Justification - Marquart, Section 2 - The Object of Faith

2. The Standard Lutheran Pattern in Presenting Justification

Marquart says:

The best starting point is Formula of Concord (Solid Declaration) III:25:


The only essential and necessary elements of justification are the grace of God, the merit of Christ, and faith which accepts these in the promise of the Gospel (Tappert, p. 543, compare Apology IV:53, p. 114).

We may put these essential ingredients of justification into a list, as follows:


1. The grace of God
2. The merit of Christ
3. The promise of the Gospel
4. Faith

The first three items constitute what was later called “objective justification.” The addition of faith completes the list, which thus defines justification in the full, normal biblical and ecclesiastical sense and usage. This ordinary sense of the word is labeled “subjective” (individual, personal) only in contexts requiring a distinction from the special usage of “objective” (general, universal) justification.

This is the very heart of the discussion, and the point must not be missed: The above four parts make up justification in the ordinary, normal biblical and ecclesiastical usage of the word. The motivating factor (God’s grace), the basis for declaring a guilty sinner innocent (the merit of Christ), the instrument for applying the merit of Christ to the sinner (the promise), and the manner in which the promise is received (faith). When we normally speak of justification, all of the above are included.

Let’s stop for a moment and consider this. When orthodox Lutheran theologians speak correctly of the justification of any sinner in the world, faith is always an essential element. The grace of God, the merit of Christ, the promise of the Gospel, and Spirit-worked faith in that Gospel promise – these are all essential elements of justification. As KM states, this is how the Scriptures normally speak about justification. This is how the Church has normally spoken about justification. This is how we should normally speak about justification, too, in my opinion.

But even the “special usage” of the term justification (components #1, #2 and #3, aka “objective justification”) is not meant to exclude faith from the equation! It simply seeks to define the object of faith.

What is the object of faith? As always, it is the promise of God. Faith, in biblical usage, is 1) knowledge of, 2) assent to, and 3) confidence in a promise of God, with the emphasis on confidence (i.e., trust / reliance).

On what does saving faith rely? What is the promise of the Gospel? What does God promise to man? What is our faith in? What are we to believe?

Here’s how the Apology puts it:

Forgiveness of sins is something promised for Christ’s sake. It cannot be received except through faith alone. For a promise cannot be received except by faith alone. Romans 4:16 says, “That is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed.” It is as though he says, “If the matter were to depend on our merits, the promise would be uncertain and useless. For we never could determine when we would have enough merit.” Experienced consciences can easily understand this. So Paul says in Galatians 3:22, “But the Scripture imprisoned everything under sin, so that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.” He takes merit away from us because he says that all are guilty and included under sin. Then he adds that the promise (namely, forgiveness of sins and justification) is given, and he shows how the promise can be received—by faith. (Apology:IV:84).

But we gain the victory through Christ. How? Through faith, when we comfort ourselves by confidence in the mercy promised for Christ’s sake. (Apology:IV:79)

Permit some quotes from Martin Chemnitz in his outstanding Examination of the Council of Trent. What are we to believe?

But the righteousness of faith is to believe that Christ the Mediator has satisfied the Law for us for righteousness to everyone who believes (Rom. 10:4). (Examination:I:528)

It is the righteousness of faith when a man by faith apprehends and has Christ, who through His most perfect obedience to the Law has made satisfaction for us, in order that He might be our Righteousness (Jer. 23:6). (Examination:I:528-529)

But this teaching is of the weightiest import, that Paul says: “Christ died for our sins and was raised for our justification.” For that Christ might be our justification, it was necessary that He should not only bear the punishment of our sins, but that He should also fulfill the Law with so perfect an obedience that it might suffice for the righteousness of the whole world. And this whole action of the Mediator turns on this, whether the Father would accept that satisfaction and obedience of the Son for the whole world. But this the Father showed especially in this, that He did not leave in death, the Son, whom He had smitten for the sins of the people, but raised Him from the dead and set Him at the right hand of His majesty. And this is what Paul says, 1 Cor. 15:17: “If Christ has not been raised … you are still in your sins,” that is, if death had overcome Christ and the Father had not accepted His satisfaction for us but had left Him in death, then we would not have remission of sins for Christ’s sake.

When, therefore, Paul wanted to explain, Rom. 4:24–25, what that righteousness is which is imputed to the believers without their own works, or what faith must apprehend that it may be imputed for righteousness, he says: To those who believe in Him who raised Jesus from the dead, who was delivered to death for our transgressions and was raised again for our justification. For that is our righteousness: (1) that the Son of God became a Mediator for us, being obedient to the Father to death; (2) that the Father accepted that satisfaction and obedience of the Son for our reconciliation and propitiation, which He showed by His resurrection. For this reason Paul, in the imputation of righteousness, connects the death and the resurrection of Christ. (Examination:I:529-530)

What, then, is the promise of the Gospel? Not that all people have already been forgiven, but that Christ has already earned for all people the forgiveness of sins and truly offers it to you here and now. Not that all people have already been justified, but that Christ has already acquired for all people a righteous status before God and truly offers it to you here and now.

What, then, is the object of faith? Christ! Christ as the sinner’s Representative (or Substitute). Christ as the sinner’s Mediator. Christ as the one who died the sinner’s death and fulfilled man’s righteousness and whose substitutionary work was accepted by his Father when He raised His Son from the dead. The entire work of Christ including the justification of Christ as the sinner’s Representative (1 Timothy 3:16) is the declaration of righteousness (objective justification) that is applied to individual sinners through faith (subjective justification). It has been acquired for the world by Christ, and is held out to the world in the promise of the Gospel, to be received by faith.

Scripture and the Confessions use the following terms synonymously, although each has its own unique picture: forgiveness of sins, salvation, justification, regeneration. So to sum it up, God’s promise and the basis for God’s promise (proclaimed through his ambassadors) is this:

“I will forgive your trespasses and remember your sins no more (forgiveness). I will declare you righteous (justification). I will consider you to be a saint (sanctification). I will turn you from a dead person to a living person (quickening). I will give you new birth (regeneration). I will save you from sin, death and the devil (salvation). I will receive you as My own dear child (adoption). I will be a gracious Father to you. I will not do any of this because you deserve it, but because I am a gracious God, and I have given My own Son to make satisfaction for your sins, to be your Righteousness before Me, and to be your Mediator. In Him – the world’s Representative – I have already procured for fallen man the forgiveness of sins, sanctification, regeneration, salvation, adoption and justification. Do not attempt to work for these things. Here is my Son! Trust in him, and you have all the things I have promised!”

The only justification that exists apart from faith in Christ is the vicarious (representative/substitutionary) justification of Jesus Christ, the Mediator. His justification, as Mankind’s Representative (“universal”), is real (“objective”), whether or not anyone ever believes it. A guilty sinner is only declared righteous by God when he hears the Gospel and believes in his God-appointed Representative.

Therefore, we are not to believe that anyone has already received forgiveness of sins apart from faith in Christ. We are not to believe that anyone has already been given an innocent verdict in God’s courtroom (i.e., has been justified) apart from faith in Christ. We are not to believe that anyone has already been saved apart from faith in Christ. We are not to believe that anyone has already been regenerated apart from faith in Christ. All of these spiritual blessings are wrapped up in Christ, and are offered to no one apart from Christ (Eph. 1:3).

We are to believe that forgiveness, justification, salvation and regeneration are ready gifts that God has already obtained for us (and for all people) in Christ and that God holds out to us in the promise of the Gospel. This is the correct teaching of “Universal/Objective Justification.”

Now, if the question is, “Do the words ‘universal,’ ‘objective,’ or ‘general’ clearly convey that teaching?”, I would have to agree that they do not. If the question is, “Does the WELS promote Universalism?”, I can most certainly say it does not. If the question is, “Is the correct understanding of Universal/Objective Justification consistently and clearly promoted and taught in the WELS?”, I would have to conclude that it is not.

The “ordinary usage” of the term justification (the grace of God + the merit of Christ + the promise of the Gospel + faith) should remain the “ordinary usage.” When we seek to define the object of our faith (as “objective justification” is intended to do), let us do so according to the language of Scripture and the pattern of sound words so beautifully and clearly expressed in our Confessions.

As stated before, in a word, the object of faith is: Christ! And Christ is enough.