I would posit that Catholic’s can have a far greater assurance of salvation than non-catholics!
Faith Alone Christianity always seems to point to a quality of faith or a** type of faith **ie; A saving faith, that produces a type or quality of work, and the notion of “Is God truly speaking to me through the scriptures”, a seeing or illuminating of the TRUE gospel!
1 In faith alone, imputed righteousness Christianity, there has to be the question lurking in the back of their minds. “Do I have the type of faith that is saving faith?” “Does the quality of my faith qualify the imputation?” Time after time sin rears it’s ugly head in their lives, one must question, would a regenerated person do that? “Am I just self deluded in thinking that I have been saved?” “Was the spirit I received a deceiving spirit, fooling me into thinking I was saved?” “How can I do this type of sin continually and be saved?”
2 In faith alone, imputed righteousness Christianity there has to be the question lurking in the back of their minds. “Was my confession sincere enough, was it truly from the heart, or am I just going through the motions?” I know I need to repent so I do, but I always return to the same sin, so have I really, truly, ever repented?"
3 In faith alone, imputed righteousness Christianity there has to be the question lurking in the back of their minds. “** I know that works will show that I have been saved, do my works bear witness to my salvation?”** “How many works are sufficient to prove my salvation to myself and others?”
4 In faith alone, imputed righteousness Christianity there has to be the question lurking in the back of their minds. “I used to believe in dispensationalism, but now I think the partial preterist may be right,** I though God was speaking to me through his word, but now I’m not sure, was I just listening to men all along, do I actually hear HIS voice or not?**” “With all the different interpretations of the word, I don’t know what to believe, is God speaking to anybody, or is this just made up?”
If you feel that I have misrepresented Faith Alone Protestant Christianity, then maybe we should have a more qualified person speak on the matter. How about a pastor, preacher, teacher and theologian…Here’s Johnny!
Here is John Piper, a popular voice in the Evangelical Calvinist tradition, preacher, teacher, pastor and theologin, speaking on the matter in his article The Agonizing Problem of the Assurance of Salvation!
The most agonizing problem about the assurance of salvation is not the problem of whether the objective facts of Christianity are true (God exists, Christ is God, Christ died for sinners, Christ rose from the dead, Christ saves forever all who believe, etc.). Those facts are the utterly crucial bedrock of our faith. But the really agonizing problem of assurance is whether I personally am saved by those facts.
This boils down to whether I have saving faith. What makes this agonizing - for many in the history of the church and today - is that there are people who think they have saving faith but don’t. For example, in Matthew 7:21-23, Jesus says, “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven. Many will say to Me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you who practice lawlessness.’”
So the agonizing question for some is: do I really have saving faith? Is my faith real? Am I self-deceived? Some well-intentioned people try to lessen the problem by making faith a mere decision to affirm certain truths, like the truth: Jesus is God, and he died for my sins. Some also try to assist assurance by denying that any kind of life-change is really necessary to demonstrate the reality of faith. So they find a way to make James 2:17 mean something other than what is seems to mean: “Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead.” But these strategies to help assurance backfire. They deny some Scripture; and even the minimal faith they preserve can be agonized over and doubted by the tormented soul. They don’t solve the problem, and they lose truth. And, perhaps worst of all, they sometimes give assurance to people who should not have it.
** First, faith is a spiritual sight of glory** (or beauty) in the Christ of the gospel. In other words, **when you hear or read what God has done for sinners in the cross and the resurrection of Jesus, this appears to your heart as a great and glorious thing **in and of itself even before you are sure you are saved by it
Second, faith is a warranted resting in this glorious gospel for our own salvation. I say “warranted resting” because there is an “unwarranted resting” - people who think they are saved who are not, because they have never come to see the glory of Christ as compellingly glorious. These people only believe on the basis of wanting rescue from harm, not because they see Christ as more beautiful and desirable than all else. But for those who “see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ” their resting is warranted.
Thirdly,** we should love each other;** because, as John said, “We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren.” In the end, assurance is a precious gift of God. Let us pray for each other that it will abound among us.
Seeing and resting,
Pastor John[Piper]
I “hope” he asks about that on the exam, cuz I’ll be ready!!