Sermon Tone Analysis

“To Fulfill All Righteousness”

The Saving Merit of Christ’s Obedience

 

! I. Introduction

!! A. What Must I Do To Be Saved?

To make things as simple as possible in introducing the topic of this paper we will ask a question not altogether unlike that posed by the Philippian jailor who asked Paul, “What must I do to be saved.”

“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved,” was the apostle’s straightforward answer to this simple question.

Why?

Because faith in Christ--which is really a believing /“into”/ Christ, a closing with, so as to make up a union with him--results in the reception of all things necessary unto salvation.

Christ himself is made by God to be unto us “wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption,” and we “are complete in him” (1 Cor.

1:30, Col. 2:10).

We need have no doubt concerning this in the light of the massive case made for it in the book of Romans.

The glory of the gospel is that it demonstrates how God has been just in the justification of those who “have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”

The sinner is “justified,” i.e., accounted as righteous, judicially /declared/ to be righteous, so that he is subsequently /treated/ as righteous in the presence of the just and perfect judge of all men, whose law stops every mouth (Rom.

3).

This justification is a decree freely made apart from the law, i.e., to one who does not work and who is not foreseen to be working, indeed, to one who is, as a matter of fact, “ungodly” (Rom.

4), yet it does not nullify the law but establishes it (Rom.

3:31).

Moreover, this decree of justification is perfect and final, there being nothing admitted between it and the state of being at peace with God, in which the believer rejoices in a sure and certain hope of the glory of God (Rom.

5:1-11).

The reason for this is that he has been united with Christ, so that what /has/ been true of Christ, in respect to Christ’s relation to the law, as being once under it and subsequently free of it, has happened to the believer, rendering him also dead to the power of sin (Rom.

5:11-7:6).

As a result of this union with Christ, the sinner has also become the recipient of the Holy Spirit, who dwells in him as a seal, not only guaranteeing the future possession of this glory, but operating unfailingly to bring at last to as state of entire spiritual and physical sanctification and glorification, perfectly conformed to the image of Christ, the firstborn of many brethren (Rom.

7:6-8:39).

Nothing less than all this is meant by the phrase “thou shalt be saved.”

The question which we must now address if we are to make sense of this doctrine that God is “just and the justifier” of them that believe on Christ, is not “what must /I/ do to be saved,” but “what must /Christ/ do in order for me to be saved?”

What is it that Christ has done in order that God may be just.

What is “the redemption that is in Christ Jesus” which enables God to “justify by His grace as a gift”?

!! B. What Must The Lord Jesus Christ Do?

All true Evangelicals would no doubt answer, “he must die on the cross.

We are saved by his atoning death, when he died in our place bearing the wrath of God which was due to us for our sin.”

This is, indeed, the testimony of many texts of Scripture: “whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood.”

“We have now been justified by his blood.”

To this, the redeemed from all nations will eternally proclaim “Amen!

To him who loves us and has freed us from our sins by his blood and made us a kingdom, priests to his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever.”[1]

Nevertheless, the question remains, does the Lamb’s “worthiness” to take the scroll, and does the Savior’s ability to justify and sanctify and keep his saints arise only from his being a victim in their stead, or even from the fact that this victim is the eternal Son incarnate, or is something more necessary?

Are they saved by his “blood,” i.e., his “death,” considered in and of itself, as a single act, or is it more accurate to understand that what makes this death “saving” is that it is the ultimate and task-completing work of one who has been the Servant of Jehovah all his life, fulfilling the terms of a covenant for their salvation.

If the latter, then it is reasonable to ask, “What is the relation of all the Servant’s service, to the Savior’s salvation?”

Is salvation the result of something done /to/ Christ, or is it also the result something done/ by/ Christ.

The life Christ lived—does it simply /qualify/ him to be a worthy candidate for the death he died for me, or does that life of righteousness have a more direct application to my life?

Does it do something for /me/, as well as doing something for Christ?

These are the kinds of questions which are in view in the discussion of the role of Christ’s “active obedience” or “active righteousness” in our salvation.

!! C. Terms and Background

It would be helpful at this point to clarify some terms that have been employed to describe the obedience of Christ.

Questions like the ones just posed were debated even before the Protestant Reformation.

Mediaeval scholastics spoke of the obedience Christ performed in his life and ministry up to his passion on the cross as his “/active/ obedience.”

On the other hand, the obedience of Christ in his death, in suffering the pains of crucifixion to make satisfaction for our sin was called his “/passive/ obedience.”

Eventually, some theologians taught that Christ’s “active obedience” was for himself, to qualify himself for the work of making satisfaction for sin, but was not a part /of/ that satisfaction.

Without it, he would not be the spotless lamb.

He must be worthy of making the sacrifice in the end by living obediently before.

As Richard A. Muller points out, this view of Christ’s obedience and sufferings fits right in with the medieval view of sin and punishment that supported their doctrine of penance.

Sinners could be forgiven, but since they lacked the righteousness of an obedient person, i.e., since they still had not met their obligation to /do/ righteousness, they still deserved punishment.[2]

Christ’s life of righteousness, being for himself, could not be applied to them.

Hence, men satisfied for this punishment in this present life by penance, or, coming short here, the debt was satisfied in purgatory.[3]

Protestant theology argued that both the active and passive obedience of Christ were parts of his whole work as the Mediator, satisfying the obligations of sinners both to obey God and to suffer the penalty for disobedience.

Reformed theologians taught that it was in fact Christ’s obedience in its totality which is imputed to believers in their justification.

Consequently, there was no need or warrant for penance or purgatory.

On the other hand, Arminian and Socinian doctrine disagreed with this.

17th century Arminianism simply equated justification with pardon, denying any /real/ imputation of Christ’s active righteousness, asserting that the idea leads to antinomianism.

Socinianism denied the imputation of /any/ alien righteousness.[4]

! II.

The Obedience of Christ

At this point, we ask, what do we mean by the obedience of Christ?

In what respect can we speak of God the Eternal Son as being obedient--to what, for what purpose, and in what way? 

!! A. Origin

Having already established the scriptural doctrine of the Trinity, with its assertion of ontological equality among the three persons of the godhead, it seems reasonable, nevertheless, to believe that the Son’s obedience as demonstrated in the economy of salvation, has its origin in that ultimate eternal status of his as the Son of the Father.

That is to say, it is not a work arbitrarily assigned to the Son instead of the Father, but because the person of the Son is “of the Father,” it is the Father who “sends” and the Son who “is sent” etc., in the pre-temporal inter-Trinitarian compact known as the “Covenant of Redemption.”

It is here, in the eternal love and delight of the Son for the Father, and of the Father for the Son, with the Father’s desire that in all things the Son might have the pre-eminence, and the Son’s desire that the Father might be glorified in all things, in the love and delight of the Triune God in the yet-to-be-created “sons of men”  and in the utter impossibility that God’s image should be permitted to exist ingloriously, that the Father appointed, and the Son accepted, the role of Savior.

What does this mean?

The Son took upon himself the task of restoring the moral uprightness of a creation that would be turned upside down by the defection of God’s image.

Adam would disobey.

By his disobedience he, the representative man, would assert that the Creator’s authority and right were not ultimate for the creature, that there was a good greater than God, and a wisdom to be had independently of God, and that there was an object other than God more worthy of his love, namely himself.

This is the essence of sin, the very meaning of evil--a creature’s attempt at independence from the God he is by creation bound to love with all his heart, his soul, his mind, and his strength.

Surely, the threatened sentence of death must be carried out, punishment must be inflicted or the serpent is vindicated, the greatest vice is no different in its effect than virtue, and the true God is found to be false.

Even if the sentence is carried out, there remains a question, how could, or why would, the “only wise God” have made man so wonderful, and entrusted this creature with his glory if the only glory to be gained from him was the glorification of the divine justice of casting him into hell.

No, if God is to receive from man the glory which is due from man, more than a penalty must be paid.

The “principal” must be paid also: man must demonstrate, through obedience, that God is known by him and regarded as worthy of ultimate love, trust, and honor.

All men, as creatures, owe this to God, but no man has, as the psalmist says, given to Him “the glory due to his name.”

Unable, having sinned in his representative, and unwilling, his heart and mind corrupt in his conception, man goes astray even from the womb.

This is the reason why there must be a /new/ man.

He must be of Adam’s race because he must be true man to represent men, but not partaking of Adam’s guilt, not corrupted by Adam’s stain.

There is one further qualification for this representative man: he must be someone who is not by nature under the same obligation as other creatures.

That is, if he is to pay the debt of obedience which men and angels owe, he must not be already naturally obligated to pay that debt for himself.

This can be none other than the creator.

The creator must assume the obligations of the creature.

He who is in the form of the worshipped and honored God “over all, blessed forever” must assume the form of a worshipping and God-honoring servant, in the likeness of sinful flesh, under the obligations of the Law, in a world under a curse.

Even though not “formally” considered a part of the obedience, nevertheless the foundation of the obedience of the Mediator is laid here in the Covenant of Redemption.[5]

The Son accepted, from his Father, the “suretyship,” or responsibility.

For these people he would act as Captain and Shepherd, Father and Husband untold ages before a body would be prepared for him and he would say, “Behold, I have come to do your will, O God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book” (Heb 10:5-7).

!! B. The Servant of the LORD

One of the most important themes in the understanding of the person and work of Christ is his role as the “Servant of the LORD.”[6]

He was not only God the eternal Son, but, /incarnate,/ he was God’s servant as man, and God the Father was “his God.”

As such he was born the paradigmatic, representative man, the second man, the last Adam, and the true Israel, who is identified with his people in birth, in name, in circumcision, in his infant exile in Egypt and in his baptism in the Jordan.

So, the Son is the Servant, living his entire life (as recorded in the gospels) in self-conscious dependence and delight in obedience to the will of his God.

“I delight to do thy will, O my God: yea, thy law is within my heart” (Ps.

40:8).

This obedience to God’s revealed will was, inward, deliberate, universal, life-controlling, and progressive.

This inward delight in the Law of God is an essential quality of obedience.

As John Murray correctly observes, 

 “To be an act of obedience, the whole dispositional complex of motive, direction, and purpose must be in conformity to the divine will.

It was not otherwise in the case of our Lord.

It was in human nature that Christ rendered the obedience required by his commission and office, and so the psychology of human action was applicable to him in all the intensity of the demands arising from his unique and incomparable undertaking as the Lord’s Servant”[7]

We see it first in his simple, matter-of-fact response to his anxious mother: literally, “Didn’t you know that I must be about my Father’s things,”[8]  Here was his, as it is meant to be every man’s, every child’s, “element”—the things of God.

Whether in the temple, or in going down and being subject to his parents he was obedient, and continued so, growing in wisdom, and stature, and in the favor of God and men (Lk.

2:40).

He grew in favor with God.

How can this be?

It can only be in the Father’s pleasure in him as he obediently passes through the progression of increasingly difficult and complex temptations of human life.