Tepid Lutherans Rydecki and Webber have studiously avoided the big question, just as Paul T. McCain has - "What about Bob?"
Webber and McCain earned their MDivs at The Surrendered Fort, where Church Growth was taught side by side with Lutheran orthodoxy. Kincaid Smith, ELS, got his DMin in Church Growth around that time.
Robert Preus' final book had justification in its title, so why are his former students not answering the question - "What about Bob?" They avoid it, just as they avoid all issues while endlessly repeating their talking point.
Dr. Robert Preus repudiated UOJ in his final book:
From Catholic, Lutheran, Protestant (second edition):
However, Preus clarified the true meaning of justification in his final book, Justification and Rome, which was published posthumously. Preus wrote this definitive comment:
"But the imputation of Christ's righteousness to the sinner takes place when the Holy Spirit brings him to faith through Baptism and the Word of the Gospel. Our sins were imputed to Christ at His suffering and death, imputed objectively after He, by His active and passive obedience, fulfilled and procured all righteousness for us. But the imputation of His righteousness to us takes place when we are brought to faith."
Preus immediately followed the statement above with a quotation from Quenstedt, one of his favorite orthodox Lutheran authors:
It is not just the same thing to say, “Christ’s righteousness is imputed to us” and to say “Christ is our righteousness.” For the imputation did not take place when Christ became our righteousness. The righteousness of Christ is the effect of His office. The imputation is the application of the effect of His office. The one, however, does not do away with the other. Christ is our righteousness effectively when He justifies us. His righteousness is ours objectively because our faith rests in Him. His righteousness is ours formally in that His righteousness is imputed to us.
Preus also quoted Abraham Calov with approval:
"Although Christ has acquired for us the remission of sins, justification, and sonship, God just the same does not justify us prior to our faith. Nor do we become God's children in Christ in such a way that justification in the mind of God takes place before we believe."
How much clearer could this be?
