Stop the presses!!!

I know that this may come as a shock to anyone who has read my posts before, so you may want to sit down before you read this next part.

Are you sitting down? Okay... here goes...

I may disagree with John Piper on something.

Now... get the smelling salts, clear your head, and continue on reading, if you can muster the energy.

Now that classes are over, I'm trying to get back to reading Piper's "The Pleasures of God", and I just finished chapter 5, titled "The Pleasure of God in Election". Toward the end of the chapter (pp. 150-151), Piper discusses that our assurance of salvation is ultimately rooted in our election. I agree with this. However, I don't think I agree with why Piper says that this is the case. According to Piper, our assurance is rooted in our election because:

"Divine election is the guarantee that God will undertake to complete by sanctifying grace what his electing grace has begun... Election is the final ground of assurance because, since it is God's commitment to save, it is also God's commitment to enable all that is necessary for salvation." (P. 150, emphases mine)

I most certainly agree that God will surely sanctify those which He has justified, and that this will be done unto perfection for each one of God's children, continued until the day when he or she enters the presence of God, and perfected there. This is the biblically sound teaching of a perseverance of faith, which I have posted about before, and will write about more extensively in the last of my series of posts on "Why I am not Catholic".

So, it is true that I believe that God will slowly, but surely, mold me into the image of His Son. With all the sin that is still in me, I love God, and strive to follow His will, more today than a year ago, and pray in faith that I will do this more a year from now than I do today.

However, I do not believe that my continued sanctification is what "is necessary for salvation." I believe that I am no more justified, or even assured, today than I was a year ago, nor do I believe that I will be any more justified or assured a year from now than I am today. If I were to drop everything I am doing right now to become a lifelong missionary in some foreign land, I do not believe that this work for God's kingdom would make me any more justified in His sight than if I continue to work in research as a phonetician. If God were ever to call me to become a missionary my response would be, "Here am I. Send me!" (Isaiah 6:8). But if that were to be the case, my salvation would be no more secure than that of the thief on the cross.

Rather, as I have written about many times, I believe that the assurance of my salvation is rooted in my election because it is in my election that God has chosen to open my eyes and ears to receive the truth of the Gospel, has given me the ability to repent of my sin, and has given me the desire to turn to Him by my own free will. And it is through all of this that my justification comes, because, by the power of God, I have turned to Christ to receive His righteousness, which clothes me in a spotless garment, and I know that my salvation is assured, not because I see the daily evidence of sanctification in my life (although it's true that this is a very real evidence of my justification), but because the wrath of God toward my sin has already been poured out on Christ, and it is His righteousness, and His holy obedience to the law, not my own imperfect sanctification, that assures that I will one day see Him in glory.

Edit 5/20/08: Well, now I'm just confused. Piper definitely believes in the doctrine of imputation (i.e. Christ's righteousness imputed, through faith, to God's elect), so I'm not quite sure what he was talking about here...