Everyone who believes is freed from everything [justified, kjv].
Acts 13:39
The believer in Christ receives a present justification. Faith does not produce this fruit later on, but now. So far as justification is the result of faith, it is given to the soul in the moment when it closes with Christ and accepts Him as its all in all. Are those who stand before the throne of God justified now? So are we as certainly and as clearly justified as those who have entered into the portals of heaven. The thief upon the cross was justified the moment that he turned the eye of faith to Jesus; and Paul, at the end of his life, after years of service, was not more justified than the thief who had no service at all.
We are today accepted in the Beloved, today absolved from sin, today acquitted at the bar of God's judgment. What a soul-stirring thought! There are some benefits that we will not be able to enjoy until we enter heaven; but this is our immediate possession. This is not like the corn of the land, which we can never eat until we cross the Jordan; but this is part of the manna in the wilderness, a portion of our daily nutriment with which God supplies us in all our comings and goings.
We are now--even now--pardoned; even now are our sins put away; even now we stand in the sight of God accepted, as though we had never been guilty. "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus."1 There is not a sin in the Book of God, even now, against one of His people. Who dares to lay anything to their charge? There is neither speck, nor spot, nor wrinkle, nor anything remaining upon any one believer in this matter of being justified in the sight of the Judge of all the earth. Let our present privileges awaken us to present duty, and now, while life lasts, let us spend and be spent for our sweet Lord Jesus.
1) Romans 8:1
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Devotional material is taken from the Truth For Life daily devotional by Alistair Begg, published by The Good Book Company, thegoodbook.com. Used by Truth For Life with permission. Copyright © 2021, The Good Book Company.