Scripture: "Justified freely by His grace through Ike redemption that is in Christ Jesus."—ROM. iii. 24.
The first three Evangelists spoke of redemption as a pardon of sin, or Justification, John spoke of it as a Life which Christ is to live in us, or Regeneration. In Paul we find both truths in their beautiful connection and harmony.
So in Romans he first speaks of Justification, Rom. iii. 21-v. 11, Then he goes on from v. 12 to viii. 39 to speak of the Life that there is in union with Christ. In Rom. iv. he tells us that we find both these things in Abraham. First, vers. 3-5, "Abraham believed God, Him that justifieth the ungodly; his faith is reckoned for righteousness." Then, ver. 17, "Abraham believed God, Who quickeneth the dead." Just as God first of all counted to Abraham his faith as righteousness, and then led him on to believe in Him as the God Who can give life to the dead, even so with the believer.
Justification comes at the commencement full and complete, as the eye of faith is fixed upon Christ. But that is only the be¬ginning. Gradually the believer begins to understand that he was at the same time born again, that he has Christ in him, and that his calling now is to abide in Christ, and let Christ abide and live and work in him.
Most Christians strive by holding fast their faith in justifica¬tion to stir and strengthen themselves for a life of gratitude and obedience. But they fail sadly because they do not know, do not in full faith yield themselves to Christ, to maintain His life in them. They have learned from Abraham the first lesson, to believe in God Who justifies (he ungodly. But they have not gone on to the second great lesson, to believe in God Who quickeneth the dead, and daily renews that life through Christ, Who lives in them, and in Whose life alone there is strength and fulness of blessing. The Christian life must be "from faith to faith." The grace of pardon is but the beginning; growing in grace leads on to the fuller insight and experience of what it is to be in Christ, to live in Him, and to grow up in Him in all things as the Head.
