Love and faithfulness
meet together;
righteousness and
peace kiss each other.
Faithfulness springs
forth from the earth,
and righteousness
looks down from heaven.
(Ps. 85:10-11)
Whilst writing this book, I was chatting with my wife, also a convert to Catholicism, about certain passages in Paul’s letter to the Romans. We had roughly the following conversation:
N.: “Funny, this whole thing about justification by faith or works.”
A.: “Oh?”
“Well, it is one of the things
which Evangelicals have a problem with Catholicism about, whether faith is
sufficient for salvation or whether works are an essential part of it.”
“Is that what they believe then?”
“What?”
“That you have to do good works
to be saved.”
“Er, no, that’s what they say
we believe.”
“Oh? Where did they get that
from?”
“Er, well, that’s what I’m trying
to work out.”
“Oh, well you see, I thought
maybe that’s what they believe,
because they always seem to work ever so hard at their religion, these
Evangelicals…”
It just goes to show how easy it is to get the wrong end of
the stick, doesn’t it? And it also shows how important it is for us to discuss
what we believe with other types of
Christians – or else we will
That the issue of salvation can be such a source of misunderstanding is ironic, for in truth there is very little difference between what Catholics and Protestants believe on this matter, in comparison with some other issues. More work has been done on this issue by ecumenical think-tanks than perhaps any other, [1] precisely because our beliefs are so compatible. Yet, sadly, relatively little of this work of reconciliation seems to have percolated down to the grass-roots. I have been told again and again by Evangelicals that I believe that I am saved by my good works. Not so.
“What must I do?”
When the young man asked Jesus, “Good teacher…, what must I do to inherit eternal life?” (Mk. 10:17) he was probably hoping for a simple straightforward answer. He didn’t get one, and nor will we if, as we must, we look at the testimony of Scripture.
There are many passages in the Bible, princip
To
For God so loved the world that
he gave his one and only Son, so that those who believe in him sh
Whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life and will not be condemned; he has crossed over from death to life. (Jn. 5:24)
This righteousness from God comes
through faith in Jesus Christ to
“Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness.” […] He did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised. This is why “it was credited to him as righteousness.” The words “it was credited to him” were written not for him alone, but also for us, to whom God will credit righteousness – for us who believe in him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead. (Rom. 4:3,20-24)
If you confess with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you confess and are saved. (Rom. 10:9-10)
The law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith. (Gal. 3:24)
In Christ Jesus… the only thing that counts is faith… (Gal. 5:6)
By contrast, there are also many passages in the New
Testament which suggest that God will repay us according to our deeds, even if
we believe in Jesus and have confirmed our faith in him. The most famous one,
apparently perhaps a direct ch
What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him?... Faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead… Do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? Was not our ancestor Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did… You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone… Faith without deeds is dead. (Ja. 2:14,17,20-22,24)
But there are other passages which require examination, both by John:
Anyone who does not love remains
in death. Anyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no
murderer has eternal life in him.
This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers. If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth. This is how we know that we belong to the truth, and how we set our hearts at rest in his presence. (1 Jn. 3:14-19)
and by Paul himself:
God will give to each person according to what he has done. To those who seek glory, honour and immortality, he will give eternal life. But for those who are self-seeking and who reject the truth and follow evil, there will be wrath and anger. (Rom. 2:6-8)
It is not those who hear the law who are righteous in God’s sight, but it is those who obey the law who will be declared righteous. (Rom. 2:13)
If you live according to the sinful nature, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the misdeeds of the body, you will live. (Rom. 8:13)
Keeping God’s commands is what counts. (1 Cor. 7:19)
We must
The acts of the sinful nature are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery; idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God. (Gal. 5:19-21)
Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds… In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life. (1 Tim. 6:18-19) [2]
not to mention, of course, Jesus:
“Anyone who breaks one of the least
of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be c
“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.” (Matt. 7:21)
“As the weeds are pulled up and
burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the age. The Son of Man will send
out his angels, and they will weed out of his kingdom everything that causes
sin and
“If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me… For the Son of Man is going to come in his Father’s glory with his angels, and then he will reward each person according to what he has done.” (Matt. 16:24,27)
“A time is coming when
“Behold, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to everyone according to what he has done.” (Rev. 22:12)
And of course the entire parable of the sheep and the goats (Matt. 25:31-46) brings these points home most forcefully. I suggest you read it in its entirety now, in your own Bible. At its conclusion, the Lord makes His message uncomfortably clear:
“I tell you
the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these,
you did not
do for me.”
Then they
will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life. (Matt.
25:45-46)
How can we reconcile these apparent differences in the
scriptural testimony? No, we may not declare the verses we don’t like “obscure”
or “difficult” and re-interpret them according to the verses we like best! Nor
is it honest to set Scripture against Scripture by suggesting that, say, Romans
3-6 or Galatians 3-5 are “central” to the issue of justification and salvation
whilst, say, James 2 or 1 John are “peripheral”. If it is truly
Sola fide
One man who delved very deeply into what Paul meant by faith
was Martin Luther. Luther was so passionate about the importance of faith as
the means of justification that in his translation of the Bible he added the
word
For we hold that a man is justified by faith apart from works of law. (RSV)
Luther wrote instead:
For we hold that a man is justified apart from works of law, only through faith. (Luther Bible, my emphasis) [3]
This caused an understandable furore, both among Protestants and Catholics. But Luther was unrepentant, writing, in an open letter published in 1530:
If your papist wishes to make a
great fuss about the word sola [alone], say this to him: “Dr. Martin
Luther will have it so, and he says that a papist and a donkey are the same
thing.” I will it, I command it, my will is reason enough. For we are not going
to be students and disciples of the papists. Rather, we will become their teachers
and judges… Please do not give these donkeys any other answer to their useless
braying about that word sola than simply this: “Luther will have it so,
and he says that he is a doctor above
Luther went on to explain, in slightly more measured tones:
I know very well
that in Romans 3 the word solum [alone] is not in the Greek or Latin
text… [but] it conveys the sense of the text – if the translation is to be
clear and vigorous, it belongs there… It is the nature of our language that in
speaking about two things, one which is affirmed, the other denied, we use the
word
So did Luther add the word
I was not depending upon or
following the nature of the languages alone when I inserted the word solum
in Romans 3. The text itself, and Saint Paul's meaning, urgently require and demand
it. For in that passage he is dealing with the main point of Christian
doctrine, namely, that we are justified by faith in Christ without any works of
the Law… So, when
And so the phrase “faith alone” (or “only faith” – in Latin,
sola fide) passed into the lexicon of
Christian usage, becoming one of the great clarion c
But was Luther as justified as he was confident, in his interpretation of “Saint Paul’s
meaning”? Luther’s argument rested on two main presumptions: One was that “when
there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. (Gal. 3:28)
Paul’s principal concern, therefore, and the object of his various pronouncements concerning “faith” and “works”, was not necessarily a supposed opposition between works-righteousness and faith-righteousness, but between a salvation limited to the Torah-following Jews and one opened up to all humanity through faith in Christ. [8] Read Romans 3:28 in context, and this meaning is inescapable:
For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law. Is God the God of Jews only? Is he not the God of Gentiles too? Yes, of Gentiles too, since there is only one God, who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through that same faith. (Rom. 3:28-29)
Of course by Luther’s time such specifically Jewish concerns,
which had so exercised Paul, were no longer at the top of the Christian agenda.
Luther was faced with a Christian culture which, arguably, had become unnecessarily
obsessed with the minutiae of how to attain and maintain right standing with
God through good works in general. He adapted the lessons of Galatians and
Romans to the situation he faced. And so, non-biblical though “faith alone” may
be, we must not make the mistake of condemning it outright: sola fide is Luther’s midrash on Paul, so to speak – a pesher as novel and exciting as Jesus’s
and Paul’s re-interpretations of the Old Testament which we examined in Chapter
Three. Like sola scriptura, it may
have been necessary to create the sola
fide slogan, in the face of the apparent legalism of much Catholic practice
of Luther’s time. Certainly re-emphasising Paul’s words on justification by faith
has benefitted
Luther wished... to re-emphasize the gratuitousness of salvation on God’s part, the sovereign lordship of Christ in the task of redemption, the recognition of this gratuitousness and the awareness of this lordship in faith, the total disproportion between what a human person can do or deserve and the always unmerited gifts of forgiveness and new life from God... This... is in harmony with what the [Catholic ecumenical] Council of Trent [1545-63] taught. [9]
For all this, we must be grateful to Luther. However, the challenge remains that the phrases “only faith” or “faith alone” appear nowhere in the real Bible – except in the negative sense, in the letter of James: “a person is justified… not by faith alone” (Ja. 2:24, my emphasis)!
Oh dear, so what about James? Doesn’t he flatly contradict the concept of “faith alone”? Well, this is what Luther had to say about him:
I do not regard [the letter of James] as the writing of an apostle…
It is flatly against St. Paul and
This James does nothing more than drive to the law and its works. Besides,
he throws things together so chaotic
In a word, he wanted to guard against those who relied on
faith without works, but was unequal to the task in spirit, thought, and words.
He mangles the Scriptures and thereby opposes Paul and
So, according to Luther’s view, Paul and James are “against” each other. And therefore, if Paul is right, James must be wrong: in Luther’s words, “St. James’ Epistle is really an epistle of straw…; for it has nothing of the nature of the Gospel about it.” [11]
I hope you can see the problems inherent in adopting this
position. Instead of accepting
However, if we read the Bible carefully, it is not difficult
to conclude that, contrary to what Luther said, there is no opposition in God’s eyes between James on the one
hand, and “Paul and all Scripture” on the other. Sola fide is another piece of “theological shorthand” [13] – rather like
sola scriptura which we examined in
Chapter Five. In truth, the “biblical tension” [14] between faith and works weaves its way throughout Scripture, and is present in
the words of Christ, Paul, John, Peter, James and
Pistis
First, it is important to take a look at the exact words which the biblical writers used to describe “faith”. Religious historian Karen Armstrong writes:
The word translated “faith” in
the New Testament is the Greek pistis
(verbal form: pisteuo) which means
“trust; loyalty; engagement; commitment”. Jesus… was asking for commitment. He
wanted disciples who would engage with his mission, give
When the New Testament was
translated from Greek into Latin by St. Jerome (c. 342-420), pistis
became fides (“loyalty”). Fides had no verbal form, so for pisteuo, Jerome used the Latin verb credo, a word that derived from cor do: “I give my heart”… When the
Bible was translated into English, credo
and pisteuo became “I believe”… In
Middle English, bileven meant “to
prize; to value; to hold dear”… So “belief” origin
Read any of the “faith” quotes listed earlier in this chapter in this light, and its meaning is transformed and enriched. Try this one:
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, so that those who trust in him, are loyal to him, and dutifully engage in his mission [pisteuon] shall not perish but have eternal life. (Jn. 3:16, retranslated, my emphasis)
Or this one:
This righteousness from God comes
through engagement, commitment and duty
[pisteos] to Jesus Christ to
One could go on forever. But the point is made: that the modern meanings of words like “belief” or “faith”, which are often taken to denote mere intellectual assent to certain points of doctrine – often the giving of intellectual assent at one particular point in time – are unfit for purpose when we wish to understand what Jesus and the New Testament writers meant when they spoke about pistis. Perhaps a better translation than “faith” might be “faithfulness” or “fidelity” – implying an ongoing trust and allegiance, expressing itself in the life we lead rather than just the beliefs we hold. Read Paul’s words on pistis in this light and he does not seem so different from James. Paul and James do not contradict each other: they merely appear to emphasise different aspects of the same thing.
For the truth is that true faithfulness, true pistis, is never “alone”. Paul never said otherwise, as we have seen, nor did anyone else in the Bible. And Paul clarifies his use of the term further when writing to the Galatians, saying:
For in Christ Jesus… the only thing that counts is faith [pistis] expressing itself through love. (Gal. 5:6, my emphasis)
And Peter expands on this statement, explaining in greater detail exactly how faith expresses itself “through love”:
Make every effort to add to your
faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and
to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness,
brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love. For if you possess these
qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and
unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. But if anyone does not
have them, he is short-sighted and blind, and has forgotten that he has been
cleansed of his past sins.
Therefore, my brothers, be
And John shows how true faith, and true love, express themselves in the way we behave and act:
We know that we have come to know him if we obey his commands. The man who says, “I know him,” but does not do what he says is a liar, and the truth is not in him. But if anyone obeys his word, God’s love is truly made complete in him. This is how we know we are in him: Whoever claims to live in him must walk as Jesus did. (1 Jn. 2:3-6)
So faith, trust, loyalty, duty, commitment, goodness, knowledge,
self-control, perseverance, godliness, brotherly kindness, love, truth, and
obedience to the commands of Christ
Faith is the beginning, and love is the end; and the union of the two together is God. All that makes for a soul’s perfection follows in their train, for nobody who professes faith will commit sin, and nobody who possesses love can feel hatred. As the tree is known by its fruits, so they who claim to belong to Christ are known by their actions; for this work of ours does not consist in just making professions, but in a faith that is both practical and lasting. [17]
C. S. Lewis echoes Ignatius’s view:
Christians have often disputed as
to whether what leads the Christian home is good actions, or Faith in Christ. I
have no right re
This was also the conclusion, ironic
The sinner is justified by living
and efficacious faith, for through it we are pleasing and acceptable to God on
account of Christ… But this happens to no one unless also at the same time love
is infused which heals the will so that the healed may begin to fulfil the law.
[…]
By faith in Christ we are justified
or reckoned to be righteous, that is we are accepted through his merits and not
on account of our worthiness or works… Nevertheless God also renders a reward
to good works, not according to the substance of the works, nor because they
come from us, but to the extent that they are performed in faith and proceed
from the Holy Spirit, who dwells in us. [20]
Even John Calvin (no papal donkey he!) was happy with this agreement, writing:
You will marvel when you read the copy… that our adversaries [i.e. the Catholics] have conceded so much. For they have committed themselves to the essentials of what is our true teaching. Nothing is to be found in it which does not stand in our writings. [21]
How sad, then, that this conciliatory and biblical view was derailed by polemics and politics, and that Christians fell instead into the exchange of insults and false accusations which has continued for the best part of five centuries. For a concept of faithfulness/fides/pistis which includes love and goodness is one which all Christians can be happy with. The dangers arise if we start to divide pistis up into its constituent bits and pit them against one another.
Pistis divided
One of these dangers is to mistake mere belief, in its
modern sense (i.e. denoting little
more than intellectual assent) for pistis.
In the days when I was an atheist, I was put off Christianity many times by
being told by Christians: “All you have to do is believe that Jesus is the Son
of God, and you will go to Heaven.” I don’t know how many of the Christians who
said this to me (and there were many) had re
If we begin to misunderstand pistis in this way, we can also make a second mistake – of attaching too great an importance to the precise words with which we formulate our faith. As we have seen in previous chapters, the precise interpretation of Scripture is fraught with complexities. And so we should not be too worried about making sure that we express our faith (and that others express their faith) using absolutely the correct words. One thing the Bible never says is that our salvation depends upon expressing our beliefs correctly. One may be justified by faith in Jesus Christ. But one is not justified by believing in justification by faith, or by saying that one is justified by faith. Conversely, one is not “not justified” by not believing in “justification by faith”, or by failing to say so. In the previous chapter, we saw how J. I. Packer warns us against insisting upon “notional correctness” in the way people express their faith; he continues:
This concept of, in effect, justification, not by works but by words – words, that is, of notional soundness and precision – is near to being a cultic heresy in its own right. [22]
David Platt, chairman of the Southern Baptist Mission Board, echoes Packer, in this anecdote about “a friend who… found himself at a Southern Baptist church talking with an older man” about hell:
The man looked at my friend and said, “Well, you don't want to go to hell,
do you?”
“No,” my friend responded.
“Okay, then,” the man said, “pray this prayer after me. Dear Jesus…”
My friend paused. After some awkward silence, he realized that he was supposed
to repeat after the man, and so he hesitantly responded, “Dear Jesus.”
“I know I'm a sinner and I believe Jesus died on the cross for my sins,”
the man said.
My friend followed suit. “I ask you to come into my heart and to save me
from my sin,” the man said.
Again, my friend echoed what he'd heard.
“Amen,” the man concluded.
Then the man looked at my friend and said, “Son, you are saved from your
sins and you don't ever have to worry about hell again.” [23]
Platt tells this story to point out the problem of
people who thought they were saved because they prayed a certain prayer, but they lacked a biblical understanding of salvation and were in reality not saved... [24]
Unfortunately, his words bring us face-to-face with a third problem
associated with the hyper-analysis of pistis:
the idea that someone might not be saved because “they lacked a biblical understanding of salvation”!
Let us be clear, though: no one, neither Jesus nor Paul nor Luther, ever
suggested that “a biblical understanding of salvation” is necessary for
salvation. Again: one may be justified by faith in Jesus Christ, but one is not justified by having a “biblical
understanding” of how that justification takes place; and one is not damned for
having an insufficiently biblical understanding of salvation! (What, after all,
is sufficient!?) No, if sola fide
means anything at all, it means that our salvation comes in and with and from
our faithful, trustful, ongoing relationship with Jesus. In the words of Peter Kreeft,
“Faith is not the relation between an intellect and an idea, but the relation
between an I and a Thou.” [25] Or, as
Orthodox Bishop K
Perhaps the most dangerous pitfall associated with the
atomisation of pistis – our fourth – is that it can make faith, erroneously,
seem like something which we “do ourselves” – and which therefore actu
The idea is that there is a list
of things which God really wishes we would do – be kind to animals, be generous
to the poor, be against war and injustice; that on the list in “believe in
God”; and that, as a favour to Jesus, God has decided to let us off the rest of
the list if we will do just this one. But this proclamation is the precise
opposite of what the Reformation said. For the “believing” that can be one of a
list of desirable deeds or characteristics is just what the Reformers called a
“work”; moreover, it is the kind of special religious work against which they
mostly directed their polemic.
“God will be gracious,” we say,
“if only you believe,” thinking to follow the Reformation. Instead, we thereby
usually proclaim a works-righteousness that makes medieval Catholicism seem a
fount of pure grace. This “belief”-condition is either too easy or too hard. If,
as usually happens, “faith” is psychologised into the holding of certain
opinions and/or attitudes, then to offer salvation if only this work is done
(never mind others) peddles grace more cheaply then did the worst
indulgence-sellers. We usually sense this, and try to patch on a little authenticity
by adding a few more conditions such as “love” and “really” believing. Then even
the verbal reminiscence of the Reformation is lost, and the pattern of medieval
Catholicism is fully embraced. [27]
Gritsch and Jenson here sum up all four pitfalls we have identified so far. Sola fide, correctly understood, should turn us away from concern about whether or not we have met any “conditions” for salvation (whether faith, or works, or words, or even “biblical understanding”), towards a recognition of God’s majesty, grace and saving love. Incorrectly understood, sola fide can be made into an instrument of salvation-paranoia which turns our face away from God towards unhealthily individualistic navel-gazing and judgmentalism.
Salvation by grace
As Gritsch and Jenson point out, there is no evidence that Luther or the other great Reformers made such mistakes, aware as they doubtless were of their unworthiness before God. And here we come to the nub of the matter, the central fact which as Christians we must hold onto firmly: pistis is not something which originates from ourselves. It is, in its entirety, the gift of God. The apostle Paul writes:
It is by grace you have been saved, through faith – and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God – not by works, so that no-one can boast. For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (Eph. 2:8-10)
So, according to Paul, neither faith nor works are anything we can boast about; [28] both are acts of divine grace: that is why they belong to each other. In truth, we are saved neither by our self-generated faith nor by our self-generated works, but by God’s free gift (for that is what “grace” means), which brings about His pistis (which includes both belief and good works) in us.
Other passages in Scripture emphasise this point, but can be obscured in translation. For example, Philippians 3:8-9 is often translated like this:
I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ [ten dia pisteos Christou]. (Phil. 3:8-9)
However, the phrase which is here translated as “through faith in Christ” can also be translated as “through the faithfulness of Christ”, [29] making:
… not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through the faithfulness of Christ. (Phil. 3:9, retranslated, my emphasis)
And Romans 3:22, which often comes out as
This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ [dia pisteos Iesou Christou] to all who believe [pisteuontas]. (Rom. 3:22)
could instead be translated using “through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ”: [30]
This righteousness from God comes through the faithfulness of Jesus Christ to all the faithful. (Rom. 3:22, retranslated, my emphasis)
The ambiguity of the phrase “pistis Christou” (“faith in Christ” v. “faithfulness of Christ”) may be annoying for those of us determined to know what it “really” means. But maybe it is a blessing in disguise that it can mean both: it is yet another “both/and” rather than “either/or” situation which God sends to enrich us. Maybe Paul is telling us that our righteousness in God’s eyes comes through the faithfulness of Christ to us as well as the other way round. After all, the only reason we can be faithful to Him at all is because He is faithful to us first. Therefore our choosing to ask for faith, or our choosing to accept it when it is offered to us, is not something we can be proud of in front of God. We should be very wary about proclaiming how much faith we have – either to others, or to ourselves, or to God. Any faith we have comes as God’s free gift, and He knows exactly how much of it He has granted us, or will grant us – better than we do.
It is so important to be clear about this. Grace means “free gift”. Salvation is by grace alone; this means that God grants it to us freely, not on the basis of any merit we have, but purely on the basis of Christ’s paschal sacrifice on the cross. Such salvation comes to us in the form of faith (or belief, or trust, or love, or even “biblical understanding”), [31] and in the form of good works which that faith allows us to perform. Neither our faith nor our works are meritorious in God’s eyes, because both (and much more) are God’s free gift in Christ. Augustine of Hippo puts it like this:
A gift, unless it be gratuitous, is not grace. We are, therefore, to understand that even man’s merited goods are gifts from God, and when life eternal is given through them, what else do we have but “grace upon grace returned” [cf. Jn. 1:16]? [32]
Martin Luther echoes him:
The promises of God give that which the precepts exact, and fulfil what the law commands; so that all is of God alone, both the precepts and their fulfilment. He alone commands; He alone also fulfils. [33]
and is, in turn, echoed by the Catholic theologian Hans Küng:
Everything comes from God, even what man does… God accomplishes everything. But it does not follow from this that He accomplishes it alone. On the contrary the greatest marvel of God’s accomplishing everything is that man accomplishes along with Him as a result of God’s accomplishment. [34]
C. S. Lewis suggests that the one scriptural verse which sums up grace best is this:
Work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose. (Phil. 2:12-13)
For, as Lewis explains,
the first half is, “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling” – which looks as if everything depended upon us and our good actions: but the second half goes on, “for it is God who worketh in you” – which looks as if God did everything and we nothing. [35]
Lewis could also have drawn attention to the “third half” of
this verse: “to will and to act according to his good purpose.” To will and to act. These are the two
mutu
Elsewhere Paul explains:
He saved us, not because of the righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy… so that, having been justified by his grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life. (Tit. 3:5,7)
This is the good news of Jesus Christ, and this is why I am a Christian, for neither is my own faith strong, nor are most of my deeds commendable – but God’s grace is reliable. “We love because he first loved us” (1 Jn. 4:19).
Let us take a look at how Jesus put it, when He was asked that question by the young man, “What must I do to inherit eternal life?” (Mk. 10:17) Jesus’s answer was not a simple one:
“Why do you call me good?” Jesus
answered. “No-one is good – except God alone. You know the commandments: ‘Do
not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony,
do not defraud, honour your father and mother.’”
“Teacher,” he declared, “all
these things I have kept since I was a boy.”
Jesus looked at him and loved
him. “One thing you lack,” he said. “Go, sell everything you have and give to
the poor, and then you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.”
At this the man’s face fell. He
went away sad, because he had great wealth. […]
The disciples were amazed at his
words… and said to each other, “Who then can be saved?”
Jesus looked at them and said,
“With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with
God.” (Mk. 10:18-22,24,26-27)
Two things are important about this passage. First, “no one is good – except God alone.” By God’s standards, we are not good, and cannot approach God on account of any goodness we may perceive in ourselves – whether that “goodness” lies in our faith or in our deeds. Second, “all things are possible with God.” God can make us good, both in faith and in works, which is something that no man on earth can do for himself. Once again, here from the mouth of the Lord is the central Christian teaching on the subject of salvation: it is a gift of grace. For
all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. (Rom. 3:23-24)
Salvation belongs to God. If he bestows that gift on us, then we must thank him, for we have not earned it by anything we have done, or said, or believed, or thought, or felt. We cannot merit new birth by anything we do, or say, or believe, or think, or feel. All merit comes to us from God, as a free gift.
Anathemas and shibboleths
This much has been agreed by
It is he who makes us just. Being just simply means being with Christ and in Christ. And this suffices. Further observances are no longer necessary. For this reason Luther's phrase: “faith alone” is true, if it is not opposed to faith in charity, in love. Faith is looking at Christ, entrusting oneself to Christ, being united to Christ, conformed to Christ, to his life. And the form, the life of Christ, is love; hence to believe is to conform to Christ and to enter into his love. [37]
In other words, the significance of well-worn and well-loved “theological shorthands” [38] like sola fide can change subtly according to the historical and social contexts in which they find themselves. Two thousand years ago, Paul could say, “A man is justified by faith” (Rom. 3:28) and James could say, “A person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone” (Ja. 2:24). Five hundred years ago, Luther could say, “Faith alone saves without works” [39] and Rome could say, “If anyone says that the sinner is justified by faith alone…, let him be anathema.” [40] And yet at the same time Rome could say, “We are therefore said to be justified by faith, because faith is… the foundation and root of all justification,” [41] and Calvin could say, “We dream not of a faith which is devoid of good works, nor of a justification which can exist without them.” [42]
Five centuries ago, Luther wrote, “If the Pope would concede that God alone by His grace through Christ justifies sinners, we would carry him in our arms, we would kiss his feet.” [43] Luther’s wish has come true: today the Pope can say, “‘faith alone’ is true,” [44] whilst fine Baptist theologians like Timothy George can say:
We must guard against making shibboleths out of the precise formulations of Luther, Calvin, or any other human teacher. To turn justification by faith alone into justification by doctrinal precision alone is to lapse into a subtle but insidious form of justification by works. [45]
No, the phenomenon we are facing is not Christian leaders and teachers abandoning their principles in favour of a facile syncretism. Rather, it is of Christians beginning to recognise that the meanings matter more than the words used to express them, and that we have no right to keep a Church divided over semantics.
This does not mean that
BIBLICAL SUMMARY of Chapter Seven
We are justified by
faith…
Jn. 1:12, 3:16, 5:24;
Rom. 3:22, 3:28, 4:3-24, 10:9-10; Gal. 3:24, 5:6
… and yet we are justified by deeds.
Matt. 5:19, 7:21, 13:40-42,
13:49-50, 16:24-27, 24:48-51, 25:31-46; Jn. 5:28-29;
Rom. 2:13, 8:13; 1 Cor. 3:8,
7:19; 2 Cor. 9:6, 11:15; Heb. 6:10, Ja. 2:14-24, 1 Jn. 3:14-19,
Rev. 22:12
There are “deeds of
darkness”...
Rom. 13:12, 1 Cor. 6:9-10, Gal. 5:19-21
... but there are also deeds which attract God’s reward.
Rom. 2:6-8, 2 Cor. 5:10, Gal.
5:22-24, 6:7-10, 1 Tim. 6:18-19
The “works of the
Law”...
Dan. 1, 1 Macc. 1, 2 Macc. 6-7, Rom. 2:25-29, 4:9-12,
14:2-6, 14:13-22;
Gal. 2:3-5, 2:11-14, 5:2-6, 6:12-15
... are no longer necessary.
Rom. 3:28-30, Gal. 3:26-28
True faith includes
love, deeds, and much more.
Ps. 85:10-11, Gal. 5:6, 2 Pet. 1:5-11, 1 Jn. 2:3-6
We are saved by grace.
Mk. 10:17-27, Jn. 1:16, Rom. 3:22-24, Eph. 2:8-10; Phil.
2:12-13, 3:8-9; Tit. 3:5-7, 1 Jn. 4:19
[1] e.g. Justification by Faith:
Lutherans and Catholics in Dialogue VII, ed. H. G. Anderson, T. A. Murphy
& J. A. Burgess (Augsburg, Minneapolis, 1985); Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification (Eerdmans, Grand
Rapids, 2000). For a list of others see Anthony N. S. Lane, Justification by Faith in
Catholic-Protestant Dialogue (T&T Clark, London, 2002), p. 263
[2] See also 1 Cor. 3:8; 2 Cor. 9:6,
11:15; Gal. 6:7-8, Heb. 6:10.
[3] from www.bibledbdata.org. In
German: So halten wir nun dafür, daß der Mensch gerecht werde ohne des Gesetzes Werke,
[4] Martin Luther: “An Open Letter on
Translating, 1530”, trans. G. Mann, rev. M. D. Marlowe, on www.bible-researcher.com
[5] Martin Luther: “An Open Letter on
Translating, 1530”, trans. G. Mann, rev. M. D. Marlowe, on www.bible-researcher.com
[6] Martin Luther: “An Open Letter on
Translating, 1530”, trans. G. Mann, rev. M. D. Marlowe, on www.bible-researcher.com
[7] e.g. in the Dead Sea Scrolls: see Robert Eisenman & Michael
Wise, Dead Sea Scrolls Uncovered,
6.35-36, on www.preteristarchive.com
[8] For more on this so-called “new
perspective on Paul” (which is really a very old perspective on Paul), see e.g. N. T. Wright, What Saint Paul Really Said: Was Paul of Tarsus the Real Founder of
Christianity? (William B. Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, 1997); Krister Stendahl, Paul Among Jews and Gentiles (Fortress,
Philadelphia, 1983); E. P. Sanders, Paul
and Palestinian Judaism: A Comparison of Patterns of Religion (Fortress, Minneapolis,
2017); N. T. Wright, “New Perspectives on Paul” (10th
Edinburgh Dogmatics Conference, 2003), on ntwrightpage.com; James D. G. Dunn,
“The New Perspective on Paul” (Univ.
of Manchester, 1982), on markgoodacre.org
[9] George H. Tavard, Justification: An Ecumenical Study
(Paulist, New York, 1983), p. 102
[10] Martin Luther, “Preface to James
and Jude”, from Luther’s Works, vol.
35, pp. 395-398, on matt1618.freeyellow.com
[11] Martin Luther, “Preface to the New
Testament 1545 (1522)”, on www.godrules.net
[12] Martin Luther, “Preface to the
Epistle to the Hebrews”, on www.godrules.net
[13] David Bailey, “Grace, Theological Shorthand and Icons of
Discovery”, on www.oasiscollege.org
[14] Anthony N. S. Lane, Justification by Faith in
Catholic-Protestant Dialogue (T&T Clark, London, 2002), pp. 132-135
[15] Karen Armstrong, The Case for God (Vintage, London,
2010), p. 90
[16] The Martyrdom of Ignatius I, in Ante-Nicene
Fathers, vol. 1, ed. Phillip Schaff (T&T Clark, Edinburgh), on
www.ccel.org
[17] Ignatius, The Epistle to the Ephesians
14, in Early Christian Writings, ed.
Maxwell Staniforth (Penguin, London, 1988)
[18] C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (Fount, 1988), pp. 127-8
[19] The head of the Catholic delegation
at Regensburg was Cardinal Gasparo Contarini, who had embraced the concept of
“justification by faith” some years before Luther did, and whose private letters
include statements like this: “Nobody can become justified through his own
works or cleansed from the desires in his own heart. We must have recourse to
divine grace which we obtain through faith in Jesus Christ, as St. Paul says,
and we too must say with him: happy the man to whom God does not impute his
sin, irrespective of his works [Rom. 4:6]… Having experienced it, and seeing
what I can do, I have taken refuge in this alone. All the rest seems nothing to
me.” [Gasparo Contarini, letter 30, to Tommaso Giustiniani (1521), in Hubert
Jedin, “Contarini und Camaldoli”, quoted in Elisabeth G. Gleason, Gasparo Contarini: Venice, Rome, and Reform (University of
California, Berkeley, 1993), p. 25]
[20] The Regensburg Agreement (1541), Article 5: 4,5,8, in Anthony N. S.
Lane, Justification by Faith in
Catholic-Protestant Dialogue (T&T Clark, London, 2002), pp. 233-7
[21] from Correspondance des réformateurs dans les pays de langue française
vol. VII, ed. A. L. Herminjard (H. Georg, Geneva, 1886), quoted in Peter Matheson,
Cardinal Contarini at Regensburg
(OUP., New York, 1972), p. 109
[22] J. I. Packer, “On from Orr:
Cultural Crisis, Rational Realism & Incarnational Theology”, in Reclaiming the Great Tradition:
Evangelicals, Catholics & Orthodox in Dialogue, ed. James S. Cutsinger
(InterVarsity, Downers Grove, 1997), p. 174
[23] David Platt, “What I Really Think About the ‘Sinner's Prayer,’
Conversion, Mission, and Deception”, in Christianity
Today (28th June, 2012), on www.christianitytoday.com
[24] David Platt, “What I Really Think About the ‘Sinner's Prayer,’
Conversion, Mission, and Deception”, in Christianity
Today (28th June, 2012), on www.christianitytoday.com
[25] Peter Kreeft, Fundamentals of the Faith: Essays in Christian Apologetics
(Ignatius, San Francisco, 1988), p. 109
[26] Bishop K
[27] Eric W. Gritsch & Robert W.
Jenson, Lutheranism: The Theological
Movement and Its Confessional Writings (Fortress, Philadelphia, 1976), pp.
36-37
[28] cf. 1 Cor. 1:29-30
[29] N. T. Wright, What Saint Paul Really Said: Was Paul of Tarsus the Real Founder of
Christianity? (William B. Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, 1997), p. 104
[30] N. T. Wright, What Saint Paul Really Said: Was Paul of Tarsus the Real Founder of
Christianity? (William B. Eerdmans, Grand Rapids, 1997), p. 106
[31] David Platt, “What I Really Think About the ‘Sinner's Prayer,’
Conversion, Mission, and Deception”, in Christianity
Today (28th June, 2012), on www.christianitytoday.com
[32] Saint Augustine, Handbook on Faith, Hope and Love
XXVIII.107 (CCEL, Grand Rapids). See also Saint Augustine, Confessions X.29 (Penguin, London, 1961): “Give me the grace to do
as you command, and command me to do what you will!”
[33] Martin Luther, Concerning Christian Liberty II, on
www.iclnet.org
[34] Hans Küng, Justification (Burns & Oates, London, 1981), p. 265
[35] C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (Fount, 1988), p. 128
[36] Martin Luther: “An Open Letter on
Translating, 1530”, trans. G. Mann, rev. M. D. Marlowe, on www.bible-researcher.com
[37] Benedict XVI , General Audience,
19th Nov., 2008: “The Doctrine of Justification: from Works to
Faith”, on w2.vatican.va
[38] David Bailey, “Grace, Theological Shorthand and Icons of
Discovery”, on www.oasiscollege.org
[39] Martin Luther: “An Open Letter on
Translating, 1530”, trans. G. Mann, rev. M. D. Marlowe, on www.bible-researcher.com
[40] Council of Trent: session VI
(1547): Canons Concerning Justification 9, on www.ewtn.com
[41] Council of Trent: session VI (1547):
Decree Concerning Justification VIII, on www.ewtn.com
[42] John Calvin, The Institutes of the Christian Religion III.16.1, trans. H.
Beveridge (CCEL, Grand Rapids), on www.ccel.org
[43] Martin Luther, A
Commentary on St. Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians II.6 (CCEL, Grand
Rapids), on www.ccel.org
[44] Benedict XVI , General Audience,
19th Nov., 2008: “The Doctrine of Justification: from Works to
Faith”, on w2.vatican.va
[45] Timothy George, “Toward an
Evangelical Ecclesiology”, in Catholics
and Evangelicals: Do They Share a Common Future?, ed. Thomas P. Rausch
(Paulist, New York, 2000), p. 131
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