“The positive result of justification is that we live for God because Christ has died for us. Good works, as the Reformers never tired of saying, are done not to earn salvation but out of gratitude for it: not out of fear lest we should be lost after all but out of joy that we are saved after all. Sanctification is the completion, not of justification, but of regeneration: holiness is the continuation and bringing to perfection (in the resurrection of believers) of the good work which God has begun by the new birth. Justification is a different kind of event altogether: regeneration and sanctification are acts of grace to change the heart and life, whereas justification is the declaration, anticipating the verdict of the last day, that the believer is in the right. Justification results in holiness because it presupposes the new birth. It is therefore also the basis of Christian assurance, the certain hope of eternal life. Assurance is not an extra blessing over and above justification, but simply the outworking of justification itself, the realization that the Spirit who inspired faith and now inspires love will continue until, in the resurrection, he has produced the full harvest of which he himself is presently the first fruits” (N.T. Wright, “Justification: The Biblical Basis and its Relevance for Contemporary Evangelicalism”).
The past two Sundays, my pastor has preached very powerfully about our need to do good works. After his first sermon, there seemed to be a rumbling of confusion. Not because he preached poorly or communicated ineffectively, but because the idea he preached is so foreign to evangelicalism. So this past Sunday he preached again. This time it seemed to hit home even more for me. And God has orchestrated these messages as one part of a series of events that make me think I need to pay close attention to the good that I do (or don’t do).
The second of those carefully orchestrated events is a small group I’m leading every other week. We’re studying Galatians, and that has been an extremely challenging task. Paul is very explicit about the place of works and the Law in the life of a believer. Far from being antinomian, Paul insists that the believer do good works. He just insists with equal force that Jewish Law keeping is not what sets one apart as a member of the covenant. Rather, it is faith in the faithful Messiah. Now, the result of that faith is a life lived in the Spirit, a life of love, joy, peace, etc. It is a life that is characterized by good works.
The third of those providential events is a series of blog posts written by a former teacher of mine and her husband. In these posts, they discuss the school they used to teach at (and the one I attended) and how they were forced out (in part) because of their belief that good works are meant to demonstrate faith, not to gain atonement or to effect sanctification.
So, when Wright says that good works are done, “not out of fear lest we should be lost after all but out of joy that we are saved after all,” he says a very liberating statment! Good works ought to characterize believers’ lives, not because we are striving to attain perfection, but because we are one day guaranteed it. As Wright points out, sanctification is the result of regeneration (a monergistic work of God). My good works demonstrate that I have been given new life; they are not my means to attaining it or keeping it.
But where is that fine line? You know, the line that separates motive from means. The line that separates the works of attaining righteousness from the works that demonstrate sanctifying faith? The Fundamentalism that I grew up with would have me believe that my good works are how I attain sanctification rather than how I demonstrate it. Paul seems to tell the Galatians, at least initially, that their Law keeping is not what characterizes them as God’s people. Yet he goes on to say that the faith that does characterize them as God’s people is a faith that produces good works.
My fear is that the faith/works debate has been distilled to a simplicity that does not resonate with Paul or James or Jesus. We’ve been told that good works do not save us. And we’ve been told that that is Paul’s point with the Galatians. Yet we’ve also been told that we must do good works or we aren’t really saved. And we’ve been told that that is Paul’s point to the Romans (and James’s point as well). Those of us that come from a heritage of Fundamentalism have been told that good works, as defined by Paul in Galatians, for example, are not enough. We must immitate the Pharisees and build a hedge around those good works and a fence around the bad works. As those of us who are both evangelical and reformed wrestle at times with the realities that we are justified on the basis of faith, yet that faith is one that produces good works; and if the faith doesn’t produce good works, it is not a justifying faith.
I think that we ignore, to our peril, the discussions of men like N.T. Wright. Agree or disagree as you will, but the implications of these discussions are vital for clarifying our understanding of the relationship between faith and works; justification, redemption and sanctification; and Baptist, Presbyterian, Anglican, Catholic, etc. Let us discuss, disagree, read, write, blog, talk. But for Christ’s sake, let us not be content to remain forever shut up in our theological pigeon holes!
I come from a rather bizzare religious background. Having grown up in extremely conservative Christian fundamentalism, and having since stepped solidly outside of that environment, I often look back into that world with incredulity. Can it really be that I believed that? Is it true that the people around me did that?
I came across 