That was an excellent post. However, I would like to hear more about your second and third Paragraphs. After all Paul in Galatians and Romans seems to imply an initial Justification making sancitfication possible. How do you reconcile these consepts. Also explain and contrast Cooperating with God’s grace with Faith alone.
God works with
representatives: e.g., Adam was a representative of humanity, whose failure, Paul tells us in Rom 5: 12 brought sin and death into the world. Yet, God is righteous and believes in perfect justice. He had to condemn sinners. But, He is perfectly compassionate, and He used His Son to atone for man’s sin. Man had sinned, and a representative of man, who had no sin [2 Cor 5:21], would make a propitiation to God by His Passion and Death. God the Father showed He was pleased by raising Christ from the Dead.
Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, Gal 3:13. Read Rom 8:1-3. By offering Himself in Sacrifice, the Father takes away the curse of the Old Covenant which required perfect adherence to its strictures. Any failure to fully comply resulted in a guilty verdict [death]. Sinful man could never measure up. It is the Law as a system that had to be replaced, Eph 2;15. In its place Christ brings the New Covenant of Grace which offers us salvation from sin and death. Read 1 John 2:2, Christ’s sacrifice provides grace to save the whole world.
However, Christ did not take on the sins of the whole world, which is the notion that the protestant heresy of Forensic Imputation is based upon.The punishment for sin is eternal damnation. Contrary to what Luther and Calvin taught, Christ did not undergo this punishment. Neither Scripture nor the ECFs taught that Christ suffered eternal punishment in hell for sin. If Christ had paid the legal price for everyone’s sin, then God would be legally bound to owe man salvation, and he would be required to bring everyone to heaven. This is necessarily so because if a debt is fully paid, there can be no further payment. God being just could not exact double payment, He could not send anyone to Hell. The words “purchase” or “ransom” do not refer to the legal payment for sin but rather to the personal price Christ paid to propitiate the Father. Once redemption is applied to the individual through the individual’s own efforts, God infuses His grace into that individual, who is then cleansed from sin.
The phrase “to be a sin for us”, 2 Cor 5:21, refer to Christ becoming man to be a sacrifice for sin. It does not refer to Christ taking sin within Himself. Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Athanasius Cyril of Alexandria, Eusebius of Caesarea, Augustine, all held this interpretation. Whereas, Luther held that Christ personified sin. About Gal 3:13he wrote, “Christ was to become the greatest thief, murderer, adulterer robber, desecrator blasphemer, there has ever been anywhere in the world…He bears all the sins of all men in His body.” WA 2, 517. This coincides with Luther’s heresy of Forsensic Imputation.
Most protestants view justification as a solitary legal act in which God designates an individual as righteous. The act once performed is never repeated. It occurs when the person accepts by faith alone, Jesus. The individual is thought of as credited with the righteousness of Christ. Protestants interpret this as meaning the individual has no righteousness within himself but only the righteousness of Christ. God credits the righteouness of Christ to the account of the individual. In reality tho, the individual is still the same sinner as before. Nothing but his legal status changes. The individual becomes justified when God declares the individual is now in a justified state. God forgives the sinner because Christ is thought to have taken the guilt and paid the penalty for the individual’s sins.
Once the above occurs, the individual is thought by the protestant to pass into another theological category, Sanctification. Sanctification is thought of as an on-going process whereby the individual starts living a holy life, refraining from sin, doing good works. It is separate from the one-time act of Justification.
Whereas, Catholics do not view justification as a one-time act. In Catholic theology, there is no meaningful difference between Justification and Sanctification. Sanctifying grace sets us apart for God and makes us holy. It is because of this holiness that the individual may become justified in God’s eyes. Important to note is that the individual is intrinsically holy because of the grace. There is no legal fiction here as in Forsenic Imputation. The grace reallym, actually, makes us holy. Read 1 Cor 6:10-11, Paul shows the inseparable and simultaneous application of justification and sanctification. These are two simultaneous events that occur when the person is baptized. For a Catholic, the two terms are interchangeable.
Have to go.
In Christ
I don’t even have to fight them to go to church anymore. They actually Just Go.
Even as a Pastor I have to fight them once in while to go to church. The Sorensen kids don’t have to go every Sunday, why do I have to, Dad your so boring why do I have go and listen to you etc. But one Sunday my eldest went to a non-liturgical service with a friend. He came home and said “I didn’t feel like I had been to church.” The blessed liturgy and eucharist is something he feels he needs to give him strength for the coming week as a teenager. Sorry for the long response. I really feel we are not too far off in so many points and it is joy to read your responses. They are helpful. In Christ. Motstraumen