Tag Archives: John Piper

The NTW Project: A “Weightier” Justification

Stage 4. Post 3. Justification: God’s Plan & Paul’s Vision

The N.T. Wright Project = 4 books. 2 weeks. 1 bishop. 1 man.

Justification: Gods Plan & Pauls Vision

Justification: God's Plan & Paul's Vision (2006)

Wright spends the majority of the second half of the book on exegesis of Pauline epistles. Due to Wright’s experience in exegesis, it is much more appropriate for us to reflect on his conclusions from his observations rather than the exegesis itself. First, Justification is about the one single family of God. Wright states, “Justification…always has in mind God’s declaration of membership, and that this always referred specifically to the coming together of Jews and Gentiles in faithful membership of the Christian family” (p. 116). The biblical idea of justification is comforting to all humanity regardless of culture, race, or gender. In this sense, Galatians 3 is at the heart of justification. Christians across the whole world should declare that, through the work of Jesus, everyone is invited to be part of God’s people.

Second, justification is based on the life of the Christian. In the future, God will justify those who have shown by their actions that they are part of God’s people. This is slightly discomforting, but Wright states, “Yes, ‘good works’ will undoubtedly include ‘moral behavior.’ But Paul is more interested…about the face of the church in the world, about Christians shining in the world as lights in a dark place” (p. 171). In this sense, Romans 2 is at the heart of justification, as Wright explains, “Possession of the Torah…will not be enough; it will be doing it that counts” (p. 184). The Christian must examine his or her life to be sure it is filled with the fruit of the Spirit. One must continually evaluate if he or she is a light to the world. In this sense, justification is a call to holiness.

Third, justification is all about God. As Wright puts it, “God’s oracles, God’s faithfulness, God’s truth, God’s vindication, God’s victory, God’s righteousness, God’s justice, God’s judgment, God’s truth (again) and ultimately (Romans 3:7) God’s glory” (p. 199). This gives the Christian hope since it is based on the faithfulness of Christ (p. 203). Jesus Christ was the representative for God to the world, where Israel failed to do so. As Wright correctly states, “Through the representative Messiah…the result is that, though in his forbearance God had previously ‘passed over’ sins, not dealing with them as they deserved, the cosmic moral deficit has now been put right, displaying God’s faithfulness and justice to the world” (p. 204). Thus, justification is all about God’s faithfulness to his covenant to put the world the back to rights, as he so desires it.

Fourth, justification is by faith. One must not think that Wright is proposing works-righteousness. One is justified in the present by his or her faith. One might ask, “Who are God’s people?” To this, Wright responds, “They are those who keep the Torah—but whose Torah-keeping consists of faith” (p. 211; emphasis original). Faith is the basis on which the future verdict is shown in the present. In this way, faith carries a sense of faithfulness. N.T. Wright states, “The present verdict gives the assurance that the future verdict will match it; the Spirit gives the power through which that future verdict, when given, will be seen to be in accordance with the life that the believer has then lived” (p. 251). Justification is seen in the present by faith in the future action of God.

Ultimately, in my opinion, N.T. Wright’s view of justification carries much more weight than the one proposed by John Piper and others. Wright’s view of justification carries a sense of mission, holiness, and faith. As far as mission is concerned, it understands that God, through Jesus, is calling all people, regardless of lines of demarcation, to himself. A hurting, divided world needs to hear the message of reconciliation. Wright’s view of justification carries a sense of holiness, in that, it understands that God is concerned if his people are properly representing him. Unfortunately, the traditional Protestant view shrinks justification into individual salvation, which many believe is granted based on mental ascent to a set of doctrines. If this is the case, one simply “mentally ascends” and has no need for moral transformation. Lastly, the biblical view of justification relies heavily on faith—faith in the work of God through Jesus Christ. As stated before, it’s all about God. The Church must never forget its reliance on God’s faithfulness. When the Church is unfaithful (as it often is), God remains faithful to his covenant. Therefore, Wright concludes his book by reminding his readers of a crucial point, “The Risen Son is the fixed point in whose orbit we move, the one who holds his people by his power and sustains them by his love, the one to whom, with the Father and Spirit, be all love and all glory in his age and in the age to come” (p. 252). The Church must never forget its call to mission, holiness, and faith, and, if it holds on to the proper view of justification, it will be followed closely be these things. Score 9 out of 10

Do you agree with me that NTW’s view carries more weight? Or am I missing something here?

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Wright, N.T. (2009). Justification: God’s Plan & Paul’s Vision. IVP: Downers Grove.

Buy: Amazon.com

The NTW Project: Imputed or Declared?

Stage 4. Post 2. Justification: God’s Plan & Paul’s Vision

The N.T. Wright Project = 4 books. 2 weeks. 1 bishop. 1 man.

The theological proposal of “imputation” is held closely in much discussion over the definition of justification. According to Wright, “imputation…lies at the heart of [Piper’s] own reading” (p. 66). However, “justification” is to be understood in relation to the law-court. Thus, “imputation,” the idea that God gives his own righteousness to the sinner, is misleading. The judge’s declaration that one is “in the right” (i.e., justified), for N.T. Wright, “does not give that person [the judge’s] own particular ‘righteousness.’ He [the judge] creates the status the vindicated defendant now possesses, by an act of declaration, a ‘speech-act’ in our contemporary jargon.” Wright continues, “If [the vindicated defendant] does all this, he is ‘righteous’ in the way that a judge is supposed to be ‘righteous’…‘righteous’ and its cognates, in their biblical setting, are in this sense ‘relational’ terms, indicating how things stand with particular people in relation to the court” (p. 69; emphasis original). The theology of “imputation” cannot be held when justification is understood in this way.

Justification: Gods Plan & Pauls Vision

Justification: God's Plan & Paul's Vision

Wright insists that much of the confusion around justification comes from misunderstanding of key concepts. For instance, Scripture often holds “righteousness” and “salvation” close to one another so much so that many have suggested the two words are synonymous. Wright explains, “But this is misleading. Words cannot simply be telescoped into one another like that…the word ‘righteousness’ connotes the notion of God’s covenant faithfulness because of which he does such things, and the word ‘salvation’ connotes the fact that his people were in trouble and needed rescuing” (p. 71; emphasis original).

Likewise, Piper and others have associated first-century Judaism with legalistic works-righteousness, suggesting that the Jews believed keeping Torah and circumcision could earn them membership into the people of God. Once again, such a conclusion comes from misunderstanding. Practices such as keeping the Torah or circumcising male children did not earn someone membership into God’s people but were marks that signified one was already part of God’s people. In this sense, Torah functioned as a “badge that Israel would wear, the sign that it really was God’s people.” Wright continues, “But the way to tell, in the present, who would thus be vindicated in the future was to see who was keeping Torah (in some sense at least) in the present. The debates within Judaism at the time…tended then to turn on the question: what exactly does it mean to keep Torah in the present” (p. 76)? Thus, Judaism at the time held that membership was by God’s grace and the works one did in the present were evidence of that membership.

Thus, justification is a “status.” As Wright states in reference to Romans chapter three, “Paul’s point is that the whole human race is in the dock, guilty before God, ‘justification’ will always then mean ‘acquittal,’ the granting of the status of ‘righteous’ to those who had been on trial—and which will then also mean, since they were in fact guilty, ‘forgiveness’” (p. 90; emphasis original). N.T. Wright expresses this as so,

But part of the point of Paul’s language, rightly stressed by those who have analyzed the verb dikaioo, “to justify,” is that it does not denote an action which transforms someone so much as a declaration which grants them a status. It is the status of the person which is transformed by the action of “justification,” not the character. It is in this sense that “justification” “makes” someone “righteous,” just as the officiant [sic] at a wedding service might be said to “make” the couple husband and wife—a change of status, accompanied (it is hoped) by a steady transformation of the heart, but a real change of status even if both parties are entering the union out of pure convenience (p. 91; emphasis original).

When God decides to justify an individual, he or she is given a new status, or, in other words, he or she is declared “righteous.” This does not mean one is morally upright or has earned the status based on good deeds, but it as if the court has decided in one’s favor.

More on this tomorrow, but are there any implications based on Wright’s perspective that are detrimental to the gospel?

Are there implications that are more helpful to the gospel?

The NTW Project: Piper-Wright Cagematch

Stage 4. Post 1. Justification: God’s Plan & Paul’s Vision

The N.T. Wright Project = 4 books. 2 weeks. 1 bishop. 1 man.

Justification: Gods Plan & Pauls Vision (2009)

Justification: God's Plan & Paul's Vision (2009)

I remember having a conversation with a Reformed pastor about what actually was the Reformed view on “justification.” He told me. I listened. Then, I responded, “What the big deal with N.T. Wright’s view on justification? I remember reading him the definition, and he couldn’t really pick it out. I think I am beginning to understand it more and perhaps could articulate the position better and reveal more of the glaring contradictions. But then I thought, maybe it’s not such a big deal as people are making it? I don’t know…

Traditionally in Protestant thought, the term “justification” has been understood to be synonymous with individual’s salvation. In other words, as one speaks about being “justified by faith,” he or she is simply referring to the past event in which he or she was “saved.” The apostle Paul’s understanding of justification has been in discussion as of late; particularly, American, pastor-theologian John Piper’s challenge to British, pastor-theologian N. T. Wright’s understanding of the term. Piper began the dialogue with his book The Future of Justification: A Response to N. T. Wright, which received a reaction from N. T. Wright in his book Justification: God’s Plan & Paul’s Vision. The debate focuses on the Piper’s support for the traditional Reformed view over-against Wright’s more recently espoused perspective on the term “justification.”

Wright is often characterized as one who follows the “new perspective” on the apostle Paul. Wright states his dread for the term “new perspective” but humorously reminds, “There are times when I wish that the phrase had never been invented; indeed, perhaps for Freudian reasons, I had quite forgotten that I had invented it myself…until J. D. G. Dunn…graciously pointed out that I had used it in my 1978 Tyndale Lecture” (p. 28). The new perspective receives great criticism from many due to its association with Ed Sanders, but Wright explains to his readers that critics “should not assume that Dunn and I are flying under the same flag” (p. 29).

However, regardless of theological associations, Wright explains that there are two items about Paul that must be addressed. First, “Paul’s rich and subtle use of the Old Testament” (p. 33), and, second, in Wright’s characteristically run-on fashion, “the apostle’s understanding of the story of Israel, and of the whole world, as a single continuous narrative, which having reached its climax in Jesus the Messiah, was now developing in the fresh ways which God the Creator, the Lord of history, had always intended” (p. 34). Wright reminds his critics that it is not enough to echo the Reformers. As he explains, “For too long we have read Scripture with nineteenth-century eyes and sixteenth-century questions. It’s time to get back to reading with first-century eyes and twenty-first century questions” (p. 37).

Wright proposes that Paul’s understanding of justification is inherently a Jewish one. The Hebrew prophets continually remind the people of Israel of God’s faithfulness to his covenant with them. God is righteous, and Israel is unrighteous. The book of Daniel, influential in the first-century, makes this point directly in chapter nine verse seven. Wright reflects on the passage, “You are in the right, and we are in the wrong. That is the basic meaning of Daniel 9:7: in the implicit lawsuit between God and Israel, God is in the right. All this is the language of the covenant…God is righteous, not just (in other words) as though in a lawsuit, but in terms of the covenant” (p. 63; emphasis original). The first step in understanding justification is to acknowledge God’s faithfulness to his covenant with Israel, or, as N. T. Wright explains, “The point is that God has promised to bless the world through Israel, and Israel has been faithless to that commission” (p. 67; emphasis original).

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