What It Means to Be Justified through Faith

By Andrea Lucado

I took piano lessons from kindergarten to eighth grade. Through all of those years, I was never very good at practicing between lessons, and Ms. Paula, my piano teacher, was never very amused with my lack of practicing.

On the wall to the right of the piano in Ms. Paula’s home studio, she had taped a row of yellow music notes cut from card stock. Each music note had the name of one of her students written at the top. And each music note contained varying amounts of colorful music-note stickers. Each sticker represented how much we had practiced the week before.

You practiced for 30 minutes, three days in a row? Great! You get three stickers.

You only practiced once this week? Sorry, only one sticker for you.

My yellow music note was not covered in stickers like the notes of some of the other students. I often only got one or two, and sometimes none at all. Each time I walked in for my lesson, I knew I would be falling short of Ms. Paula’s expectations. Even worse, I knew that the other students would know, since the music notes were displayed for all to see.

The sticker-based system was not unique to Ms. Paula’s studio; it is how much of life works.

You closed that account? Great! You get a promotion.

You got a C on that exam? Sorry, you might not get into college.

You have lots of social media followers? Great! You are popular and accepted.

You’re not a good athlete? Sorry, you get picked last.

You get what you deserve. You are justified by your deeds, actions and good report cards. This is how we get along in life, move up, move on.

Fortunately for all of us, Jesus took this sticker-based system and flipped it on its head. He came to Earth and started telling people that he was here to fulfill the law, meaning that he was here to let us off the hook. Doing A, B, and C no longer led to righteousness. He, and he alone, led to righteousness. The amount of stickers you had no longer mattered. All you had to do was simply believe in him

For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.  John 3:16

Paul sums up this idea in Romans as well.

Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand. And we boast in the hope of the glory of God. Romans 5:1-2

This truth is a total game-changer.

We have been justified through faith, not stickers we received for our good deeds.

We have peace with God through Jesus, not through our own doing.

We stand now in grace, not in fear of falling short.

We boast in the hope of the glory of God, not in the glory of our hard work.

Faith is all that is required of us. When everything else in this world tells you that you need to do more, be more, or practice more, Jesus says that in him, you are enough. In him, through faith, you are justified. And the stickers you once so desperately worked to collect have been replaced by a simple seal.

When you believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.  Ephesians 1:13-14

Amen.

If you are interested in learning more about how we are justified through Christ, check out our study on the Book of Romans. It lays out the Gospel unlike any other book in the Bible: Romans: Making Men Good.