The Doctrine of Imputation

The Protestant/Apostolic doctrine of "imputation" is another "homoousious" separating truth from error for well over the past quarter of the church's history. Imputation says that if God saves you, you get his righteousness, and he by it has justified you, at present. No Christian awaits what Scripture calls “justification.” He has it already.  

Romans 4 is key. The doctrine of imputation comes from many places in God's word. One is from the Greek verb ἐλογίσθη that Paul uses in Romans 4:3. “ABRAHAM BELIEVED GOD, AND IT WAS CREDITED (ἐλογίσθη) TO HIM AS RIGHTEOUSNESS." (NASB95). Let’s be after Paul’s point. It's often translated in English as "counted," "credited" or "reckoned." What's said here is that Abraham was ἐλογίσθη (root word: λογίζομαι) given something by God when Abraham voiced his trust in the promises God made to him (see Genesis 15). What was given to Abraham (stressed as being before his circumcision in vv. 9-12 for a reason) was justifying righteousness in Paul's mind. Abraham was made to be at peace with God by God. James only reinforces all this in his letter. Paul introduces NT justification in the earliest chapters of Romans. By the time we get to Romans 4, God's justifying righteousness is set forth as given to every saint, as both Abraham and David bear their separate witnesses. This establishes a continuity of the principle of grace alone in both the OT and NT. Paul calls David (Psalm 32) to bear witness to this same gift of righteousness. The conclusion of Romans 4 is that Abraham, David, and now Paul/all Christians are saved by a gift by the gift of righteousness imputed. Romans 4:6: "David also speaks of the blessing on the man to whom God credits (λογίζεται) righteousness apart from works." The believer's sin is "imputed" (λογίσηται) to Christ, and Christ's righteousness is imputed (λογίσηται) to them. This is what makes the Christian the “blessed man” of Romans 4:8: “BLESSED IS THE MAN WHOSE SIN THE LORD WILL NOT TAKE INTO ACCOUNT” (λογίσηται; root: λογίζομαι). This is the basis of Paul's “therefore” statement on the matter in Romans 5:1-2. Nothing can be more assuring than if Christ is your boast! Non-believers have no peace with God; saints do...because they've been given (λογίζομαι) something, and that something, by virtue of one’s receipt of Christ, is righteousness. They have a perfection called justification in the present. See carefully also Romans 8:1-4.

Here is the doctrine of imputation restated: "He made Him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf, so that we might become the righteousness of God in Him." 2 Corinthians 5:21.

Imputation is for all Christians in Romans 4:23-24. "Now not for his [Abraham's] sake only was it written that it was credited (ἐλογίσθη) to him, but for our sake also, to whom it will be credited (ἐλογίσθη), as those who believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead." The “it” is righteousness. Abraham believed in God’s promises. All of Israel’s national inheritance came from this promise in Galatians 3:18. Abraham is Paul’s type for us. We too have promises in a Son far greater than Isaac. Peter bears his witness to these “precious and magnificent promises” in 2 Peter 1:1-4. The promise of Christianity in justification is that the triune God imputes Christ's personal righteousness to the believer. Romans 8:33: “Who will bring a charge against God’s elect? God is the one who justifies.”

God never justifies through works at all. Romans 4:4-5 demands this fact. God owes no one life for their wages. No one who thinks he does are the justified. Alongside works? Maybe. A faith resulting in works? Surely (see James 2). But faith is never by works. The Cross is not God's cooperative effort. No works (see Ephesians 2:8-9), no circumcision, no baptism, no table, no church membership and no giving saves, grace is the basis of righteousness. Titus 3:4-7. All these most lovely works done in obedience to this Gospel bring their lesser graces and can be called salvific in types as the justified saints prove their love in obedience, but Paul proves here that God saves only apart from them all.

In the so-called “Epistle to Diognetus” from somewhere near the end of the second century, one likely saint reflects on God’s imputed graces saying: “O sweet exchange! O unsearchable operation! O benefits surpassing all expectation! that the wickedness of many should be hid in a single righteous One, and that the righteousness of One should justify many transgressors!” I think he got it.

Imputation is God sharing Christ's own righteousness. This is what he gives (λογίζομαι): “For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified.” Hebrews 10:14. Is Christ yours?

Grace to you!