A Thought For The Week Of November 6, 2017

"Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ ..." (Romans 5:1) We are "justified through faith." That's a pretty classic doctrine and there are times when I find myself wondering what - exactly - it means. In conversations I've been involved in the dispute has become whether this doesn't actually make faith a sort of "work" that we perform in order to attain God's favour. In other words, does it become a part of law? You know something is law if the sentence starts with "if." "If you have faith, then I will save you." In other words, it's a conditional salvation - conditional on us having faith. It's also an exclusionary concept, in that it places outside salvation anyone who doesn't have faith - and, more specifically, faith in Jesus. Since it was Paul who wrote this, perhaps it's only Paul who can truly explain how he saw the relationship between faith and law - and Paul, I think, gets into the issue a bit in another place (1 Corinthians) by explaining that faith is a gift from God. So faith can't be a work, because it's not something we generate within ourselves; it's not something we achieve. It's something that God gives us. It becomes grace. You know something is grace if the sentence starts with "because." So the formula changes from "If you have faith, I will save you," to "because I have given you faith, you are saved." This reinforces that it's God who acts. Always. Not us, but God. The initiative always rests in God's hands. We simply respond to what God is already doing in us and around us. That's important if we believe in a God of grace and if we believe that grace is what's operative. That's why the classic Protestant statement was never simply "salvation through faith," but has always been "salvation by grace through faith alone," which is the biblical formula found in Ephesians. And, in context, "faith alone" was really in opposition to the idea of salvation by works. Paul probably wasn't thinking of people of other religious faiths. He was stating that grace - God's action - always comes first. Indeed, faith is impossible apart from the grace of God. Is Paul saying that anyone who doesn't have faith in Christ is outside of the grace of God? That's hard to say. He's writing to Christians, of course, so the issue of salvation for those outside Christ isn't the heart of the matter for him. Not here at least. And I think it best to take the same approach. After all, as followers of Jesus we proclaim grace and not law. We do not judge or condemn. We are not competent to do so. But neither should we offer false promises or empty security. We are to proclaim assurance - and what Paul did know, and what Paul proclaimed was that there was salvation found in Christ - by grace, through faith alone.