Gospel Guidebook: Getting and Keeping It Right 
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The Gospel and the Justification of God
by Robert P. TerryUpdated March 14, 2025
We read in Romans 1:1-6 (NASB), "Paul, a bond-servant of Christ Jesus, called as an apostle, set apart for the gospel of God, which He promised beforehand through His prophets in the holy Scriptures, concerning His Son, who was born of a descendant of David according to the flesh, who was declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead, according to the Spirit of holiness, Jesus Christ our Lord, through whom we have received grace and apostleship to bring about the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles, for His name's sake, among whom you also are the called of Jesus Christ;". From this description, we learn that the Gospel is not a message that is primarily concerned with sinners and their salvation. That is only secondary. Rather, the Gospel is concerned with God's Son and how He was declared to be the Son of God with power, showing Himself to be Jesus Christ the Lord. Accordingly, obedience of faith cannot mean the efforts sinners make under the pretense of faith to appropriate the favor of God to themselves in the name of Jesus Christ. None of sinners' efforts, approaches, entreaties, or appropriations have anything to do with the Gospel. Rather, obedience of faith means assenting to the righteousness of God revealed in the Gospel (Rom. 1:16-17) for His name's sake, that is, for the sake of His glory (Rom. 1:5). This is even more obvious when Romans 1:16-17 is compared with 2 Corinthians 4:3-4 where we are told that the Gospel makes known the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. It was this righteousness and glory that was kept secret for long ages past, but had now been revealed and manifested in the preaching of Jesus Christ (Rom. 16:25-27) This means that the Gospel is primarily about the justification and glorification of God. It might sound strange talking about the justification of God, but this simply means that God was declared just or righteous (Deut. 25:1), and this is exactly what the Apostle Paul teaches. For example, in the above verses, His being "declared the Son of God with power by the resurrection from the dead, according to the Spirit of holiness" corresponds to Him being "justified in the Spirit" (1 Tim. 3:16). Likewise, in Romans 3:25-26, the Apostle says twice (presumably for emphasis) that the purpose of faith in His blood is to demonstrate (or declare or manifest) His righteousness so that He might be just and the justifier of believers in Jesus.
In confirmation of this, we read in Luke 7:28-35, "For I say unto you, Among those that are born of women there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist: but he that is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he. And all the people that heard him, and the publicans, justified God, being baptized with the baptism of John. But the Pharisees and lawyers rejected the counsel of God against themselves, being not baptized of him...But wisdom is justified of all her children." In these verses, we see that accepting the counsel of God unto oneself resulted in the justification of God, that is, acknowledging His justice and His righteousness. It is in this manner that wisdom, which was the personification of Christ in book of Proverbs, is justified by all her children. This shows us that a correct response to God's counsel results in the glorification of God. Water baptism was a temporary Jewish purification ritual that served to announce the coming of Christ to Israel and prepare the hearts of the people for Him (see, for example, John 1:31, 3:23-26, and Luke 1:17), but the Gospel of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ is the everlasting proclamation of God's victory over the devil, the world, and principalities and powers (John 16:11, 16:33, Col. 2:15). As a result, "They will come and will declare His righteousness to a people who will be born, that He has performed it" (Psalm 22:31). Therefore, the correct response to God's counsel in our day and age is to assent humbly to the divine righteousness revealed in the Gospel, all to the praise of His glory. These are truly glad tidings. In contrast, however, just as the Pharisees and lawyers rejected the counsel of God against themselves, preferring their own wisdom and seeking to establish their own righteousness, it is equally to the doom of those in our day and age who reject the proclamation that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God (again see Rom. 1:1-6, but also Mat. 16:16, John 4:42 KJV, 6:69, 11:25-27, John 20:31, etc.), regarding bare belief in the divine righteousness accomplished by Christ too small of thing and preferring rather to dabble in mysticism through their appropriating acts of "heart work" (see Lord's Day 7 Q&A #21 of the Heidelberg Catechism, or my article here) or desiring to perform some noble act whereby they chose Christ, surrender their souls to Him, promise to commit their lives to Him, or undergo a water baptism ritual in order to establish their own righteousness.
It is sinful human nature that causes the natural man to look within himself for some "spark" of light (Isaiah 50:11), or some distinguishing feature whereby he might exalt himself above other sinners (Luke 18:11). Therefore, when it comes to the Gospel, the sinner naturally wants to make it all about himself and rob the Son of God of His glory. And this is essentially what every appropriating act does when the performer of it supposes to put himself front and center in the procurement of his interest in Christ as the best means he knows to gain the favor of God. Seeing this is the natural tendency of man, we must be on guard constantly and be eager to "cast down imaginations, and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bring into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ, and have in a readiness to revenge all disobedience" (2 Cor. 10:5-6).
There are many Christians who rightfully speak of the need to constantly look outside of themselves to Christ as their only righteousness, but some of these same people, in their very next breath, will regard you as a vile person if you demonstrate to them that their very own creeds, catechisms, confessions, and statements of faith teach people to do the very opposite thing by describing so-called "true faith" as an instrument that appropriates the status of the elect to itself through some elusive and mystical operation of "heart work" (which, in order to obfuscate the merit of such act, they always ascribe to the Holy Spirit) by which the sinner must make true something that wasn't true until it was appropriated (again, see Lord's Day 7 Q&A #21 of the Heidelberg Catechism, or my article here). This makes me suspicious that their appeals to always look unto Jesus might be nothing more than an expedient by which they dress the wound of their appropriating act as though it were not serious (Jer. 6:14), and thereby supplement what they perceive the Holy Spirit to be performing in their hearts with what they perceive to be the merits of Christ.
Now, I have written much on this website about the Gospel and the nature of faith (such as in my articles here, here, and here), but I will provide a quick recap here. What God requires of sinners is that they believe His righteousness revealed in the Gospel, for the recognition that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, who accomplished a justifying act on the cross is the power of God unto salvation (Rom. 1:16-17). Whoever assents to the divine righteousness proclaimed in the Gospel both justifies God and is himself justified. This fulfills the Scripture where it says, "For with thee is the fountain of life: In thy light shall we see light", for the righteousness of God reflects righteousness unto all who behold it, just as Moses' face shone with the glory of God after beholding it, and thus, "They looked unto him, and were lightened: And their faces were not ashamed" (Psalm 36:9, Psalm 34:5, and 2 Cor. 3:1-4:6). All who behold the righteousness of God revealed in the Gospel are justified, just as all who looked upon the bronze serpent on the pole were saved, the antitype of which was Christ crucified (John 3:14-15).