Sola Fide is not immune to arrogance

[traillius]

Some of those who espouse Sola Fide, give this as part of their reason:

" not of works lest any man should boast "

Humans are as likely to boast of any human endeavor, including faith, equally with works. Given that arrogance is endemic, why have faith or works, if the concern is pride?
I think the admonition not to boast is independent of the means of redemption or salvation.
What are your thoughts?

 

[TriuneUnity]

Some of those who espouse Sola Fide, give this as part of their reason:

" not of works lest any man should boast "

Humans are as likely to boast of any human endeavor, including faith, equally with works. Given that arrogance is endemic, why have faith or works, if the concern is pride?
I think the admonition not to boast is independent of the means of redemption or salvation.
What are your thoughts?

I think it depends on the view of sola fide that one espouses. Those within historic Protestant thinking would hold that faith is a gift of God, not a decision that we have made to follow Christ. Therefore, we cannot boast in our faith because we are not the source of it. Also, faith in and of itself is not meritorious for salvation. The meritorious aspect is the object of our faith, which is Christ. We are not justified BY our faith, but through our faith. We are justified by Christ.

 

[Loboto-Me]

I’m going to agree that faith is a gift from God, but for me, it started out as a decision to follow Christ even before faith came into the picture.

Sometimes love is a decision then we receive grace which is a gift which in turn develops faith.

So that means that someone who is an intellectual atheist and who through study is finally starting to see “the light”, he is not metorious? I doubt that Jesus would see it that way.

This is probably a comment that has nothing to do with the topic, but it’s something that I was thinking about anyway.

 

[Jon_Hus]

Some of those who espouse Sola Fide, give this as part of their reason:

" not of works lest any man should boast "

Humans are as likely to boast of any human endeavor, including faith, equally with works. Given that arrogance is endemic, why have faith or works, if the concern is pride?
I think the admonition not to boast is independent of the means of redemption or salvation.
What are your thoughts?

This is the hardest doctrine in the Bible. Man wants to have a part in his salvation, this is why he does works. Many would like to say to God, “I did this and I did that, I deserve heaven”.

Heaven though, is from start to finish given to us based on the work of Jesus and all we can do is believe that His work is sufficient. Paul boasts about Jesus and this is the only boasting we can do.

Those are my thoughts, you did ask.

 

[traillius]

I can only speak for myself. I may be partially motivated to please God. But mainly I do works, because I Love God, because I want to help others, because its my obligation, or because my conscience binds me to act. Avoiding works simply to avoid boasting is foolish. Don’t boast, except in christ. But don’t use that as an excuse to avoid, fear, or denigrate works. Doing nothing, when you could act to make things better, is to me at least a far greater sin than boasting on works. I will risk the latter, rather than allowing more misery by doing the former. I can in either case seek forgiveness. The difference is that the first choice will hurt more people than just myself.

 

[JonNC]

=traillius;6405613]I can only speak for myself. I may be partially motivated to please God. But mainly I do works, because I Love God, because I want to help others, because its my obligation, or because my conscience binds me to act. Avoiding works simply to avoid boasting is foolish. Don’t boast, except in christ. But don’t use that as an excuse to avoid, fear, or denigrate works. Doing nothing, when you could act to make things better, is to me at least a far greater sin than boasting on works. I will risk the latter, rather than allowing more misery by doing the former. I can in either case seek forgiveness. The difference is that the first choice will hurt more people than just myself.

I mean this as a true compliment: This is very Lutheran of you. If you consider it, though, as Catholic, you can see how close we actually are.

Jon