Posted on 10/31/2001 8:11:42 AM PST by AnalogReigns
There is no such thing as merit;What Was Wrong with Luther?
but all who are justified
are justified for nothing (gratis),
and this is credited to no one
but to the grace of God. . . .For Christ alone it is proper
to help and save others
with His merits and works.Martin Luther
Justification is conferred in baptism,
the sacrament of faith.
It conforms us to the righteousness of God,
who makes us inwardly just
by the power of his mercy.The New Catechism (of the Roman Catholic Church)
I have found that my beliefs are essentially the same as those of orthodox Roman Catholics.Billy Graham
Was Martin Luther Wrong?Since the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century, “by faith alone” (sola fide) has been the defining doctrine of evangelical Christianity — and the way of justification the defining difference between Roman Catholics and evangelicals. But in recent years these differences seem to be increasingly ignored by evangelical leaders such as Billy Graham, Charles Colson, Bill Bright and others. A noticeable trend has been developing.
Most so-called “Christian booksellers” carry books from both evangelical and Roman Catholic publishing houses, with little differentiation. A leading evangelical recording artist, Michael Card, recently recorded and toured with Roman Catholic monk/musician John Michael Talbot. Evangelicals and Catholics are found praying together, worshipping together, and studying the Bible together. While these things have not gone without criticism, their widespread acceptance has led a number of evangelicals to ask:
Whatever happened to the Reformation?
Was Martin Luther wrong, after all?
Or does it really matter?Today marks the 484th anniversary of Luther's famous posting of 95 Theses on the church door at Wittenburg — a move seen as the beginning of the Protestant Reformation. It seems fitting, therefore, to ask this crucial question as we commemorate his revolutionary act. After all, to Luther it was the Gospel itself that was at stake... no less so today as then.
The gospel according to Rome is the "good news" that a sinner may be justified if he or she receives the sacraments, has faith, and cooperates with grace to the point of becoming inherently righteous. That justification is effective as long as the believer refrains from mortal sin. If the person loses justification by mortal sin, he or she may be restored to justification by the sacrament of penance. If the person dies not in mortal sin but with impurities, he or she can get to heaven after being cleansed in purgatory.
Was Luther wrong in standing against this "gospel"? If not, shouldn't the fact that so many evangelicals are acquiescing to Roman Catholicism disturb us?
Using the Bible as your guide — setting your emotions and prejudices aside, while engaging the mind — you be the judge...
Rob Schläpfer : Editor
editor@antithesis.com
What was the matter with Martin Luther? some might ask. The matter with Luther was a matter of the greatest possible urgency.
The matter with Luther was that sin matters.
The matter with Luther was that salvation matters,
ultimately and eternally.
Luther felt the weight of these matters to a degree few people, if any, have felt them in human history. These issues mattered enough to Luther to compel him to stand against the authority of church and state in a lonely and often bitter contest that made him Luther contra mundum. [=against the world]
Following the ancient Aristotelian form-matter schema, historians have pinpointed the doctrine of justification by faith alone (sola fide) as the material cause of the sixteenth-century Protestant Reformation. It was the chief matter under dispute. Luther considered it "the article upon which the church stands or falls." At a personal level he understood that it was the article upon which he himself stood or fell.
Thus, since the Reformation the doctrine of sola fide has been the defining doctrine of evangelical Christianity. It has functioned as a normative doctrine because it has been understood as essential to the Gospel itself. Without sola fide one does not have the Gospel; and without the Gospel one does not have the Christian faith. When an ecclesiastical communion rejects sola fide, as Rome did at the Council of Trent, it ceases being a true church, no matter how orthodox it may be in other matters, because it has condemned an essential of the faith. Whereas at Worms Luther stood, at Trent Rome fell and remains fallen to this day.
The Character of God
The dilemma Luther experienced in the anguish of his soul was related in the first instance to his correct understanding of the character of God. One of the essential attributes of God (essential in that without it God would not be God) is his justice. The Scriptures clearly reveal that the God of heaven and earth is just. This means far more than that the judgment he renders is equitable. It is not only that God does what is just, but that he does what is just because he is just. His righteous actions flow out of his righteous character.
That God is eternally and immutably just posed for Luther (as it should also pose for us) the ultimate dilemma, because we are not just. We are sinners lacking the perfect justness of God. Our sin violates the supreme standard of righteousness found in God's character. This is the burden Luther felt so keenly, but which we tend to treat lightly. We are inclined to think that God is so merciful that his mercy will annul or cancel out his justice. We assume that God will grade us on a curve and that he is quite willing to negotiate his own righteousness.
As sinners with recalcitrant hearts, human beings have no fear of the justice of God, in part because they are ignorant of his law and additionally because, when they are aware of it, they hold it in contempt. We have all become, as Jeremiah said of Israel, like a harlot who has lost the capacity to blush (Jer. 6:15; 8: 12). We assume that our works are good enough to pass the scrutiny of God at the final tribunal. And we do this despite the apostolic warning that by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified (Rom. 3:20).
People who consider themselves just enough in their own goodness do not tremble before the law and feel no need for the Gospel. For such, the matter of justification is not of great importance. It is merely a "doctrine," and to the contemporary church few things are deemed less important than doctrine. "Doctrine divides," we are told. "What matters is that we have a personal relationship with Jesus. The doctrine of justification doesn't save us; it is Christ who saves us."
Doctrines Unite
Certainly doctrines do divide. Certainly doctrines do not in themselves save us. Certainly we are called to have a personal relationship with Christ. However, doctrine also unites. It unites those who share one Lord, one faith, one baptism. And though doctrines do not save us, they correctly inform us of how we are saved.
It must be added, too, that having a personal relationship with Jesus does not save us unless it is a saving relationship. Everyone has a personal relationship with Jesus. Even the devil has a personal relationship with Christ, but it is a relationship of estrangement, of hostility to him. We are all related to Christ, but we are not all united to Christ, which union comes by faith and faith alone.
Luther understood what David understood when he asked the rhetorical question,
If you, O LORD, kept a record of sins,
O LORD, who could stand? (Ps. 130:3)
The question is rhetorical because no explicit answer is given. The answer is nevertheless obvious:
No one.
No one by himself can stand before a God who takes note of our iniquities, for we are all sinners. The problem is that the Lord does mark iniquities and promises to bring every one of them into judgment. Moreover, as long as we remain outside of Christ we are continually heaping up judgment against the day of wrath.
The only way an unjust person can escape the day of God's wrath is to be justified. Only the justified will stand in that day That is why the matter of justification is so vital. It is not a mere theological abstraction or a petty doctrine. The struggle of the Reformation was not a contest of shadowboxing, nor was it a tempest in a teapot. It is perilous to think it was much ado about nothing or simply a misunderstanding among theologians and clerics. To be sure there were issues that were confused and obscured in the heat of the debate. But it was crystal-clear that the core issue was the way of justification, and the two sides took not only differing positions but mutually exclusive and irreconcilable positions in the debate.
What Is Justification?
Justification refers to a legal action by God by which he declares a person just in his sight. The Protestant view is often described as "forensic justification," meaning that justification is a "legal declaration" made by God.
What is often overlooked in discussions about justification is that the Roman Catholic communion also has its version of forensic justification. That is, Catholics agree that justification occurs when God declares a person just. However, when evangelicals speak of forensic justification, the phrase is used as a kind of theological shorthand for sola fide, and what is tacit is the assumption that God declares people to be just who in themselves are not just. Rome teaches that God declares people just only when they are in fact just. They are declared to be just only if and when justness inheres within them. Both sides see justification as a divine declaration, but the ground for such a declaration differs radically.
Rome saw justification as meaning "making just," based on the Latin roots for the word justificare (Justus and facio, facere), which in Roman jurisprudence meant "to make righteous." For Rome, God only declares to be just those who have first been made just...
***
The differences between these two "gospels" is in grave danger of being lost in our day. Efforts to heal the breach between Rome and the Reformation have yielded confusion among many. The issue cannot be resolved by studied ambiguities or different meanings attached to the same words. The crucial issue of infusion versus imputation remains the irreconcilable issue. We are either justified by a righteousness that is in us or by a righteousness that is apart from us. There is no third way.
R. C. Sproul
Because the RCC persists to this day in trying to sell the idea that the RCC -- not Christ -- dispenses salvation. That is why good little catholic mommies, instilled with the superstition of the RCC, believe their babies won't be saved if they die before they are 'baptized' by the RCC. [Of course, our not-so-friendly Calvinists who are busy damning everyone not in their group (sounds similar to the RCC doesn't it?) don't help -- they would also damn irretrievably most dying babies. [Thankfully, Jesus, Calvinist/RCC pontificating to the contrary notwithstanding, doesn't agree.]
I generally agree with you on the issue of believer baptism because it doesn't really DO anything. We observe the ceremony of baptism as an outward demonstration and testimony of what Christ has done in our hearts. But if Christ hasn't regenerated one's heart, it doesn't matter if you take a shower, a bath, a scuba dive or a high dive, it ain't gonna "work."
Short and sweet -- Jesus saves, not baptism. No matter who does it or how or when it's done. A little (or a lot of) water and an incantation is still just water and incantation.
When everyone has heard the Gospel of Christ, THEN we can discuss which form of baptism comes closer to what the disciples were doing. [Remember Christ never 'baptised' anyone.] But until everyone has heard, it really doesn't matter.
Whatever. It doesn't seem to be working.
Medieval heretics were heretics by anyone's definition. Are you familiar with the beliefs of the Albigensians and Cathars, whom the book lists as baptists? The groups believed among other things that:
*The God of the Old Testament was a mad evil being who created the physical world out of ignorance and arrogance.
*It follows that matter is evil.
*Jesus was not the son of the OT God (known as the Demiurge), but his enemy.
*Jesus's goal was to free people from the physical world.
*Sex is abhorrent because it causes new people to be born and more matter to be created.
*If you positively must have sex, than anal and oral sex are the only approved methods.
*If you are unable to attain the rank of "Cathar," that is to say, "purified," than you can simply live a life free of moral constraint.
Now, last I checked, non of these are believed by most baptist churches. However, Trail of Blood says that the Albigensians and Cathars were baptists, and since these are among the many beliefs of those two groups, then, well, I'd always thought baptists were odd, but I had no idea...
In addition, there is not one single bit of historical evidence that states that those church elders who did not show up at Nicea were baptists. Zero. No primary source says anything about "baptists," or even groups that practice what baptists do. Are you aware of what the Donatists heresy stated? The Donatists believed that they were the only people who had the moral fiber to be proper Christians. The Donatists believed that people were saved by the righteousness of their works, and that sacraments were utterly invalid if administered by an elder who was in a state of sin. The Donatists were baptists? Trying to make baptists out of heretics is a neat idea if you're looking for some sort of apostollic succession, but it is utterly flawed. In none of the writings of the Fathers from Clement (writing just after the death of John) to Augustine (in the late 4th century) is there any mention of a church group that even resembles baptists. QED.
No...it's the Bible that sets that truth out. Baptists are merely repeating what the Word of God says.
Having been part of evangelical Calvinist fellowships all my life, I've never seen them "damning everyone who's not in their group..." The doctrine of predestination says that the Father knows who the elect are, and no one else... His calling is specifically effective, and not an anemic "call to everyone equally" like non-Calvinists like to claim. If God calls everyone, then He must be a most unpersuasive Guy, as it appears a majority of people reject God from birth onwards.
I, like every other responsible Calvinist I know, believe there are myriads of non-Calvinist believers on earth...as faith alone saves...
Of course we think there are no non-Calvinists in heaven...only ones who formerly didn't understand while on earth...
Like I mentioned earlier...the only people who pretend to see the unbroken thread of Baptists are, ummm, Baptists.
Didn't know the Baptists were Donatists though... ;)
Reminds me of the Mormon "history" of North America.
Oh, yah, right -- I'm sure it's there somewhere.
Here's a better solution. Forget about your favorite theological construct to overlay upon the Bible that just proves that your little group is right and everyone else is wrong. Just go get a Bible (preferably a good modern translation -- there are many) and read it for yourself.
I know. I know. How dangerous that would be with no priest or Calvinist commentator to tell you what to think or what the Gospel writer surely meant -- or what 'the church' has 'always' taught -- or what 'everyone' has 'always' understood. Just read it. [The whole New Testament mind you, not just your favorite half verse.] For yourself. (And try it with an open mind.) Just read it through. Then, if you magically come up with the same tired old construct or some doctrine of papal (or Calvinist commentator) infallability, so be it. But, by that time, perhaps everyone will have read it with an open mind for themselves.
What a concept!
BTW, I'm betting on the Gospel and Jesus Christ and against all the old constructs and 'church doctrines'.
This of course is NOTHING like the number of flaming gay priests one meets these days is it? The "vow" is perfect cover for sodomy and child abuse.
I am amazed at the number of gay priests they are everywhere.
Martin Luther left the church and the vow..he married ,like the leaders of the reformation and those that followed he saw mariage as a blessing from God,not a threat to the wealth of the church!
<flame-retardant jumpsuit>
I treat the five points of Calvinism as an attempt to outline, as much as is possible, the mechanism behind salvation. Obviously it is a flawed understanding, because, as you said, it is a manmade construct, but in my mind it is the conception most consistent with God's omniscience and omnipotence. However, because no one but God knows who the elect are, the five points cannot be looked to as guidance for how to live our lives (as you said, only the Scripture can provide that), and anyone who justifies action on predestination or "I'm of the elect" is wrong. So, while I agree with your point that it is bad for Calvinism to be used as a crutch for man's designs, I don't think that it is a "vicious" ideology.
Who was it that said Alexander VI would have been a pretty good pope if he had been just a little bit religious?
After all, not only our culture, but our very Religious Beliefs are under attack.
Be a little patient, my FRiend, I believe our religious values & beliefs are in the process of being validated. When our current crisis "Shakes out," our "Moral Compass" may WELL be "RE-CALIBRATED!"
Doc
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