V. Another doctrine militated against by this Dialogue-writer
V. Another doctrine militated against by this Dialogue-writer
Is, that of the insufficiency of man’s righteousness to justify him before God, and the imputation of the righteousness of Christ for that purpose. And,
1. He allows, [5501] that the false deceitful outride and ceremonial righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, of Jewish and Christian hypocrites—may well enough be compared to filthy rags; but not the righteousness of the saints. But pray, who were the persons that acknowledged their righteousness to be as filthy rags in Isaiah 64:6, the only place of scripture where this phrase is used? Were these scribes or Pharisees, Jewish or Christian hypocrites, who made such an ingenuous and hearty confession of the pollution both of their nature and actions? No, they were the church of God, a set of godly persons in Isaiah’s time, whose minds were impressed with a sense of the awfulness of the divine Majesty, and of their own vileness and unworthiness; they were men truly humbled before God, in a view of the impurity of their nature, the imperfection of their services, and their coldness and backwardness to things divine and spiritual; as the context manifestly shows. Can it be thought that such words as these should be spoken by hypocrites, we are all as an unclean thing? How strong and full is the following expression? And all our righteousness are as filthy rags: not only some part of our obedience, but all our performances, even the best of them, everything done by us, that can come under the name of righteousness, are so, being attended with so much sin and imperfection. What righteousness was that which the apostle Paul renounced, Philippians 3:9, and desired not to be found in? Says [5502] this man, his Jewish righteousness, or conformity to the ceremonial law; but this he had renounced before, in 7, and then adds, verse 8. Yea, doubtless, I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord. Now, by all things, he must mean something else, over and above, and besides what he had before renounced, and which at least, in part, he explains of his own righteousness, which is of the law, his moral righteousness; yea, all the obedience he had been enabled, by the grace of God, to perform, since his conversion; for to understand it of his ceremonial righteousness, is to make him guilty of a very great tautology.
2. The imputed righteousness of Christ, this author says, [5503] is a phrase no where to be found in God’s book, nor is it easy to be understood; wherefore he calls it unscriptural and unintelligible doctrine. Imputed righteousness is a phrase neither unscriptural nor unintelligible, nor is the imputed righteousness of Christ so. David describes the blessedness of the man to whom God imputeth righteousness without works. (Romans 4:6) Now what righteousness is that which is imputed without works? not a man’s own righteousness, that cannot possibly be imputed without works; it must be the righteousness of Christ, which is imputed without the works of men being joined unto it to make it perfect. Again: Abraham believed God, and it was imputed to him for righteousness. (Romans 4:3) Not Abraham’s own faith, or faithful obedience, as says [5504] this man; but the object of his faith, the righteousness of the Messiah, in whom he believed; for that which was imputed to Abraham, was not imputed to him only, but to others, even to believers under the gospel dispensation. Now it was not written, says the apostle, for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; but for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead. (Romans 4:23, 24) So Christ is made unto us righteousness, (1 Corinthians 1:30) by the imputation of it, not to himself, but to us; nor is the meaning, as this author [5505] would have it, that the doctrine, example, life and death of Christ, are the means of making men righteous; but he himself is made unto them righteousness, and they are made the righteousness of God in him, through the imputation of his righteousness to them, as he is made sin for them, through the imputation of their sins to him. (2 Corinthians 5:21) Add to all this, that in the same way that we are made sinners by the disobedience of one, which is by the imputation of his disobedience to us, are we made righteous by the obedience of one, of Christ, namely, by the imputation of his obedience or righteousness to us. (Romans 5:19)
3. This writer suggests, [5506] that the “doctrine of Justification, by the imputed righteousness of Christ, is a poisonous doctrine; and asserts it to be an encouragement to bad men and loose women to go on in sin, and a discouragement to good men to perform duty.” To which I need only say, with the apostle, (Romans 3:31) Do we make void the law through faith? that is, by the doctrine of justification by faith in the righteousness of Christ, which is the doctrine he was speaking of? God forbid! yea, we establish the law. Nothing can lay men and women under a greater obligation to live soberly, righteously and godly, or has a greater tendency to make them careful to maintain good works, than this doctrine of grace, or the consideration of this, that being justified by grace, they are made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. (Titus 2:11, 1 2 and 3:7, 8) In this, as in other doctrines, our author shows himself to be no true Churchman; and, for the future, ought to drop that character. The doctrine of Justification is thus expressed in the eleventh Article of the Church of England: “We are accounted righteous before God only for the merit of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ by faith, and not for our own works or deservings; wherefore, that we are justified by faith only, is a most wholesom doctrine, and very full of comfort; as more largely is expressed in the Homily of Justification.” Nor did the compilers of this Article reckon this doctrine a licentious one, or a discouragement to good works, as appears by the Article concerning them, which follows upon this.