March 9

But thanks be to God that, though you once were slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were committed. — Rom 6:17 BSB

What a reason we have to bless God that He so instructed His Apostle to reveal how a sinner is justified! How could we have come to know this mystery without divine revelation? How would we understand how God could be both just and the justifier of the ungodly? How could we see all the perfections of God harmonizing in the Person and work of Jesus—His law maintained in all its strict purity and justice, while mercy, grace, and love flow freely in the salvation of sinners? But the Spirit of God led Paul deeply into this blessed truth. Especially in the Epistle to the Romans, he traces this grand foundational doctrine with such clarity, weight, and power that the Church of God cannot be thankful enough for this revelation. His chief purpose is to show how God justifies the ungodly by the blood and obedience of His dear Son; so that, “as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.” He declares that “the righteousness of God is unto and upon all who believe,” and that “through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God set forth as a sacrifice of atonement through faith in His blood,” God pardons the sinner, justifies the ungodly, and sees them as righteous in His beloved Son.

In this teaching, Paul (in Romans 5) traces justification back to the union of the Church with her covenant Head. He shows us our standing in Christ, as well as in Adam, and explains that all the miseries we inherit from Adam are more than countered by the mercies that flow from our union with Christ. He concludes with the heart-reviving truth that “where sin abounded, grace abounded much more,” and that “as sin reigned in death, even so grace might reign through righteousness to eternal life.”

This is the “form of doctrine” into which the soul is delivered when it comes to a heartfelt reception of this truth. As the soul is led into the experiential enjoyment of this reality, it embraces it with a deep trust and filial submission, recognizing it as all its salvation and desire. Just as a mold leaves its image on the soft clay or molten metal poured into it, so the heart, softened and melted by the Spirit’s teaching, receives the impress of this glorious truth with confidence, feels its sweetness and power, and marvels at it as the only way God can justify an ungodly soul. And He does so without sacrificing a single attribute of His holy character, but rather magnifying His purity and justice.