Adopted by an act of Session on March 31, 2005

BE IT RESOLVED THAT:
(1) Any doctrine of justification that denies that faith alone, sola fide, as receiving and resting upon Christ alone for salvation, is the only instrumental means of justification, is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(2) Any doctrine of justification by faith that defines "faith" as being equivalent to or synonymous with "faithful obedience to God," "covenant faithfulness," "covenant obedience," and the like, is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards, tends toward the Romanist doctrine of justification, and thereby greatly disturbs and compromises the peace, purity, and unity of the church.

(3) Any doctrine of justification that denies the forensic nature of justification is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards. Therefore to define "to justify" as "to make righteous", and not "to declare and constitute as righteous", is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(4) Any doctrine of justification that teaches that justification is a process beginning with baptism and/or conversion ("initial" or "present justification"), which is contingent upon continual obedience to the Law of God, which can be lost by apostasy, and which is not completed until the Judgment Day in "final justification", is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards, denies the permanent, irreversible, and unrepeatable nature of God's once-for-all justifying verdict, and thus represents a most reprehensible, pernicious, and severe error.

(5) Any doctrine of justification that does not teach that immediately upon believing in Jesus, God instantly imputes the perfect righteousness of Christ to that believing sinner, so that on that basis he stands forgiven and accepted by God forever, never again to fall into condemnation, is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(6) Any doctrine of justification that blends justification and sanctification, or the imputing of righteousness and the imparting/infusing of righteousness, into one, is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(7) Any doctrine of the atoning death of Christ that does not teach that the death of Christ was a satisfaction of God's justice, and a propitiation of His righteous anger by the merits of Christ's obedient life and His death as the substitute of God's elect, is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(8) Any doctrine of baptism that teaches that all who are baptized with water are by that baptism necessarily or automatically incorporated into Christ and made the recipients of all the benefits of Christ's accomplished work, e.g., regeneration and justification, is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(9) Any doctrine of baptism that explains water baptism as the moment in which we are regenerated, or as the point of transfer from death to life, is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(10) Any doctrine of election that teaches that the elect can apostatize, or that baptism is the proof of election, is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(11) Any doctrine which asserts that believers in Jesus can lose their justification and salvation is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(12) Any doctrine that teaches that God accepts less than perfect obedience by Christ in behalf of the elect for fulfilling the conditions of salvation is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards. Any doctrine that denies the Covenant of Works is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(13) Any doctrine that denies that the covenant of grace was made with Christ as the second Adam, and in Him with all the elect as His seed, is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(14) Any doctrine which asserts that reprobate members of the visible church are "in the covenant of grace" and "in union with Christ" in the same sense as are the elect members of the church, until such time as these reprobate members "break the covenant" or apostatize, is contrary to the Bible and to the Westminster Standards.

(15) Any doctrine of the covenant that denies that the Lord's Supper is to be served only to such as are of years and ability to examine themselves, or that all ignorant and ungodly persons, as they are unfit to enjoy communion with Christ, so are they unworthy of the Lord's Table, and cannot, without great sin against Christ, while they remain such, partake of these holy mysteries, or be admitted thereunto, is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(16) Any doctrine of Biblical revelation that denies, downplays or undermines the propositional and systematic nature of the verbal and written revelation of God is contrary to the Bible and the Westminster Standards.

(17) Any ridiculing of the doctrines of sola gratia (grace alone), sola fide (faith alone), solo Christo (Christ alone), sola Scriptura (Scripture alone), or soli Deo Gloria (glory to God alone) is a ridiculing of the teaching of the Bible and the Westminster Standards, and hence is a serious assault against the peace, purity and unity of the church.

(18) Any ridiculing of the Westminster Standards as being a Greek and Hellenistic, and therefore an inadequate, interpretation of the Bible is a ridiculing of Biblical Christianity in one of its purest, most articulate human expressions.

Credit: The Session of Redeemer OPC of Toms River, NJ, gratefully acknowledges that the above resolutions are based upon the resolutions of the Reformed Presbyterian Church in the United States (RPCUS) with reference to the "New Perspective on Paul" Movement. Many of the above resolutions are taken almost word-for-word from the RPCUS resolutions.