OUR DIFFERENCES WITH ROMAN CATHOLICISM (PART 5)
The Excellence of the Christian Faith • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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-{1 Corinthians 6}
-On Wednesdays we have been touting the excellencies of the evangelical, biblical faith by comparing what we believe with other religions that believe differently than us. This way we are more grounded in our doctrine, able to defend our faith, and share the good news with others.
-For several Wednesdays I have shared our differences with the Roman Catholic Church. I have noted that Catholics believe that authority for faith and practice comes from a church that is founded on both tradition and Scripture. On the other hand, we Baptists (as representatives of the broader Evangelical Protestant spectrum) believe in Sola Scriptura—Scripture alone is our sufficient authority for all of life, faith, and practice.
-I had then spent some time noting the differences between the faiths for how one is justified—having a right standing before God. I noted that the Catholic Church teaches one must be baptized to offset original sin, and then one must do good works to merit grace for entrance into heaven. On the other hand, we believe that Christ’s death and resurrection were sufficient to pay the penalty for all sin for the one who believe. Salvation comes by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone.
-I want to continue to consider justification as we continue to compare what I might call the grace versus works divide, and consider what we believe about sin and the thoroughness of Christ’s payment for sin. Look at what Paul says:
9 Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived; neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals,
10 nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers, will inherit the kingdom of God.
11 And such were some of you; but you were washed, but you were sanctified, but you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God.
-Paul makes clear that unrighteous sinners will not inherit the kingdom of God. We know that here and elsewhere (especially in Romans) Paul tells us the extent of sin—everyone is a sinner. And unless something is done about that sin, the sinner will pay the penalty for their sins all by themselves.
-So, Paul in this passage, goes through the lifestyle that these church members used to live before they knew Christ. Some were immoral, some were idolators, etc. But then they heard the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ, that He died to pay the penalty in their stead, and rose again to give them life.
-So, Paul is giving us a picture of before and after. Such were some of you, living in these sinful lifestyles. And then you believed in Jesus Christ. And what does it say happened to them after they believed? You were washed, you were sanctified—meaning that they were made completely and utterly holy in the eyes of God (even though it was not a completely lived experience yet). And it says that they were justified—given a right standing before God. The way that it is worded is that these things are facts. Washed, sanctified, justified—Jesus Christ took care of every possible effect of sin.
-This then means that for the believer, there is no longer anything that prevents you from coming into God’s presence for all of eternity. When a believer dies, they are ushered into heaven, while unbelievers are ushered into hell.
-For the Catholic Church it is not quite that simple. I will try to explain things the best that I can, but for them a believer, while heaven-bound might not immediately go to heaven. In fact, very few do according to their teaching.
-To start this particular discussion, we first consider their teaching about sin. They believe that there are two categories of sin. There is venial sin which are smaller sins that will not keep you out of heaven, but they will incur some temporal punishments. They won’t kick you out of heaven, but unless dealt with, they may keep you from immediate entry into heaven. Examples of these types of sins might be petty thievery, idleness, white lies, etc.
-On the other hand, there are what are known as mortal sins. When one commits a mortal sin, it completely depletes their soul of sanctifying grace and you are destined for hell unless you do something to restore some that grace, where a person essentially become re-justified. Examples of mortal sins might include murder, adultery, and things like that. Anything you might consider the big ones.
-Now, to make an observation, there is no biblical warrant for such a distinction of sin. Yes, there are sins that are more harmful to a person, others, and society, but the Bible makes clear that any sin separates you from the mercies of God. The wages of sin, whether big or small, whether you categorize them as venial or mortal, is death—spiritual death. And there is just one solution—Jesus Christ.
-But to return to what Catholics teach, a person who commits venial sins, while still going to heaven eventually, still has to deal with the temporal punishment of their sin. They have to do something to cleanse themselves of that punishment. The person who commits mortal sins needs to first re-acquire sanctifying grace (which they first got at baptism and then lost) and then they also have to deal with the temporal punishment for their sins. How do they do that?
-According to the Catholic Church, they do that through what they call the sacrament of penance. You do stuff to be reconciled to God and pay for the temporal punishments of your sin. What does that involve. There are three parts: first, contrition—which is demonstrating sorrow for your sin. Then there is confession where you disclose your sins to a priest. The priest then is the one that absolves you (meaning, they release you from the consequences of your guilt).
-But the priest cannot absolve you of your temporal punishment for whatever sins you committed, so you have to do acts of penance—this is where the priest tells you some things you can do to provide satisfaction for those sin, removing the temporal punishment. Say 10 Our Fathers, say 10 Hail Marys, give to the church, fast for a time, whatever. But you have to do something to get rid of the temporal punishment. And there are some who go to such great lengths to try to do something to make penance for their sins—to cleanse themselves of the guilt and punishment. And you notice there is a stress on doing it yourself.
-Between junior and senior years in high school I was an exchange student to Portugal for a few months. In Portugal there is a small village called Fatima where Catholics claim Mary appeared to some peasant children and told them different things. But they built a shrine there in honor of this supposed event. And I visited that shrine. And in there, there is a statue of Mary (which is another subject for another day), but there was like this track around the shrine. And there were people crawling on their hands and knees to the point of getting bloodied, praying rosaries, saying other prayers, all trying to do penance for sin. At the time I was still Catholic, so it didn’t phase me too much. Now, I’m like: What in the world?
-There is just so much that is wrong with this penance thing. First, there is nothing in Scripture that says to confess our sins to a priest. In fact, the Bible says that all believers are priests.
6 and He has made us to be a kingdom, priests to His God and Father—to Him be the glory and the might forever and ever. Amen.
-We consider what David said in his psalm of repentance about to whom sin is to be confessed:
5 I acknowledged my sin to You, And my iniquity I did not cover up; I said, “I will confess my transgressions to Yahweh;” And You forgave the iniquity of my sin. Selah.
-David went straight to God. When you look at prayers that have confessions in them in the Bible (the prayer of Nehemiah, the prayer of Daniel, etc.) they go straight to God. And we know that we can go straight to God through Jesus Christ, who is our only mediator.
-But then there is the whole problem of penance—trying to satisfy the guilt and punishment of sin on one’s own. Whereas we rightfully believe (according to Scripture) that the only satisfaction of sin (whether it’s the guilt, the punishment, the power)—any part of sin can only be satisfied by Christ’s blood alone. The apostle John:
2 and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.
-A propitiation is a satisfaction—only Jesus can satisfy God’s just wrath against sin. Not us, not doing works, not saying prayers—there is nothing we can do. Jesus did it all. There is a reason that we sing JESUS PAID IT ALL, because only He could. And through Him we experience what God spoke through the prophet:
18 “Come now, and let us reason together,” Says Yahweh, “Though your sins are as scarlet, They will be as white as snow; Though they are red like crimson, They will be like wool.
-But now, the whole conversation we’ve had tonight leads to another teaching of the Roman Catholic Church that unless you have been Catholic you might not understand—and that is the teaching about purgatory. So, for the Catholic, until you die you really don’t know where you are going—heaven, hell, purgatory, whatever.
-But what’s the whole purgatory thing? Purgatory is defined as “a place or state in which are detained the souls of those who die in grace, in friendship with God, but with the blemish of venial sin or with temporal debt for sin unpaid. Here the soul is purged, cleansed, readied for eternal union with God in Heaven.”
-So, according to Catholic dogma, purgatory is a place where the dregs of temporal punishment is purged. If you didn’t do enough on earth through penance or whatever to cleanse yourself of the temporal punishment of your sins, then you need to be purged of that filth before you can go to heaven. I guess you might picture it as a refining fire—you need to get rid of the impurities first before going to heaven. And many Catholic theologians do describe purgatory as a place of fire—you do go through punishment in order to be cleansed of this temporal punishment. And that always made me wonder if there are millions of Catholics in hell who think they’re in purgatory—the fires of hell are mistaken for the fires of purgatory. Just one of those weird theological thoughts I get.
-But once you’ve finally paid off your temporal punishment, then you can go to heaven. They say that the length of time that you spend in purgatory depends on the amount of temporal punishment you still have stuck to you. It could be years, decades, centuries, millennia.
-But here’s the kicker, friends and family on earth who are still alive can do things to help shorten someone’s time in purgatory through what’s called indulgences. As one author describes it:
The Roman Catholic Church teaches that the Church is the steward of a vast reservoir of merit called the “treasury of the Church” or “treasury of merit.” This treasury was allegedly earned by the works and prayers of Jesus Christ, His mother Mary, and the saints of all ages....According to Roman Catholic theology, the Church has the power to dispense from this reservoir “indulgences” which are said to cancel the debt of temporal punishment....The more temporal punishment remitted through indulgences in this life, the less time someone will have to spend in purgatory.
-So, you can do indulgences through masses said on someone’s behalf, or giving money to the church, or other ways. Martin Luther had something to say about that—the abuse of indulgences is what kind of set off the Protestant Reformation.
-But the whole concept is unbiblical. Nowhere is purgatory taught in Scripture. In fact, Scripture teaches the opposite—eternal life is a free gift not a merited reward. There is a reason Jesus said on the cross IT IS FINISHED. He meant that He paid everything in full—the believing sinner does not need to do anything, and in fact cannot do anything.
-Jesus said:
28 and I give eternal life to them, and they will never perish—ever; and no one will snatch them out of My hand.
-Eternal life is eternal. And Jesus said:
6 Then He said to me, “They are done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give to the one who thirsts from the spring of the water of life without cost.
-You cannot earn or deserve grace or salvation or forgiveness or heaven. There is nothing to do when Jesus has already done it all.
-So, the Catholic concept of justification has no biblical merit, and it actually is a chain that binds people instead of freeing them in Christ. And we want to pray that people would be freed from the slavery of works-based religion...
