Christ teaches us in the Lord’s prayer to pray every day: Forgive us our debts. We seem to need that every day: daily forgiveness. The Catechism confesses in Lord’s Day 31 that our sins are forgiven “as often as we by true faith accept the promise of the gospel”. Here also, forgiveness is something that happens time and again. 

How is it with our justification? Is it something that happens on a daily basis? Sometimes you get this impression. Must we see it like this then: each day we are out of favour again with God, and each day we must become a child of God again? Do we start each day as unbelievers who must be justified?

To this question I right away add a couple more.

1. The Bible, on the one hand, calls the believers the righteous ones (especially in the Old Testament, the Psalms and e.g., in the books of wisdom) and saints (especially in the New Testament).
   At the same time, we are seen as people who are still tainted with sin and in need of forgiveness. So, what are we: saints or sinners?
2. In the Heidelberg Catechism (Book of Praise, Q/A 62) it says that “even our best works in this life are all imperfect and defiled with sin”, and it further mentions good deeds and prayers which are pleasing to God (Q/A 91 and 117). The Catechism speaks of a conscience which accuses me that I have grievously sinned against all God’s commandments, have never kept any of them and am still inclined to all evil (Q/A 60), and on the side speaks of our fight with a free and good conscience against sin and the devil (Q/A 32).
   So how is it: are there really good deeds, and does a good conscience really exist?

One-Time Justification⤒🔗

The concepts “justification” and “forgiveness” are regularly being used as synonyms. But I plead to not neglect the difference between them, but to mark it clearly. That it is about two different things, becomes evident already as they are dealt with in different Lord’s Days of the Catechism. In Lord’s Day 21 it is about forgiveness, and in Lord’s Days 23 and 24 it is about our justification.

That it is about (two) different matters, also becomes clear in that we speak of “the justification of the wicked” (it is about who we are) and about the “forgiveness of sins” (it is about concrete thoughts, words, and deeds).

Our justification refers to the status that God gives us. We were sinners, but God does not impute our guilt to us; he puts the reconciliation, satisfaction, and holiness of Christ on our name, and takes us as his children and heirs. The fruit of this justification is that we live in peace with God, and we call him Father. We have been freed from the power of Satan thanks to the reconciliation of God’s Son and the work of God’s Spirit who brings us to God. Whoever has Christ, has life. This status is promised to us in the sign and seal of holy baptism, and we are confirmed in it each time we receive the bread and the cup and Christ guarantees us: this is for you, I gave myself to reconcile all your sins. Lift the cup and look forward to celebrating it in due time together with the Lord.

We may say “our Father”. The Canons of Dort (Book of Praise, page 565 ff) can speak of “the state of justification”. This just(ified) position we have received without any merit of our own, purely and only for Christ’s work: we from our side were unbelievers and enemies of God. Our works in no way contribute(d) to our new justified position. In no way at all could they mean something in the payment for our guilt, or in the obtaining of our child (of God) status. They only made our guilt greater, as none of our works are perfect. It is God’s grace when he awards us the status of child and heir. That is what answers 60 and 62 of the Catechism are about, with those destructive words about our conscience that accuses us, and about our best works which are all imperfect and defiled with sin. That is written in connection with this.

Justification is for us never a station that we passed by. Our whole life this applies to us, and I can fall back on this in faith, however serious my conscience accuses me. Where God has justified me as an unbeliever, and rescued me from death (!) to life, I may always return to him and appeal to Christ’s work. However (much) I have sinned and failed and however much I find sinful in myself yet, I may appeal to the God of my justification, to his justification.

If he justifies me, being an unbeliever, even more so then is Christ’s work sufficient now that I have been adopted by God as his child.

Permanent Sanctification and Forgiveness←⤒🔗

We are justified, and we are being sanctified. The latter is a lifelong process in which the Holy Spirit is busy with us, and God’s grace shows itself in our life.

God’s Spirit works it, we let ourselves be sanctified, and walk in God’s ways. We serve God with our heart and soul. In that process we are continually relying on forgiveness and on the power of the Holy Spirit to work through that renewal. For in that process, we are not without sin.

Paul writes how he notices time and again that he does what he does not want and does not do what he wants. He discovers in himself the law that evil things press upon him, even when he wants to do good. It is a weakness, which against his will has remained in him. It is the sinful nature, against which he must fight his whole life. With his mind he subjects himself to the law of God, but by his nature he submits himself to sin. Why does sin take over the helm all the time? Paul calls out: who will save me from this?

In the framework of this lifelong fight against our sinful nature stands the forgiveness that we receive. It is the forgiveness which we pray for each day and which we need throughout our lives (answer 56 of the Heidelberg Catechism). Article 29 of the Belgic Confession (Book of Praise, page 511) confesses of those who belong to the church: “Those who are of the church may be recognized by the marks of Christians. They believe in Jesus Christ the only Saviour, flee from sin and pursue righteousness, love the true God and their neighbour, without turning to the left or right, and crucify their flesh and its works. Although great weakness remains in them, they fight against it by the Spirit all the days of their life. They appeal constantly to the blood, suffering, death and obedience of Jesus Christ, in whom they have forgiveness of their sins through faith in Him.”

As Luther said, we are at the same time righteous and sinner. Also, as righteous ones we need daily forgiveness, and this is being given to us as often as we accept the promise of the Gospel with a true faith. Paul says of this in Romans 5:10: “For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son (our justification), much more, now that we are reconciled (justified), shall we be saved by his life” (our forgiveness, thanks to the high-priestly work of the living Christ).

Truly a New Life←⤒🔗

So, sin remains in us: weakness against our will. But this remaining weakness does not nullify that faith in us truly starts a new life (Belgic Confession, article 24): God’s Spirit awakens in us true love and real obedience and good works. Even though they remain imperfect, by God’s grace those deeds are being sanctified and they are pleasing in God’s sight. In his gracious (!) eyes they are good deeds, which he has made possible (Eph. 2:10) and which are being cleansed and sanctified by God’s Spirit (Belgic Confession, article 24).

This is about the effect of the work of Christ and his Spirit. Our good deeds, imperfect as they are, cannot be a payment for our guilt. In the framework of our justification, they do not help. But our good Christian deeds surely are realistic fruits of the Spirit. With this walk of life we differentiate ourselves from them who do not know Christ.

This grace, received from God, which shows itself in a life which is led by the Spirit, can often be a form of pleading in the Psalms for a prayer for deliverance. A prayer to be delivered from the grip of unbelievers, or a prayer to not go down without a difference with unbelievers. Save me from my enemies, let me not go down with the mockers. That call for grace received, we also know from the “Lord’s Prayer”: forgive us our debts, as we (as proof of your grace in us) will also forgive our debtors.

And we hear the apostles thank for what God (!) works in the churches in terms of faith and hope and love, and in real fruits of the Spirit. If all works out, then a Christian does not remain an unbeliever and enemy of God, but they are “more and more renewed after God’s image” (Heidelberg Catechism, answer 115, Book of Praise). What does become bigger, is the knowledge of sin and realization of guilt. They also grow. And if we then try to image the new obedience on the new earth, then we say: what we now notice by ourselves in this life, is “only a small beginning” of what will come (Heidelberg Catechism, answer 114, Book of Praise).

What all can we expect then?

Starting Every Day Anew?←⤒🔗

The question of this article was whether justification for believers must happen on a daily basis?

Are we “standing outside” every day? Does answer 60 of the Heidelberg Catechism teach us that every day again we are unbelievers?

The answer is: No. If we would think that, then we would be guilty of the kind of thinking that according to the Catechism controls the papal Mass. In answer 80, the Catechism explains the difference between the Lord’s Supper and the papal Mass as follows: “The Lord’s Supper testifies to us that we have complete forgiveness of all our sins through the one sacrifice of Jesus Christ, which he himself accomplished on the cross once for all” but the Mass teaches “that the living and the dead do not have forgiveness of sins through the suffering of Christ unless he is still offered for them daily by the priests” (Book of Praise, page 545).

Whether you call the latter repetition or representation does not really matter. The difference is what you are in Christ. Rome does not know a state of justification, but a justification which must over and over again be realized. Every time again you “stand outside”. Until your death you are not sure unless you have received a special revelation.

Are we “standing outside” every day again? If that is the impression which sermons leave behind, then there is something wrong. We cannot speak highly about the church as the communion of the saints, and then at the same time meet these same believers as continual unbelievers. Pastors have reason for self-reflection when listeners react: “If church does not have more to offer me than that I continually stand to face justification, then I choose for a congregation where I will see and experience the life-changing work of the gospel.’

Sin will always rear its head in our lives; no one will deny that. But if God justifies unbelievers, then they do not remain the unbelievers they once were. The Bible knows a true difference between the righteous ones and the unbelievers. Answer 60 of the Heidelberg Catechism does not say that we are unbelievers over and over again, but that however sinful we may be, we may seek refuge with our Mediator. The God who in his love came to us, is not a God who puts us at a distance over and over again.