THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN GRACE AND WORKS
The relationship between grace and faith and works is very simple, and not a matter of semantics or word-play at all, but deadly serious. Paul points out how serious it is: 'For as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse: for it is written, 'Cursed is every one that continueth not in all things which are written in the book of the law to do them' (Gal 3:10). Anybody who is trying to attain to salvation by works is under obligation to keep the whole law, and if they cannot, they are condemned.
A sinner is saved by grace (God's undeserved favour and mercy) which is the opposite of works. You cannot merit or deserve or earn grace. Paul points out that these are opposites in Romans 11:6 'And if by grace, then it is no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace: otherwise work is no more work'. And again in Romans 4:4-5 'Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness' So the idea that sinners are saved by grace AND works is impossible. If you work for something, you no longer receive it by grace; and if God graciously gives you something, you don't work for it.
It simply is undeniable that the Bible teaches that salvation is by grace, received through faith. Here are some examples.
'For by grace are you saved through faith: and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast' (Ephesians 2:8-9).
'Though I might also have confidence in the flesh. If any other man thinks he has whereof he might trust in the flesh, I more. . .But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and I do count them but dung, that I may win Christ, and be found in him, not having my own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith' (Philippians 3: 4, 7-9).
Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost (Titus 3:5)
Important points here. Why must salvation be by grace? Two answers:
1) God must have all the glory so that man may never boast. If man could contribute something to his salvation, even the tiniest bit, he would boast. But 1 Cor 1:29 says that 'no flesh should glory in His presence' and verse 31 adds 'he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord'
2) Our works cannot save us. Look what Paul writes in Philippians. Paul was a man who excelled in works. But what does he say of them? He calls them loss and DUNG. Imagine man offering the 'dung' of his own works to God! That is what all those people do who trust in their works to save them. Theirs is a religion of dung. Paul came to see that, and then he did not want to be found clothed in his own righteousness (which is dung) but to be found IN CHRIST, having CHRIST's RIGHTEOUSNESS. The prophet Isaiah says something similar: 'All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags' (64:9). Filthy rags and dung. Mix that with God's grace and what do you have? Something which God, who is holy, will never accept.
But God does not save a sinner by grace, so that that sinner can live in wickedness. No! God saves a sinner to make him holy. Ultimately that will only happen at the point of death when God brings the believer home to Heaven, however, when God saves a person, he gives him a new heart, with new desires, and a love for God, and God's law. The new heart loves righteousness, and hates sin and is the beginning of a new obedience. Jesus calls that being born again (John 3). James calls it being 'begotten of the word of truth' (1:18). The prophet Ezekiel spoke of this. He describes it as God taking away the heart of stone and giving a heart of flesh. He says 'I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes' (36:26-27). The Christian has a new heart and the old nature at the same time. The spirit and the flesh. In the New Testament 'the flesh' usually means that totally depraved nature all men have. Everybody has flesh. Some have the new heart also. Paul describes what happens then: 'For the good that I would I do not: but the evil that I would not, that I do [...] I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me. For I delight in the law of God after the inward man: but I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin' (Romans 7:19-23). So, Paul wanted to do good, he delighted in God's commandments, but the old flesh stopped him doing what he wanted to do and led him into sin. Yet, Paul fought the flesh, as every Christian must do. For Paul writes again in Galatians: 'The flesh lusteth against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh, and these are contrary the one to the other: so that ye cannot do the things that ye would' (5:17). There is no such conflict in the unbeliever, for the simple reason that he has not got the Spirit. Paul in Romans describes the unbeliever (the natural man) as 'minding the things of the flesh' adding that to be 'carnally minded is death' and 'the carnal mind is enmity against God and is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be: so then they that are in the flesh cannot please God: but ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his' (8:5-9).
Now if we come to James, we must see that Paul and James (both inspired by the Holy Spirit) cannot be contradictory. That is impossible. So, what does James mean? It is simple: James is telling professing believers that they must test their faith by their works. Works are the evidence of faith. The absence of works proves that there is no faith, just a vain and empty profession. James does not tell people to trust in their works, or to hope that their works will save them, or even that their works make up part of their salvation and acceptance with God. Never! To be exhorted to do good works does not mean that good works save. Good works are the evidence of a changed life. Good works are the way in which we show gratitude to God for His great salvation. Jesus said, 'If ye love me, keep my commandments' (John 14:15). Make no mistake about it: the person who says he is a believer and yet lives as a thief, or an adulterer or a fornicator or an idolater or a murderer or a drunkard, is a liar and his 'faith' will not save him. See 1 Cor 6:9-10 and Gal 5:19-21, Eph 5:5-6.
When Paul talks about being justified by faith, he is speaking about justification before God. The grounds of the believer's justification is the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ. Paul says that in Philippians 3 which I quoted earlier: 'be found in him, not having mine own righteousness which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith' and again in Romans 3 speaking of Christ, 'Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness [...] to declare, I say, at this time his righteousness: that he might be just and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus. Where is boasting then? It is excluded. By what law? of works? Nay, but by the law of faith. Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law' (3:25-29).
James speaks of justification, as the context shows, before men. How is a man proved righteous before men? By faith alone? No, because a man cannot see into the heart, he needs evidence, and that evidence is works, good works, done out of a new heart, given by God in grace. That is why James can say, that faith without works is dead and vain. Of course!
The Epistle of First John is about light and darkness, sin and righteousness, life and death. 'God is light' (1:5). 'If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie' (1:6). To walk means that a continuous habitual way of life. The Christian walks in the light (1:7) meaning that is the tenor of his life. It does not mean that he never sins. He sometimes stumbles into sin, but generally he walks in the light . If the believer sins 'the blood of Jesus Christ [...] cleanseth us from all sin' (1:7) and if we 'confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive' (1:9) and 'we have an Advocate' (2:1). Obviously, the believer sins (1:9, 1:10, 2:1) but sin is not his 'walk'. A person who 'walks' in sin is an unbeliever. John describes the believer as one who 'doth not commit sin [...] he cannot sin because he is born of God' (3:9) and 'whosoever doeth not righteousness is not of God' (3:10).
John is not speaking of sinless perfection here. The word 'commit' is better translated 'practise'. To practise sin means to live in it, to do it habitually. This the Christian cannot do. The new heart does not sin. Habitually living in sin is not an option for the Christian. John is not teaching salvation by works here. He is showing the radical difference - caused by grace and grace alone - between the Christian and the unbeliever who walks in darkness, or as Paul writes, describing himself and his fellow believers before their conversion (and therefore describing all unbelievers, no matter how outwardly moral and nice they appear): 'foolish, disobedient, deceived, serving divers lusts and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful and hating one another' (Titus 3:3)
As far as 1 John 4:1-3 is concerned, John is warning about the Gnostic heresies concerning the Person and Work of Christ. The heretics were teaching that Jesus had not really come in the flesh. They were denying His true humanity. They did this because they believed that there was something inherently sinful in human flesh, and therefore could not accept that Christ the Sinless Son of God should have a real human body. The writer to the Hebrews refutes that in Heb 2:14-15. The context of 1 John 4 shows that John was speaking of 'antichrists' who were already in the world in his day. To John the opposite of these antichrist heretics was believing that Christ is come in the flesh. However, just because a person believes that Jesus came in the flesh (i.e. in the incarnation) does not make him a true believer. Paul had a controversy with the Judaizers. They believed everything Paul believed concerning the Incarnation, the Atonement and the Resurrection, yet they wanted to add works (circumcision in this case) to the Gospel. Paul called them 'accursed' (Galatians 1:8) and perverters of the Gospel (1:7) even though they assuredly believed that Jesus Christ was come in the flesh!
THE DOCTRINE OF JUSTIFICATION
I want to tell you about a teaching of the Word of God that thrills my soul: JUSTIFICATION. That God can accept me, a sinner, conceived in iniquity, totally corrupt in body, mind and soul, before His divine Holiness for the sake of His Beloved Son is for me a reason for wonder and praise, and I hope that as I explain how it is so, that that wonder will be instilled into the hearts all all who read this. May God be glorified as His matchless grace is magnified.
Martin Luther called the doctrine of justification by faith alone ‘the article of a standing or falling church’, in other words, if the church loses this doctrine she has lost the Gospel. It is no minor theological point. On it eternal destinies depend. How is a sinner right with God? What is the sinner going to present to God as the basis of his acceptance with God?
Most should know enough of the Gospel to know that works righteousness is an abomination before God. There is NOTHING that a sinner can produce that pleases God, all his works, thoughts and deeds are defiled. Except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God (John 3 v 3), ‘they that are in the flesh CANNOT please God’, :note the word ‘cannot’: if a person is still in the flesh, unregenerate, not called by the Holy Spirit, living according to the world, he is in darkness, still in bondage to sin, a child of Satan, whose best efforts are filthy rags in the sight of the Holy One of Israel. Indeed, to attempt to attain justification by human effort is an insult to God’s grace.
What is Justification?
Firstly, Justification is a LEGAL TERM: It is used in courtrooms and also in God’s Judgement Hall. God in Christ is JUDGE, the sinner is the ACCUSED, the charges are read out: the sinner has failed to keep the Commandments of God, he is an incorrigible rebel, proud, boastful, unloving, merciless, stubborn, selfish. He stands condemned already, and his conscience reminds him of the fact. God, the all-knowing Creator of the Universe has overlooked nothing, He has seen all the deeds of the sinner, He has heard and recorded every word and thought. With Him there is no fear of a miscarriage of justice. God in His ineffable holiness is offended, indeed the Bible tells us that God is ‘angry with the sinner every day’. God cannot simply overlook sin, He hates it with an unchanging hatred, His justice, infinite justice MUST be satisfied. The only way a finite creature can satisfy infinite justice is by being ETERNALLY punished.
The good news of the Gospel is that there is hope in Christ. He has satisfied justice. Romans 3 speaks of Christ. ‘Whom GOD hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God. To declare, I say, at this time His righteousness: that He might be just and the justifier of him which believeth in Jesus’
God found a way in which His righteous demands could be satisfied and He could forgive the guilty. The only answer was the Lord Jesus Christ.
The death of Christ was no mere example of heroic dignity or sacrificial love. It was a SUBSTITUTIONARY ATONEMENT for all believers. Christ took their place under God’s wrath (a substitution) and He paid the penalty due (atonement). Christ’s death actually and truly saves all those for whom He died. God’s wrath was poured out in all its fierceness upon Christ, He was made a curse for His people, the Good Shepherd laying down His life for His beloved sheep. That price was paid IN FULL 2,000 years ago on Calvary. Since Christ is God He was able to endure infinite wrath and satisfy divine justice without suffering eternally.
No more price need be paid nor can be paid.
Who would pay? Christ won’t: He said ‘It is finished’. He is not getting back on that cross. That was His humiliation, He is now glorified. The sinner cannot: if that were possible why did GOD send His beloved Son? No, Christ had to pay it or His people could never have been saved.
We can rest in the completeness of Christ’s sacrificial death. God will never require another payment. With Christ’s sacrifice He is well pleased: He proved that by raising Christ from the dead.
Secondly, Justification is an ACT, not a process.
It is a completed act. When a sinner believes on the Lord Jesus Christ believing He is able to save to the uttermost all who come to Him, IMMEDIATELY he is transferred from death to life, from darkness to light. He is justified without delay, his sins are forgiven, he is accepted in the Beloved. God looks upon him with delight, reconciled, no longer indignant.
Thirdly, Justification is COMPLETE, not partial. It does not increase or decrease One cannot be more or less justified. One is either justified or condemned. One is either reconciled to God through the blood of the Cross, or still at enmity with God. Justification CANNOT be lost to the truly converted soul. God will not justify us today and condemn us tomorrow. Because our justification is grounded in the unchanging Christ it is unchanging.
Fourthy, Justification is a DECLARATION of righteousness, not a making righteous: God does not make sinners righteous in justification. He simply declares or pronounces that the sinner is righteous because of what Christ has done on that sinner’s behalf. A.W. Pink explains it thus: ‘As to condemn a man is not to make him unrighteous, but is simply the pronouncing of an adverse sentence against him, so to justify is not to effect any moral improvement in his character but is simply declaring him to be righteous’
Fifthly, Justification is by FAITH, but it is not faith that justifies. The GROUND of our justification is the righteousness and satisfaction of Christ, NOT anything we have done or produced of ourselves, or even anything which God has produced in us. It depends on something totally outside of us: a righteousness alien and foreign to us which is kept in Heaven for us. Our faith, repentance, relationship with Christ, our subjective feelings of peace (all wonderful things) are NOT which please God or make Him willing to justify His beloved People. Even having Jesus in your heart is not the reason. God ONLY accepts a sinner IN CHRIST, clothed in His righteousness. Some professing evangelicals think they ‘got saved’ because of their faith, because they responded, because they asked Jesus into their heart, they allowed God to take over their life or whatever. This is also a false Gospel. We are NOT in any way saved by what we do but by what Christ DID. If you are basing your hopes of Heaven on your FAITH then you are seriously in error. Faith, being weak and incomplete is a very uncertain foundation on which to build salvation. To have this idea about faith is to make it into a WORK which we produce. But faith is NOT a human work, it is foreign to a sinner to believe on Christ. Faith is a gift of God. Although faith is vital, the OBJECT of faith is much more important. What do you believe and in Whom do you believe? Faith is simply the empty hand which receives the righteousness of Christ. A sinner goes to Heaven pleading the merits of Christ and His ALONE. He alone is able to please the Father and in Him alone are we acceptable in God’s sight. Sixthly, Justification is by IMPUTATION, not infusion.
To impute means to account to, to credit to, to reckon to another. Romans 4 is full of the expression, ‘it was COUNTED unto him for righteousness’ (v. 3), ‘his faith is COUNTED for righteousness’ (v. 5), ‘faith was RECKONED’ (v. 9) ‘the blessedness of the man unto whom God IMPUTETH righteousness without works’ (v. 6). The doctrine of imputed righteousness still divides Christianity from every other faith. God deals with man on the basis of imputation. When Adam (the Representative or Federal Head of mankind in the Garden of Eden) sinned, his guilt was imputed by God to all his descendants by natural descent. When Christ the Spotless Lamb of God came into the world God imputed to Him the guilt of the sins of His People whom He legally represented. Christ was TREATED as the guilty One, God SAW Him as legally responsible for their sin and He did not spare His wrath. The other side to imputation is that God IMPUTES, CREDITS, ACCOUNTS or RECKONS to the believer the merits of Christ, the righteousness, obedience and law-fulfiling of Christ. It is a LEGAL TRANSACTION like the transfer of credit from one account to another. Our legal standing before God is then one of perfect innocence. Just as when guilt was imputed to Jesus without defiling His moral character, so in justification God does not change the heart of the sinner, there is no inner moral change at all (that is something called Sanctification), just an OUTWARD, LEGAL change in STATUS. Therefore when God looks upon the justified believer, He does NOT see our sin and unworthiness, indeed our damnworthiness, but He sees the righteousness of His Beloved Son.
Some teach, however, contrary to the Scriptures that justification is by grace INFUSED or POURED into the heart. God then justifies on the basis of the grace in the heart. The gracious operations of the Holy Spirit in the sinner and not the work of Christ for the sinner then become the basis or ground of justification according to this false view. Grace has then been corrupted and has become a work as the sinner, who never knows if his justification is complete, seeks to accumulate enough grace to please God. These false teachers have enslaved many. Although they call it salvation through grace, they have re-defined grace. Grace is the merciful attitude of God toward a helpless sinner. Divine grace is unconditional. God bestows it freely and sovereignly on sinners who cannot fulfil any conditions. Praise God that He does not demand conditions before He extends mercy. He doesn’t wait until we have made enough progress in grace before pronouncing us justified. His mercy lifts us out of our sin, calls us, draws us, indeed resurrects us without our co-operation or help. Hallelujah!
Application.
Why is this doctrine important? Is doctrinal accuracy even important at all today? What possible practical use could it have?
First of all, the Bible teaches that God wants His People to know doctrine. Doctrine is simply another word for teaching, and God has a lot to teach us, so much in fact that He wrote 66 books. Through Hosea God complained that ‘My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge’. To know God and to know about Him is a source of comfort and joy that no amount of spiritual experience and feelings can bring. To be ignorant of the truth is to be lost.
The doctrine is a CHRIST-EXALTING doctrine.
If when we were yet sinners Christ died for us, if guilt-ridden sinners are saved without works by sovereign grace alone, then God receives ALL the Glory. He planned and accomplished our salvation in Christ. It causes us to look outside of ourselves unto Christ for our righteousness and acceptance with God. Glory be unto His Name!
It is a COMFORTING doctrine.
If our salvation depended on us, on our co-operation with God’s grace, if God took into account the inner state of our hearts or the amount of works we did through the grace He gives us BEFORE justifying us, we could NEVER have any assurance of acceptance with God. Our consciences would always be tormented with the question: Is God pleased with me? Have I done enough? If, however, we rest on what Christ has done in satisfying the Father we can be assured that just as the Father delights in His only begotten Son, so He is pleased with all who are in Christ. Such a sweet assurance is unique to Christianity. Others say, ‘I hope so’, but the Christian can say triumphantly, ‘I KNOW that my Redeemer liveth’!
It is a SANCTIFYING doctrine.
Jesus said’ ‘He who is forgiven much, loveth much’. We owe a debt to God which we could NEVER pay. Christ stepped in and paid it all for us, and He has set us free from our debt. Therefore, we love our great Benefactor and want to live to please Him. ‘If you love me, the Master said, keep my Commandments’. The justified do just that, they fail and stumble many times but their whole desire is to serve their King. If we are working to EARN our salvation our life becomes a drudgery as we attempt to accumulate enough credit, but if we serve God willingly, gratefully, it is as a labour of love.
My prayer is that those who still stubbornly cling to their own righteousness may repent before they are ushered into Judgement, and that those saved may realise the richness of the salvation which God has bestowed upon them. To be justified FREELY BY HIS GRACE is a wondrous thing. Live then in gratitude to the Saviour, AMEN.
