Reformation 500: The Five Solas - Part 2 - Sola Fide 10-8-2017

Sola Fide

The year was 1510, seven years before Martin Luther would post his 95 Thesis which we so often talk about. Martin Luther was at the time an Augustinian monk who had already by this point spent years learning and teaching, practicing the Roman Catholic Sacraments and conducting them himself. But the more Martin Luther participated in these actions which were supposed to deliver to him grace, the more empty and angry he felt. His mind was continually burdened and troubled - how could these tiny works and small merits overcome the insurmountable problem of sin? So troubled was his conscience that it was not uncommon for Martin Luther to spend between three to six hours with his confessor, confessing not only every misdeed but every rogue thought that had entered his mind. So exhausted was his confessor, Dr. Johann von Staupitz, Vicar of the Augustinian order at the University of Wittenberg, that he finally exclaimed to Luther that he was making religion too difficult and that all he needed to do was to love God. But Staupitz advice did nothing to ease Luther’s torment, rather it worsened for he knew that even at his best he could not love God adequately and rightly. Luther writing of this dark time in his life penned these words, “I was myself more than once driven to the very abyss of despair so that I wished I had never been created. Love God? I hated him!” Martin Luther was so distraught that he felt he could not even turn to Christ for salvation because he so feared and loathed him. Luther would later write in the story of his conversion:

“Though I lived as a monk without reproach, I felt that I was a sinner before God with an extremely disturbed conscience. I could not believe that he was placated by my satisfaction. I did not love, yes, I hated the righteous God who punishes sinners, and secretly, if not blasphemously, certainly murmuring greatly, I was angry with God, and said, "As if, indeed, it is not enough, that miserable sinners, eternally lost through original sin, are crushed by every kind of calamity by the law of the decalogue, without having God add pain to pain by the gospel and also by the gospel threatening us with his righteousness and wrath!" Thus I raged with a fierce and troubled conscience.”

Luther could not grasp how it was possible for a mere man such as himself to overcome his own sins and by his own works merit justification in the eyes of God.

But everything was about to change for Luther. Two years later in 1512, Staupitz resigned from his post and professorship at the University of Wittenberg and appointed Martin Luther to take his place. Martin Luther would now be responsible for more teaching than ever before and as a result he began spending more and more time reading the Bible. To us that may seem a given, but for Luther it was a game changer. At this point few people were actually reading the Bible and even most of what Luther had been teaching was not from the Bible itself but from other documents and teachings of the Roman Catholic Church. For Luther, this simple act of reading would change his life forever, for by his reading of the scriptures, as he studied from Romans and Galatians and Ephesians he encountered for the very first time the true Gospel and the goodness of our Lord Jesus. Luther writes:

“At last, by the mercy of God, meditating day and night, I gave heed to the context of the words, namely, "In it the righteousness of God is revealed, as it is written, 'He who through faith is righteous shall live.'" There I began to understand that the righteousness of God is that by which the righteous lives by a gift of God, namely by faith. And this is the meaning: the righteousness of God is revealed by the gospel, namely, the passive righteousness with which merciful God justifies us by faith, as it is written, "He who through faith is righteous shall live." Here I felt that I was altogether born again and had entered paradise itself through open gates. There a totally other face of the entire Scripture showed itself to me. Thereupon I ran through the Scripture from memory. I also fount in other terms an analogy, as, the work of God, that is what God does in us, the power of God, with which he makes us wise, the strenght of God, the salvation of God, the glory of God. And I extolled my sweetest word with a love as great as the hatred with which I had before hated the word "righteousness of God." Thus that place in Paul was for me truly the gate to paradise.”

Luther had discovered what had been lost to so many for so long, the true Gospel, the good, life giving news of Jesus Christ. For those of us who are Protestants is the bedrock of our faith, a Sola of the Reformation, and a Biblical truth at the core of what it means to be a Christian - we call this truth - Sola Fide, Faith Alone.

Luther had struggled to come to terms with what so many people struggle with when they come to the church - good works. So many of us either because of moralistic traditions that have encroached on the church or from seeing the pagan religions surrounding the church come to the foot of the cross thinking that we have something that we can exchange with God in order to receive what Christ purchases by His blood. We think we can exchange good deeds and good works, acts of obeisance and obedience, money, tithes, offerings, sacrifices and that through our payment in whatever form we can buy our way out of the punishment of sin. But friends, there is no amount of money, no sacrificial bull or goat, no act of obedience, no sign of respect, no outpouring of worship that you can do that would ever merit the forgiveness of your sins against the one true eternal and holy God. Luther realizing this felt hopeless in the Roman Catholic Church as the sacraments he participated in and presided over were woefully inadequate as a means of grace. But when Luther read the word of God, his eyes were opened - there never was anything man could do to save himself from his sin. Man’s salvation has always been a gift from God through faith. Every Christian recognizes this truth that we are justified, we are declared not only forgiven, but righteous in God’s eyes, not by works, but by faith alone.

In writing to the Ephesians Paul says this:

Ephesians 2:1–10 ESV

And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience— among whom we all once lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the coming ages he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

Notice something very important about this entire passage, whose actions are the ones that accomplish, that achieve, that merit salvation? Not mine. Not yours. Not mankind’s. God’s works. Notice the actions in this passage and who is doing them. God is the one who has mercy. God is the one who loves us. God is the one who makes us alive. God is the one who saves. God is the one who raises us up. God is the one who seats us in the heavenly places. God is the one who shows immeasurable riches. God is the one who gives not only grace but even faith. God is the one doing all of the work - we have nothing that we can boast in except in Jesus work. You want me to prove it? Let’s go back to that passage and see what we as human beings add to the equation for our own salvation. We were dead. Spiritually we were dead. Why? Because we trespassed against God, we sinned against Him. We followed the course of this world, not our Creator who made this world. We followed created things rather than Creator God including the very epitome of disobedience the devil himself. I know what you’re thinking - I’ve never followed the devil. Every single time you have not obeyed God, every time you have not honored Him, every time you have not loved Him with every fiber of your being and exalted Him with every word of your mouth and and worshipped Him in every thought of your mind you have followed in the footsteps of Satan. We all have. We have lived for our own passions and desires, fulfilling every want no matter how perverse and profane and in so doing we have shamelessly and repeatedly placed ourselves under the wrath of God. The great Protestant preacher and theologian Jonathan Edwards said it well when he said, “You contribute nothing to your salvation except the sin that made it necessary.” It is only by faith, that marvelous gift of God that you are justified. Flip over to Galatians.

Paul writes a letter to the Galatians in which he admonishes their behavior for believing a distortion of the gospel. He says I’m astonished at how quickly you abandon sound teaching, how quickly you turn away from the God who called you to life. And continues giving us a glimpse of just what it was that they had started to believe - that they needed to add various works to their faith in order to merit God’s forgiveness and achieve for themselves justification. Look at

Galatians 2:15–21 ESV

We ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners; yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified. But if, in our endeavor to be justified in Christ, we too were found to be sinners, is Christ then a servant of sin? Certainly not! For if I rebuild what I tore down, I prove myself to be a transgressor. For through the law I died to the law, so that I might live to God. I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose.

Galatians 2:15-21

Paul says very plainly - no one can be justified by works or by the law. Only through faith are we justified. The Galatians like so many turned to the law of the Old Testament thinking that through the law they could earn life, but that was never the intention for or the function of the law. My friends the law is like an MRI, it can show you that there is a problem, but it can’t actually fix you. You need a capable physician for that. Jesus is our physician, our victor, our savior, and our God. My friends throw yourself upon his mercy, repent of your sins and believe in Jesus, have faith in His work on the cross, in His power to overcome your sin and indeed you will be saved. But make no mistake, if you go on thinking that you can somehow earn justification and salvation yourself, you will never go to heaven, you will never expunge your record or cleanse your soul and even more terrifying in your works you are declaring that Christ died for no purpose.

My friends, Christ died for a great purpose and as part of a plan. And today if you will confess that Jesus is Lord, believing in Him, having faith in Him then you will be saved. More than just saved you will be changed, transformed, made new, and from your life will flow good works as a result of the good work of God. But you can’t buy it. You must simply and humbly come to Jesus and receive it. If He is calling you to do so now then come and receive from Him as we stand and sing together.