difficult to hold men to this doctrine of justification by faith alone
apart from works of law. We are constantly seeking to bring in our
works somewhere.
5. But we have not as yet completely answered the question of how men
are justified. There is another side to the truth and if our doctrine
of justification is to be complete and well-balanced, we must look at
that other side. You will find part of this other side in Rom. 10:8,
10, +"If thou shalt confess with thy mouth Jesus as Lord, and shalt
believe in thy heart that God raised him from the dead, thou shalt be
saved; for with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with
the mouth confession is made unto salvation."+ God here tells us
that the faith that appropriates justification is a faith with the
heart, i.e., a faith that is not a mere notion, or opinion, but a faith
that leads to action along the line of that faith, and it is therefore
a faith that leads to open confession with the mouth, of Jesus as our
Lord. If some one has some kind of faith, or what he calls faith, that
does not lead him to an open confession of Christ, he has a faith that
does not justify; for it is not a faith with the heart. Our Lord Jesus
Christ Himself tells us that heart faith leads to open confession; for
He says in Matt. 12:34, +"Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth
speaketh."+ Faith in Jesus Christ in the heart leads inevitably
to a confession of Jesus as Lord with the mouth, and if you are not
confessing Jesus as your Lord with your mouth you have not justifying
faith and you are not justified.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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