Does anyone believe in sola fide anymore?
This week the World Communion of Reformed Churches signed the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification co-authored by the Lutheran World Federation and the Roman Catholic Church in 1999 (see here). The document was already formally endorsed by the World Methodist Council. And according to the article, the Anglican Communion is expected to sign later this year.
Basically, all the mainline churches are on-board. This is bad news, because that document effectively adopts a Roman Catholic view of justification. Why is that bad? Gene Veith, a dissenting Lutheran, explains the problem:
“The accord confuses justification and sanctification, accepting the Roman Catholic understanding that since faith produces good works, we end up being saved by our good works after all” (see here).
Mainline churches in Europe and America are officially adopting a message of works salvation.
The numbers of Protestants and Evangelicals who believe that salvation is by faith, apart from works, is rapidly decreasing.
That marks a great opportunity for Free Grace Theology.We are virtually alone in affirming that believing in Jesus is the only condition of eternal salvation.
Some people have objected that this is only true of liberal, and not true of conservative, Reformed, Lutheran, Anglican, and Methodist theologians.
I am not so sure.
As readers of this blog know all too well, conservatives are often just as confused as Roman Catholics in mixing faith and works. John MacArthur is well known for teaching this (see here). That also appears to be true of people like John Piper (see here and here). And it has long been a problem in conservative Reformed seminaries like Westminster (see here).
Thankfully, the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod, a conservative denomination, came out against the Declaration for denying sola fide. Unfortunately, their statement to that effect was not as clear as it could have been—speaking of “trust” instead of “belief”:
“What is that truth? God loved the world so much that He sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to live a perfect life in our place and to die for our sins. God declares us to be totally righteous and completely forgiven because of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. God gives us eternal life as a free gift through trust in Christ alone.
“The Roman Catholic Church teaches that something more than trust in Christ is necessary for us to be saved. It teaches that we are able to merit, through our works, eternal life for ourselves and others. We believe this teaching obscures the work of Jesus Christ and clouds the central message of the Bible” (emphasis added; see here).
I don’t like using the word “trust” as a synonym for “believe” because too many people think of “trust” in terms of behavior (see here and here). Better to just stick to Jesus’ own language of believing in Him (John 3:15-18, 36). So let me state the objection more clearly than my Missouri Synod friends.
God gives us eternal life as a free gift “through believing in Christ alone.” And the Roman Catholic Church—along with Reformed, Lutheran, Methodist, Waldensian, and Anglican Churches—teaches that “something more than belief in Christ is necessary for us to be saved.” That denies the gospel. And someone who has only ever believed that message is not born again.
Is the Free Grace movement all alone, in teaching faith alone?
Jim Poulos
Consider the word faithful in these verses:
1Cor. 1:9 ,1Cor. 10:13, 2Cor. 1:18
Or faithfulness: in Rom. 3:3
In all the above verses the word ‘faithful’ or ‘faithfulness’ communicates trustworthy or reliable. God can be ‘relied on’ or ‘trusted upon’ for His faithfulness.
It seems to be, reducing the word ‘faith’ to belief in a proposition also reduces quality of word ‘faithful’ when used in reference to God’s character. I seems to be reading a connection between the word ‘faith’ and ‘faithfulness’ is a much more consistent and natural reading.
sc
so are you saying that works are what gets us saved? or continual “faith”?
Jim Poulos
I’m sorry I don’t know your name, but an emphasis was put on the meaning of the word ‘faith’ being ‘believe’ apart from ‘trust’. My point was about it seem natural to see a connection with how the words ‘faithful and faithfulness’ are used with reference to God and with the word ‘faith’ how it is used by a person.
‘Faithful and Faithfulness’ of God suggests His trustworthiness or His reliability to accomplish what He says. Wouldn’t someone who has ‘faith’ in God suggests they are trusting His trustworthiness. Seems a very natural conclusion. To constantly reduce the word ‘faith’ to a simple recognition of the truth seems to truncate what otherwise seems a more natural a fuller sense of the word used in Scripture.
Diane
AMEN~!!! So thankful that the Holy Spirit enlightened me to sola fide years ago as a teenager just by opening my eyes to John 3:16. Keep teaching and preaching this wonderful biblical truth~!!! 🙂
Yehoshua
8I tell you that he will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth? Luke 18:8
When Jesus comes at the harpazo and later at the perousia will he find the faith espoused via Free Grace Theology or via Lordship salvation? The answer is that He will find both (as well as atheism, agnosticism and idolatry). At the harpazo only those who believe in Him via Free Grace will be removed to the Father’s House … the others will be left behind.
After a life of doing mitzvot, of believing that my ethnicity assured me a place in heaven, of believing that Messiah had not come yet, of believing that prayers out of books could justify me before God, of believing that study itself about God and keeping the Ten Commandments could assure me of a place in Heaven … after counting all this as dung and believing in Jesus Christ as my Divine Messiah and God, why would I EVER believe that any ‘work’ could ever save me.
The beauty of God’s Plan of Salvation is that it does not involve works to be saved before, during or after actually being saved. In these end-times, Lordship salvation (in all of its ‘manifestations’ is the broad way leading to Eternal Gehenna. The Way to Eternal Life is to actually ‘have’ the Son, via grace alone, through faith alone, in Yeshua HaMaschiach (Jesus Christ) alone.
12He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.
I John 5:12
John Kulp
It would seem that Ephesians 1:12-13 would show that the distinction you make between trusting and believing is not really significant.
I do appreciate your stand on justification by faith alone, but your final question above referencing your society or movement seems rather too self-aware, as though your group were the last remnant. There are thousands of “brethren” like myself in the tradition of Darby and the other early dispensationalists who preach and teach justification by grace alone through faith alone, unencumbered by the lordship salvation teaching. And I trust there are still many others as well.
Shawn Lazar
Great! We definitely count many of the early dispensationalists (including Darby) as “Free Grace” even though they did not use that term.
“Trust” can be used a a synonym for believing. But I think that, most of the time, it is used to indicate that simply believing is not enough. You need to do something more, something that affects your behavior. Many Evangelicals adopt the threefold definition of faith as notitia (understanding), assensus (assent or belief), and fiducia (trust). It is not enough to believe something as an intellectual exercise, they’ll say. You need to “trust” Christ in the sense of committing your life to him. For example, see this…
“if they genuinely trust the man in the helicopter, they will set off in the direction that he advocates. They will follow his instructions (à la John 14:15). Their actions will demonstrate the genuineness of their faith.”
http://www.ligonier.org/learn/articles/what-faith-and-not/
John Kulp
I agree that the potential exists for twisting the idea of a simple, initial trust as in Ephesians 1 into a doctrine that undermines sola fide.