Billy Graham on Justification
Forensic — righteousness imputed, not infused
But God not only forgives the past, He clothes you in righteousness as though you had never committed a sin.
THE POSITION
Justification is more than forgiveness: God "clothes you in righteousness as though you had never committed a sin," at the cost of Christ's blood. Righteousness given to the sinner rather than worked in him is the forensic stance, but he never uses the word "declares" in what was read and does not set it beside an infused account, so the state is a lean.
5 and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth. To Him who loves us and has released us from our sins by His blood,
20 OTHERS HOLD THIS
ABOUT THIS FIGURE
Evangelist of the citywide crusades from 1947 to 2005, ordained a Southern Baptist minister, founder, with L. Nelson Bell, of Christianity Today (1956) and convener of the 1974 Lausanne Congress. He is generally reckoned to have preached in person to more people than anyone before him and was the public face of postwar evangelicalism. This entry rests on sermon texts dated 1951 to 2005 that the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association republishes on the Decision magazine website, his recorded Billy Graham Minutes, his daily devotions, interviews he gave to Time, Christianity Today, Newsweek and Robert Schuller, and the My Answer column that ran under his name. By the standard account the column was written with staff, so cells that rest on it say so.
Cite this page
"Billy Graham on Justification", Examined Doctrine, July 2026 edition, https://examineddoctrine.com/position/graham/justification (archived at https://examineddoctrine.com/editions/2026-07/position/graham/justification).