Tuesday, December 30, 2008

The Extremes of Faith Alone

There seems to be two extremes of Christians who believe in the doctrine of faith alone. One one side, you have the type of Christian who believes that faith saves and works are a by-product of that faith. A quote that I found on Wikipedia would describe this as such, "Justification is by faith alone, but not by the faith that is alone [that is, not by a supposed faith that has no accompanying works]."

On the other side of the spectrum, you have a believer who believes that they are justified by faith alone to the complete exclusion of works. Unlike the believer mentioned above, this person takes the stance that justification is by faith alone, that is alone. Absolutely no accompanying works.

For the sake of argument, let us suppose that what the Catholic Church teaches regarding faith and works is true. Even if you do not understand it, or believe it, let us just assume that it is true.

What happens when these believers die and are standing before the throne of God, assuming of course the Catholic position is right? Will God send a person to hell because they did not completely understand justification by faith and works, even though they had faith and works? What about the individual who died with only faith? Since they had no works, would God send them to hell, because they did not fulfill the requirement of works?

The reason why I am sharing this with you, is because I think that I understand why this is a great concern that the Catholic Church has for all Christians. It understands justification to not be merely faith, but faith and works, just as St. James says that it is. Does it really matter if you hold to the belief that you are justified by faith alone and you still have a faith that is alive with works? I don't think so. Does it matter instead, that you believe your faith alone justifies you, and you do not obey God and keep His commandments, the Catholic Church says it does.

Because of this, I think that most of the debate that circles around faith alone, specifically from two individuals that through they do not share the same view of justification, still have both faith and works, doesn't really matter. At the same time, for the same reason it is why the Catholic Church is so adamant in it's teaching that you must believe in God, and you must also obey his commands - for the sake of the individual that is only relying on his faith, and does not obey God's commands.

What do you think?

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Teo extremes? Faith that saves and by nature produces works is 'extreme'? Justification by faith alone is 'extreme'?

By the way, I do believe both 'extremes' so what does that make me?

Scripturelly speaking, the sin of 'unbelief' is what sends anyone to Hell, and genuine belief (saving faith) in the Son as the one God sent as Savior is what secures a home in Heaven. John 3:18
So your whole point about going to Hell because there were no works to show for having had faith is moot. Then we also have the thief on the cross who had no oopoprtunity to do good works, only believe.

To the careful exegete, James does not say what you say is says. Here again, the hermaneutical principle of scripture interpreting scripture applies. there are to many instances in scritpure pointing to faith alone to apply your interpretation to James, although out of the context of scripture it can be misinterpreted.

If justification is not by faith alone, and the James passage means faith WITH (caps for emphasis only, not shouting) works saves, scripture contradicts itself and is not infallible. Did you not say that you believe in the infallibility of scripture in an earlier post?

Furthermore, it is entirely possible that two persons can have faith and works, but only one of them have saving faith in Christ. One may just have faith in his good works and end up in Hell. Or, if one has faith in 'faith' instead of Christ (has 'dead' faith/no real faith) and there are no works, while the other has faith in works, the both end up crispy critters in pain and torment forever.

And that takes us right back to John 3:18 and Eph 3:8-9.

Dan

Carlus Henry said...

Dan,

Teo extremes? Faith that saves and by nature produces works is 'extreme'? Justification by faith alone is 'extreme'?

When I mention extremes, I did not mean to distinguish between the extreme of justification by faith alone or saving faith. I meant the extremes of one person who believes in faith alone and also follows God's commandments, and another person who believes in Jesus Christ, but does not follow God's commandments.

By the way, I do believe both 'extremes' so what does that make me?

I don't think that you can fall into both of the categories that I mentioned. Either you have faith in God and obey His commandments, or you just have faith in God and do the exact opposite of what God says to do.

Scripturelly speaking, the sin of 'unbelief' is what sends anyone to Hell, and genuine belief (saving faith) in the Son as the one God sent as Savior is what secures a home in Heaven.

This is part of the story, yet not the whole story. In every single instance in Scripture, where judgement is depicted and described, it is never a matter of how much you believed in God. It is always a matter of what you have done. Now, before you start to accuse me of a works based righteousness, that is not what the Catholic Church teaches. I will do a post in the near future about exactly what the Catholic Church teaches about faith and works.

John 3:18. You are exactly right in what it says. It says believe. But what does the Bible mean when it says believe? Does it just mean a consent of the will, or does it mean to also be obedient to God's commandments? What about love? Doesn't God want us to love Him? Is it possible to believe but not love God? Is it possible to Love God but not believe Him? To simply say that you have faith and not love is strange.

So your whole point about going to Hell because there were no works to show for having had faith is moot.

Once again, my post was not intended to give a full explanation of salvation. It was instead to shed light on the fact that it really doesn't matter to the person who believes in God and does the will of God, whether or not that individual believes that he is saved by his faith alone or by faith and doing God's will.

Then we also have the thief on the cross who had no oopoprtunity to do good works, only believe.

God is at liberty to do whatever He wants to do. At the same time, we are not. We are told to be obedient to Him. I have no problem with God determining on His terms whether or not He will allow the theif on the Cross into heaven. He is God, not me.

James does not say what you say is says...there are to many instances in scritpure pointing to faith alone to apply your interpretation to James, although out of the context of scripture it can be misinterpreted.

I would completely disagree. Faith alone is no where to be found in the Bible. It does say that faith saves, yes. But it never says that it is alone. The only time that faith and alone are ever together is in James 2:24

You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.(James 2:24)

That is the most clear and straightforward teaching that I have seen regarding faith alone, sripturally speaking of course.

If justification is not by faith alone, and the James passage means faith WITH (caps for emphasis only, not shouting) works saves, scripture contradicts itself and is not infallible. Did you not say that you believe in the infallibility of scripture in an earlier post?

You are absolutely right. So either faith alone is true, or James 2:24 is wrong. You and I both know that the Scriptures are always right. So it is one of our interpretations, and not even our interpretations, just the one that we have decided to believe, that is at err. Not Scripture. So, let's think about it....

When did the concept of faith alone begin? From my understanding, it was around 1500 AD with the Protestant Reformation. So once again, should I take Martin Luther's word and the past 500 years of understanding of Scripture, or should I rely on the teaching of the Apostles and the Church for 1500 years? For me, it is no contest (now anyways...if you would have asked me 7 months ago, I would have agreed with you).

Furthermore, it is entirely possible that two persons can have faith and works, but only one of them have saving faith in Christ. One may just have faith in his good works and end up in Hell. Or, if one has faith in 'faith' instead of Christ (has 'dead' faith/no real faith) and there are no works, while the other has faith in works, the both end up crispy critters in pain and torment forever.

Once again, I am not trying to say or explain who is going to hell and who is not. God is the ultimate judge, not I.

Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because he has not believed in the name of God's one and only Son.[a] This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what he has done has been done through God."[b](John 3:18-21)

For 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)

God bless..

Anonymous said...

James 2:24

"I don't think that you can fall into both of the categories that I mentioned."

Of course I can:

Faith finds fullfillment in action. Verse 26 gives us a summary: "For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead.

Dead means dead. Dead means it never existed in the first place. Faith justifies and will produce works, but the works themselves don't justify.Works complete or fulfill faith, but do not justify in themselves.

Your expansion of John 13 supports the idea that works are produced out of genuine belief and faith,

Abraham's faith was imputed to him as righteousnessnot his faith plus his works of obedience that resulted from his faith.

Romans 4:2 "For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God."

Rahab's actions were a result of her faith (Heb 11)

The entire book of Galations is Paul refuting the idea that works justify, which the church had fallen back into.

It's interesting that the argunment you offered in your main post begai with the assumption / supposition that Catholic Church is true and you work your equally 'interesting' logic around it. Reading the text of your argument tells us that.

Concerning you Wikipedia quote, I could not find it exactly, but I did find a Wikipedia article that stated that the Gospels teach that justification is by faith alone (emphasized over and over and over again in scripture). The article also said that adding works is a misinterpretation by the Catholic church. What Wikipedia might say about anything is only as good as the source from which it came. When it says the Gospels say and the Gospels actually say what "W" says, I am in agreement with "W".

I also found a quote by D. James Kennedy that speaks to the entire context of James:

“...James is dealing with people who profess to be Christians, and yet they don't evidence the reality of their faith by their works [deeds]. Over, and over again... people will say they have faith and they don't have works, and James is saying that real faith always produces works as a result... The question is, 'A man may say that he has faith, but will that faith justify him?' If it is just a 'said' faith”—no, it won't!” (D. James Kennedy in“Irreconcilable Differences,” a roundtable discussion and television broadcast, Ft. Lauderdale FL, 1995)

I almost forgot, my 'faith tradition', if you are speaking of a particular church or denomination isn't worth a hill of beans in the grand scheme of things,howeer there is one in my background. Like Jason over at Godsgal's (I think that's where) I read the Bible and it changed my life.

I have the feeliong if I name a particular 'tradition' you'll just come back with something like "That's nice and even that tradition originated in the Catholic church! They were just led astray by heretics."

Dan

Carlus Henry said...

Dan,

I have the feeliong if I name a particular 'tradition' you'll just come back with something like "That's nice and even that tradition originated in the Catholic church! They were just led astray by heretics."

Just because we have a difference of opinions, please do not mistake me for a jerk. ;) The reason why I ask is because knowing this information, will give me a better idea of who I am talking to. I have spent a lot of time talking with Calvinists, and when I was speaking with someone who was Presbyterian, I approached the conversation with the same approach as I did the Calvinist. That, in my mind, was not giving the person I was talking to justice because I was not considering their faith tradition.

"I don't think that you can fall into both of the categories that I mentioned."

Of course I can:


Once again, I must apologize, because I was not clear in my earlier statement. What I was saying is that you, Dan, cannot be both a person who has faith only and a person that has faith and is obedient to God's Word. I was not saying that you cannot believe that the two people can be justified. I was talking about either you have faith only or you have faith and works that complete that faith.

Dead means dead. Dead means it never existed in the first place. Faith justifies and will produce works, but the works themselves don't justify.Works complete or fulfill faith, but do not justify in themselves.

Once again, the point of this post was not to defend the position of faith and works, or even clarify the Catholic teaching of faith and works, for that is worth a whole post on it's own. However, we both do agree that faith without works is dead faith. Amen.

Your expansion of John 13 supports the idea that works are produced out of genuine belief and faith,

Amen.

Romans 4:2 "For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God."

What are the works that Paul is talking about? In order to understand the context of what he is discussing, you need to go back to the previous chapter. This can easily be seen because the first verse of Romans 4 states:

What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather, discovered in this matter?(Romans 4:1).

What matter?

But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, 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. God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished— he did it to demonstrate his justice at the present time, so as to be just and the one who justifies those who have faith in Jesus.

Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded. On what principle? On that of observing the law? No, but on that of faith. 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. Do we, then, nullify the law by this faith? Not at all! Rather, we uphold the law.


The point that I am trying to make is that the verse that you are using actually is discussing the works of the law. The works of Mosaic Law. That is the complete context of the verse you are using.

But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God's wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed. God "will give to each person according to what he has done."[a] To those who by persistence in doing good seek glory, honor 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. There will be trouble and distress for every human being who does evil: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile; 10but glory, honor and peace for everyone who does good: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile. 11For God does not show favoritism.(Romans 2:5-11)

The reason why I am including this is to show that even Paul believes that we will be judged according to what we have done, not how much faith we had. To negate the value of works in salvation is just not scriptural.

The entire book of Galations is Paul refuting the idea that works justify, which the church had fallen back into.

Once again, this is works of the Law, the Mosaic Law.

...Wikipedia...
Okay. Wikipedia is not the Word of God, we both know that. I think that you are reading too much into my quote from Wikipedia. I was just trying to show that most people who believe in faith alone justification does not believe in faith to the exclusion of works.

You can find the quote that I used from the Protestant Distinctive.


D. James Kennedy...
Like I said, we all appeal to the source that we believe is the proper authority.

Overall, I think you are more interested in discussing the Catholic teachings of faith and works. You admit that faith without works is dead - "Dead means dead. Dead means it never existed in the first place. Faith justifies and will produce works...". You admit that faith justifies. So if faith doesn't have works can it justify? Or better yet, can a dead faith justify? Doesn't that mean faith and works? Or am I not representing what you are saying?

Thanks and God bless.

Anonymous said...

"So if faith doesn't have works can it justify?"

No, but scripture is crysztal clear - it is the faith that justifies, not the works, according to scripture I have shown you. Passages taken out of their immediate and/overall biblical context can be used to say works also justify, but put tham back into their context they cannot, or scripture that says very specifically that works cannot justify lie.

Is scripture infallible, or not?

ANyhway, have a Blessed New Year!

Carlus Henry said...

Anonymous,

"So if faith doesn't have works can it justify?"

No...


So, it seems that we disagree on specifics, but not in general. This is the whole point of my post.

When we stand before the throne of God, with differing opinions of what justifies us, yet we both have faith and works, is He going to condemn us to Hell because one of us did not understand the specifics of justification? I don't think so.

At the same time, for the poor soul that believes in the tenet of Faith Alone, without accompanying works to complete the faith (James 2:22), or how you put it, faith without works cannot justify, then that person can be lost.

Since we, Christian community, are responsible for all souls (we are our brother's keeper), therefore it is important that we challenge any teaching that may lead people astray.

Happy Belated New Year, I hope yours is very blessed.

Anonymous said...

neither this thread nor are your rebuttals well informed. You are arguing against something that doesn't exist apart from sporadic Protestant idiocy and Roman Apologetic strawmen.

Jason

thomassowellguy@yahoo.com

Carlus Henry said...

Jason,

neither this thread nor are your rebuttals well informed. You are arguing against something that doesn't exist apart from sporadic Protestant idiocy and Roman Apologetic strawmen.


I agree with you. It is very hard to find something that all of the different Protestant faith's believe. Although what I am arguing against may be sporadic Protestant idiocy to you, it may be a core belief to another Protestant. This is part of the challenge that I have with talking about a tenet of the Protestant faith. They are so varied, that it is hard to talk to everyone at the same time.

I read a great article called Disunity on Essentials, that speaks to this challenge. In the future, I could be more specific and discuss the Lutheran version or the Baptist understanding, or the Methodists, Presbyterian or even the Calvinist understanding of Faith Alone...but I am not ready for that kind of challenge.

Anyways...I am sorry that I am not as theologically deep as you would like for me to be. There are plenty of books as well as other blogs that you may serve you better. Please do not read sarcasm into this, I am really being sincere.

God Bless you on your journey...

Carlus Henry said...

Jason,

Thanks for commenting on my blog.

I am sorry that you think that there are posts that I have not submitted. I do not have any additonal posts of yours to submit.

Since I agree with a lot of what Owen said, I don't think that I need to say anything else regarding his follow ups to your opposition.

I respect you as a brother-in-Christ. At the same time, I did not start this blog as a battle ground. This blog intention is for discussions with gentless and respect for each other, even if we have differing opinions.

I am sorry that you believe that I have wronged you and I also forgive you for the insults of your last comment (which is the first one of yours that I have rejected). With that in mind, I just don't see how any more conversation could do any of us any more good - especially in light of bringing us both closer to Christ.

God bless you....