by John H. Gerstner

Up to this point our interest has been in coming to Christ. We have considered our lost condition by nature, our need of a Savior, Christ's remarkable qualifications for that role, and the way by which we are persuaded of it. But now we address ourselves to the question of how we know that we have truly come to Christ, or how we know that we truly know Christ. It is conceivable that a person could come to Christ without being certain that he is actually united to Him. It is also conceivable that a person could think that he had come to Christ without really doing so. And it is conceivable that a person could truly come to Christ and know it. So what we wish to discover here is how we know that we know the Savior.

In previous chapters we have thought about our sinfulness and how we came to be sinful, and about Christ, His deity, and His mediatorial work. All of these were doctrines which could be ascertained objectively and were, in a sense, external to us. Now we are dealing with something that we can only know by self-examination. We are to search into our own souls to see if we have a certain experience. At the same time we are being objective in this sense: We are studying the Word of God to ascertain the evidences for which we must search. While we are considering what the evidences are of a saved condition, we will be asking ourselves whether or not we possess these qualifications. At that point the discussion is both objective and subjective.

Many indications of a regenerate condition are mentioned in Scripture. As a matter of fact, there are too many of them for us to consider in this brief chapter. So we will restrict ourselves to one passage to use as a guide in this discussion. However, we will refer to other passages incidentally, but not primarily.

Romans 5:1-3 will serve as a foundation of our discussion: "Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ; by whom also we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand, and rejoice in hope of the glory of God. And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also, knowing that tribulation worketh patience."

In this passage the apostle is giving us the argument from experience. In the immediately foregoing passage, the fourth chapter, he has shown the experience of the patriarchs of old, Abraham and David. Now he turns away from the past to the present and speaks of the experience of the Roman Christians, saying, "Therefore, being justified by faith, we have. . . ."

1. The first fruit of justification, or the first evidence of our being in a justified state, is peace. The apostle says, "Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ."

Before we can consider the peace mentioned here, we must first of all notice a minor textual matter. The King James Version, the Revised Standard Version, and the New American Standard version all represent Paul as saying, "we have peace." However, Paul did not actually write that; what he wrote was: "let us have peace." There is little doubt among the scholars about that. Why, then, do they not simply translate it "let us have" instead of rendering it "we have"? Well, most of those scholars are frank enough to say that they render it in the indicative because they believe that is the thrust of Paul's thought, even though he does use a subjunctive word. That is, most interpreters feel that the argument of Romans is so logical and so relentless and so obvious that at this particular point Paul can be making nothing but a declaration. There cannot be anything tentative or uncertain, hypothetical or hortatory, about it. So in spite of the language which the apostle uses, the translators construe him otherwise because they feel his thought demands it. I sympathize with the translators and agree with their general appraisal of Paul's' thought here. Nevertheless, I consider it a very serious matter to change an inspired author's word. I prefer, therefore, to leave the subjunctive just as the apostle gave it to us.

What is the significance then of the fact that Paul did use the subjunctive, and that he wrote: "let us have peace"? Does it somehow diminish the force of this passage because he used a subjunctive rather than an indicative tense? I think not. As a matter of fact, I am inclined to think that it may, if I understand properly, show a greater significance, and contribute more to the movement of Paul's thought, than the indicative would.

What I mean is this: Paul could never tell these Christians, or urge or exhort them, to have peace unless he believed that peace had actually been established by God through justification. In other words, his use of the subjunctive presupposes a prior indicative. Paul is exhorting the Romans here to have peace in the sense of experiencing peace because peace already has them. That is, peace has already been established, and they therefore have every right and duty to appropriate it, to enjoy it, and to revel in it. I suspect that the apostle is far ahead of his translators here. The translators are holding back at the indicative which Paul has already assumed and moved beyond. The point, however, as far as we here are concerned, is that the subjunctive necessarily implies the indicative. The exhortation to have peace presupposes that peace has already been established. Paul could never urge a man to experience a peace which the apostle did not believe had already been effected between that man and God.

Remember that in Romans 1:18 Paul had already said that "the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men. . . ." Now if the wrath of God were still burning against believers, the apostle would certainly never urge them to have peace. Nowhere in these early chapters, where he is shutting up all under divine judgment and exposing them to the wrath of God, does he, nor could he, urge them to have peace. It is only after the grace of God in Christ and justification by faith are introduced that Paul urges his readers to have peace with God.

Coming now to the peace of God itself, notice the first great fruit or mark of justification here mentioned. This is an indication that there is no longer any estrangement between a holy God and the former sinner who was under His wrath and judgment. If a person has peace established, and is in a position to experience, feel, and rejoice in this peace, this is a true indication that he actually has a genuine union with Jesus Christ.

This immediately raises a question, however. Is it possible that a person could wrongly think that he was justified, and therefore think that he had established peace between God and him, and then actually feel in his heart this peace to which the apostle exhorts him? In other words, while a truly justified person will have this fruit of justification, namely peace, is it still not possible for people who only think they have justification to feel a peace which flows from it, which peace is spurious and quite misleading? Is experienced peace a true indication of a person's converted state? Putting it in the form of a question, Can we know that we know Christ because we have the experience of peace? Obviously if it is possible to have a spurious feeling of peace, the feeling can be no sure indication that a person has justification or has Jesus Christ.

Yes, it is possible to distinguish between true and spurious peace. Peace may be a feeling, but it rests on some presumed fact which may be logically grasped and evaluated. If you ask some persons why they feel at peace with God, they will answer, "Because God never hates or becomes truly angry with anyone." They suppose that God needs never be feared, and so they have a kind of peace. The doctrine on which their peace rests is unscriptural, and is therefore false and ipso facto; it is spurious. If, however, a person feels peace and knows that it results from faith that Christ satisfied divine justice for him and converted his soul and united him to the Savior, the peace he feels is genuine since it rests on the truth of God.

*****

This is part twenty-two of John H. Gerstner's small book entitled Theology for Everyman, originally published in 1965 (Moody Press, Chicago). That book was subsequently republished in 1991. It has since fallen out of print and we thought it would be good to revisit this book here on the blog. Over the next couple of months, we'll work our way through the book. Here is where we've been so far: Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6 and Chapter 7.