Luther on repentance

Still going to finish my posts on "Why I'm not a not a Catholic"... I promise!

But here's a little something to tide over while my busy semester wraps up. It's a quote from Martin Luther on what true repentance is, why we are not forgiven on the basis of our wanting to "do better", and how we find assurance in this:

A Christian remains firmly attached to Christ and says, "If I'm not good, Peter wasn't either, but Christ is good." Such are the elect. Others say, "God is gracious to me because I hope to amend my ways," but this is only a gallows repentance; the heart isn't in it. Although the wicked sometimes have compunctions (so they call them) - that is, promise themselves that they will be good - they soon depart from the straight path and seek to merit a reward. But a Christian says, "I wish to do as much as I can, but Christ is the bishop of souls. To him will I cling, even if I sin." It is thus that one has assurance.

Luther's Free Beer: on hold

Looks like Brother Martin is going to have to wait a bit for that cold one... the semester hit a busy spell, so I'll be out of blogging commission until things slow back down a bit!

Stay tuned.

Luther's Free Beer, Part 3: "Righteousness is obtained through faith" (part 2)

There are many who would disagree with me on these points, though, and would oppose the idea of the righteousness of Christ being imputed to us. Many believe that our own righteousness is to be obtained as a result of our own works, or rather by some combination of Christ's work and our own. We have already looked at some of the verses that one might use to oppose imputed righteousness, so I won't go back over them, but I would like to look here at one more passage:

Not everyone who says to me, "Lord, Lord," will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, "Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?" And then will I declare to them, "I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness."
-Matthew 7:21-23

Surely this is good evidence that God doesn't justify us through our faith alone, but also through works! Jesus Himself is saying that those who say "Lord, Lord," won't necessarily be saved, but that they must also follow God's will in order to be saved, right? I don't think so... again, I see this approach as a reversal of what God has actually revealed in these passages. Just like with the passages that we looked at in James, I think that this is a question not of works as the basis of justification, but as the evidence of true faith. To make this more clear, let's look at the six verses leading up to what Jesus will say in verses 21-23:

Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.
-Matthew 7:15-20

It seems more clear in this context that Jesus is not claiming that one must follow God's will in order to be saved, but that those who are saved will inevitably follow God's will! Just because somebody does a good deed does not mean that they have the Spirit of God working in them to glorify Him through these actions. Salvation is not ultimately about works, even works done in the name of God. However, again, as Jesus says here, justification will necessarily lead to sanctification... but sanctification can never lead to justification! There may be some who would ask me, "What's the big deal, Chris? This is just a small difference in meaning. There's no need to cause a fuss over this!"

Ahh... but I would disagree greatly with that disagreement! :o) There is great need, indeed!

Firstly, an interpretation of these passages of Scripture which allows us to believe that we are ultimately saved by the things that we do (i.e. our sanctification leads to our own justification) builds a doorway for legalism to enter in with great ease. This is not in the spirit of Christianity, for in the words of John the Baptist, "He must increase, but I must decrease."

Secondly, and more importantly, the very glory of God is at stake here! When we begin to get our eyes off of ourselves and our own works, we turn them to Christ, and see the wonderful nature of His holy majesty and perfect righteousness! God must get the glory in our salvation, not us. However, this opens up many questions that are debated among Christians, which I will not get into here here and now, but I will say this about my personal experience here: when I started to understand more of how the Bible declares that I was saved from my sin, my eyes were opened to see the beauty of salvation, and what an amazing thing it is to even be called a child of God! Here are just two of the many verses which show why it is that I feel unending gratitude to God for being His son:

No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day.
-John 6:44

But you do not believe because you are not part of my flock. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me.
-John 10:26-27

Or take also the words of Christ that we have already seen from Matthew. What is Jesus' reaction to those who claim to follow Him, and even do good works in His name, yet will not see salvation? "And then will I declare to them, "I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness." Jesus didn't know them? But Jesus is God, right? So shouldn't He know everything?! It's clear that Jesus is using a different definition for the word "know" here when referring to these people. It's the same "know" that is used in Amos 3:2 when God says of Israel, "you only have I known of all the families of the earth." God certainly knew about all of the families on earth... but there were only certain people on whom He chose to set His divine love. Or, when the Bible records that Adam "knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore Cain", we can be sure that Adam did a lot more than have intellectual recognition of his wife in order for her to become pregnant!

The point I'm trying to make here is not only that the people who come to God saying, "Lord, Lord," yet are rejected by Him, are not justified by their works, but that these people do not follow Christ because they are not of His chosen adopted children, not of His flock. It is this adoption which gives the Spirit, it is this Spirit which gives true sanctifying power, and it is this sanctification which is the fruit of true faith, not the basis of justification. The sheep of Christ's flock make themselves known by the transforming power that is in them, and by their love (John 13:35), but it is not these signs which allow them to be in the flock in the first place. Christ's sheep are not His flock because they do what He says... they do what He says because they are in His flock!

Well, if we are not saved through our own works, but through our faith in Christ, how can it be that one can receive this faith? That question will be tackled in the next part, "Faith is a gift", but I would ask you to ponder over these verses until then:

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
-Ephesians 2:8-10

Luther's Free Beer, Part 3: "Righteousness is obtained through faith" (part 1)

If the Bible teaches that our righteousness is not obtained through works of the law, then how is it possible for one to be justified and declared as righteous in the sight of a perfectly holy God?! Thankfully, it seems that Scripture is a bit more clear on this point. There are many passages in the Bible which attest to justification by faith alone, but let's start with just a couple which, by themselves, could be considered the veritable battle cries of the Reformation:

For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.
-Romans 3:28

For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved.
-Romans 10:10

Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever believes has eternal life.
-John 6:47

It may need to be reiterated at this point that justification by faith alone is true not only because it is how justification is presented in the Bible, but also because salvation by faith alone is absolutely necessary for God, who is just, to be able to declare us to be righteous. "Righteous", by definition, means "without guilt or sin". We are humans who are sinful by our very nature, and therefore, we have never had, we do not presently have, and we will never have any righteousness of our own. Because of this, if we are to ever be labeled as "righteous", this title needs to be obtained by another on our behalf, and given to us. This process - a transaction, if you will - is called imputation:

And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness, just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from works: "Blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven, and whose sins are covered; blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin."
-Romans 4:5-8

For what does the Scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness."
-Romans 4:3

The only righteous being to ever walk this earth was our very God Himself who came in fully human form as Jesus Christ. It was His righteousness, not our own, that not only appeases His own holy wrath against sin through obedience to the law, but also fulfills the demand for worship that is required of a perfectly glorious and awesome creator being (i.e. Jesus not only never committed any sin of commission, He also never committed any sin of omission). This fulfillment of the requirements of righteousness is then given to us through faith, and makes a propitiation for God's wrath against our sin:

Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. -Romans 5:1

This transaction, this imputed righteousness, was at the very heart of the Gospel for the reformers. Martin Luther was once tormented by Paul's letter to the Roman church, particularly by one key passage:

For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed...
-Romans 1:16- (first half of) 17

Luther simply couldn't understand how God's own righteousness being revealed to us could ever possibly be "good news" to us who have no righteousness of our own! And his torment was very understandable, because during Luther's era, verses like these were interpreted by the Church in this way, as God's own actively righteous state being displayed to us, and his anger being set against us, compelling us to do good works to appease His wrath. This also made Luther angry against God, because in this verse Luther viewed God as crushing us with the impossible requirements of the law and threatening us with punishment through the Gospel!

But then Luther continued to contemplate the rest of this verse:

For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, "The righteous shall live by faith."
-Romans 1:17

It was upon reflexion of the full meaning of this verse that Luther realized that God's "righteousness" named here did not refer to His active righteousness by which He sets His anger against all sin, but rather His passive righteousness that He reveals to sinners by giving it to them, ascribing His own righteousness to those who were once completely unrighteous:

"The righteous shall live by faith"!

Furthermore, he saw that this imputed righteousness is the way by which the spiritually dead are made alive and given salvation:

"The righteous shall live by faith"!

And what are the means by which God chooses to give His righteousness to us sinners?

"The righteous shall live by faith"!

Luther's Free Beer, Part 2: "Righteousness is not obtained through works" (part 2)

In closing, however, I would like to quickly address the fact that there are some texts in the Bible that have been used to support the idea that justification is obtained through both faith and works. I believe, however, that this reading of the passages is a case of misinterpretation, or rather, misapplication of the text. Let's just look at one section of the Bible, which contains some of the most famous passages of this sort, James, chapter 2. The main prooftexts for perfected justification by works are verses 14, 17, 20, 22, and 24:

14: What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him?

17: So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.

20: Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless?

22: You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works

24: You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone.

However, I don't believe that what James is referring to here is the basis of justification, but rather the fruit of justification. He has already noted, along with Paul, that we are all sinners and have transgressed the law of God, and, therefore, should justly be under His wrath: "For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it." (verse 10) Therefore, James did not believe that we humans can fulfill the righteous requirements of the law, because we have all transgressed it. Moreover, James was speaking this truth about Christians, because it was to "the twelve tribes" that he wrote this epistle. He recognized that even those who had the Spirit in them could not keep the law perfectly.

In verse 14, it seems that James is referring to a question not of works as the basis of justification, but as the evidence of true faith. "If someone says he has faith", James writes, and continues, "can that faith save him?" What kind of faith is it that this person says he has? Is it merely a knowledge of the facts of the Gospel? "I believe in God," one might say. Can this belief alone save them? No, for even the demons believe this (verse 17), and they are certainly not of God's children. What if someone says, "I believe in Jesus"? Are they saved by this kind of faith? No; for, again, Satan and his own know who Jesus is better than we do (Mark 1:24). What, then, if someone says, "I not only believe in Jesus, but I also believe that Jesus is the Son of God, and that He came to earth to be an atoning sacrifice for those who have faith in that sacrifice. I also believe that He was raised to life by God and now sits in heaven at His right hand." Surely, this person, with this kind of faith must be saved! Right? Still, I say no, not necessarily, because these are all facts of our world that Satan himself is fully aware of. However, saving faith is the kind of faith which allows a person to say, "I believe that all of these things are true... and that they apply to me! Not only do I believe that Jesus came to die, but that He came to die in my place!"

And it is this kind of faith, the kind of faith which can only be obtained through the power of the Holy Spirit (1 Corithians 12:3), that will save a person. Furthermore, because this kind of faith comes by the power of the Spirit, it is a transforming faith, a faith that will necessarily produce the fruit of the Spirit. I believe that this is the important framework of knowledge to have while reading these passages. For surely, faith, without the fruit of the Spirit, without the ability and desire to obey the commands of God, is not a saving faith, but a dead faith. This faith is not the kind of faith which saves, it is not the kind of faith which is living, and it is not the kind of faith that produces works... because is not the kind of faith which is given to the children of God by the Holy Spirit upon the hearing of the Gospel!

Luther's Free Beer, Part 2: "Righteousness is not obtained through works" (part 1)

This second part of the reason why Martin Luther's gettin' a frosty pint from me in heaven is very closely related to the first. We've already seen that, due to original sin, there is no person who has a righteousness of their own. We are all contaminated by sin (Romans 8:23) and cannot possibly give ourselves as a pure atonement for ourselves, nor for others. Nevertheless, just as the sin-atoning sacrifices of the covenant of Abraham in the Old Testament required the shed blood of a spotless sacrifice in order for the sin of the people to be forgiven, so the covenant of Christ in the New Testament requires the shed blood of a spotless sacrifice to the same end. This has already been accomplished by Jesus Christ's righteousness and sacrifice... because it could not be accomplished by us.

Well, this often doesn't ring too well with the individualistic nature of us humans, since we like to do things on our own. We like to try to be autonomous creatures. We like to think that we are able to do enough so that we can work our way from sinfulness to a righteous, holy state. We know intrinsically that we are not perfect, so we want to try to do things in order for God to forget our sinful state, and justify us based on our works. "If I'm just good enough," we say, "I'll surely go to heaven when I die." This common desire to atone for our fallenness by human means is clearly opposed in Scripture. Here are just a few passages to look at, but there are many others to be found-


1) Works will not justify us before God:

For by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.
-Romans 3:20

For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, "Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them." Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for "The righteous shall live by faith."
-Galatians 3:10-11

Again, we must recognize why this is impossible, in order to get ourselves out of a legalistic mindset. As the Apostle Paul indicates clearly in Romans 5:18-19, all human beings are justly under condemnation because of the original sin committed in the Garden of Eden. We did not take the fruit ourselves, but it was taken for us by a just and fair representative of the human race, and the judgment rendered in response to this rebellion was rightly imputed to each and every one of us. Therefore, each and every one of us is contaminated by sin, and cannot fulfill the righteous requirement of the law.


2) Christ died to fulfill the righteous requirement of the law on our behalf:

For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.
-Romans 10:4

I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.
-Galatians 2:21

The beauty of the Gospel is that the very same God who demands that which we cannot possibly do fulfills His own perfect requirement by Himself. We cannot do it, but God did it for us. And for each and every one who looks not to their own efforts to be saved, but places their faith in the righteousness of Christ, this fulfillment of the righteous requirements of the law by Jesus is ascribed to them. This is what is meant by imputed righteousness... a concept which is opposed by the Catholic church, and the "New Perspectives" movement... but is, itself, the very heart of the Gospel! How can the news of a requirement which we cannot fulfill ourselves possibly be "good"?! If our justification were to be obtained through our perfect obedience to the law, then the Gospel would cease to be good news. But furthermore, if our salvation were even to be maintained by our obedience to the law... this still wouldn't be good news! Our sanctification cannot be made perfect until our glorification, which will not happen in this world. Therefore, even for those who are in Christ, who are given the power of the Holy Spirit to sanctify them, to conform them to the image of the Son, they cannot possibly be made sinless this side of heaven, and so cannot fulfill the righteous requirements of the law even after their conversion! This is the very problem that the early church in Galatia struggled with, and Paul properly rebuked them for:

O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh?
-Galatians 3:1-3

The answer to Paul's rhetorical question is an emphatic "no!" He realized that, even after the commencement of human sanctification, the "flesh profits nothing" (John 6:63), and our salvation is not perfected by it. What then is Paul's answer to the bondage of law that the Galatians were placing upon themselves? It was Christ who fulfilled the law, that we might be free from it:

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us - for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree"
-Galatians 3:13

It was Paul's correct understanding of the Gospel that lead him to preach that "the righteous shall live by faith" (Romans 1:17, Habakkuk 2:4). You see, Christianity in fact is a works-based religion... it's just not our works which count! Christ has done the work that we could never do. It is through the faith which is given to us, not through our works, that our salvation is both begun and perfected. This, then, leads me to the next discussion, "Righteousness is obtained through faith".

Luther's Free Beer, Part 1: "Man has no righteousness of his own"

Okay, let's start this...

At the heart of the dividing line between the Protestant and Catholic belief systems is the question of how man is made righteous before God. Both sides recognize that we, as human beings, are sinful, and that our sin needs to be atoned for in order for us to be justified in God's sight; however, they differ greatly in their views of precisely how this justification is obtained.

It seems that Bob Dylan might be a Protestant:

You can't get to glory by the raising and the lowering of no flag.
Put your goodness next to God's and it comes out like a filthy rag.
In a city of darkness there's no need of the sun
And there ain't no man righteous, no not one.
-"Ain't No Man Righteous (No Not One)"

Why do I say that I think Dylan is a Protestant based on these lyrics? Well, he's alluding to Isaiah 64:6 when he compares our goodness and God's goodness ("We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment."), and to Psalm 14:1-3 and Romans 3:10-12 when he declares that no man is righteous ("As it is written: 'None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God. All have turned aside; together they have become worthless; no one does good, not even one.' ").

But don't both Catholics and Protestants believe this? What's the problem, then? Well, to understand the full effects of the truths of these verses, we need to understand how the Bible presents the concepts of original sin, justification, and sanctification.

The term "original sin" means that, since the fall of mankind to sin, we humans - as descendants of Adam - are no longer born holy, righteous, without sin. More than that, we are not even born morally neutral! Rather, we are born in a state of sin (Psalm 51:5) and, as an entire race, are condemned and justifiably under God's holy wrath. Paul states clearly this condition of our inevitable condemnation in Romans 5:18-19. However, in the same breath, intertwined in those very same sentences, he gives a hope for us condemned sinners, the righteous life of Christ:

Therefore, as through one man's offense judgment came to all men, resulting in condemnation, even so through one Man's righteous act the free gift came to all men, resulting in justification of life. For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's obedience many will be made righteous.

The importance of recognizing the truth of original sin for the full understanding our own justification is found in the fact that, as the Bible teaches the hopelessness of man's condition (if left to himself!), it shows us that man can do nothing to bring himself to righteousness, to justify himself in God's sight. God requires perfect holiness - not just our best effort! - in order to proclaim a human being as righteous. I will say it again: God requires perfect holiness, not a single drop of sin, to proclaim a person to be righteous. If we are born in sin, condemned by the fall of Adam, we cannot, absolutely cannot have this righteousness on our own! Therefore, if we cannot justify ourselves, then it must be God who justifies (Romans 8:33), and He must justify on the basis of something outside of us, since He requires an absolutely perfect holiness for the atonement of sin, and such a holiness cannot be found in any one of us.

A couple more verses to ponder over:

Do not enter into judgment
with your servant,
For in Your sight no one
living is righteous.
-Psalm 143:2

"Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good – except God alone."
-Luke 18:19

Relevant to the discussion of original sin and justification is sanctification. This term refers to the very real life transformation that every Christian begins experiencing from the very moment that they believe upon the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ for their sins. This is an ongoing process of conforming us to "the image of the Son" (Romans 8:29) that enables us to turn from sin and, through the power of the Holy Spirit, begin living a life that glorifies Christ. However, this process is not perfect: sanctification does not make us perfect like Christ is perfect. Rather, it is a word (which means, literally, "to set apart") given for the very gradual process by which we are given the power to choose holiness over sinfulness... but it will not be perfected in this life. We cannot become perfect beings who never commit sin while we are still living on this earth, in these bodies.

I stress this point of understanding the Biblical definition of sanctification (Paul makes his stance on this matter very clear in his epistle to the Romans, if you would like to know more) because there are many who seem to confuse sanctification with justification, or will even collapse the two categories into one. The latter is the stance that the Roman Catholic church takes, which I do not believe is Biblically sound. Justification and sanctification are two very different things that happen in the Christian life! Rome would have us believe that we are justified not only by the atoning sacrifice of Christ, but also by a life-long process of sanctification. I believe that this is simply not true, and that it is not supported in the Bible*. Our sanctification is the fruit of our justification, it is not the basis for our justification! Justification will inevitably lead to sanctification, but sanctification can absolutely never lead to justification.

If we are to believe that the Bible teaches that no man is righteous, that God demands an entire life of perfect living in order to justify, and that what semblance of righteousness that man might have within himself is as filthy rags in the sight of God, then we must concede that man cannot be justified on the basis of something that God might see inside of him. This point leads me to the Biblical teaching that our righteousness is not based on works, which I will discuss in the next part.

*There are some texts which have been used to support the idea of justification based on human works, but I will discuss this later.