I have already answered your question, so let me ask you a question: Do you agree with James that you must keep the Law to establish and maintain your salvation?
Your answer did not add to my understanding of Sola Fide. My question has to do with the impact of sin entering the soul of a person of faith. Is that person’s righteousness permanent and never taken away or does that person lose righteousness until he repents for his sin?
In response to your question about James, I am more concerned with what Christ says. James is somewhat demanding (show me your faith) and insulting (you ignoramus). I agree with the things he says that are consistent with what Jesus commands us to do; love one another, do not commit adultery, do not kill. James writes that if we fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” that we are doing well. Paul makes a similar statement in Galatians 5:14; “For the whole law is fulfilled in one statement, namely, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”
I am inclined to believe that God deals with each one of us individually, based on what is in our heart.
When I pray, I start like this:
I enter into the presence of God.
A God who is greater than I can possibly understand.
Yet a God who is close to me, closer to me than I am to myself.
A God who loves me.
When a person of faith loves God as He commands, that person is returning a shadow of the love God has for him. God also calls us to share the love He gives us with each other.
Through this love God has for us and we return to Him, a person of faith has a great desire to please Him, and becomes upset with himself when we does something that is not pleasing to God or does not do what God wants us to do. I am mindful of what Paul says in Romans 7:15, “For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.”
God loves us and gives us every opportunity to repent when we fall into sin. A man of faith regrets the sin he commits almost as he is doing it, and God forgives his sin because He knows what is in the man’s heart.
Is this in line with what Sola Fide instructs or am I way out in left field?
James advocates keeping the Old Covenant Law. James as the head of the Church in Jerusalem sent his men to challenge Paul's teachings of a grace-only gospel. It was only at the council of Acts 15 that Paul prevailed with his grace-only gospel. The epistle of James was obviously written during this Law-based gospel period since James insisted that members of the Church must keep the O.C. Law. Indeed, the Church was being run out of the temple in Jerusalem for the first two decades of its existence. Christianity at this time was only a sect of Judaism. If they had not kept the Law they would have been at best driven out of Jerusalem, and at worst stoned to death.
What did the false witnesses say against Stephen? "This fellow never stops speaking against this holy place and against the law." This was a false witness (Ac.6.13), meaning that Stephen had not been preaching against the temple (and everything it stood for) or keeping the Law. Stephen then turned it around on his accusers and accused them of not keeping the Law. He claimed that they were "uncircumcised". No wonder they stoned him to death.