Probably the most central question that prompted the Protestant Reformation was a question of the true meaning of justification. Justification. What is justification? What does it mean to be justified before God? And what does it require to be justified before God? That'll be our topic for this morning. And it's a topic that has been hotly debated for millennia. What is justification? But before we think about justification, let's place this doctrine of justification back into our bigger study of God's decrees. This is a doctrine that is central to the Bible and to redemption and to the gospel. And if God's will, if the foundational purpose in all of God's decrees is to gather all things together in one, in Christ, and if justification truly is central to God's way of redeeming sinners, then we should be able to see how this concept of justification accomplishes that redemption, that gathering. So let's begin with the simplest things. God's desire is to spend eternity with his people. God wants to surround himself with people to love and provide for, and he wants these people of his to love him and enjoy him and enjoy their entire existence with him. He wants people to enjoy a perfect existence with him in heaven. That was God's purpose from the beginning. to love his people and to be loved by his people in the midst of his creation for his people. Think back to the garden and think about the most pure and sinless relationship between God and man. God called this place paradise. Adam had paradise in the Garden of Eden. He really did. He enjoyed God and God enjoyed him. There was beauty and holiness and peace. God and Adam walked together in the cool of the day. Who knows, but maybe they walked together in all times of the day. I want us to think about that a little bit. That's still what it means to glorify God and enjoy him forever. It really means walking with God like Adam did in the garden, knowing God and enjoying God intimately. The biggest difference between us and Adam is that we no longer walk by sight though, do we? No, we walk by faith. Adam walked by sight. He saw God and spoke to God face to face. He heard God speak with his ears. Adam's relationship with God was unhindered. And the reason for that is because that pure and perfect relationship in paradise between God and Adam hadn't yet been disrupted by sin. Think about that. God's will to gather a people to himself and live with them in peace and perfect communion, which he had in the garden, was severed and torn apart by sin. So sin becomes the tool of the devil to literally separate us from God. Sin has literally become the most destructive and unnatural thing to ever enter into God's creation. It destroyed everything that was good in the garden and everything that was good in creation. It destroyed paradise. And God wants to gather, Satan and sin want to separate. That's what we saw in the fall. It almost appears that God's will has been completely upended. And what makes it all worse is the fact that sin doesn't just set us backwards a step in our relationship with the Lord. Instead, that one sin of Adam's completely severed every man who would come after him from God. The relationship was not only destroyed, but any chance for a future relationship seems destroyed as well. This is the consequence of sin. This is the irreversible damage done by sin. So what can the human race do? After all, God requires a perfect righteousness and a perfect holiness just to commune with him, just to talk to him, to pray to him. So again, what can people do who have no righteousness and no holiness? How can they possibly restore a relationship that requires such perfection? Because God does require perfection if you want to spend eternal life with him. And that doesn't mean something achieved eventually after practice and discipline. It means a perfect righteousness that has never been disrupted or corrupted. Sinlessness for your entire life needs to be a perfect and perpetual sinlessness, and that means without a single error or misstep for our entire life. Seems that paradise can never be attained again, right? It begs the question, why on earth would God require such perfect holiness if his will is actually to gather all things? It almost appears that he has made his own will impossible, doesn't it? Why would he require mankind to be as perfect as he is? That's his requirement after all. Peter quotes the Lord for us in 1 Peter 1 and verse 16 tells us this. The Lord says, be holy as I am holy. That's God's perfect requirement for communion with him. So again, what do we do? We seem to be a people without hope, right? Paul writes to the Romans, all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. And so there is not one righteous person. No, not one, he says. It appears that heaven would be a place without men now, right? A place of angels only around the throne of God. And it would appear that God's decree to gather all things together in one in Christ has been thwarted. by the devil. So what do we do? Well, I hope it's clear that we can do nothing, at least in the sense of our doing. We need to look to the Scriptures and see what God will do. That's the key here, and that's the key of the Reformation. That's the lesson we learn from the law. We are not able to see God by our works. Adam's works have severed us from God and our own works have sealed us all from his sight. We cannot see God and he will not even look upon us. That's our natural condition. And what stands between us? Sin stands between us. And a lack of righteousness and a lack of holiness stands between us. We appear to be without hope. But immediately after the fall, what did we see? We saw the Lord speaking to Adam, didn't we? And throughout the Bible, we see him calling men and teaching men and promising salvation to men. And we see that throughout the entire biblical story. So obviously he still intends to gather his people into paradise. And so we see a reason for hope. And what this means is that he's going to make unholy people holy, and he's going to make unrighteous people righteous, and he's going to resolve the problem of sin. That is the definition, at least from this layman's terms, of justification. God is making unholy people holy and unrighteous people righteous, and he will resolve the problem of sin. That's justification. A righteousness and a holiness that comes from God, not by works, but through faith to restore mankind to paradise. Listen to Habakkuk 2 in verse 4, a central cry of the Reformation. Behold the proud His soul is not upright in him, but the just shall live by his faith. The just live by faith, meaning they receive their hope, their righteousness, their holiness, and the remedy for sin through faith in Christ. Mankind is going to be restored to paradise. That's justification. Question 36 is our question this morning. in Benjamin Keech's catechism. It asks the basic question, what is justification? I say this is a basic question, not because the answer is simple, by the way. This is a basic question because the reason for the question comes from maybe the most basic and simple need from all people who have been awakened to their own sinfulness. What must I do to be saved. What must I do? How can I be saved? I have been made aware of my need. I have been made aware of my unrighteousness and unholiness. And I've been made aware of God's perfect standard to spend life with him. Now, how do I remedy the awful and sinful condition that stands between me and the life I now desire? And the answer to this question, what does a person need? He needs justification. And so today I want to study this question and find the definition of justification. What is justification? What is it that makes unrighteous men righteous and unholy men holy? How does this become the remedy for our sin and the source of our much-needed righteousness before the Lord? The answer, according to our catechism, is justification is an act of God's free grace wherein he pardons all our sins and accepts us as righteous in his sight only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us and received by faith alone. You can find the summary of today's message in your bulletins. It says justification is one of the most central purposes of God in redeeming his elect. As an act of free grace, God pardons us of sin and he accepts us as righteous by giving us a righteousness which is found in Christ, a righteousness that we receive by faith alone. This is God's way of making unrighteous people righteous and unholy people holy. And this is the only way that people can hope to stand in the presence of God forever in paradise. What is justification? That's our question this morning. All right, with that introduction, let's go to the Lord once again before we begin. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we come before you once again, thankful even to hold the Word of God in our hands. Thankful that you have established a biblical story for us to delve into together. to read from and learn from, to find your will, to find your purpose for our lives. We ask you, dear Lord, to teach us today. We ask you to help us to understand this most deep and basic aspect of our faith, justification. We ask that you would guide us in our study and that we would come out of this with a deeper understanding of what it means stand before you with assurance of the work that has been completed in Christ for us so that we might stand forever in eternity before you as just. We just thank you Lord for this truth. We thank you for the teachings that have been passed down for thousands of years that have laid out this doctrine so perfectly for us. We ask that you would help us to understand today. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. All right, so what is justification? Keech begins by telling us that it is an act of God. God's requirement of perfection and our sinful condition It means that we can do nothing to help ourselves in our salvation. That's really important. Our sin has disqualified us from contributing to our salvation. That's how awful sin is, right? It not only separates us from God, but it also makes it impossible for us to repair that relationship. The damage done between us and God by sin is permanent and unrepairable. That's what sin has done. You can see that Satan probably thought he was pretty successful in the garden, right? On the surface, it appears that he actually accomplished his mission perfectly. He took the people that God was gathering and he made them so sinful that they could never be reconciled to God again. That's what Satan did in the garden. However, God was never discouraged by this. Because God's purpose was always to have a people, not with a righteousness of their own, but with a righteousness that was his. And so as part of God's decrees, we see sin and the fall become the very things that make this possible. In order for God to give righteousness, he must begin with unrighteous people. And so God will now be glorified by revealing his patience and his long-suffering and his mercy and his justice and his grace, all things that he never would have been able to reveal apart from the fall. In a real way, God has allowed his enemies to accomplish his will for him. Satan has laid the foundation of sin, which Christ would build redemption upon. The gathering of God would proceed from a place of separation. Redemption would proceed from a place of slavery. Salvation would proceed from a place of lostness. Healing would proceed from a place of sickness. Righteousness, therefore, would proceed from a place of unrighteousness. And so unrighteous and unholy people would receive righteousness and holiness not from themselves, but from God. He will gather all things in Christ. Listen to the first part of this sentence in Keech's Catechism. It says, justification is an act of God's free grace. How can it be anything else, right? We are disqualified from contributing. What does it mean to be disqualified? Think about sports. It means we aren't allowed to play the game because we broke a rule, right? And that's exactly what we as people have done. In order to participate with God in eternal life, we must remain perfect and unstained by sin. Obviously, we are disqualified, right? We have been more than stained by sin. If sin were water, we swim in it. If sin were black ink, we have literally bathed in it and we're stained by it. And so if God requires us to be perfect and unstained, we look more like coal miners coming out of the shaft at the end of a long sweaty day. We look like a mechanic at the end of the day covered in grease and oil from head to toe. We look like a guy who works on an oil rig covered in soot and oil. We don't look pure. All our works are like filthy rags. And so our sin, has done more than just stain us here or there. It has absolutely covered us in its filth. It has disqualified us. Imagine going to meet with a king, and that king rightly requires the servants in his presence to wear their best suits and their best dresses and to be as perfect as a person can look. That's how you honor a person who deserves your honor. You present yourself as best you can for them. You present yourself in the best way you can. And so imagine you go to that king in filthy rags, looking like you just crawled out of a coal mine. That's disrespectful to that king. That's not the honor that a king requires. And the king would kick you out of his presence immediately. He would never tolerate that kind of disrespect. The same is true of our God. All our best works are like filthy rags. And to be in God's presence requires perfection. It requires a cleanness and a purity that we cannot accomplish. But he offers that perfection. That's the most profound part of the gospel. It offers us everything we need. God gives us everything we need to spend eternity with him. And so we see that justification is the work of God. Romans 3 in verses 24 and 25 is our proof text this morning. Let's turn there together, please. I'd like to start in verse 20. What's the verse again? Verse 20, Romans 3. It says, therefore, by the deeds of the law, no flesh will be justified in his sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now the righteousness of God, apart from the law, is revealed, being witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. Now here's our proof text. 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. There's a lot being said right there, but this is justification by grace. It is an unmerited gift and an act of God's free grace. It is an act which passes over sin and provides the righteousness that God requires by giving it to those who come to him in faith. That's ultimately the gospel. He makes unrighteous people righteous and unholy people holy. God's will is to gather all things together in one in Christ. Sin has separated us from God because sin has made us permanently unrighteous and helplessly unholy. We cannot be righteous or holy again. We are permanently stained by sin's evil. We walk around in filthy rags. We have lost our innocence. We have participated in egregious sins. We have thought evil thoughts and done evil deeds. And so we can have no part in the Lord who is holy, holy, holy. That's our natural condition. We are disqualified from eternal life with God. That's why Paul says, therefore, by the deeds of the law, no flesh will be justified in his sight. For by the law is the knowledge of sin. The law reveals our sin. You can't be justified by the law. The law stares back at you like a mirror and reveals that you are totally unworthy of the presence of God because the person staring back at us is in that mirror is a person covered in filthy rags. That law says all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. It is true and apart from the gospel, this would be the entire summary of human history. All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. But now, Paul says, the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed. This is the gospel. No flesh will be justified by the law, but there is a righteousness of God apart from the law. We're given a righteousness that is not our own. That's amazing, right? This is the gospel. The filthy rags are exchanged for the righteous robes of Jesus Christ. Unstained, perfect, and pure, just as God requires. We wear the righteousness of Christ like a robe which covers our sin-stained rags. And so we can stand before God in prayer, And we can stand before God with our offerings, and we can stand before God with our repentance and with our good works. And not because any of these things we bring are perfect, but because we wear the robes of Jesus Christ. That's justification. Paul says God set forth Jesus as a propitiation by his blood. What is propitiation? It means God is appeased. or he's satisfied by Christ's blood. It means he is reconciled to his people by Christ's blood. God would gather those who were separated by sin. He would overcome everything that sin stood in the way of, and he would do it by the blood of Jesus Christ. He would gather together all things in one in Christ by Christ's blood. Why? Why would he do all of this? look upon his enemies with such kindness and grace, those who disrespected him in the worst ways. Why would he offer us everything that is needed to spend eternity in his blessed presence? Well, Paul tells us, doesn't he? He does all of this, verse 25, to demonstrate at the present time his righteousness, that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. Justification is the Lord's work. He is the source of justification. He is just, and he offers justification to us. Again, how does he accomplish this? By giving us the blood. It cleanses all sin and pays the debt we owe, and by giving us the holiness and the righteousness that we need. Everything God requires, he offers in the gospel. So our pardon, our justification, is an act of God's free grace. When we stand before God in the courtroom, those who trust in Christ and in His blood will be pardoned. That's our first point. Justification is an act of God's free grace in pardoning sinners. Justification means we are innocent in the sight of God. Our sins no longer stand between us and God. We are now holy and righteous. This is the work of God in justification. Next in our answer, we see that justification, or in justification, we are accepted as righteous in His sight. I touched on this a moment ago. When we put on the robes of Christ, we are accepted just as Christ is accepted. You see how miraculous this is? Just wearing his robes makes us acceptable and accepted as we were the ones who lived the perfect life ourselves. We don't deserve this, but this is God's purpose. He will gather a people who are not his people and he will call them the people of God. Justification is an act of God, bringing disqualified people back into his presence on the basis of grace, making them acceptable in his sight. It's really remarkable. And how does God bring acceptance to the individual? Now, if you have never laid hold of Christ for salvation, this next section is so important. How does God take the work of Jesus his blood and his righteousness and apply that to us. How does he make us, people who are disqualified by our sin, how does he make us acceptable when his standard is perfection? We understand that he places the robes of Jesus upon us, that he covers our sin and accepts us as holy and righteous. But how does he do that? How do we receive these things? You'll notice in your bulletins, that under our second point we have righteousness imputed and righteousness received by faith. This is how God makes us acceptable and these are really important theological points. Let's start with this word imputed. I touched on this a couple weeks ago, but let's think about it again. What does the word imputed mean? It basically means to attribute. In our case it means to credit one person with the work of another. Our only hope for eternal life is that the righteousness of Jesus Christ would be attributed or credited or imputed to us. We need the works of Christ put on our account. We need to wear his holy and righteous robes and we need to be covered in his holy and righteous robes. So God does just that. He imputes the righteousness of Jesus Christ to us. We receive that righteousness in justification. We are pardoned from our sin and we are counted as righteous. That's what it means that righteousness is imputed. It is placed upon us like a robe. The catechism once again says justification is an act of God's free grace wherein he pardons all our sins. and accepts us as righteous in his sight, only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us. Romans 4, in verses 7 and 8, quote David in Psalm 32, said, Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered. Blessed is the man to whom the Lord shall not impute sin. Lawless deeds are forgiven and sins are covered. That's imputed righteousness. We're covered in the blood of Christ and we are covered in the righteous robes of Christ. Listen to 2 Corinthians 5 verses 19 and 21. Paul writes, God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not imputing their trespasses to them, For he made him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that's our sin imputed to him, that we might become the righteousness of God in him, that's his righteousness imputed to us. This is double imputation. Our sin is placed upon Christ at the cross and his righteousness is placed upon us. We are reconciled to God through imputation. we are accepted because he is rejected. Our sin is upon him, his righteousness is upon us. That's double imputation. He takes the filthy rags and he gives us the righteous robes. And this imputation means that the righteousness being offered here is a perfect and unchanging righteousness. This is really important. I watched an Orthodox Christian speaking from the Middle East somewhere He was describing why he could have no assurance in his theology. He didn't seem bothered by it, but he was acknowledging it. He explained that in his understanding, he would basically be judged not solely by Christ's righteousness, but also by his repentance. He kept acknowledging that he must stand back up every time he fell down in sin. He needed to repent. So his repentance was a part of his justification. This is also the Catholic view. And this is called infused righteousness. This is the kind of righteousness that is given to us by God in Christ, but it's a righteousness that requires us to maintain it. It's a righteousness that needs to be kept pure, requires work to keep it. This is not the gospel. The righteousness we are given by God is so perfect that we cannot undo it. Imputed righteousness, the righteousness that we are given by God, is as stable and unmovable as Christ himself. If you are a Christian, when you sin, you don't stain Christ's righteousness. This is important to understand. It is still Christ's righteousness and it is completely separate from us. We don't just kind of receive it and then have it in our care to hold on to and watch over and protect. That's not what this means at all. Imputed righteousness means that the righteousness we're judged by is sitting right now at the right hand of God in heaven. It is safe and secure and untouchable by us and our sin or our enemies or principalities and powers. We cannot stain his righteousness because it isn't ours to stain. It's not infused into us or made a part of us. It remains totally separate from us and it is Christ himself. That's one of the most important things to understand and that's one of the most important things that was brought into the conversation in the Reformation. So when you sin as a Christian, you are not staining your God-given righteousness. You are revealing yourself as unworthy and unable to accomplish your own salvation, but that's it. And you're revealing that you're still a sinner in need of strength. And you're revealing that you are in need of prayer. And you're revealing that you're in need of repentance. And you're revealing that you need a church to surround yourself with, and be surrounded by, to help you walk through this life. And you're revealing that you need the righteousness of Christ. You need an imputed righteousness. That Orthodox Christian thought his righteousness, the righteousness that he received from God, could be lost. That's because he thinks it's put within him, it's infused within him. And it's something that can be stained and affected by his own life and his own sin. But that's not the case. Imputed righteousness is something preserved and protected by Christ alone. As long as He is perfect, our righteousness will be perfect. He's not giving it to us to preserve and protect. That's what He did with Adam, and that didn't end well. No, our righteousness is Christ Himself. If we have received His righteousness, then we are in fact righteous. That's justification. As long as Christ remains righteous, we are righteous. And Christ's righteousness is as stable as God himself, because he is God himself. Now how do we receive this imputed righteousness? The Catechism tells us it is received by faith alone. By faith alone. Righteousness is not by works, but by faith. It is not earned, it is given, and it is received by faith. What does this mean, received by faith? Turn with me please to Galatians 2. Galatians 2 in verse 16. Paul says, We know that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. Even we have believed in Christ Jesus, that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by the works of the law. For by the works of the law, no flesh shall be justified." Faith. Belief, it says, receives the benefits of Christ. Faith receives the gift of justification. We must believe in the works of Christ and the promises of Christ that his work is for us. We must trust in God that his word is good and that his purposes are accomplished in Christ. That's faith. That's belief. John Gill writes, the righteousness of Christ, received by faith, quiets all confidence in our own works. This is received when we come to Christ and believe in him, not only as the Messiah, but as the Lord, our righteousness. Think about this faith. Gil points out three things here. Faith believes God when God says there is no justification by works. Faith also believes God when God says justification is found in Christ alone. And faith believes God that these things are true and believes in the Messiah himself as Savior and Lord, the Lord who is our righteousness. These are the things that we believe. This is faith. It is a belief in Christ accompanied by a belief that we cannot save ourselves and a belief that the righteousness we need is found in Christ alone. imputed righteousness. Faith believes in imputed righteousness. That's why it's so hard for Catholics and Orthodox Christians to be saved. They don't understand righteousness. How can you receive comfort and peace and joy unless you understand that the righteousness you have, you've received from Christ, is eternal? Gill says, by faith we receive this blessing from the Lord in our own conscience and enjoy the comfort of it and all that spiritual peace which results from it and which we could not find in the works of the law. Why is the conscience blessed? By faith. Because the law no longer threatens it with guilt. Why does faith enjoy comfort and peace? Because our righteousness is secure in Christ and we understand that and we believe that. But let's be clear, faith doesn't justify us. Jesus justifies us. His blood and righteousness justifies us. Faith receives that gift and faith enjoys the comfort of it and the spiritual peace which results from it. Notice that difference. Christ in his blood and righteousness justifies. Faith enjoys it. Faith embraces it. Faith experiences the comfort of it and the peace of it. Faith receives justification. Philippians 3 in verse 9 says, I am found in him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith. This is again an imputed righteousness. It's a righteousness which is apart from us. and faith receives it with joy. That's what faith is. Let's think for a moment about what faith isn't. We don't go about life hoping our faith is enough. We don't go around hoping that we believe enough to justify us. That's not what this is teaching. Instead, John Gill helps when he writes, the righteousness of Christ is the sole matter of justification. And it comes to us through faith. apprehending, receiving, and embracing it. And it shows us that righteousness must be before faith, or it could not be through faith. What does he mean by that? This might seem like a technical thing, but I want to think about this before we close this morning. Faith doesn't save us. We aren't saved by enough faith. So many evangelical Christians suffer from a lack of assurance because we worry about our lack of faith, the weakness of our faith. That's not what this is teaching. We are saved by grace through faith. Grace is what saves us. The blood of Christ is what saves us. So what does faith do if faith doesn't actually do the saving? And how does this help us understand how we walk as Christians? Faith itself is not the means to salvation. We don't need a certain amount of faith to be saved. Faith is receiving what we hear and accepting it as true. Gill says faith apprehends, faith receives, and faith embraces the things that we have considered this morning. Faith apprehends, faith receives, and faith embraces justification by the blood and righteousness of Christ is what saves. Faith believes it. The righteousness of God is the objective truth of the matter. Jesus died for sinners and sinners are justified by grace. Faith is merely the open hand that receives that gift. And you can do that today. You don't have to wait until enough faith or your faith is strong enough or smart enough or heartfelt enough. You can receive the gift of God today. You can apprehend that gift today and embrace that gift today. That's what faith is. Faith apprehends. It lays hold of the truth that we are without hope and guilty before the law, without a righteousness of our own. And faith apprehends, it lays hold of the truth that Christ died to reconcile us to God by paying the debt we owe and putting His righteousness on our account. It apprehends, it lays hold of these things. Faith receives these truths as well. It accepts them. It welcomes them. It is the hand that reaches out to accept the gift of righteousness in Christ. That's what faith is. Faith embraces the gift of righteousness. Faith takes hold of Christ and his gift with both arms and embraces it. It believes these things and it cherishes these things and it holds on for dear life. That's faith. Faith is not the thing that justifies us. Faith is what receives the gift. It is Jesus and his blood and righteousness that saves us. Faith sees the restoration of paradise and longs for it. It thinks upon God as a loving Father and loves Him for it. It thinks upon the peace found in a righteous standing before God and is comforted and filled with joy, knowing that eternal life is a place of paradise, a place of love and comfort and of a conscience which is pure and at peace. So faith isn't the means by which God saves. God saves by grace. Faith is the means of enjoying it and receiving it. Sometimes I think we view faith as a work. If faith were a garden, faith is not the tilling of the garden and the weeding of the garden and the harvesting of the garden. Faith is the enjoying of the garden. It's the receiving of the fruits of the garden. It's the eating of the garden. God tills. and God weeds and God harvests, we receive and enjoy the fruits of his labor. That's faith. And that understanding of faith produces good works. But we are not saved by faith or by works. We are saved by grace through faith. Believe God, enjoy God, and know that the righteousness we need is offered in Christ. Receive it. The catechism says, Justification is an act of God's free grace wherein he pardons all our sins and accepts us as righteous in his sight only for the righteousness of Christ imputed to us and received by faith alone. May we all know this kind of justification and may we all have the peace that comes from believing it. There is only one true peace in this world And that is the peace that we can have with God through faith in Christ. Apprehend Christ, receive Christ, and embrace Christ, and enjoy the peace of Christ that surpasses all understanding. His righteousness cannot be lost or harmed. Lay hold of that kind of righteousness and that kind of Savior. And as Paul says, may the God of peace himself, sanctify you completely, and may your whole spirit, soul, and body be preserved blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. That's justification. Amen. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, we once again thank you for this rich doctrine. We thank you, Lord, for our catechism. We thank you for your Holy Spirit who teaches us. We thank you, Lord, for the Bible that we hold in our hands once again. We are blessed beyond our understanding. And one day in eternity, I think we'll see truly how blessed we are. So we thank you, Lord, for the gift of faith. We thank you for the gift of justification. And may that work in our hearts. May that work to promote assurance in our hearts. that we might serve you as volunteers in the day of your salvation. And we pray these things in Christ's name. Amen.