Polls show that 85% of Americans believe they're going to heaven (ABC News Poll: December 20, 2005). Most Americans say they believe in the inspiration of Scripture, and say they are Christian. But...meeting the demands of Scripture for entrance into heaven is not how they decided if they are going to heaven; in fact, our behavior patterns and specific beliefs often run the opposite of Scripture. According to a May 2013 Gallup poll, 59% of Americans believe gay sexual relations are morally acceptable, 63% believe sex between an unmarried man and woman is morally acceptable, and 42% say that about abortion. But Scripture, the basis of Christianity, says none of these behaviors are morally acceptable. It seems that American “Christians” are saying fornication, sodomy, and murder are acceptable. We have to conclude that many people are calling themselves Christian, yet feel it’s OK to ignore Scripture and our Lord's commands when it's convenient. The problem is, a belief system that “gets me to heaven” with no sacrifice, no obedience necessary is what I call “easy believism.” But that kind of "believism" is a road to hell.
We need to be most cautious about what Scripture says to be saved. Can we really ignore Scripture, be disobedient and still escape Hell? Have we possibly deceived ourselves into assuming we're good enough for heaven, when Scripture warns us otherwise? Have we rationalized behavior that is unsupported by Scripture--and not considered the danger therein? Jesus, in Matthew 7:14 says:
“narrow is the gate and difficult is the way which ..leads to life, and there are few who find it."
The word "life," here, as any Biblical linguist would tell you, means "heaven." I've taken polls of my friends on the word “few,” without referencing its Scriptural source. It’s interesting how we basically agree on 6-7% of a group of people would fulfill the definition of the word. Thus, on average, only 6-7% of people are heaven-bound. That’s a long way from 85% who profess Christianity in America. Doing a little math, this says that one out of 12 or one out of 14 who call themselves Christian will make it to heaven. Do you like those odds?
This paper is inspired by a CD of David Bercot, a writer and lecturer on Scripture. The big question is, Does maintaining salvation involve works? The title of the CD is “Paul vs James,” since James seems to emphasize works and Paul seems to discount them and emphasize faith alone to escape hell.
Bercot points out that for most evangelical "theologians" today, this "contradiction" between Paul and James is “resolved” easily: their Study Bibles and commentaries “simply explain James away.” I.e., Paul “has it right,” so what James says (works are important) is pretty much ignored. Thus they cancel out James completely. Bercot doesn’t like the way they pass over the clear plain INSPIRED statements of Scripture in James. He asks, what is the real truth about this important matter of works? For the answer, we need to study the words of Jesus.
Actually, most Christian denominations, by focusing on Paul (as interpreted today) are ignoring what Jesus had to say on what it takes to be saved. If we dare to speak out on what Jesus actually says about the role of works to go to heaven, modern-day evangelicals will call us “heretics!” After we're done putting Jesus' comments in, today they'll say we’re not saved for believing that, that we’re preaching a “works salvation,” that we’re “trusting our own righteousness instead of the righteousness of Christ.” But do not be intimidated when you read the Truth from the mouth of Jesus.
Intelligent theologians had a place for works in salvation all through history—until Martin Luther introduced corrupt methodologies, which were duplicated by Calvin, to give the Protestant movement an opposite twist from Catholicism. The Catholics emphasized works, but they layered in un-Scriptural works. The Protestants, under Luther and Calvin, felt they had to go to the opposite extreme, casting works completely aside and saying salvation is just faith in Christ. But neither one had it right.
Here is where Martin Luther got it wrong:
a. He relegated the key teachings of Jesus to the back closet—Jesus “didn’t teach the theology of how to be saved,” the theologians--and Luther--concluded. “You have to read Paul to get that.”
b. He did "Proof texting:" He established theological positions by picking and choosing Bible verses that fit the theology he had decided ahead of time to promote, and ignored other verses that don’t fit. Most people, unfortunately, don’t read the New Testament in whole, to get the context of what is the overall picture. Your position on what it takes to be saved should be arrived at after reading the entire New Testament and fitting nearly all the relevant verses together on the subject.
c. He turned the New Testament writers into theologians, and changed their ordinary, everyday words into narrow theological terms.
d. He did, and some do today, make dishonest Bible translations and reference works. Remember, unlike Scripture, translations are made by humans who have their preconceptions to maintain.
Let's begin at the top: Putting Jesus in the “back closet.” Christianity is the only religion or philosophy where the modern-day adherents ignore the teachings of the Founder and study the teachings of a disciple of the founder! To find out about what God says about salvation, do we go to Jesus, the God-man, the greatest Teacher who ever lived? No, we go to Paul—in Romans, for instance. This wrong focus started with the Gnostics, and somewhat with Augustine, but it became an overriding “principle” with Luther. He put a preface in front of each New Testament book, and an overall preface before the whole New Testament. His remarks (which books he favors, which books are “straw”) colored the thinking of theologians ever since. He said Romans was the “chief part of the New Testament, the very purest gospel.” (His praises of this one book are half the length of the book itself). In deciding “which are the best,” as he called it, of the New Testament books, he likes John, Paul’s books, and I Peter (but not II Peter or Matthew, Mark or Luke, 3/4 of the gospels!) John’s gospel is “far, far to be preferred to the other three” and “placed high above them.” He thus thinks we’re better off not reading the Sermon on the Mount or the Sermon on the Plain (which are only contained in the 3 Synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke)—because, Bercot suspects, their gospel by Jesus contradicts Luther’s gospel which he has made up from Paul. James he called an “epistle of straw” for “it has nothing of the nature of the gospel about it.” (Now keep in mind, reader, that God inspired ALL the books of the Bible. They are all equal because they all have something to say for our edification.)
Bercot suspects Luther liked John over the Synoptic gospels because John uses the Greek for “believe” 99 times, vs only 9 or 10 times each in the other 3 Gospels. Verses with “believe” can be easily twisted to fit Luther’s gospel of easy believism. Luther’s favoring Paul over Jesus to make up his gospel was a direct violation of Jesus’ commandment of Matthew 23:9-10:
Do not call anyone on earth your father…10 And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ.
To quote Luther: “We can know everything we need to know about Christ and the gospel without ever having heard or read the Sermon on the Mount or the rest of what Jesus said that’s not recorded in John.” Really? The early Christians stood against that type of nonsensical thinking when the Gnostics tried to do something similar (further fascinating CDs on the Gnostics and Luther by Bercot are also available). But nobody is standing against this twisted thinking nowadays.
So let’s look at what Jesus taught on salvation from hell, for once. There are several long passages in the 4 gospels, and a hundred or more short passages, on this all-important doctrine of how to avoid hell. Let’s analyze a few of them. We start with parts of John 15:
“I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. 2 Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit... 4 Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me. 5 “I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing. 6 If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned… 10 If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love…19 If you were of the world, the world would love its own. Yet because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you.
Key teachings of this important passage:
a. Jesus, using the word "abide," describes an ongoing, life relationship with Him as Necessary for salvation.
b. We must abide with Jesus and bear godly fruit or we’re going to be cut off the vine (i.e., on the way to hell).
c. We abide in Christ’s love ONLY if we obey His commandments.
d. Abiding, in part, means separation from the world.
Bercot asserts that of hundreds of messages he’s heard, none have used this John 15 passage when they discuss salvation. But clearly (especially in verse 6) that’s what the passage is about! In summary, in order to be saved, we must maintain an obedient, love-faith relationship with Him. A one-time declaration of faith will not do the job.
Let's compare that to what's taught today. Doctrines of salvation taught by men today can be categorized into two groups: Either they are (1) A system that requires an obedient, love-faith relationship with Christ, or (2) Everything else—since all other systems are “equally useless” (i.e., they will leave you deceived and hell-bound if you don't read Scripture thoroughly yourself).
Some of the alternate systems of “salvation” taught by men:
a. Paul in his day fought against Christo-Judaism: It had a knowledge of Jesus as Savior and Son of God, but added that you had to follow the law of Moses in the Old Testament to be saved.
b. Roman Catholics and Eastern Orthodox: Sacramentalism. Receive the sacraments, attend Mass regularly, don’t die in unconfessed mortal sin, and be a loyal member of a church, to be saved.
c. Merit-ism: Live dutifully by all the commandments in the New Testament to be saved. (Relationship with Christ not necessary).
d. Good-ism: Attend church and be a good person. That’s followed by liberals, and most Catholics, truthfully, nowadays.
e. Evangelical Protestantism: Accept Jesus as your personal Savior, have a born-again experience, believe that you’re saved by faith or grace alone, and obedience to Christ is not necessary for salvation. (Obedience is good, it's just possible to ignore it and still go to heaven, as long as you don't do something REALLY BAD. If you stress obedience as necessary for heaven, you’re teaching “unsound doctrine, and you’re probably not even saved.”)
None of the above 5 require an obedient, love-faith relationship with Christ. True, evangelicals stress the importance of a loving relationship with Christ, but they don't REQUIRE love as expressed in obedience (as John 15:10 above clearly points out, obedience is necessary to go to heaven). The "love" of these "Christians" is often when they are in trouble, or it may be emotion-driven, not sacrifice-driven.
Bercot stresses that, keep in mind, there are multiple thousands of people who attend churches that follow one of the 5 alternate systems above, who ALSO have a saving relationship with Him--on their own--and know His great love through sacrificial obedience.
I should make a note, that will make a lot of people uncomfortable: It’s impossible to analyze “how much” obedience, or violation, is necessary to be saved, or exactly how much of sins will send us to hell. That can’t be measured —relationships can’t be reduced to a formula. We would all like perfect certainty--but with perfect certainty comes complacence. Anyhow, a saved person doesn’t want to measure it, he just enjoys Jesus' company, and can't stand the disconnection when he sins.
Thus, salvation is not a one-time event of faith-and-you're-done. We must maintain (or abide with) the relationship. And the requirement to abide? Keeping His commandments. If we don’t keep His commandments, we don’t love Him. So it says in John 15. Obedience is not a drudge, but a loving friendship. And remember, He chose us—God first loved us before we loved Him. Salvation was originated entirely through the acceptable blood of Christ. God wants perfection, and we couldn't do that--but Christ did, as our substitute. And when we stumble, we must experience real confession and repentance. Then He gives His grace again.
And finally the world will hate us. Not everyone all the time. But our belief system is opposite the world. They hate it--when you're not participating in their sins, their violating Jesus who died for them--and our behavior rains on their selfish parade. (Remember the high percentages above of "Christians" who accept sodomy, murder, and fornication). If you don’t feel some rejection in your frequent contacts with regular people, your light is not shining God's light enough.
There are past, present, and future aspects of salvation. In the past, if we at some point accepted the Lord and repented from our sin—what He is, what He did—we became attached to the Vine (using the John 15 metaphor). We were really saved. But--very important, we have to maintain that relationship to stay saved. Are we walking in the Spirit (using His power to help us completely conquer known sin)? Then we are abiding on the Vine. It’s a breathing, ongoing relationship. A constant inflow of life-giving water drawn in from the roots of the Vine. And the future? Since our abiding produces fruit (Galatians 5:22ff), we are heaven-bound. But if we don’t produce fruit, we will be cut off from the Vine and thrown in the fire. Just because we’re on the Vine now doesn’t mean we’re guaranteed to be on it next year. No unconditional eternal security.
On the corruption of proof texting, it's true, we can back up any of the 5 false methodologies above with selected texts from Scripture. But we would have to shove lots of others under the rug because they don’t agree together. The key is to understand everything that Jesus says on the subject first, and then look for agreement by the other Scriptural authors--then you put it together integrally. (All the relevant New Testament verses are given in a separate PDF CD, by the way). Full weight to each verse. Not picking one author (like Paul) and ignoring others (ignoring Jesus!)
Keep in mind that every statement made in Scripture is not the gospel in full. John 15 above, however, is a good model of the maintenance side of salvation. Other statements, you’ll find, will add a piece to that, but none will make an exclusionary remark that disagrees with it. There are some unanswered questions in John 15 too that other Scripture fills in—i.e., what are the “fruit?” (Study Galatians 5 for that). How do you get on the Vine?
.
So what else does Jesus say on the subject of salvation? We can’t give them all, but here are enough to whet your interest. In the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5ff, which Luther didn't like), look at Matthew 6:14-15:
"For if you forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses.
The importance of forgiving is a godly fruit we need to possess. When we are first born again, only our PAST sins are forgiven. On a daily basis, we still need to pray forgiveness for our sins (I John 1:8, 9). But how sincere is our repentance when we don’t forgive others? See Matthew 18:23-35—note how the servant’s penalty was reinstated on him due to lack of forgiveness on his part (no eternal security there—his release from debt was conditional on his future behavior). We conclude that if we are unforgiving, we can’t be sincere in asking God for forgiveness; that sin may be a stumbling block that lands us in hell.
Now consider Matthew 7:21, 23:
“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. 22 Many will say to Me in that day, ‘Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name? 23 And then I will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!’
Their profession of faith required works. But they only do good works on the surface, since Jesus accuse them of works of lawlessness, so their profession is meaningless. Their disobedience kept them from heaven--that's what easy believism leads to.
Bercot says people have this “cop-out:” They say, “I get suggestive feelings of supernatural instructions in my head. This must be God’s commandment for me!”—but we cannot let the so-called personal "instructions" override His written Word. You have to know the written Word. Study it.
Look at Matthew 10:32:
“Therefore whoever confesses Me before men, him I will also confess before My Father who is in heaven.
Don’t forget, you can deny Him not by words only, but also by living the way of the world. You cannot have two masters. If you live the world and think mostly of it, you lose Christ. He will not be your Advocate when the Judgement Day comes.
Stressing sacrifice of personal indulgences as part of salvation is Matthew 10:38:
And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me.
Jesus requires great commitment. Yet His yoke is light (Matthew 11:29), infused and rewarded with His love. We will joyfully lay down our lives for Him, knowing that things are much nicer in heaven.
In Luke 16:6-9, Jesus is saying God will extend patience for us to produce fruit. But not forever. At some point, with nothing produced, the tree is cut down. It also says, He will help us, with His Spirit, to produce fruit—unless we let worldly pleasures block those efforts.
In Luke 24:46-47, repentance is necessary:
Then He said to them, “Thus it is written, and thus it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead the third day, 47 and that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in His name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem.
In John 3:3-5, we learn that salvation begins with a New Birth. That's when we realize our sin and the need of a Savior--and that Jesus is the only Savior. That’s what puts us “on the Vine.” We all know John 3:16 and surrounding verses. Or do we? Let’s look at “the rest of what He said,” John 3:19-21:
And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. 20 For everyone practicing evil hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his deeds should be exposed. 21 But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have been done in God.”
Again, deeds are involved, not just belief. We must "DO the truth." Your real belief can be seen in your deeds (which is what James is saying, James 2:14ff).
Another treasure for you to think about: Two closely-related Greek words that are translated “believe:” The first word, pisteuo means to believe, trust, but it’s just mental assent. The other is peitho, sometimes translated “believe,” but other times translated “obey.” Thus, Scriptural believing is interwoven with obeying. Not just mental assent. Webster’s defines “believe” as “confidence in the statement of another.” Our level of confidence can be tested on us by God, and our response—our deeds--signifies if we truly “believe.” Thus belief and deeds are one. Do we believe Jesus when He says that we must bear fruit or else be cut off and burned? When He says that if we love Him, we will obey His commandments? Do we really read His Words to see what all those commandments are? Do we believe that His commandments are truly in our best interest—enough to follow them even when they don’t make sense? Our deeds will signify if we believe. One-third of the world “believes” in Christ, but Bercot suspects it’s mostly the first Greek word—mental assent only. But that's a ticket to hell. Remember, Jesus said only the “few” would be saved (Matthew 7:14). Can Jesus be talking about the first definition, not requiring deeds, when He says “few” would be saved, when 1/3 the world fulfills that loose definition? And Luke 13:24 says we must “strive” to enter heaven—that again suggests deeds are involved.
There’s an evangelism tool that says we ask the prospect, “If you die and are standing before God, and He asks, “Why should I let you in?” And if the prospect gives the “standard” answer (I’ve been good), you’re supposed to say, “No, all your works are as filthy rags; have faith in what He has done—not your works, which count nothing in salvation.” But Scripture shows the opposite--it so happens that Jesus set up the same standing-before-God scenario in one of His sermons; And, He told all of us the “answer to the test” (every student’s dream to get the correct answer)—on what basis will He let us into heaven, Jesus asked. (Hint: It's not the evangelism tool). He said in the Last Judgment, people will be lined up, and He will let in some people and reject other people. On what basis? He will separate people, in the Last Judgment—based on their deeds. Thus, his comments were the exact opposite of what modern theologians say. In Matthew 25:34, 35 and 40, Jesus says
Then the King will say to those on His right hand, ‘Come, you blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: 35 for I was hungry and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in.. ‘Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.
On that day, He won’t expect us to feel that our deeds mean nothing. He will be looking for deeds that show our belief is strong, and right. Once we are born again, we must strive to exercise our gifts and do the righteous deeds that will get us to heaven. Or else, as He clearly points out--we won't be allowed in.
None of these teachings by Jesus disagree with our John 15 model—they harmonize with it. This is not a selection of proof texts. In context, “salvation is by faith alone” doesn't cut it, as Luther claimed. Works have a place. They always had a place, if you read the early church fathers. Do you want to believe man’s gospel, or Jesus’ gospel? Where you spend your eternity may depend on it!
Acknowledgements: Dave Bercot: "Paul vs James" Disc 1
NEXT WEEK: IS THIS MODEL HARMONIZED BY THE OTHER BOOKS OF THE NEW TESTAMENT? BERCOT’S “PAUL VS JAMES”, DISC 2.
No comments:
Post a Comment