Faith Alone Is The Instrument Of Justification AND Salvation
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Controversy can be ugly and painful and the recent controversy over sanctification has been both at times. It can also be helpful by bringing greater clarity and this controversy has been useful in that respect. Some orthodox Reformed pastors are being charged with antinomianism because they allegedly over emphasize grace—how sinners who face eternal condemnation apart from the free favor merited for them by the perfect, whole obedience of Christ can over emphasize grace I am uncertain but that is the charge. Further, it is charged that some of these advocates of free grace downplay the moral, logical necessity of sanctification and good works as a consequence of Christ’s free justification of sinners. Whether that is so is a necessarily subjective judgment. Must one publish something on sanctification every time one publishes something on justification? Who determines how much emphasis on sanctity is enough? To be sure, it probably is the case that, in their enthusiasm for justification
sola gratia,
sola fide, some proponents of free acceptance with God have perhaps not been as consistently clear about the implications of grace and the normative role of the moral law for those who’ve been freely justified (accepted with God) and who live before the face of God (
coram Deo) by grace alone through faith alone, in union with Christ.
With those caveats out of the way, one feature of the response by some to the renewed emphasis on grace is the assertion that though we are justified by grace alone, through faith alone we are
saved partly through works. This distinction has emerged more clearly in recent discussions in response to some of the recent posts on the HB and in correspondence. So, is it the case that we are justified
sola gratia,
sola fide but that our works are part of the instrument through which we are finally delivered from the wrath to come?
I’ve addressed this question in earlier posts (that were not written during a heated controversy and so may have been missed). As part of my regular exposition of the
Heidelberg Catechism (which is why this is called the
Heidelblog) I wrote 10 posts explaining the Heidelberg Catechism’s definition of faith. In
part 10 I contrasted the teaching of the Q/A 21 (“what is true faith?”) with that of Norman Shepherd, one of the godfathers of the self-described
Federal Vision movement and the intellectual grandfather of some of the criticisms of the advocates of free grace. In this post I want to borrow from that earlier post and weave that material together with a response to some of the critics.
In the course of this discussion it has been argued to me that our sanctification, that conformity to Christ and obedience wrought in us by the Spirit is part of the instrument, the means, not of our justification—although some seem to be distinguishing between an initial justification
sola gratia,
sola fide and a final justification that includes sanctity, a distinction that is utterly foreign to Reformed theology—but of our salvation, i.e., our final deliverance from the judgment to come.
I reply: Our obedience is either the ground (the basis), the instrument (the means), or the evidence (the fruit) of our salvation. The Reformed doctrine is the latter. It is the case that believers will be progressively sanctified by the work of the Holy Spirit, through the due use of ordinary means, and that progressive sanctity will produce obedience in conformity to God’s holy law. That sanctity and concomitant and consequent obedience, however, is no part of the ground or instrument of our final salvation or acceptance with God.
The difficulty is that some Reformed folk are not satisfied with making Spirit-wrought sanctity, which produces obedience that comes to expression in good works, a logically necessary fruit of justification and the evidence of their regeneration, justification, union with Christ, adoption etc. They want that sanctification and attendant good works to do more. They want that sanctity, obedience, and fruit to be a part of the means or instrument of our salvation (deliverance from the wrath to come), which includes our justification. As historians are wont to say, this has happened before.
Norman Shepherd, who taught at Westminster Seminary in Philadelphia from the 1950s until 1981, and who was dismissed from his post there because of his doctrine, and whose doctrine of justification has been denounced by several confessional Reformed denominations, made good works more than the logically necessary fruit and evidence of our free acceptance with God in Christ. In his notorious 1978 “Thirty Four Theses” Shepherd wrote:
11. Justifying faith is obedient faith, that is, “faith working through love” (Gal. 5:6), and therefore faith that yields obedience to the commands of Scripture.
Shepherd adopted a Romanist definition of faith formed by love. He turned “working” into “makes faith what it is” or “makes faith justifying.” It was against this very error that the Protestants were so adamant in saying that good works are never the ground (with which Shepherd formally agreed in the 34 Theses) or
the instrument of salvation. Shepherd rejected the Protestant doctrine on this point. That rejection led him to teach:
18. Faith, repentance, and new obedience are not the cause or ground of salvation or justification, but are, as covenantal response to the revelation of God in Jesus Christ, the way (Acts 24:14; II Peter 2:2, 21) in which the Lord of the Covenant brings his people into the full
possession of eternal life.
Notice that he mentions the ground (basis) and cause of justification and salvation but he omits the
instrument. This is because he has already folded works into his definition of faith as the instrument not only of justification but also of salvation. According to Shepherd, sanctification and works are our “covenantal response” and “the way” by which we “come into possession of eternal life.” I was reminded of this language in our recent discussions. He continues:
20. The Pauline affirmation in Romans 2:13, “the doers of the Law will be justified,” is not to be understood hypothetically in the sense that there are no persons who fall into that class, but in the sense that faithful disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ will be justified (Compare Luke 3:21; James 1:22-25).
Contra Calvin and the Reformed, there are Reformed people today who adopt this view of Romans 2:13 and that should be quite concerning. The Reformed view is that, in Romans 2:13, Paul is preaching the law, he is prosecuting the Jews for thinking that they could, finally, present themselves to God on the basis of their works. In effect, Paul says: Go ahead. See how well you do. Paul says in Romans 2:13
For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified. (Romans 2:13 ESV)
Our Lord Jesus did not merely hear the law. He did it. He performed. He obeyed. He earned his standing before God and he earned, by his condign merit, a right standing before God for all who believe. Paul is not teaching here that believers, in union with Christ, can (if they exert themselves) present themselves to God in part or wholly on the basis of Spirit-wrought sanctity. On this passage Calvin explained:
…they gloried in the mere knowledge of it: to obviate this mistake, he declares that the hearing of the law or any knowledge of it is of no such consequence, that any one should on that account lay claim to righteousness, but that works must be produced, according to this saying, “He who will do these shall live in them.” The import then of this verse is the following, — “That if righteousness be sought from the law, the law must be fulfilled; for the righteousness of the law consists in the perfection of works.” They who pervert this passage for the purpose of building up justification by works, deserve most fully to be laughed at even by children. It is therefore improper and beyond what is needful, to introduce here a long discussion on the subject, with the view of exposing so futile a sophistry: for the Apostle only urges here on the Jews what he had mentioned, the decision of the law, — That by the law they could not be justified, except they fulfilled the law, that if they transgressed it, a curse was instantly pronounced on them. Now we do not deny but that perfect righteousness is prescribed in the law: but as all are convicted of transgression, we say that another righteousness must be sought. Still more, we can prove from this passage that no one is justified by works; for if they alone are justified by the law who fulfill the law, it follows that no one is justified; for no one can be found who can boast of having fulfilled the law.
Calvin read this passage not to teach the nature of the Christian life, as some Reformed folk do today, but he read it in light of the distinction between law and gospel. For Calvin, Romans 2:13 is not good news, that believers can, if they will, obey unto final acceptance with God. It is bad news: God still demands perfect obedience to the law and we cannot do it.
In response, as I’ve seen in this discussion, some who read Romans 2:13 to refer to Christian obedience “in the way of salvation” turn to the doctrine of congruent merit, that God imputes perfection to our best efforts so that those efforts are able to contribute toward our final acceptance with God. This is a version of the Franciscan covenant theology that the entire Reformation rejected. Again, it was against this background that the Belgic spoke of goods works “fruit” and evidence of our acceptance with God and not any part of the instrument.
We can see Shepherd folding works into faith as part of the instrument of justification and salvation here:
21. The exclusive ground of the justification of the believer in the state of justification is the righteousness of Jesus Christ, but his obedience, which is simply the perseverance of the saints in the way of truth and righteousness, is necessary to his continuing in a state of justification (Heb. 3: 6, 14).
Notice that he says “ground” but omits “instrument.” Notice too that he says that obedience is necessary for
continuing in s state of justification. As Cornel Venema noted in his
review of Shepherd’s
Call of Grace Shepherd dispensed with merit altogether. This, of course, led him not only to deny our merits (which all Protestants should deny) but
also the imputation of Christ’s merits. Yet, in this discussion, it seems that some of Tullian’s critics think that they are safe in talking about our good works somehow contributing to our final salvation so long as they deny that they are meritorious.
To be continued....
