John Robbins: The doctrine of Christ's perfect, extrinsic, objective, imputed righteousness--forensic justification--ended 1,000 years of stagnation

For a thousand years, because of the church's doctrine of justification as an internal grace rather than the objective, external, legal declaration of a sinner's innocence by God, men had looked inside themselves for the grace that merited salvation. The more devout retreated to monasteries and convents to find their salvation in their interior lives. Some sat on poles, some beat their bodies bloody, and some made pilgrimages to "holy" places. The church had lost the message of the Gospel, that men are saved by a righteousness wholly outside of themselves—the righteousness of Christ. By his perfect life, innocent and substitutionary death, and bodily resurrection, Christ had fulfilled the demands of God's law on behalf of all who believed in him. It is to Christ that one must look for salvation, said Luther, not inside oneself. Once the religious subjectivism of the medieval church was eliminated in Protestant countries, the energy consumed by desperately seeking and earning salvation was turned outward, and a thousand years of intellectual, political, social, economic, and religious stagnation ended.

John Robbins: Works are not the condition, ground, or instrument of salvation, but rather salvation is the condition or ground of obedience

"But the Holy Spirit speaking in Scripture ... repeatedly exhorts believers to lead holy lives. His argument is, You are already Christians; you have already passed from death to everlasting life; you are already saved; therefore, act like Christians. ... (Ephesians 5:8, 15-16). There are dozens of other such exhortations. But our acting like Christians does not save us, for we are already saved. The indicative -- salvation -- logically and chronically precedes the imperative: Behave as the saved people you are. Our good works are not the condition or ground or instrument of our salvation; our salvation is the condition or ground of our obedience. Works and justification are not related as equals, but as effects to cause. Ideas have consequences. Christian ideas have Christian consequences. Those who believe the Gospel, given the opportunity, will produce good works."

(John Robbins, Not Reformed at All: Medievalism in "Reformed" Churches, pp. 121-122)

John Robbins: Foolish anthropocentric religion thrives when man has no fear of God and is unapprised of his predicament

When we look at the current religious scene, there is little evidence that people are asking such theocentric (God-centered) questions. Instead, they are asking anthropocentric (man-centered) questions: How can God make me happy? How can Christ make my life run smoothly and joyously? How can I solve my problems and find fulfillment in life? Never has so much religious activity been so disinterested in the question of justification with God. Why? Because there is so little fear of God. People can wave their arms or jump up and down “in the Spirit.” But if the religious interest is not marked by a great fear of God, it is not the work of the Holy Spirit, for he is “the Spirit .†.†. of the fear of the Lord.” Again, why is there such an appalling disinterest in justification by faith? Because people are taking it for granted that God is gracious and forgiving. In fact, they feel that they are on such good terms with him that they talk to him as if he were (to use Luther’s complaint against the Enthusiasts) “a shoemaker’s apprentice.” How can justification be a concern when there is no marked fear of God?

Consider how these man-centered questions are patently foolish in the light of man’s predicament. Here is a wretched sinner, bound hand and foot and consigned to Hell for his great crimes against his maker. Standing on the threshold of eternal damnation, he presumes to ask, “How can God make me happy?” Such a question shows he has no understanding of his awful predicament. If the Spirit gives him any true enlightenment of his situation, he will cry out, “How can I be right with God?” (John Robbins, Ethics and Justification by Faith Alone)

John Robbins: The blasphemous charge of antinomianism against Paul's doctrine of justification demonstrates he taught justification apart from works

John Robbins explains the separation -- in history and in modern times -- between those who teach salvation by faith alone and those who heretically and damnably add works:

The Bible clearly and emphatically teaches that a sinner is saved by belief of the Gospel alone, "apart from the deeds of the law." That is why the blasphemous charge of antinomianism arose against the Gospel in the first place. If Paul and the other apostles had taught a false gospel of faith plus obedience as the way of salvation, the charge of antinomianism would never have been brought against them. Neither Rome nor many so-called "Reformed" theologians seem to understand that salvation is not a result of good works; good works are a result of salvation. It was that difference that divided the Christians from the Romanists in the sixteenth century, and it is that difference that divides the Christians from the Romanists in the twenty-first century. (John Robbins, R.C. Sproul on Saving Faith)

John Robbins: Justification by faith alone is the article upon which churches and individuals stand or fall

John Robbins asserts that justification by faith alone was central to biblical and reformational theology:

Justification by faith alone was not just another topic in theology for Paul; it was the center of Christian theology, a sine qua non of Christian doctrine. The Reformers recognized its central place 1500 years later and declared that it was the doctrine by which churches, as well as individuals, stand or fall. (John Robbins, Why Heretics Win Battles)