Note we are to make disciplies - not converts.
Posted on 07/12/2021 2:22:26 PM PDT by Old Yeller
The words justification and sanctification have largely fallen out of use in Western culture. Sadly, they are also fading from sight in the Christian church. One reason this decline is distressing is that the Bible uses the words justification and sanctification to express the saving work of Christ for sinners. That is to say, both terms lie at the heart of the biblical gospel. So, what does the Bible teach about justification and sanctification? How do they differ from one another? How do they help us understand better the believer’s relationship with Jesus Christ?
Justification is as simple as A-B-C-D. Justification is an act of God. It does not describe the way that God inwardly renews and changes a person. It is, rather, a legal declaration in which God pardons the sinner of all his sins and accepts and accounts the sinner as righteous in His sight. God declares the sinner righteous at the very moment that the sinner puts his trust in Jesus Christ (Rom. 3:21-26, 5:16; 2 Cor. 5:21).
What is the basis of this legal verdict? God justifies the sinner solely on the basis of the obedience and death of His Son, our representative, Jesus Christ. Christ’s perfect obedience and full satisfaction for sin are the only ground upon which God declares the sinner righteous (Rom. 5:18-19; Gal. 3:13; Eph. 1:7; Phil. 2:8). We are not justified by our own works; we are justified solely on the basis of Christ’s work on our behalf. This righteousness is imputed to the sinner. In other words, in justification, God puts the righteousness of His Son onto the sinner’s account. Just as my sins were transferred to, or laid upon, Christ at the cross, so also His righteousness is reckoned to me (2 Cor. 5:21).
By what means is the sinner justified? Sinners are justified through faith alone when they confess their trust in Christ. We are not justified because of any good that we have done, are doing, or will do. Faith is the only instrument of justification. Faith adds nothing to what Christ has done for us in justification. Faith merely receives the righteousness of Jesus Christ offered in the gospel (Rom. 4:4-5).
Finally, saving faith must demonstrate itself to be the genuine article by producing good works. It is possible to profess saving faith but not possess saving faith (James 2:14-25). What distinguishes true faith from a mere claim to faith is the presence of good works (Gal. 5:6). We are in no way justified by our good works. But no one may consider himself to be a justified person unless he sees in his life the fruit and evidence of justifying faith; that is, good works.
Both justification and sanctification are graces of the gospel; they always accompany one another; and they deal with the sinner’s sin. But they differ in some important ways. First, whereas justification addresses the guilt of our sin, sanctification addresses the dominion and corruption of sin in our lives. Justification is God’s declaring the sinner righteous; sanctification is God’s renewing and transforming our whole persons—our minds, wills, affections, and behaviors. United to Jesus Christ in His death and resurrection and indwelt by the Spirit of Christ, we are dead to the reign of sin and alive to righteousness (Rom. 6:1-23; 8:1-11). We therefore are obligated to put sin to death and to present our “members to God as instruments for righteousness” (6:13; see 8:13).
Second, our justification is a complete and finished act. Justification means that every believer is completely and finally freed from condemnation and the wrath of God (Rom. 8:1, 33-34; Col. 2:13b-14). Sanctification, however, is an ongoing and progressive work in our lives. Although every believer is brought out once and for all from bondage to sin, we are not immediately made perfect. We will not be completely freed from sin until we receive our resurrection bodies at the last day.
Christ has won both justification and sanctification for His people. Both graces are the concern of faith in Jesus Christ, but in different ways. In justification, our faith results in our being forgiven, accepted, and accounted righteous in God’s sight. In sanctification, that same faith actively and eagerly takes up all the commands that Christ has given the believer. We dare not separate or conflate justification and sanctification. We do distinguish them. And, in both graces, we enter into the richness and joy of communion with Christ through faith in Him.
That would be fitting for an article elaborating on the fruit of the Spirit thru faith, but the focus here was on the difference btwn Justification and Sanctification and yet their relation as the former results in the practical outworking of the latter. For without faith it is impossible to please God, (Heb. 11:6) for by which heart-purifying regenerating faith (Acts 10:43-47; 15:7-9; Titus 3:5) the sinner is washed, sanctified and justified (1 Co. 6:11) and effects the obedience of faith which works by love. (Galatians 5:6) And which is the only kind of faith that is salvific. (Heb. 6:9,10)
And yet you apparently cannot see this as you imagine that love may more importance than even faith, and that the necessity of having a faith which works by love "does not seem to fit very well at all into your description" when in reality without effectual faith then there would be no works by believers, and as said, the article clearly states that "saving faith must demonstrate itself to be the genuine article by producing good works. It is possible to profess saving faith but not possess saving faith (James 2:14-25). What distinguishes true faith from a mere claim to faith is the presence of good works (Gal. 5:6)....faith actively and eagerly takes up all the commands that Christ has given the believer.
Thus you are in error and engaging in a false dichotomy.
I think the confusion STARTS with the crummy way Romans 4:3 is translated in the Douay-Rheims version. They substituted the word "righteousness" with "justice" (and not just in this verse) for some strange reason when the Greek word is:
dikaios: correct, righteous, by impl. innocent
Original Word: δίκαιος, ία, ιον
Part of Speech: Adjective
Transliteration: dikaios
Phonetic Spelling: (dik'-ah-yos)
Definition: correct, righteous, by implication innocent
Usage: just; especially, just in the eyes of God; righteous; the elect (a Jewish idea).
Even the word "just" or "justified" is a better choice than justice. The Scripture this passage refers to - Genesis 15:6 - uses the Hebrew word for righteousness.
That passage from Romans 4 makes the most sense when you show it in context:
And speaking as a former Catholic, it DOES teach that in order to remain in the state of grace/justified, good works MUST be performed which is really no different than saying you are justified by works. It teaches an "accursed" gospel.
You might want to check the settings on your spin machine. Just sayin’
The Mormon have a phrase that covers this, it’s called ‘lying for the Lord’. Islam have a similar, taqqiya(sp?). For many Catholics it’s like the three monkeys ...
We have often butted heads, but one can tell that you truly believe the things your church has taught you - as you should.
Likewise; I believe the things I have come across in my studies.
But, as blind men inspecting the elephant; there must be some things that we have both yet to investigate as we circle this massive beast.
No, in what I referred to you set justification by faith as being opposed to pleasing God by love. You took a statement of hyperbole which does not describe justiifyiong faith that "worketh by love" that the article referred to, and and set it in opposition to the what they article taught, asserting "does not seem to fit very well at all into your description." Rather, what you perceived did not fit very well at all into its description.
"and the best you can do with your Faith Alone ideal is to validate its contradiction- by attributing definition to Paul for that which he DID NOT write and at the same time dismissIn or revising what St. James DID In fact say about your Sola...You can’t Square that between these two New Testament authors- and make it fit no matter how hard you try.... I am beginning to see through the scriptural rabbit holes you are trained in and enjoy so much- and I think I am starting to see a situation where for you.... and this might sound weird.... where you find having “Faith”, in “your own Faith” to be of a critical importance.... "
What incongruity of ignorance is this? Apparently (as is the norm for students of RC propaganda) you hold to the fallacy that sola fide means a faith that is alone justifies rather than it being the faith which effects works being that which purifies the heart in the washing of regeneration.
As even Luther himself formally taught:
faith is a living and an essential thing, which makes a new creature of man, changes his spirit... Faith cannot help doing good works constantly... if faith be true, it will break forth and bear fruit... where there is no faith there also can be no good works; and conversely, that there is no faith.. where there are no good works. Therefore faith and good works should be so closely joined together that the essence of the entire Christian life consists in both. if obedience and God's commandments do not dominate you, then the work is not right, but damnable, surely the devil's own doings, although it were even so great a work as to raise the dead... if you continue in pride and lewdness, in greed and anger, and yet talk much of faith, St. Paul will come and say, 1 Cor. 4:20, look here my dear Sir, "the kingdom of God is not in word but in power." It requires life and action, and is not brought about by mere talk. Works are necessary for salvation, but they do not cause salvation... faith casts itself on God, and breaks forth and becomes certain through its works... faith must be exercised, worked and polished; be purified by fire... it is impossible for him who believes in Christ, as a just Savior, not to love and to do good. If, however, he does not do good nor love, it is sure that faith is not present... where the works are absent, there is also no Christ... References and more by God's grace. http://peacebyjesus.net/Reformation_faith_works.html
Consider the SS Puritans who often had a tendency to make the way to the cross too narrow, perhaps in reaction against the Antinomian controversy, as described in an account (http://www.the-highway.com/Early_American_Bauckham.html) of Puritans during the early American period:
“They had, like most preachers of the Gospel, a certain difficulty in determining what we might call the ‘conversion level’, the level of difficulty above which the preacher may be said to be erecting barriers to the Gospel and below which he may be said to be encouraging men to enter too easily into a mere delusion of salvation. Contemporary critics, however, agree that the New England pastors set the level high. Nathaniel Ward, who was step-son to Richard Rogers and a distinguished Puritan preacher himself, is recorded as responding to Thomas Hooker’s sermons on preparation for receiving Christ in conversion with, ‘Mr. Hooker, you make as good Christians before men are in Christ as ever they are after’, and wishing, ‘Would I were but as good a Christian now as you make men while they are preparing for Christ.’”
And that maybe it can even become paramount... I could be wrong, but Do you think it possible for someone?- to have a zealous Faith IN their own Faith?
Certainly but non-sequitur. But Catholicism fosters faith in one's own merit and that of Herself for salvation, including by such reactionary misleading statements as
"nothing further is wanting to the justified [baptized and faithful], to prevent their being accounted to have, by those very works which have been done in God, fully satisfied the divine law according to the state of this life, and to have truly merited eternal life." (Trent, Chapter XVI; The Sixth Session Decree on justification, 1547) Likewise Canon 32 teaches that if anyone says that the one justified by the good works that he performs by the grace of God does not truly merit eternal life, and in case he dies in grace, the attainment of eternal life itself, let him be anathema.
There is a contextual sense in which works justify, meaning they justify one as being a believer as it did Abraham, having fruit that accompanies salvation (Rm 8:14; Heb. 6:9,10) and thus fulfilling the affirmation given thru imputed righteousness. (James 2:23; Gn. 15:6; Rm. 4:1ff) And God rewards the faith of believers as expressed in works by the Spirit, (Heb. 10:35) though man the only things man can - and must - claim any credit for is his disobedience, but as regards what obtains justification then it is effectual faith, not any moral merit
Of course it does, not as meriting the call of God, nor the grace by which one is justified by merit, and with the difference btwn this and salvation by works being explained as Catholic justification by works being by God's grace.
Although the sinner is justified by the justice of Christ, inasmuch as the Redeemer has merited for him the grace of justification (causa meritoria), nevertheless he is formally justified and made holy by his own personal justice and holiness (causa formalis), just as a philosopher by his own inherent learning becomes a scholar.. Catholic Encyclopedia > Sanctifying Grace)
For according to the teaching of the Catholic Church the righteousness and sanctity which justification confers, although given to us by God as efficient cause (causa efficiens) and merited by Christ as meritorious cause (causa meritoria), become an interior sanctifying quality or formal cause (causa formalis) in the soul itself, which it makes truly just and holy in the sight of God. (Catholic Encyclopedia > Justification)
This is set in contrast to justification by imputed righteousness, not as due any holiness of heart (as in "infused charity" whereby "the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity are in the process of justification infused into the soul as supernatural habits." ibid) but (contrary to the typical RC miscontruance of sola fide, it is not separate from regeneration.
As Scripture clearly teaches,
To him give all the prophets witness, that through his name whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins. While Peter yet spake these words, the Holy Ghost fell on all them which heard the word. (Acts 10:43-44) Can any man forbid water, that these should not be baptized, which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we? (Acts 10:47)
And when there had been much disputing, Peter rose up, and said unto them, Men and brethren, ye know how that a good while ago God made choice among us, that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the word of the gospel, and believe. And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us; And put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. (Acts 15:7-9)
But Abraham was declared righteous when he believed God to do what he was helpless to do, even though he did works or charity before that, and not because he suddenly became righteous. But because he was of true saving faith then he therefore obeyed God.
But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness. (Romans 4:5)
And being not weak in faith, he considered not his own body now dead, when he was about an hundred years old, neither yet the deadness of Sara’s womb: He staggered not at the promise of God through unbelief; but was strong in faith, giving glory to God; And being fully persuaded that, what he had promised, he was able also to perform. And therefore it was imputed to him for righteousness. Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; (Romans 4:19-24)
Thus it is effectual, heart-purifying regenerating faith that is counted for righteousness, rendering one "accepted in the Beloved" on Christ's account.
"No, no - you are not interpreting 32 properly… as it clearly begins: CANON XXXII.-If any one saith, that the good works of one that is justified are in such manner the gifts of God, This – the second to LAST Canon on Justification… is simply referencing someone who has been already justified – and doing good works in the manner of gifts OF God…. It.Does.Not.Say. as you wrote- “One justified by Good Works”. That would again contradict everything in Trent."
To the contrary, Canon 32 is NOT teaching contrary to one being justified by Good Works, but actually teaches just that - but of course that this is by the grace of God - and condemns anyone who says that the one justified by the good works that he performs by the grace of God does not truly merit the attainment of eternal life itself. Read it:
"If anyone says that the good works of the one justified are in such manner the gifts of God that they are not also the good merits of him justified; or that the one justified by the good works that he performs by the grace of God and the merit of Jesus Christ, whose living member he is, does not truly merit an increase of grace, eternal life, and in case he dies in grace, the attainment of eternal life itself and also an increase of glory, let him be anathema." (Trent, Canons Concerning Justification, Canon 32
"Most important – it would contradict The VERY FIRST Canon on Justification of the Church Council of trent responding to thr reformers..… the First usually being the MOST important:: CANON I.-If any one saith, that man may be justified before God by his own works, whether done through the teaching of human nature, or that of the law, without the grace of God through Jesus Christ; let him be anathema."
You may want to see a denial of man being justified before God by his own works here but that is not what it is condemning, but is condemning being justified before God through the teaching of human nature, or that of the law, without the grace of God through Jesus Christ. It does not teach that man is not justified by works done by the grace of God through Jesus Christ, which is Catholic theology as shown.
" 2007 With regard to God, there is no strict right to any merit on the part of man. Between God and us there is an immeasurable inequality, for we have received everything from him, our Creator. 2008 The merit of man before God in the Christian life arises from the fact that God has freely chosen to associate man with the work of his grace. ".. Our merits are God's gifts."
Yes, as I have said. God rewards faith by rewarding believers for their works of faith, and which fruit justifies/vindicated them as being believers, however, man obtains justification by imputed righteousness while becoming a new creature thru regeneration.
"2010 Since the initiative belongs to God in the order of grace, no one can merit the initial grace of forgiveness and justification, at the beginning of conversion. "
Correct, as I said, and I have read all this before, but the Catholic basis for justification is that of the presumed inherent righteousness of the baptized soul, and then his works of merit - by God's grace of course - and thus (usually) needing to do to Purgatory to actually become good enough to be with God, versus being made accepted in the Beloved and made to positionally sit with Him in Heaven on His account (Eph. 1:6; 2:6) and going to forever be with the Lord at death or His return, glory to God.
NOW - that does not mean people may incorrectly assume that for themselves – they can “do good” for their eternal reward
When you have statements - however misunderstood - like the below, and given the natural mind of man that presumes salvation by merit , then it is any wonder:
"nothing further is wanting to the justified [baptized and faithful], to prevent their being accounted to have, by those very works which have been done in God, fully satisfied the divine law according to the state of this life, and to have truly merited eternal life." (Trent, Chapter XVI; The Sixth Session Decree on justification, 1547)
….you hold to the fallacy that sola fide means a faith that is alone justifies rather than it being the faith which effects works being that which purifies the heart in the washing of regeneration.
"Yes guilty as charged… You may not hold that “fallacy” but I’ve run into the non-Catholic who certainly do…. And again “SOLA” means Only, Alone…. Faith alone…. The minute you say “ faith which effects works” you begin to move away from the Sola position as I see it"
Then the problem is your ignorance which requires me to use my time to correct. Again, "sola" refers to what actually justifies one, heart-purifying regenerating faith or actually becoming righteous despite yet possessing a sinful nature, which will not be manifest after conversion, and which for the RC means he/she must endure Purgatory until they become actually good enough to be with God.
"Works are necessary for salvation, but they do not cause salvation... (Luther) Now I don’t know when in his transformation Luther taught this- I would think he distanced himself from this Catholic thinkin near the end… but this IS exactly what the Church teaches…"
No, it not.
"Good Works then are NOT not “signs” of our Faith- or something that “proves” our Faith for reward… which is what I encounter often"
Then encounter it more:
But, beloved, we are persuaded better things of you, and things that accompany salvation, though we thus speak. For God is not unrighteous to forget your work and labour of love, which ye have shewed toward his name, in that ye have ministered to the saints, and do minister. (Hebrews 6:9-10)
"Remembering without ceasing your work of faith, and labour of love, and patience of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ, in the sight of God and our Father; Knowing, brethren beloved, your election of God. For our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much assurance; as ye know what manner of men we were among you for your sake. And ye became followers of us, and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost: (1 Thessalonians 1:3-6)"
And when he saw their faith, he said unto him, Man, thy sins are forgiven thee. (Luke 5:20)
But Christ as a son over his own house; whose house are we, if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm unto the end. (Hebrews 3:6)
Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath great recompence of reward. (Hebrews 10:35)
"Love cannot be absent from the Salvific process- and that is our biggest stumbling block."
Which is consistent with the very verse in the article in which you find inconsistency.
For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision; but faith which worketh by love. (Galatians 5:6)
" That Faith and Works are like a pair of scissors- both blades are necessary for the scissors to work properly. “Alone” neither blade can do very little on its own… "
Rather, they are inseparable for they are cause and effect, however what we truly believe (st least at the time) is the cause behind all our volitional choices. Like as forgiveness and healing went together in the story of the palsied man, so that the Lord could ask, "Whether is it easier to say to the sick of the palsy, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and take up thy bed, and walk? (Mark 2:9) even though healing was the effect of forgiveness, so faith and obedience go together, but faith is the cause behind the effect.
Note we are to make disciplies - not converts.
Although I think the author is right, but if these terms have faded from a "Christian" church, I would question whether that church is Christian at all. These are fundamental doctrines.
Simply:
“Justified” - At the time of salvation, God cleanses you and you’re pure just as if you had never sinned.
“Sanctified” - Set apart by God for a special purpose.
Two men went bear hunting. While one stayed in the cabin, the other went out looking for a bear.Seems a lot of churches are more involved in getting folks saved than they are at cleaning them up and ready for service.
He soon found a huge bear, shot at it but only wounded it. The enraged bear charged toward him, he dropped his rifle and started running for the cabin as fast as he could.
He ran pretty fast but the bear was just a little faster and gained on him with every step.
Just as he reached the open cabin door, he tripped and fell flat.
Too close behind to stop, the bear tripped over him and went rolling into the cabin.
The man jumped up, closed the cabin door and yelled to his friend inside, "You skin this one while I go and get another!"
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