Posted on 07/08/2008 8:16:05 AM PDT by Gamecock
Sola Fide
Latin “faith alone”
The historic Protestant doctrine that the only instrumental cause of justification, from the human perspective, is faith. While God is the ultimate cause of justification, Protestants believe that faith in Christ through the message of the Gospel is necessary. There are no works, no matter how meritorious they may seem, that can add to justification (Eph. 2:8-9). This doctrine, according to Protestants, finds its roots in the teachings of Paul but was obscured in the middle ages and restored during the Reformation. Many Protestants would be quick to point out that it is not the doctrine itself that saves, but the reality that the doctrine represents. In other words, one is saved by faith alone, not by belief in the doctrine of faith alone. As well, most Protestants would say that “it is faith alone that saves, but the faith that saves will not be alone.” This doctrine represents a major point of distinction between Protestants and Catholics, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and, often, Eastern Orthodox.
"The church" exists because of what the Bible says. If you had no Scripture, you would have no church. Therefore, any "tradition" of "the church" needs to conform to what the final authority, the Bible, says, and if it does not, then is a false tradition. Authority rests in God's Word, which every person will be judged individually for how they handled it, not in some hierarchy which came along centuries after the fact.
If memory serves, it includes all but the Missouri Synod.
Per what Jesus said about the first and second most important points of the Law being "Loving God with all your heart, soul, mind, strength" and "loving your neighbour as yourself", there is no substantive difference between the two. The Levitical law included quite a lot about deeds of charity and mercy.
You managed to strike out on one pitch.
The Chruch exists because of what Jesus said and did, what the Holy Spirit says and does.
The Chruch exists because of what Jesus said and did, what the Holy Spirit says and does.
Ahem.
And how would you know what Jesus and the Holy Spirit said and did, except that this is found in Scripture?
The Bible is the record. The Church exists because of what is recorded there, not because of the record itself.
I pointed out on yesterday's TWODT that II Thess. 2:15 combined "traditions" and "epistles" which Paul had given to that church, suggesting that the one and the other had the same content. Ergo, the "traditions" that Paul gave by word would have been substantively the same as what appeared in his letters. There is absolutely no reason to think that these "traditions" were in any way, shape, or form contradictory to the written Word of God, and therefore, simply appealing to the word "traditions" in that verse is not any sort of support for all of the garbled nonsense that has been added over the centuries in the name of "tradition", but which finds no actual support in the Bible.
This doesn't answer my point - if you had no Bible, no inspired, revealed scripture which determines how we are to, among other things, organise the entities called "churches", then you would have absolutely no clue whatsoever what a "church" even was. Without that written "record", you would have no continuing church.
It does answer your point. It is the words, teachings and acts of Christ that started the Catholic Church, not the recording of them.
“If you had no Scripture, you would have no church.”
The Bible itself demonstrates that this is exactly backwards; the Church created the New Testament to document and standardise the central teachings of the pre-existing Church.
The Holy Spirit created the Church in its fullness by its descent at Pentecost, not by its later inspiration of writings. Scripture was, evidently, neither immediately necessary nor ultimately sufficient.
Riddle me this, Batman: How would you know anything about the words, teachings, and acts of Christ, if there was no New Testament?
The thing we need to look for in scripture is the phrase ‘instrumental cause.’ So it seems like we can have sola fide only at the expense of sola scriptura.
The churches had the Old Testament, indeed, the original church in Jerusalem was instituted by Christ during His earthly ministry (only being empowered, not created, by the Holy Spirit at Pentecost) and were not sufficient until they had the full teaching revealed in the New Testament.
“Riddle me this, Batman: How would you know anything about the words, teachings, and acts of Christ, if there was no New Testament?”
“How can I [understand Scripture], unless someone instructs me?”
Its the instruction in interpretation of the Gospel which is vital, not the mere writing of the Gospel down for anyone to distort or abuse. The Devil can quote Scripture to serve his purpose.
No need to be abusive. What is important is that the events happened. The Church existed before even a word of the NT was committed to paper.
Actually, God "created" the New Testament and gave it by revelation to the churches. As for "the church" - without the NT, you would have no idea how "the church" was even supposed to function, etc. without it. This is because the churches and the Scripture were instituted by the same source - God. God gave the churches the Scripture (which they already had in portion in the possession of the OT) so as to "standardise" their teachings - but the churches themselves do not authoritative determine what those teachings are - they only affirm correct teaching as it was found and revealed in the NT.
Without the Scripture, you truly would have a situation where no one can say what is right or what is wrong. Hence, you would have no churches that can act as the "pillar and ground", the affirmers and perpetuators, or the truth.
Who's being "abusive", or are you trying to divert attention away from the substance of the discussion? What is important is that, without the Scripture, you would have no idea what the events which happened even were. Without Scripture, why would there be any reason to believe one group who claims that they "know" from their traditions how it all happened, versus any myriad of other groups making the same claim? "Traditions", such as they are, are defined by Scripture, and any tradition, of "the church" or otherwise, which deviates from Scripture, is a false tradition.
“were not sufficient until they had the full teaching
Were there teachings which were only introduced in the text of one ofeEpistles or Gospels of which the other faithful were ignorant until the sending of the epistle or publication of the Gospel?
How could any of the other witnesses confirm the account, then? Why would the Church accept something only on the word of one witness?
The Catholic Church predates Scripture. Your analysis fails.
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