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17 But [de] if, [ei] while we seek [zeteo] to be
justified [dikaioo] by [en] Christ, [Christos] we [heurisko] ourselves [autos] also [kai] are found [heurisko]
sinners, [hamartolos] is therefore [ara] Christ [Christos] the
minister [diakonos] of sin [hamartia]? God forbid [me]. [ginomai] KJV-Interlinear
17
"But if, while seeking to be justified in Christ, we ourselves have also
been found sinners, is Christ then a minister of sin? May it never be! NASB
The words, 'while seeking,' refers back to the previous verse, 'have believed in Christ.'
When Paul and Peter were seeking justification from their own sins, they in their cultural upbringing, naturally looked to the works of the Levitical law, which was written by Moses long ago.
The Law, which is found in the first five books of the Bible, but primarily in Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, delineates the many moral and social rules for how one was to conduct themselves in order to maintain some semblance of purity, as opposed to being ceremonially unclean.
None of these rules brought about salvation. Most if not all of the rules demonstrated that man could not maintain a cleanliness within himself that was adequate to satisfy Gods perfect mandates.
These things needed to be accomplished by someone other than mere man, someone who was capable of fulfilling all of the moral codes requirements and thus be perfectly qualified to pay the price of sin, demanded by sin.
Sin is an opposition of truth, and therefore an opposition of God. Sin is a corruption and an evil which cannot sustain itself, nor even clean up itself.
God is perfection and cannot be tainted by sin in any form, lest God becomes as sin is. If God were tainted than all perfection would be gone and God would not be God.
Thus, it would take a person who was God but also on the level of man, that was capable of accomplishing that cleansing process, washing away sin forever.
As perfection, God can have no relationship with sin. Therefore as sinners, man cannot have a relationship with God unless mans sin is cleaned away for good. Since sin was incapable of self-cleaning, then someone else would be needed in order to accomplish that cleaning process.
That someone of course is Jesus Christ.
Therefore, seeking justification in Christ is the correct approach for salvation. Christ did the work, not man. Christ accomplished the work necessary for man to have salvation available to man.
To look for justification in ones own work, is promoting sin to correct sin.
Therefore, if the works of the Law do not promote or accomplish justification, then one cannot expect gentiles to adopt a system that was never designed to do what many traditional Jews were demanding.
Justification was not by works for Jews, and therefore it would not be accomplished through those same works for gentiles either.
There was a Levitical purity accomplished through the ritual rules, but these were there to teach mans inability and therefore mans need for a Messiah and Savior, to accomplish that which man could not do for himself.
To pursue justification through ones own works would be to pursue sin in order to justify sin.
And if this were correct then Christ, or God, would be the promoter of sin within sin. And that is certainly not so, as Paul points out here.
Justification is obtained in Christ. And the wording here is 'in Christ' not 'through Christ' and that is important, because Christ did the work, Christ accomplished the work, and man had no part whatsoever in the work of salvation.
We approach the Father 'through Christ,' and this indicates our effort in approaching as one would go through a door in order to get from one place to another. And this is perfectly fine as it is the only authorized means of approach, which we do whether you know it or not, within all of your spiritual activities.
But 'in Christ,' acknowledges that all the work for our spiritual existence was accomplish not by us, but only by Christ.
Therefore, human works are taboo, not authorized, never accomplish anything, cannot sustain or obtain anything of a spiritual nature.
So, whether you are a circumcised Jew, or a circumcised any person, or an uncircumcised gentile or whomever, your justification to God is not accomplished by means of what you do or do not do.
Faith and faith alone, which is believing in Christ, is the only means of justification that is available to anyone.
