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Justification
In plain words
Justification means God declares you not guilty and right with Him because of Jesus, not your record.
Imagine standing in court. The evidence against you is real, and you are guilty. Then the judge says: someone else has paid the full penalty, and the case is closed. You walk out free, not because you were good, but because someone stood in your place.
That is what the Bible means by justification. Everyone has done wrong and fallen short of God (Romans 3:23-24). When you trust Jesus, God counts His perfect life and His death for you. You are declared right with God, completely and at once.
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Paul says we are justified "by faith in Christ and not by works of the law" (Galatians 2:16). Faith is not a good deed that earns it. Faith is the empty hand that receives it. The result is peace with God (Romans 5:1). You no longer have to prove yourself to Him every morning.
A common mistake is to think justification is a fresh start that you then have to keep up by trying hard. It is not. God's verdict stands. Another mistake is to think it makes no difference how you live. Real faith always starts to change you, but that change comes from the verdict, not toward it.
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The Greek dikaioo is a legal word: to declare righteous, to rule in someone's favour. Paul builds on the Old Testament picture of Abraham, who believed God and was counted righteous (Romans 4:3-5). Justification answers the question every conscience asks: how can a guilty person stand before a holy God?
This was the centre of the Reformation. Christians differ on whether justification is only God's legal declaration, as Protestants teach, or also includes the inner renewal of the person, as Catholic and Orthodox churches teach. Evangelicals hold that we are justified by grace alone through faith alone, and that this faith is never alone.
My verses
Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Know that a man is not justified by works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have believed in Christ Jesus, that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.
For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.” Now the wages of the worker are not credited as a gift, but as an obligation. However, to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited as righteousness.