Justification by Faith.
I. Justification by faith is in fact a doctrine belonging of necessity to all true religion, and not to the Christian religion only. Men speak sometimes as if the Gospel had introduced a method of salvation which is not the completion and perfection of all that went before, but a method utterly opposed to it, as though Abraham and the patriarchs entered heaven by a quite different door from St. Paul and the members of the Christian Church. But the New Testament teaches differently. St. Paul entirely repudiates the notion of his having made void the law by the doctrine of faith; he shows that the principle which justified Abraham was identical with that which he preaches as the principle of Christian justification, a conclusion which is confirmed by the Old Testament expression that "Abraham believed God, and it" (that is, his faith) "was counted unto him for righteousness." If I wanted independent confirmation of St. Paul's doctrine of justification by faith, I would seek it in the confession of any man whose spiritual consciousness was ever so slightly awakened, and who sought, on his knees before God, some communication of the Divine life; and I am sure that the earnestness with which such a man would implore help from above would sufficiently show that no works of man can establish that union with God which is the life of the human soul.
II. When St. Paul wrote with so much earnestness, it was not faith itself for which he was contending so much as for faith in the Lord Jesus Christ as opposed to faith shown in any other way. Who shall say that he put faith before works? He never made the comparison at all. He simply pointed to Christ as the way to the Father, and therefore to union with Christ, or faith in Him, as the only conceivable means of bringing forth fruit to the praise and glory of God.
Harvey Goodwin, Parish Sermons,vol. ii., p. 198.
References: James 3:1-18. Homiletic Quarterly,vol. ii., p. 188. James 3:2. J. Keble, Sermons for Christmas and Epiphany,p. 483; J. H. Thom, Laws of Life,vol. i., p. 266; H. W. Beecher, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xv., p. 301.James 3:4. F. Wagstaff, Ibid.,vol. xxii., p. 170. James 3:5. J. F. Haynes, Ibid.,vol. xviii., p. 54; Ibid.,vol. ii., p. 182; Homilist,2nd series, vol. ii., p. 173.James 3:8. D. Burns, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xv., p. 101; Clergyman's Magazine,vol. i., p. 51.