The Reformers' formula for salvation was that we are "saved by faith alone but not by a faith that is alone," and they defined this faith: by grace alone, in Christ alone, giving God alone the glory, and the Scripture alone as the authority--known as the
Five Only's (by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone, Scripture alone as authority, to God alone be the glory
: sola gratia, sola fide, solus Christus, sola Scriptura, and sola Deo gloria). We are to have Bible verses as our spiritual birth certificates, not taking the authority of a teacher, preacher, or church to certify our salvation--it's not their job description! Our assurance comes from the Word of God coupled with the inner witness of the Holy Spirit (cf. Rom. 8:16). We are to examine our own hearts, and become fruit inspectors of ourselves!
Grace means
we cannot add to it, we cannot substitute for it, we
don't deserve it, we cannot earn it, nor can we ever pay it back--grace all the way! We cannot put faith
in the church or the pastor/teacher or even ourselves but the object must be Christ--it's the object that saves, not faith per se. Faith doesn't save: Christ is the Savior! Faith is the instrumental means or channel of grace.
The battle cry or rallying cry of the Reformation was that we are
"saved by faith alone"; yet Romanists said that the Bible doesn't say that and they couldn't point to any certain passage in particular. When we are arguing or proof-texting we have missed the boat and don't see the big picture. Many cults like to point you to some verse and catch you off-guard, unprepared for their interpretation. You are either grace-oriented or not! Yes, they are technically right, but no text says Jesus is God per se, in so many words, or that God is a Trinity either! Some seemingly obscure doctrines we deduce from accepted dogma and plain, obvious passages or verses.
But with the Romanists, faith is seen as agreeing or acquiescing with what the Church (in their case the Roman Catholic Church) teaches or espouses. Faith of this kind is merely head belief, not heart belief, that doesn't enter the inner being of man and grow as a living and saving faith. Saving faith is an
obedient one! We obey the gospel! The Holy Spirit is only given to those who obey: "We are witnesses of these things, and so is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey Him" (Acts 5:32, HCSB). (CF. Heb. 3:18-19). THE POINT IS THAT FAITH AND OBEDIENCE ARE ETERNALLY EQUATED IN HOLY WRIT! THEY ARE TWO SIDES OF THE SAME COIN; "ONLY HE WHO BELIEVES IS OBEDIENT; ONLY HE WHO IS OBEDIENT BELIEVES"
NB: The Judaizers were guilty of mixing law and gospel, works and faith, merit and grace! This confusion led Paul to delineate the gospel message and condemn anyone who preaches an unbiblical evangel.
Rome distorts the pure gospel message in multiple ways: it adds works to faith, merit to grace, the Church to Christ, tradition to Scripture, and diminishes the glory of God as a result and outcome. For instance, they may have a lot of faith in their priest or in the Pope as being right. Of course, they see faith as necessary, grace as necessary, and Christ as
necessary even Scripture as necessary, but they refuse to acknowledge them as
sufficient. We believe grace is not only necessary but
also sufficient to save us, as we are saved by grace, not by works, as Paul said, "My [God's] grace is sufficient for thee" (cf. 2 Cor. 12:9).
What Rome has done is make faith a meritorious work and in effect
enabled man to save himself by what's called an analytic is a tautology, adding no new data, inherent righteousness and infused justification, not a synthetic, meaning we add data, alien righteousness (belonging to Christ, not us), and imputed justification of Christ--they see man as getting qualified or meriting salvation and he must make himself worthy in some way with some presalvation work--this is like stealing God's glory and giving yourself a pat on the back.
"Salvation is of the LORD," (Jonah 2:9) and is a completed work of God, not a cooperative venture. If we had to do anything, we'd fail. (Inherent is what we already possess and analytic means we add no new info--a triangle has three sides-- and this implies he already has the capability and is just and it's only latent, and it's infused which means inspired or quickened--so God just instills our latent righteousness--whereas synthetic means we add new data we don't have to the equation, and alien means foreign and not our own--so God imputes Christ's righteousness to us, it's not our righteousness that saves us! In other words, God declares us righteous by virtue of Christ's righteousness, we are not made righteous and have no natural righteousness of our own--our righteousness is solely God's gift to us, not our gift to Him.
We must not believe in ourselves but in Christ and the object of our faith must be Christ, not Christ plus something or someone, not even us--we must give up trying to save ourselves. It is heresy to add anything to Jesus in our salvation: Jesus plus alms-giving, Jesus plus churchmanship, Jesus plus tithing, Jesus plus witnessing, Jesus plus any good behaviors--we are not saved by good behavior, but unto good behavior and if we don't have it our faith is suspect and may not exist. Dead faith cannot save and that refers to a faith that is unfruitful and is not shown or demonstrated by works or deeds to prove it and validate it. The faith you have is the faith you show, is what I always say.
The present-day evangelicals like to preach an easy-believism and/or play down the lordship of Christ in making a decision to follow Him and open the door of one's heart to die in Him, taking up one's cross after Him in obedience. Christ will not save those He cannot command according to A. W. Tozer and what this means is that we must accept His ownership over our lives and surrender our wills at salvation and constantly renew that surrender as is fitting and proper. In other words, true saving faith involves trusting Jesus alone as Savior, and submitting to His authority or lordship over our lives--only then do we own Him as our Lord and Savior. He will not be a divided Christ, we accept Him for who He is or it's rejection.
We must not confuse the gospel with the law either! Law involves our duty to God and gospel is how Jesus settled the sin question and all He did on our behalf. The two can be distinguished but not separated: we have responsibilities as well as privileges as the flip side! They go hand in hand. Parishioners must see their duty as well as the grace of God. The Law was given to break and make us realize we cannot keep it; we don't break it, however, it breaks us! What we do break is God's heart! Preachers must get them lost ( cognizant of conviction of sin) before attempting to save them (preach salvation via the gospel) and some actually believe they are saved having never sensed they were ever lost sheep! All we like sheep have gone astray! We all need to be corralled into the flock now and then and a sermon ought to be able to give us a spiritual inventory as we get our regular checkup and connect with the preacher and one another with the message in mind.
The slogan "Just do it!" is relevant to following Christ; a disobedient follower or disciple is a contradiction in terms! Remember the obedience of Peter: "Nevertheless, at thy Word, Lord, I will cast down my net." We are like soldiers in God's army and the line for the poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson comes to mind: "Ours is not to wonder why ours is but to do and die!" If Christ can be obedient unto death for us, we must follow our Exemplar and do likewise, for He doesn't ask us to do anything He didn't do. Those who question orders don't belong in the military and likewise, with our Lord, we should obey wholeheartedly, and in full compliance.
In regards to law and gospel, we must never separate faith and repentance. There is no saving faith without genuine repentance, and no genuine repentance without accompanying saving faith--they're two sides of the same coin, going hand in hand and one is the flip side of the other; you could call the command to penitent faith, or believing repentance, for you can distinguish them but never divorce them without compromising the truth. Acts 20:21, ESV, says that the apostle was "testifying both to Jews and to Greeks of repentance toward God and of faith in our Lord Jesus Christ." Note that these two active verbs are juxtaposed and forever wed in Scripture. We see other passages where we are enjoined to repent unto salvation and in others to believe in the gospel. We make a turnaround from sin (repentance) to Christ (faith). The first words preached by John the Baptist and Jesus were to repent; Jesus added to believe in the gospel!
NB: The Reformation was inaugurated because of a revolt against so-called tradition of the Roman Catholic Church as well as the restoration of the gospel, and during the Counter-Reformation in the Council of Trent (1545-63), the Church declared tradition on a par with the Bible in authority as well as condemn (pronounce anathema) anyone who believes we are saved by faith alone; i.e., the Protestants!
In sum, we must learn as the gospel hymn goes,
"Trust and obey!" Paul was a good example for he was not disobedient to the heavenly vision and warned of those who distort or pervert the gospel (cf. Gal. 1:7) and even preach another gospel, another Jesus, and another Spirit (cf. 2 Cor. 11:4).
Soli Deo Gloria!
