Posted on 11/03/2011 7:39:32 AM PDT by fishtank
Is the Reformation Over?
by R.C. Sproul
Is the Reformation over? There have been several observations rendered on this subject by those I would call “erstwhile evangelicals.” One of them wrote, “Luther was right in the sixteenth century, but the question of justification is not an issue now.” A second self-confessed evangelical made a comment in a press conference I attended that “the sixteenth-century Reformation debate over justification by faith alone was a tempest in a teapot.” Still another noted European theologian has argued in print that the doctrine of justification by faith alone is no longer a significant issue in the church. We are faced with a host of people who are defined as Protestants but who have evidently forgotten altogether what it is they are protesting....
...excerpt
(Excerpt) Read more at ligonier.org ...
The works of the law refer to the Levitical holiness code, not to doing works of charity that flow out of your faith.
You can’t have faith without works or works without faith. Salvation won’t come to those who commit evil, but say they love Jesus.
Grace enables faith and works. Works of the law do not save now that we are under grace and not the law, that was what Paul and James taught. It also happens to be what Christ talked about later on in Matthew 7, after your cite of verse 21 take a look at v26. To pit faith against works is not only un-biblical, it's anti-biblical.
'zactly!
That’s what the Catholic Church believes. Free-will comes in when it comes to our choosing not to sin rather than giving into our passions.
Jesus offers grace to all, but it is up to us to accept his invitation.
When the Catholic Church says we need works, she is saying that we have to choose to live as Christ wants us to with the help of his grace.
The Church teaches it because it’s truth, as reviled in Scripture and made plain by the Magesterium, it’s one of the many reasons I remain Catholic.
actually the biblical doctrine is the “man is not saved by faith alone” — we are saved by GRACE alone. As Christ taught we are to repent, confess our sins, believe, be baptised, be in communion with God and endure to the end. His salvation is for all to receive (no limited atonement) — He does the saving, we only humbly accept this grace from God
Good point. Also the epistles were written while the temple works and sacrifice were still happening in history of two thousand years ago. So Paul is comparing the old with the new testament while the old is still being lived by jews of that era. Today reformation people read it wrong. It is out its time.
“Ephesians 2:8-9 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9Not of works, lest any man should boast.”
“For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:10).
“Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works” (James 2:17-18).
“Grace enables faith and works. Works of the law do not save now that we are under grace and not the law, that was what Paul and James taught. It also happens to be what Christ talked about later on in Matthew 7, after your cite of verse 21 take a look at v26. To pit faith against works is not only un-biblical, it’s anti-biblical.”
Titus 2:11-13 “For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world; looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ.”
Amazing how Scripture and Church teaching are consistent on the roles of Grace, Faith, and Works in our individual salvation!
Amen
What do you expect when you had ignorant Germans, Dutch and Englishmen trying to imagine life in Semitic Palestine in the 1st century? Instead of restoring something they founded a mutant version of Christianity that had nothing to do with the early Church.
I think they polemics are hard-pressed to explain what the Oriental Orthodox and Assyrian Church of the East’s polity and faith is closer to that of the Church of Rome than theirs.
They never knew any sort of union of Church and State because they were persecuted by Constantine’s successors for their questionable Christology. They never were affected by scholasticism except when the Portuguese unsuccessfully tried imposing it on them.
These churches believe in the episcopacy of divine right, the same 7 sacraments as the Church of Rome, praying for the dead, the same view of faith and works, the corporeal presence of Jesus in the Eucharist, etc.
I find I can attend a Coptic Orthodox Bible study with very few disagreements compared with if I were to attend an Evangelical Bible study that looks at the Bible without any cultural, political, or historical contexts.
The common American Evangelical view of the apostles is that they were white Americans who looked and thought like them.
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