"Justification by faith" — to a theologian these words express one of the most basic principles of the Christian faith. But to many people today, they're simply one more example of Christian jargon that seems to brand the church as too complicated and out of touch for our time. Is it real? Is it relevant? Does it matter? To the apostle Paul in our scripture reading for today, "justification by faith" was so important that he repeats it over and over again like a football coach going over and over the same drill again and again. To him and to his first readers, "justification by faith" was not primarily a theological concept. It was not meant as a technical term to be understood only by a select few. In fact, it was a response to a very real situation in the life of the church.

It all bega…