John Piper on Romans 3.25-26

whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood through faith. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

This is a pretty amazing argument.

I would insist that God’s righteousness that obligates him to save his people and fulfill his promise to save the world cannot be divorced from his righteous opposition to sin (though I’m not impressed with the insistence on the divine egotism Piper likes so much).  After all, how can God promise to save from sin if he was not opposed to sin?

But what is amazing is that Piper gets so detailed in arguing for a consistent definition while he actually wants to completely flip definitions within a paragraph.  Here is the text:

But now the God’s Righteousness has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— God’s Righteousness through faith in/the faithfulness of Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood through faith/faithfulness. This was to show God’s righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

I have used the ESV with some interpretive options given in italics.  I changed the ESV’s odious paraphrase “to be received by faith” back to “through faith.”  I suspect that Paul is saying that God’s righteousness is demonstrated in the faithfulness of Jesus in providing propitiation and redemption, and that thus “through faithfulness” is a statement that the propitiation came about through God’s or Jesus’ faithfulness.

But here is Piper’s understanding:

But now the righteousness imputed by God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— the righteousness imputed by God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood through faith. This was to show God’s unswerving commitment to uphold his own glory, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins. It was to show his unswerving commitment to uphold his own glory at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

Piper’s done great work in the Bible.  This is not an instance of such.

2 thoughts on “John Piper on Romans 3.25-26

  1. BrianN

    Mark:

    This has the same weaknesses of the NIV in this passage (switching dikaiosune theou when it no longer suits the “righteousness imputed by God” meaning).

    Reply
  2. Jim Irwin

    To quote Bob Marley in his song “Redemption Songs”:

    “How long shall they kill our prophets, while we stand aside and look?
    Some say it’s just a part of it — we’ve got to fulfill the Book…”

    Reply

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