laid out by McGrath in his book Iustitia Dei:
“Augustine’s discussion of iustitia, effected only through the justification of humanity, demonstrates how the doctrine of justification encompasses the whole of Christian existence from the first moment of faith, through the increase in righteousness before God and humans, to the final perfection of that righteousness in the eschatological city. Justification is about ‘being made just’…By ‘justification’, Augustine comes very close to understanding the restoration of the entire universe to its original order, established at creation, an understanding not very different from the Greek doctrine of cosmic redemption. The ultimate object of humanity’s justification is its ‘cleaving to God’, a ‘cleaving’ which awaits its consummation and perfection in the new Jerusalem, which is even now being established.”
It’s All The Same Grace
We can borrow Pauls’ language all we want and place it in theological dictionaries. We can break things down into so much detail in order for us to feel confident in Christ. But the bottom line is that it is all the work of one grace by God. Let’s look at some concise quotes from Dr. Piper on this:
“One of the most important implications of this conclusion is that the faith that justifies and the faith the sanctifies are not two different kinds of faith. “Sanctify” simply means to make holy, or to transform into Christlikeness…For faith is the act of the soul that connects with grace, and it receives it, and channels it as the power of obedience, and guards it from being nullified through human boasting…”(Future Grace p. 193)“The simple reason why the faith that justifies is also the faith which sanctifies is that both justification and sanctification are the work of sovereign grace. They are not the same kind of work but they are noth works of grace…”(Future Grace p. 194) “My claim is that justifying faith and sanctifying faith are one, and that the heart of this faith is future oriented, promise-trusting confidence in God…”(Future Grace p. 202)
There is not one god that justifies and another god that sanctifies. It is the same God with the same power that does both; but sanctifying grace is the eschatological aspect of this power, where as justifying grace is the declarative and initiating power. Justifying grace is that power which first pulls the victim from the wreckage. Sanctifying grace is when that same power begins to stop the bleeding from the victim and nourishes them into the hospital (Church).
Let us not overreact to Rome, and separate the gospel into fragments that in no way make sense when they are attempted to be put together. The Reformers did indeed distinguish doctrines for us, since Rome had mixed them all together in the ecclesiastical blender, but they never meant for these doctrines to be loaners, and fragment the gospel and the Church itself!