Thank you for the post. Yours sounds close to Catholic understanding, but Luther taught faith alone. How do you define that? Would shipwrecking the faith be stopping belief in Christ or viewing Him as a fairytale, or would it be more of losing faith in His commands and falling into sin and not desire repentance?
As Catholics, we believe that we are born again by water and the spirit, and the sign that we are born again is that we are given the gifts of the three theological virtues, Faith, Hope, and Charity, which come from God alone. They cannot be obtained by work.
Faith to believe that God IS, and He is a rewarder of those that diligently seek Him. Hope to believe that He will do what He says He will and complete His work in us, and Charity to love who God is and do everything that we can to please Him.
The remaining theological virtues of prudence, justice, temperance and fortitude are achieved by good works cooperating with grace. We will be given as much as we desire, but we have to desire it and we have to ask for it. The Lord has given us the sacraments as channels of grace to help us along in our struggle with virtue.
Faith is not alone, as the word of God says if I have Faith but not Charity, I am nothing
I was wondering your thoughts in this area
Peace be with you
What I described above is what Lutherans--and Luther--understood "faith alone" to mean. Faith alone receives what God has done and accomplished in Christ, and thus through faith alone God justifies; that is, God declares us just and gives us Christ's righteousness, so that we stand before God bearing not our own righteousness (which we have none to offer) but only the righteousness of Jesus.
Without faith it is impossible to love God, without faith I have no hope. So while "If I have faith, but have not love, I am nothing" is true, because I can believe as hard as possible, but without love what even is my faith? Nevertheless, we love because He first loved us; and our salvation is from God alone, as pure gift; received through faith (faith, which God gives, creates, and strengthens).
Unlike many other Protestant traditions, Lutherans understand that justification isn't just some one-time thing; it's instead a continual, ever-present reality. God is continually speaking the Gospel to us, the good news of our forgiveness, the declaration that we are forgiven because of what Christ has done. So in Word and Sacrament God is giving us faith, creating faith, strengthening faith; and therefore God is declaring us forgiven, giving us the righteousness of Jesus, clothing us with Christ and making us new people. It's not that we were, at one time, justified; we are being justified all the time. God is always speaking and working, giving and sharing Himself with us. And so to abide in Christ through faith is to cling to the promises which are ours in Christ, to hear the word, to be at the receiving end of God's grace through Word and Sacrament. Through Baptism, through the Eucharist, through Confession and Absolution there is real grace, real saving and justifying grace that cleanses us, that gives us life from God. God is saving us out of His love and kindness toward us in Christ.
We cooperate with God not for our justification, but our continued sanctification; that we should be conformed to the image of Christ and possess the fruits of the Holy Spirit, and live lives of faith and love.
Essentially here is the distinction we make: Justification refers to God unilaterally declaring us righteous on Christ's account. Sanctification is about our taking up our cross and following Jesus, and loving our neighbor.
We thus speak of "two kinds of righteousness", Righteousness Coram Deo, or righteousness before God which is the passive righteousness we receive as pure grace through faith; and Righteousness Coram Mundus, or righteousness before the world which is the active righteousness we are to have in relation toward our neighbor in love. So that Luther would say the entire Christian life is constituted by a life through faith in Christ, and a life through love of neighbor. These two things are what constitute the Christian life: Faith in Christ and love of neighbor. But in the same way that love of neighbor is not what justifies us before God; it is also true that faith in Christ is not the same thing as righteousness toward our neighbor in love. The two must co-exist, but faith always precedes good works. Good works flow from faith, not as something which makes us right with God, but which bears justice toward our neighbor, for it is our neighbor who is hungry, our neighbor who is thirsty, our neighbor who needs to be clothed.
So that in all things I can trust in the promises of God to love me and save me, without the dread fear of my own sinful weakness at every hour of every day depriving me of God's goodness--I can therefore rest secure in His promise of grace which is freely given, and freely received. And out of this confidence with God devote myself to a life of good works, done not out of fear, but love. For we were made for good works, as Ephesians 2:10 says; but they do not improve our lot with God (Ephesians 2:8-9). All we have we have from God, and the life we now live is to be lived to His praise as we take up our cross and bear this life in love for others, out of obedience to Christ who saved us.
-CryptoLutheran
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