UPDATE: 11:13:08 Open commenting is now over, and moderated commenting will be the norm for the foreseeable future. Expect ACTIVE moderation.
Several years ago I wrote an essay on sola fide- salvation by faith alone- that I really liked, but no one else seemed to like.
At the time, when I was just starting to get a little attention for my writing, I thought that it was simply overlooked. Today, I have another theory.
Evangelicals have gone pretty soft on salvation by faith ALONE.
Sola fide doesn’t sit very well with a lot of evangelicals. In fact, I’m not sure they believe it. I’m quite sure that a sizable group has thought it over and they don’t believe it.
Sola fide is that annoying little item over which we had a reformation. Roman Catholics really don’t care for that word “alone”, and they have some reasonable basis for concern. Articulation of sola fide by Protestants is notoriously bad.
What we believe- as I understand it- is something like this. (Theological Attack Bloggers: Cut me some slack please. I’m not a Ph.d.)
We are justified by the work of Christ alone, credited to us as righteousness as we place our faith in Christ- alone. This is ultimately the work of God alone, and therefore is all of grace.
Works of any kind, including any conception of faith as a “work,†is extraneous to justification per se, but not extraneous to the reality of faith. So faith is accompanied by imperfect but genuine repentance, love, obedience, confession and perseverance. None of these things are identical with faith and all partake of the both faith and works. Properly we say that these are the works of faith that accompany true faith. When we see faith, it is accompanied by these friends, but they are not identical.
This is all a lot of trouble and semantics from the ordinary Joe’s point of view, and I am really sympathetic. I really am. But when I consider the importance of sola fide, I have to conclude that it’s worth all that trouble. Wake up the kids, Martha. We need to talk.
Mixing “faith alone†with anything else produces a bastardized notion of salvation; a synergism that is eventually going to be tilted toward works in a way that will sink the ship on the rocks of despair, legalism or intellectualism.
Sola fide is like Nehemiah’s wall. Build it. Build it before you do anything else. Build it if you have to fight while you build it. Build it if you have enemies outside the walls and subversives within. (You’ll have both.)
Hold onto sola fide and you will be saved. Best of all, the Holy Spirit will give you the sweet assurance that you are saved because salvation is by grace alone, by Christ alone and by faith- simple faith- alone. That you need “saving†and that you believe Christ provides it for you sufficiently by his person and work- this is all that is required.
But what concerns me today is not some theologically subtleties. What concerns me are the practical denials of sola fide that seem to pour out of evangelicalism’s transformation of itself from a “Gospel†movement to a “culture war†movement.
Just listen and read, and you will hear exceptions to sola fide from right and left.
The burden of sola fide seems to be too much for many of us. We glibly talk as if it is really nothing unusual if we add our theological preferences, our politics or our social/cultural causes to what “must†be believed. Our own astonishment that someone would feel/act/believe differently than we do intrudes into sola fide with such ease that we ought to be shocked and ashamed. But we’re not.
I grew up in a church that would have told you that you had to believe in salvation by faith alone to be a Baptist. I minister among those same people today.
And what do I hear?
I hear that no Christian could read Harry Potter.
I hear that no Christian would wear that t-shirt or listen to that kind of music.
I hear that no Christian could possibly not see in the Bible all the things that I see there.
I hear that if you are a Christian, you must support these political views.
I hear that a person can’t be a Christian and not oppose another set of political views.’
I hear dress codes called “the way Christians should dress.â€
I hear in reference to any number of sins common to human beings that “no one could be a Christian and do that.â€
And with every statement (and many more) sola fide is dismantled a bit more.
Martyn Lloyd-Jones once said that if you aren’t regularly accused of being an antinomian, you probably haven’t preached the Gospel. I absolutely agree.
I’m tired of the young Christians I disciple, preach to and teach hearing the fine print, the extra bonus messages and the added essentials. One order of sola fide, please. Hold the artificial additives.
I believe in the reformation Gospel of the five solas, not only because scripture teaches them, but because I can’t be saved otherwise.
If you put the human element- even in the guise of theology, or culture transformation or politics- into the Gospel, I’m doomed and damned. If works or sincerity or character change are in there at all, I’m toast.
Sola fide, 120 proof grace and no works on my part are the only way I am going to be saved.
When you begin to talk about the works of love that always come from faith, I agree. But I also know that all my righteousness is as filthy rags, and once my fingers are on the ark, I’m dropped dead.
Sola fide can’t be tampered with, and evangelicals are not just tampering with it. Many are in the kitchen completely remixing the recipe.
I don’t know what cake they are baking, but it doesn’t smell like Jesus or his salvation.
I say let’s toss whatever isn’t sola fide to the back yard and bring out the good stuff.
The harmonizations and oppositions of James and Paul have been going for for centuries and won’t ever stop.
I’m simply speaking honestly. If the God of the Bible says to me that salvation includes works, then I simply cannot be saved. I have absolutely no works at all of any kind that are in any way even approaching acceptability to God.
Faith is never alone. I made that clear. It is accompanied by many things, but if those things contribute anything to God’s view of me, then I’m not going to be saved.
You cited Luther: >Therefore justification does not require the works of the Law; but it does require a living faith, which performs its works.â€
That’s exactly what I believe and exactly what I’ve blogged above. Living faith produces many things that do not contribute to justification.
peace
MS
“Living faith produces many things that do not contribute to justification.”
This, I found to be an extremely helpful observation.
Hm.
This is really good, Michael.
Hmph..
My view on all of this is deeply influenced by the teaching of Robert Capon. Read “Between Noon and Three” and really any of his books.
I’m very committed to the law/Gospel distinction, and I’d rather err on the side of universalism than any other direction. I reject transactionalism and I believe salvation comes by the gracious existential application of the sacrament of the cross/Gospel to a broken world under judgement.
In the IM archives, you might want to read “Our Problem With Grace.” That can also be found in the iMonk 101 category.
Jesus convinces me that salvation is revealed utterly and completely in the grace of God and comes by faith alone by Christ the mediator alone. If this were not true, I would say Christianity is inferior to at least two other religions.
So to me, this is the deal breaker.
MS
Works are all well & good, but if we think we’re somehow gaining God’s favor with them we’re dead wrong. Which works are the saving works? How many of them do I have to do to make sure I’ve done enough? If I stumble, how long before my works “bank” is low enough that I need to be concerned about my salvation again?
There are two dangerous outcomes to this–some people can become neurotic, chronically discouraged, constantly chasing God’s favor, exhausting themselves & everyone around them always trying to be good. Others can get a pretty good handle on good works, and think they must be doing well with God because of all these good things they’re doing…and then become smug & self-righteous.
I’m going to bring up part of Ephesians 2:8-9, the passage I mentioned earlier: “…not by works, so that no man can boast.”
In my opinion, it’s salvation that produces the good works, as a result of being a new creation. With Christ living in me, it’s not me doing the works by my own efforts; rather, it’s evidence of Christ’s life in me producing the desire to do such works.
And those who know me personally can attest that on my own efforts I get pretty much nowhere.
Any good on my part has to be because of Christ in me.
Again Michael, you aren’t making the distinction between *Salvation* and *Justification* in your thinking. I feel Paul best sums up the distinction in I Corinthians 3:12-15 :
“Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.”
You are right, works are not necessary for your salvation, but we have Scriptural assurance that our works bring us further reward in Heaven, even though as Paul says a few verses earlier we can only do them by the Grace of God. You say that Justification is by “Faith Alone”, but need to qualify this with “not a faith that is alone”. This makes Sola Fide a useless teaching, as it needs to be qualified out of existence.
Again I emphasize, Justification is not Salvation. Salvation is by Grace Alone, and Justification is the working out of that Salvation through the Works of Faith, as taught by Jesus, Paul, and James.
I liked this post a lot Mr. Spencer. I think David Wells makes a great case in The Courage to Be Protestant that evangelicals – if they are to survive, much less thrive – need to recapture their understanding and embrace of the Solas.
Keep up the writing…
Nick
>Justification is the working out of that Salvation through the Works of Faith.
Thanks for the kind response Sam.
Of course, you realize that all of Protestantism disagrees with the sentence above, and the disagreement is at the heart of the Gospel.
As I’ve said multiple times, by this definition, I cannot go to heaven or be declared right with God, and really, I couldn’t be a Christian.
I sat on the couch and thought long and hard about this last night. Were I to get up this morning convinced that salvation is real only through works of faith, I would be in complete despair.
It is a small theological distinction you’re promoting, but I once heard Mark Shea say that only after his conversion to Catholicism, when he was NO LONGER SURE he was going to heaven, did he really feel he was living the Christian life. (Or something similar. Forgive me Mark if I misquote too badly.)
This is the abyss for me. I can’t speak for anyone else. But it is the pit of despair. I am currently teaching Galatians, and every day I do I go home rejoicing that Paul said three times in one paragraph no one is justified by works of the law.
I believe that living faith produces works. I also believe that my faith is insufficient, my works are insufficient and my righteousness is insufficient. Any command that I “work out my salvation by “works of faith” rather than by “faith that produces works” damns me and leaves me in despair.
One mediator. One gift of righteousness. One sovereign declaration of justification. One salvation by faith, grace, Christ alone that produces imperfect repentance, obedience, etc.
Convince me otherwise, and convince me to abandon Christianity.
peace
MS
Thanks for giving me a little more time, IMonk.
skerrib, I agree totally that “if we think we’re somehow gaining God’s favor with them we’re dead wrong.” That’s not what I’m trying to propose, at least, but I see that the distinction isn’t ridiculously apparent.
yall have a good weekend
Christina,
We have a different concept of how salvation works and what it means to be saved. You’re saved in a court room, we’re saved in a family room.
Just to echo what iMonk said after your last post and add my own thought. There is a difference between the family room and the court room. They are distinct but inseperable.
I think two elements that wed these together– (1) Union with Christ and (2) Covenant. In our union with Christ, we recieve a forensic verdict and a righteousness outside ourselves (justification) and we are transformed which produces righteousness (sanctification) inside of us (albeit never perfection that we need before God). In this respect justification and sanctification are distinct but always inseperable. The end of union with Christ is of course full glorification. This union is experienced through faith alone although it evidences itself through the fruit of the Spirit.
(2) Covenant is one of those images that in the Bible weds the legal with the familial. Covenants have legal concepts in the Old Testament especially when you consider the covenant lawsuit of the prophets. Covenants also have relational (you might say familial) overtones as well–particularly as you think of the marriage supper of the Lamb and other Biblical covenants.
iMonk,
I couldn’t agree more, if we don’t know for sure where we stand before God it is the pit of despair. Nothing can seperate us from Christ’s love–why? Because it is God who justifies. No charge of guilt can hang over us–despite any sins we might commit. (Romans 8:31-35).
-Tim
I sat on the couch and thought long and hard about this last night. Were I to get up this morning convinced that salvation is real only through works of faith, I would be in complete despair.
For me what you say is the abyss. If my salvation was based on my faith, my fickleness would frighten me.
My salvation is not dependent upon works or faith, but upon GRACE.
- We are adopted into God’s family (Baptism – ALL GRACE)
- We accept the teachings and rules of the house (faith brought by GRACE).
- We try to live according to those teachings (works in GRACE).
- We graduate and it’s decided whether or not we come back to live in the house forever (Judgment).
When a child does the dishes or takes out the trash, they’ve not EARNED the right to live in the family, to have the family name. BUT that same child can consistently CHOOSE to not live by the house rules and thereby need to be forcibly removed from the house (or choose to remove himself, disowning his family).
Can we do any good on our own? NO! Apart from God’s grace we can do nothing! Take the dishes example. In order to do the dishes the child must be a member of the house, be provided with the training, the dishes, the soap, the time/reminder, the promptings even. Yet the parent praises the child…for what? For choosing to do what the parent asked. EVEN if the parent had to help every step of the way because the child was prone to drop/break the dishes the child is still praised.
Should the child refuse to do the dishes, even lashing out at the parent who tries to help then the child is punished. If the child continuously refuses to live by the faith they say they profess, upon reaching ‘independence’ their removed from the home – or they run away earlier. They’ve chosen to leave and for us, the point it’s final is death. God delays this as long as possible, giving us every opportunity to turn to him, but if we choose to reject his love he lets us do so!
You need not be afraid of this teaching my brother, for it contains life! We do not EARN our right to be members of the family, either by the strength of our weak faith OR by the number of our works. We are members by our Adoption through the blood of Jesus Christ! Yes we can reject our adoption, it’s silliness to presume that because you said “I believe” when you were 16 that will be your ticket to heaven.
Yet you KNOW this is silliness so you’ve created some mysterious “living faith”. Yet the more you describe it it’s not “faith alone” at all! What you believe is that you must be saved by God’s grace, made manifest in your faith (through God’s grace) working in love (possible only with God’s grace).
Grace alone will set you free from this and solves this problem. Why do you cling to something that is bringing you down? You’re drowning in a sea of contradictory teachings over something that doesn’t even exist in the bible! There is a safe ship you can board and be free of these fears!
Our relationship with God is not a legal “I believe therefor you MUST let me in” nor is it a legal “I did X,Y, and Z therefore you MUST let me in.” but a love! “I trust you lord to help my unbelief, train me in the way of perfection so I can be “perfect as you are” I trust you Lord that you will not let me die in rebellion, but will give me every possible opportunity of returning to you and repenting.” I TRUST you Lord with my life and my salvation and I seek to conform my will to yours in every action of every day. I trust that every event you’ve put in my life is a lesson to how to serve you better. I trust you’ll punish me when I fail so that I won’t become a spoiled brat and leave the house in a tantrum. I trust in your grace and your grace alone to perfect me in holiness. Lord I give everything I am and will be to your divine providence, I AM YOURS!”
In heaven we will be perfect as our father is perfect, as Jesus REQUIRES of us. It will be not by our own power that happens, but through God’s grace. We’ll not be “snow covered dung-hills”; my heart yearns for more. I want to truly love, to give of myself and be given back. I want to be able to give COMPLETELY of myself and to be able to accept another back completely. This is heaven! We cannot do that unless we’re perfect. God offers us this cleansing, TRUE cleansing. He doesn’t pretend we’re clean, but cleans us through the events in our lives. He teaches us and raises us as children, for that’s what we are, children! It is a family room and a court room. We’re raised by the Father so that when we stand before the Judge, who is one and the same, we are judged by the Father. What a terrible knowledge and wonderful blessing!
Our works do not save us, but nor does our faith! They are elements by which we respond to what does save us, God’s grace and his grace alone.
Tim,
we receive a forensic verdict and a righteousness outside ourselves (justification) God’s WORD is powerful. If God were to say, “Christina you’re a man.” It’s not just an extrinsic act, I would begin changing into a man.
Now that may be a silly example, but it’s illustrating the point that when God speaks it happens. His very Word creates because the “Word is God and through the Word all things came into being.”
To say that God says “your righteous” and it doesn’t really happen is to make God a liar.
if we don’t know for sure where we stand before God it is the pit of despair.
I KNOW where I stand before God, I’m his beloved, flawed, often disobedient child. I know when I’m disobedient and I know when I need to apologize (if not through my shame, then he usually lets me know. I know that I’m far from perfect now, but I trust God to train me in the way of perfection and will eventual lead me whole into his kingdom.
OK. I’m getting preached at, which is not what IM is about. Since I’m not converting to Catholicism, we can all relax.
Christina:
It’s very odd for a Catholic to be telling me that I have somehow denied that salvation is by grace. I’ve said it over and over, from almost the first paragraph of the post. Please recognize that I’m not dense or uninformed on the RCC’s concept of grace. I live with a Catholic and I’ve done nothing much the last two years but listen to and read the Catholic case.
It’s very odd for you to tell me that the RCC is offering me a gracious Gospel of absolute assurance, because I know that the RCC doesn’t offer that assurance, but only a hope. And don’t even start me on purgatory, Indulgences, etc.
I’ve talked about grace here. It’s THE reason I’m not moving from the solas to Rome’s Gospel.
http://www.internetmonk.com/articles/G/grace.html
Peace
MS
OK. I’m getting preached at, which is not what IM is about. Since I’m not converting to Catholicism, we can all relax.
Yes I got emotional, I want to rejoice with you in heaven. Now I’m not saying you can’t get there as you are, you sound like a great swimmer, but it’s much safer on the boat.
However, I will try to limit my emotional outbursts from now on.
It’s very odd for you to tell me that the RCC is offering me a gracious Gospel of absolute assurance, because I know that the RCC doesn’t offer that assurance, but only a hope.
I didn’t mean to imply I was offering a gospel of absolute assurance. I tried to make it clear that we can fall away and reject God’s love, but our hope is real and strong.
I would like to point out that you don’t offer absolute assurance either. What is living faith? How many works does it take to go from dead faith to living? Are you really saved? Are you sure?
And don’t even start me on purgatory, Indulgences, etc.
No, we’re not allowed to go off topic
As for Grace, I feel “faith alone” denies grace on some level. I feel that we’re saved by God’s Grace and our response (acceptance) is faith working in love. I think we’re actually very close, for as I understand it you say we’re saved by Grace and our response is faith which produces love.
I’m reading your article now though, I just wanted to clarify those items first.
*produces good works out of love* accidentally left that out…
>Now I’m not saying you can’t get there as you are, you sound like a great swimmer, but it’s much safer on the boat.
Not on a boat that teaches justification and sanctification are the same thing, that purgatory completes Christ’s work and that the church is still handing out indulgences. I’m stick with my piece of evangelcial driftwood.
Now where are all the Catholics who have been telling me for months that I really am a Christian? C’mon Alan and Amy
If I lack assurance, it’s not because assurance isn’t available. Scripture is resounding that there is no condemnation for those who are IN Christ Jesus. If that means “In formal communion with the Bishop of Rome,” then there’s no assurance. If it means I trust in Christ alone and in myself NOT AT ALL, then I have assurance. And I do.
In fact, I think the problem most people, Catholics and Protestants, have with the Gospel is that it offers too much assurance. Way more than anyone can deal with from the standpoint of defending religion as necessary for mediation with God. It’s the elder brother coming to my party where I’ve been raised from the dead by my father and saying “Well….you have some hope that the father will receive you if you join the Catholic church etc etc etc.”
Excuse me, I’m going to the buffet. This is MY resurrection party.
See Keller, The Prodigal God
peace
MS
This is a great site. I have ready many of the comments. I am sure many will mot like what I am going to say. Countless Christians have made their particulars churchs or demonination an idol in their hearts giving to its name or programs a loyal and devotion that ought to be giving to God.
Jesus is Lord you don’t make Him Lord of your life. You submit to His Lordship. You don’t have the ability to make Him Lord, that would make you greater than the Lord if it was possible for you to make Him Lord. Is is God 100% and it will always be God.
You are christian if you’ve been validly baptized, that’s true, but all Christians are imperfectly joined with the Catholic Church if not in union with Rome.
I don’t know if the metaphor of the ship mixes well with that truth, I didn’t mean to imply that you were not a Christian.
Purgatory is off topic, but I will say that your understanding is incomplete.
Scripture is resounding that there is no condemnation for those who are IN Christ Jesus.
What does “in Christ” mean?
If it means I trust in Christ alone and in myself NOT AT ALL, then I have assurance. And I do.
What if you stop trusting? What if you decide that today you can do it on your own? Have you lost your assurance?
If that means “In formal communion with the Bishop of Rome,†then there’s no assurance.
You’re right, there is no assurance that I know today I’ll be in Heaven when I die. That’s presumption. However, I know what Rome teaches since there is the Catechism. Even if I didn’t, what is required is the obedience to the authorities Jesus has given us. Am I obedient? If not I can go to confession to be forgiven. Not assurance, but hope, strong powerful hope.
Tim and Michael, you guys are doing a pretty good job of convincing me that I didn’t understand sola fide to begin with, just by how you’re talking about it here.
Michael, when you said this though,
“I once heard Mark Shea say that only after his conversion to Catholicism, when he was NO LONGER SURE he was going to heaven, did he really feel he was living the Christian life… This is the abyss for me.”
I have to admit that I feel the complete opposite.
I’m going to extemporize a little bit, to see if I can’t find us some common ground.
I guess it comes down to where the Bible is in your life: if you’re looking into it for a roadmap to salvation, you go to war with your inner doubt intellectually. Certainty of salvation is proof of salvation. But Catholics are taught the meaning of our faith in the Mass: we look around at each other, see the giant cross in front of us, and recall that not everybody at the foot of the first cross believed in Jesus, and find ourselves humbled accordingly.
I can’t speak for all of us, but all the Catholics I know find the faith humiliating to their desire for certainty. We have a rational religion and we have the sacraments: in between, a sea of people are discovering their moral ignorance and confessing it. Catholic Christianity, in that sense, is better understood as an attitude – distinct from the attitude we observe in a ‘Sanctified, Sold-Out, Spirit-Filled Faith In Jesus As My Lord and Savior (TM)’. We’re just not naive enough to believe that the our struggling faith and fool-ass living is evidence of God’s greatness and sacrifice.
Salvation is something we SEE attained for us mystically, so what we DO because of it reveals to US how weak and uncertain our faith in Jesus really is. We connect our actions to eternal salvation reflexively, because all of Catholicism is tied up in words we hear at Mass every week: “do this in memory of me.”
I’m getting a lot out of the incidental little things you say (here and in your article). It’s obvious to me that I have a lot of knots to untie in my own faith if it’s ever going to mean anything. Keep it up.
Christina:
OK. That’s the last word on that.
The point of IM is to NOT have that discussion. Attempting to convert me, you or other commenters is simply not allowed here. Since you’re new, you probably weren’t aware of that.
I appreciate the invitation to join the one true Church. Trust me, it would be a lot less trouble at my house if I did.
But these conversations move me a lot closer to Buddhism than to another team of Christians.
So peace
MS
This is the abyss for me. I can’t speak for anyone else. But it is the pit of despair.
I hear that. I don’t know what your runner-up religions are, but my list starts with a pessimistic form of nihilism. If I can’t look to the cross and say, “Jesus did it all,” then I’m as good as dead.
Patrick:
>Salvation is something we SEE attained for us mystically, so what we DO because of it reveals to US how weak and uncertain our faith in Jesus really is.
This sentence is highly descriptive of my understanding of salvation via Luther and Capon.
Let me channel Capon for a second:
The cross is a sacramental event that reveals a salvation that exists eternally in the person of the second person of the Trinity, who has always been the mediator between God and all of creation for all time.
In the cross I apprehend the complete salvation that is in God himself. God is the Gospel (That’s Piper, not Capon.)
In the story of the Prodigal, the son’s faith is imperfect. We know nothing of what he will do tomorrow. What we know is 1) the God who was always forgiving him through his own mercy and 2) the elder brother’s works based, transaction based understanding of the family.
The son is imperfect at all times, but he is “alive again,” and discovers this fin his father’s embrace. Such grace was always his, but he refused it. This did not change it, only his experience of it.
We repent, believe, confess our sins, exp forgiveness in real time etc because of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
This is in the eucharist for me: the true presence of the mediator revealed in the Biblical story and available to all, for nothing. Imperfect faith and DEATH are the ways to find life.
peace
ms
imonk: i was a little surprised to hear you talk so much about assurance and despair, considering your praise on several occasions for The Myth of Certainty. isn’t commitment what is important, not just assurance or certainty of any sort of security? do we love God because he first loved us or because we have a get out of jail free card? i certainly am not trying to convert you to anything different or of course not try to send your faith into despair–but isn’t “faith” in the fullness of the word much stronger than it’s attachment to simply one concept?
Differences evaporate.
When you had a Capon quote up awhile back, I thought to myself, “I’m not sure I like this guy”. In my experience, instinctive contempt really means one of two things: 1) I have an idea, or 2) I’m about to be won over and I don’t like it.
Sounds like I’m going to be reading some Capon. This is another example of a random Protestant being more Catholic than most of us, I think.
From his wiki,
“Capon described himself in the introduction to one of his books as an “old-fashioned high churchman and a Thomist to boot.â€
Thanks, dude.
The Myth of Certainty isn’t about the Gospel or assurance. It’s about all the things we attach to our faith about which scripture doesn’t give us a sure word.
But Jesus = salvation is a sure word. There’s one mediator and he has me.
End of assurance issue.
addendum: I just read in an article that Fr. Capon once referred to Augustine as having a “romantic” stance on Christianity – YES!!!! That’s what I’m talking about.
“The Myth of Certainty isn’t about the Gospel or assurance…”
I know this is a pretty standard Evangelical take, but, in the post-Evangelical wilderness, does it look any different to you? Has your understanding of the meaning of this statement changed in the last 20 years in the SBC?
End of assurance issue.
I was really confused until you posted this. I didn’t realize assurance was off topic. I tend to wander off quite often huh?
Since I don’t want to drive you to Buddhism I’ll wander off into my own world for now. Perhaps you could do a post on Purgatory and indulgences (I missed the last one)…that would be fun
Please keep me in your prayers!
Christina
(Tim=quote)
I couldn’t agree more, if we don’t know for sure where we stand before God it is the pit of despair. Nothing can seperate us from Christ’s love–why? Because it is God who justifies. No charge of guilt can hang over us–despite any sins we might commit. (Romans 8:31-35).
Excactly Tim, this is the only way we can have “The joy of our salvation”, because justification comes from God alone. We will never measure up to God’s requirments, we just have to have faith that Jesus is enough.
Christine, please don’t ask for another post on Indulgences. The last one was way more than enough for a lifetime. Check the archives…
Been following this one closely. Way to go iMonk!
Ultimately assurance is about confidence that God is good and will keep the promises He made to us in His Son. Phillip Carey says that to undermine the hard promises of Christ made to the beiever is to call Him a liar. Some of us are absolutely unable to “do the Christian life” under a cloud of doubt as to God’s disposition towards us, especially if His disposition can change on a daily basis depending on how well we are “living the Christian life”. How warped do people end up when they grow up uncertain of a parent’s love and constantly scared about damaging that love beyond repair by being “bad”? Even more so with our heavenly Father. And lack of certainty is a good thing according to some of you guys? You Evangelicals who reject Sola Fide need to talk to your RC brethren and see if you can join up under a “Roman Catholic lite” clause in Canon law, because minus the sacraments, saints, and pope, you guys are preaching the same message.
I’m with iMonk, if its not grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone, to hell with the whole business, Zen Buddhism, here I come.
Christiana:
Pope Benedict believes even an atheist who has good intentions can be saved, [mod edited]. That makes the Faith vs Works argument almost entirely moot to begin with….[mod edited] Only Evangelicals and ‘Evangelical Catholics’ argue over the Reformation contoversy: the modern RCC has decided neither faith OR works are really essential anyway, as long as some vestige of goodness remains. The flock or Roman apologists are beating what is a dead horse for Rome.
[Mod note: Sorry that I didn't read this one more carefully. My apologies to the thread.]
Christina:
>What if you stop trusting? What if you decide that today you can do it on your own? Have you lost your assurance?
A quote from a recent episode of the NBC sitcom,”30 Rock” seems appropriate to this kind of question:
Kenneth: “I don’t believe in hypotheticals. It’s like lying to your brain.”
joe only God saves,can you say what limit Gods mercy is? faith is not against good works, faith is about taking the image of Christ. God didn’t come in glory to declare Himself. He came in humility to show what mans glory could be and that glory is to emulate Him. I let you decide what He did while He was among us!
Joe, you’re probably right. All of us Roman Catholics have been betrayed by our now obviously-apostate church, whose demented, Christ-denying Bishop is determined to take to Hell with him.
We should probably renounce it and join your denomination. What did you say that was, again?
Patrick: Sorry for letting that one fly through without some attention. My apologies to the RCs in the discussion.
Gong back to the original post: What could any of us possibly do to earn our salvation? It’s a free gift. Period. However, once I have been given real life, eternal life, I will be different than I was before. Perhaps that will be difficult for others to see, especially at first, but God and I should both be seeing it.
Based on personal experience, I have found that this new life does produce growth. As I grow in Christ, I become more like him. It seems to be a somewhat slow process for me. How about you?
I have absolutely no need to run around inspecting other people, trying to figure out if they fit my requirements for being really alive in Christ. That’s between them and God. Yes, there are some people who take it upon themselves to do such things. I’ve known a bunch of them, and you probably have too. Perhaps your experiences vary from mine, but I have always found one or all of the following characteristics in those people:
1) They are doing a poor job of running their own lives and growing in Christ, so they seem to feel the need to tell me or you how to do it. I suppose they think we are an easier project than they are. They imagine themselves to be “experts†on such matters. They especially love to point out where they think we fall short or need improvements.
2) They are unable to run/manage/control their own family, so they want to run me or you.
3) They are an eternal “parent†who want to tell not only their own children, young or not, how to run their lives, but also you and me.
I’ve got my hands full with running my own life. Sorry, I’m not interested in trying to run yours. If you feel the need to examine my works, please examine your own first and when they’re all in perfect order I’d be happy to hear about how you did it.
I am sorry if I am repeating someone else’s words or thoughts. I read through the first half of the postings, but have to get going and wanted to comment.
imonk is right, but I have a slightly different perspective on the issue. There is a difference between the state of being saved and doing things which please the Almighty and bring Him honor and glory.
To use an extreme example; the Christian who is unfaithful to his wife does not lose his salvation, but he does dishonor the Lord and humiliate and shames his wife and in some cases ruins his marriage.
The woman who, as imonk mentioned, “dresses like that” does not lose her salvation, but wearing a short, tight skirt to church will place a stumbling block in front of some of her brothers, and some may be tempted to sin by lusting after her.
Paul states that women are to dress modestly. Yes, evangelicals have taken to defining what this means right down to the length of the skirt and all of that. I am not saying that we should do this, but what is Paul talking about in that passage?
Having faith in God is a bit like Loving God. Jesus could say that the commandment “Love the Lord your God…” was the greatest commandment, because God had defined what it meant to love Him. Jesus goes on to define it “if you love me you will keep my commandments”
There are those out there who say that they show their love for God by killing people. There are those who say they show their love for God by smoking pot. God, Himself defines what love is and tells His creation how we are to love Him.
It’s the same with having faith in God. There must be some definition to “faith”. “Faith” is demonstrated in myriad ways in the life of the individual believer. The Bible gives some very clear ways that faith in Christ will be demonstrated, and when we see something that runs completely counter to that, should it not at least give us pause?
“I don’t know what your runner-up religions are, but my list starts with a pessimistic form of nihilism. If I can’t look to the cross and say, “Jesus did it all,†then I’m as good as dead.”
Gammell, thank you for this powerful reminder of who I once was. Before being saved by God (before becoming a Christian), I *lived* this “pessimistic form of nihilism.” If God ever released me from His grip, I would go right back to that terrible place. I thank God that He won’t ever release me from His grip. Romans 8:30 is an unbreakable chain, praise be to God!
“And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified.”
Michael,
Do you share the concern that Fr. Ernesto mentions that “Sola Fide” may lead to complacency? Let’s ignore the argument about whether it’s correct and assume for the sake of discussion Sola Fide is correct that once saved your Heaven bound without doubt.
Surely works, performed out of the love of God and for His glorification, do have value or He would not have asked us to do them. Further we have verses speaking of laying up treasures in Heaven rather than Earth. So surely if we love God, we would naturally do the works He asked us to do. If we do them imperfectly, make that when we do them imperfectly or infrequently or reluctantly we are still showing our love for Him and indeed worshiping Him through works. So even if it does not influence our salvation one bit – it helps us to understand Him and to fulfill the commandment He gave us to strive to love Him with all that we have. What I mean to say is that regardless of whether Sola Fide is true or not, a Christian ought to live the same way. Either way, works in His name are inherantly part of the Christian life.
Aggie:
I am complacent. I am lazy. My spiritual life is a wreck. In terms of anything accomplished for Christ, I’m a mess.
I have to disagree with my good friends on the place of works.
Works ADORN the Gospel, but they provide NO assurance. Assurance is a Gospel work.
The high view of works in James in contra a faulty view of the faith, not the Gospel view of faith.
peace
MS
“Works ADORN the Gospel, but they provide NO assurance.” OK I agree with this, because I don’t believe in assurance – but the point was that when motivated by faith, works are simply a good thing, quite independently of any reward that may or may not be given.
By the way, I would count your honest discussion of God and sincere search for Christ as a good work especially in that it gives witness of your faith and it’s centrality in you life. That’s no small thing in this faithless cynical world.
You see, where I think the problem comes is that as a Protestant, I believe in works, but I believe all my works are completely impotent to save, to provide anything that contributes salvation or assurance. They are- in REFERENCE TO GOD’S HOLINESS- of a completely different essence than faith. BOTH faith and works are imperfect and tainted by sin, but faith rests on Christ alone, doing nothing, except trusting in him to be the resurrection and the life. So I value works for God’s sake and as God’s command.
I agree in much of what you say. Faith is the key work Christ seeks: John 6:28-29 (if I’m going to use John 6 against Sola Fide then I need to refer to it when it supports you). I think we Catholics view faithful charity, as imperfect as it is, as a way to show love for God. Since there are many ways to show love for Him and since faith is required for works to be of any use clearly faith >> works. So as you said it has some value, if it’s for God’s sake, and we can find some ground to agree on.
I’d rather define the limits of the disagreement than to fight round 536.
By faith alone. I am once again moved by Jesus’ sacrifice and His grace. When we substitute works for grace (in the million little ways we do this) it dulls the shocking (humbling!) truth that without His grace we are doomed and damned. I’m not as excited by a salvation that comes by reading my bible every day, attending church regularly, only reading Christian authors, or thinking Obama is the Antichrist. I’m moved to my knees, and into a live-changing faith, by the life of Jesus.
My husband and I often grieve the “salvation-by-works-and…” subtext in our evangelical circle of friends. It’s alarming how many friends DO NOT believe in sola fide. They say they do, until we start discussing the particulars. Most times, I don’t even want what they call Christianity.
What you described here is like music to my ears. I’m so glad I’m not crazy. I’m so glad it only takes faith to reach Jesus, because if it took something more I’d be doomed. No matter how much “better” I am now, I know my goodness is like filthy rags.
okay, tell me why does the Lord separate the goats and the sheep by their works. good works to the kingdom,no good works to everlasting damnation?
Many eschatological judgment passages feature works. Works reveal living faith. Faith without works is dead. Since judgment is evidentiary, the books are opened and works are reported.
But faith is the premise of all works and is throughout the Bible starting with Cain, Noah, Abraham, etc.
John 6:29 Jesus answered them, “This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.â€
>If the God of the Bible says to me that salvation includes works, then I simply cannot be saved. I have absolutely no works at all of any kind that are in any way even approaching acceptability to God.
>Faith is never alone. I made that clear. It is accompanied by many things, but if those things contribute anything to God’s view of me, then I’m not going to be saved.
On a purely personal and non-theological note, I really appreciated these statements. Although I believe in grace as the singular impetus for my salvation…I still constantly attempt to somehow merit my standing with God. This is countered at other times by the surrendering and declaration to God that if He needs more, I cannot provide it and I am lost. Maybe the most honest thing one can say to God. Son of David have mercy on me is the cry of one who cannot help himself and needs Him “alone”.
so living faith is doing His will, following Him(i’m guessing that means to imitate Him),this sounds like trusting and working to me!..and if you don’t you will go the way of the goats…unless you accept His grace of forgiveness by turning back to the way of the sheep(which sounds like more work to me,in way of repentance)…which tells me its better to believe in His fullness(teaching), than to sit around waiting for a free pass, that will send you with the goats…its clear to me if works reveal faith and they are living,then a good judgment by Gods “mercy” will put you in His Kingdom…
Michael,
Now that we found at least a small point of agreement I want to find the limits of Sola Fide. If faith alone is needed why baptize? If faith alone is needed why repent and do penance or make reparations (like return stolen goods etc)? Isn’t that unnecessary? Further if faith alone includes these things to be considered true faith then what distinguishes those things from works born of faith? Finally if Sola Fide really means you don’t need to Baptize or do anything else, why tithe or go to Church at all or read the Bible? Why not be fully slack?
why was God incarnate, why didn’t He just descend in a glorified body and tell the world, I’m the creator believe Me and have eternity in my presence or don’t and live in darkness! no need to fix your illness,just come as you are!no need for atonement, repentance,the angels could have told Abraham,Moses there was no need for all that non essential stuff,no need for all that scripture,the church,all that have died to protect His holy name.Come,come as you are as long as you believe I am who I say I am,I didn’t mean it when I said, when you did not do it to the least of these you did it also to me,so no damnation for your unrepentive illness.No need to overcome death.Death just come as you are, by the way my most beautiful angel, you know who I am come no need to heal your illness either!