. 6. Christ’s death justified guilty sinners. That is a legal, or judicial, term used to indicate that a person has been declared righteous. It does not mean that the elect are necessarily made perfect in and of themselves. In other words, sinners are not made personally holy and righteous in order to be accepted before God. Rather, they are declared to be sinless despite their lives and obvious guilt. God looks on them as though they had never sinned because Christ bore their sins for them