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In the Husbands and Treier volume, Robert Kolb discusses various contemporary Lutheran theologians who are attempting to bring Luther to bear on contemporary theology and life. He focuses attention on Gerhard Forde, Wilfried Harle, Oswald Bayer, and a few others. <\/p>\n
His discussion of the claim that \u201cJustification is God\u2019s killing and his making alive\u201d is illuminating: \u201cthese Lutheran expositors of justification make specific Luther\u2019s expression of the biblical teaching of justification in terms of dying and rising . . . . Employing Paul\u2019s baptismal terminology in Romans 6, Luther taught that the Word of the Lord brings sinners into the death and burial that sin necessitates, and then raises them through the Word of life that comes as a gift from the cross in the sacrificed and risen Lord Jesus Christ . . . . In his Justification by Faith <\/i> Forde called for a return to Luther\u2019s death-life language, not discarding the legal metaphor of judgment and pardon by any means, but enriching it as Luther did with the Pauline description of justification as the death of the sinner and the resurrection of the new creature in Christ, the reborn child of God . . . . salvation is not a repair job, not a smaller or larger alteration or improvement. Justification is rebirth. Sinners disappear from God\u2019s sight, and we stand before him as his new creatures, his own children. That God\u2019s Word \u2013 as in Genesis, so in absolution \u2013 actually creates new reality is the key to Forde\u2019s analysis. Thus, Forde breaks through the long-standing debate about whether justification is \u2018forensic\u2019 or \u2018effective.\u2019 \u2018The absolutely forensic character of justification renders it effective \u2013 justification actually kills and makes alive. It is, to be sure, \u201cnot only\u201d forensic, but that is the case only because the more forensic it is, the more effective it is!\u2019 For \u2018the death inflicted by the justifying word which reduces us to nothing is the real <\/i> death, the true spiritual death, the death of sin, the death of all defiance against the God who \u201cwill have mercy on whom He will have mercy.\u201d\u2019 God\u2019s mercy \u201cis the death knell of the old and the harbinger of the absolutely new . . . the unconditional word, the promise, the declaration of justification is that which makes new, that which puts the old to rest and grants newness of life . . . . God\u2019s Word creates reality, and God\u2019s word of forgiveness creates the identity of being God\u2019s child, an identity which brings with it expectations of performance of God\u2019s will.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In the Husbands and Treier volume, Robert Kolb discusses various contemporary Lutheran theologians who are attempting to bring Luther to bear on contemporary theology and life. He focuses attention on Gerhard Forde, Wilfried Harle, Oswald Bayer, and a few others. His discussion of the claim that \u201cJustification is God\u2019s killing and his making alive\u201d is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3021,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-theology-soteriology"],"yoast_head":"\n