For it has been granted to you that for the sake of Christ you should not only believe in him but also suffer for his sake (Phil. 1:29).

The phrase, "faith for faith," is taken directly from the translation of Rm. 1:17 by the English Standard Version, expressly, "For in it [that is, the Gospel] the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith." I say, "translation," but I mean more "interpretation" for, though the literal interpretation of the passage is "faith to faith," I am thinking (though I am unsure of this) that the translators of the ESV are picking up on part of what the apostle is doing with this phrase, namely using it as an inclusio to bracket with Rm. 3:21, 22 the section of the epistle from Rm. 1:18-3:20. [An "inclusio," is a literary device used to set apart a particular section of literature, bracketing it with common phrases.]

This intention by the apostle becomes quite apparent when we look at this seemingly obscure statement by the apostle in Rm. 1:17, viz. "the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith," in light of the clear statement by the apostle in Rm. 3:21, 22: "But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it–the righteousness of God through the faith of Jesus Christ for all who [have faith]" (translation mine; compare with Young’s Literal). In other words, we see that the revelation of the Righteousness of God (which is the Gospel, mind you) is not merely transacted from God’s righteousness to human faith, but it is transacted from God’s righteousness to Christ’s faith granted to the elect manifested by their personal faith. In other words, this simple statement, "faith for faith," states what is said more explicitly elsewhere, namely that our faith is not our own but is a gift from God (cf. Eph. 2:8) and that Christ is the author and finisher of our faith (cf. Heb. 12:2). This simple phrase explains both how faith can be counted as righteousness and how dead men become alive in Christ to believe the Gospel, for even a man’s faith originates in God and in God alone. Second, in the immediate context, the phrase from Rm. 1:17: "The righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith" stands perfectly paralleled to the subject of the discourse of the section it brackets, namely "the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth" (Rm. 1:18). In other words, as becomes quite apparent in the following discourse by the apostle, there are two places in which a person can stand, and only two—either a person stands in faith and is covered in the Righteousness of Christ, or a person stands under the wrath of God which shall be poured upon that soul when the temporal propitiation of wrath afforded for that soul by the work Christ is expired. His works will on that day be rendered unto him (cf. Rm. 2:6), and he will be judged and damned in accordance to the law that has been revealed to him, either in the written code or in that which has been written upon his heart (cf. Rm. 2:12, 14-16). Therefore, the apostle can say with absolute certainty the truth which he proclaims in Rm. 2:12: "For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law." I hope that this short overview of the phrase, "faith for faith," as found in Rm. 1:17 shows that the name of this site was not chosen in vain but was chosen because the heart of the Gospel lies therein. We are nothing apart from the work of Christ, and therefore all of our boasting is excluded since we are justified by a law of faith (cf. Rm. 3:27)–a faith that comes from God alone and imputes to us a righteousness that comes from God alone. To him alone be glory forever! Amen.

And just when things seem that they could not get worse, they do. And it seems to get worse daily. Whether it is the heat pump that needs to be fixed or replaced ($1600-$5000), the new carpet that must be installed ($800), Uncle Sam demanding his due by April 15th ($1100), or the seemingly daily emails that report that our home value estimate has dropped yet again when we were already set to lose money six months ago, etc., etc., the bombardment of negative information has me groping for answers. “Are we not on the path that is honoring to God?” “Will God provide so that we can honor him by honoring our debts?” “Is God really in this at all?” All these questions and more continually pop into my mind and heart, and with each passing day they seem harder and harder to answer.

Up till now, I have answered these questions to myself and to those who care enough to ask by saying that God will glorify himself by making our situation as impossible as possible so that when all things are brought about and reconciled, he alone will receive the glory for it all. And while I continue to entertain such a notion in my mind, my heart has begun to waver. Sure God is God, and the thousands of dollars that we need to shed this awful burden from our backs is nothing to him, yet I cannot see anything on the horizon. Doubt seems to be growing maliciously on me like a cancer, and I am left wondering whether I will be healed or left to die.

If one thing is for certain, I have become praying man as of late. And most of the time, those prayers seem to be pleas of desperation from a man who is grasping onto the last thread of a rope, dangling over a cliff of the Grand Canyon. Will God be my salvation in this time? Will he wait to grab me after that last thread has finally snapped? I do not know, but I know one thing for sure: whatever the outcome, I will never be the same.

And how have Pelagians misunderstood the Gospel? They have done it by misunderstanding the bad news of humanity’s condition. For if good news is going to exist, bad news must go before it, and if extremely Good News is going to exist, extremely bad news must go before it.

It is for this reason that the apostle Paul, after he declares that he is not ashamed of the Gospel for in the Gospel the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith (Rm. 1:16, 17), immediately expounds upon the terrible state of humanity (vv. 1:18-3:20). This terrible state is summarized in that all men are by nature unrighteous and that all men actively and willfully suppress the truth of God in their unrighteousness, and therefore God’s wrath is being stored up for them (cf. v. 1:18). And because of this terrible state in which all men are, the apostle, at the climax of this section upon the bad news of men’s condition, declares, “None is righteous, no, not one. No one understands, no one seeks for God. All have turned aside, together they have become worthless. No one does good, not even one” (vv. 3:10-13).

Therefore, the bad news of man’s condition is this, namely that God is righteous, and men are unrighteous. And in order for men to stand before a pleased God, they must be righteous, they must understand, they must seek for God, they must repent, they must have worth, and they must do good. However, no man does these things. In his natural state, he is the opposite of what he must be, and he perpetuates his condition by his own will and works. Therefore, by himself, no man can stand righteous before God.

Therefore, after the apostle finishes his discourse on the terrible news of man’s condition, he reintroduces the Gospel using the same language by which he introduced it prior to his discourse, namely, “The righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith” (v. 1:17). He writes:

But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law … [namely] the righteousness of God through the faith of Jesus Christ for all who have faith (or believe). For there is no distinction, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God and are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as propitiation by his blood to be received by faith” (vv. 3:21-25).

In other words, the extremely Good News of Jesus Christ is that despite man’s terrible condition, men can now be made righteous through the gracious gift of Christ’s redemption by faith. But how are we to understand this faith by which we are made righteous? Is it an active seeking out and an active trusting in God by our own free volition? By no means! For by himself, no one understands and no one seeks for God (cf. v. 3:11). What is this faith then? This faith is the gift of Christ’s faith to us who could never have faith. It is imputed faith. How do we know this? We know this because the apostle expresses the Gospel in this way: “The righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith” (v. 1:17), expressly, “Through the faith of Jesus Christ for all who have faith” (v. 3:22). In other words, the faith that we have in Christ is not a meritorious work that we by our own choosing choose to have, but it is a gift granted by Jesus Christ to us–Jesus who is the author and finisher of our faith (Heb. 12:2). Therefore, it is no surprise that since the apostle is teaching in Rm. 3:21-26 the same thing that he teaches in Eph. 2:8-10, namely that faith is a gift of God not a work of man, he then makes the exact same conclusion in each passage, namely, “What then becomes of our boasting? It is excluded” (v. 3:27). For no man can boast in a salvation that is not his doing given to him through a faith that is not his own.

The Pelagian therefore misunderstands the Gospel in that he believes that all men are able in their natural condition to believe upon Jesus Christ despite the testimony of the apostle that no one can understand and no one can seek for God in his natural state. Therefore, for the Pelagian, the bad news of man’s condition is not as bad as Scripture declares, and the Good News of Jesus Christ is not as good as Scripture declares. In this way, the Pelagian misunderstands the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

The sad irony for most of us who call ourselves Baptists is that we bear baptism in our denominational title, yet we by and large have no clue what baptism is. In this way, we are much like the Circumcision party of whom the apostle Paul writes in Galatians 5 in that we, like them, bear the symbol of God’s covenant in our title, and, we, like them, understand the symbol of the covenant with great precision, and yet we do not understand the reality behind the symbol. We, like the Circumcision party, are zealously meticulous about practicing the symbol correctly, giving lectures and preaching sermons on why baptism by immersion is the only acceptable mode of baptism, all the while neglecting to teach upon the reality of baptism. We will harp upon the mode of the symbol to such detail so as to say that a baptizer cannot hold the nose of the one being baptized because dead people do not hold their noses, yet we neglect to teach that baptism is matter of the heart performed by the Spirit of God not by the letter of the law.

“What is the big deal? Why does this zealotry upon the proper mode of baptism have any weight upon the health of the church?” The reason that this emphasis upon the proper mode of baptism has been a burden upon the church is that it more often than not draws attention from the teaching of the reality that is baptism. And by focusing upon the symbol and neglecting the reality, we who call ourselves Baptists have neglected the proper teaching of the Gospel. For if what the apostle Peter writes is true, namely that “Baptism saves you” (1Pt. 3:21), and salvation comes through the Gospel alone, then baptism is the Gospel. Therefore, our proper understanding of baptism is essential to our proper understanding of the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ.

However, before I address the proper understanding of baptism and the Gospel, I need to first address why we need baptism and the Gospel that accords with baptism. In his Epistle to the Romans, the apostle Paul bookends his letter by testifying that he has two charges as an apostle: to preach the Gospel and to bring about what he calls the “obedience of faith” in those to whom he preaches (Rm. 1:1, 5; 16:25, 26). As we read further into the Epistle, we find that these two charges given to the apostle–to preach the Gospel and to bring about the obedience of faith–are not two separate charges, but they are in fact the same charge. In other words, the Gospel is the obedience of faith. For we find in the Epistle that no one will see God and have life apart from the Gospel, and no will see God and have life apart from the obedience of faith. For the apostle writes, “He will render to each one according to his works. To those who by patience in well doing seek glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life. But for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury” (Rm. 2:6-8). Therefore, obedience is necessary for salvation and eternal life, and disobedience leads to damnation. Therefore, since obedience to the law of God saves a soul, then obedience therefore has some part in the Gospel.

However, despite the clear declaration that “It is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified” (Rm. 2:13), the apostle seems on the surface to contradict himself later in the letter by writing that salvation comes from faith alone apart from works of the law. He writes, “For the Promise to Abraham and his offspring that he would be heir of the world did not come through the law but through the righteousness of faith. For if it is the adherents (obeyers) of the law who are to the be the heirs, faith is null and the Promise is void” (Rm. 4:14). Thus he writes later, “Therefore, we have been justified by faith” (Rm. 5:1), seemingly contradicting what he had written earlier, namely, “The doers (obeyers) of the law will be justified” (Rm. 2:13). So then which is it? Are we justified by faith, or are we justified by obedience?

The answer to the question is not an easy one, and it has been typically answered in one of three ways. Two of the ways are false ways and are prevalent in the church even now, and one is true and not as prevalent. Both false ways distort the language of the Gospel, and both are, because of this, a false gospel. The first of the two false ways to deal with what the apostle calls the obedience of faith is the emphasis of obedience to the neglect of faith. This is what we would call a works-based Christianity. And though it is found across denominational lines, the chief example of this way is Roman Catholicism. These who hold to such a works-based gospel focus upon the deeds of men and neglect the righteousness that comes by faith, and as such, they must distort the language of the Gospel to change the Christian religion from a heart and Spirit-based religion to one that is deeds based. Thus when you speak to many Roman Catholics, you will hear them speak of charity instead of love, of penance instead of repentance, of service instead of worship, and of sacrament instead of grace–all these manipulations highlighting their distortion of the Gospel.

The second is its opposite, and it likewise distorts the Gospel and its language. It is the response the apostle’s declarations that emphasizes faith to the neglect of obedience, and it is prevalent in many churches who call themselves Evangelical. This way emphasizes the initial will and response to its gospel call, and neglects the fruits of true faith, which is obedience unto holiness and eternal life. Thus those who hold to such distort the language of the Gospel by using phrases such as “Accept Jesus as your personal Savior” instead of “Believe and repent,” “Once saved, always saved” instead of the doctrine of the “Perseverance of the Saints,” and, perhaps the worst of all, “You have accepted Jesus Christ as your Savior, will you not accept him as your Lord?”

And though both distort the language of the Gospel so as to make it what it is not, both have a much more fundamental problem, namely they both rest upon the work of men. This is such a problem because both presume that men by their nature are able in their present state to perform in such a way so as to bring themselves into God’s favor. The problem with such a presumption is that the apostle Paul declares in Romans 5 that all men are sons of Adam, and as his sons, have him as their head and are therefore children of disobedience and slaves of sin and unrighteousness. Thus the apostle says of men in Adam:

None is righteous, no not one;
No one understands, no one seeks for God;
All have turned aside, together they have become worthless;
No one does good, not even one;
Their throat is an open grave;
…They use their tongues to deceive;
…The venom of asps is under their lips;
Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness;
Their feet are swift to shed blood;
In their paths are ruin and misery;
…And the way of peace they have not known;
…There is no fear of God before their eyes (Rm. 3:10-18).

For this reason, no man can work his way to God, for, “No one does good, not even one,” and no one can will his way to God, for, “No one understands, no one seeks for God.” It is for this reason that the apostle writes later in the Epistle, “So then, [salvation] depends not on human will or exertion, but on God who has mercy” (v. 9:16), and why he quotes the prophet Isaiah later in that chapter same concerning Israel, “If the Lord of hosts had not left us offspring, we would have been like Sodom, and become like Gomorrah” (v. 9:29).

Next: On Baptism: II. The Remedy to Man’s Inability

However, despite these admirable and godly traits, this brother is a full-fledged Arminian and believes the very doctrines that the Synod of Dordt denounced. And while I am convinced that the Spirit of God dwells in this man, I have felt it my duty to share with him at least some differing views on his beliefs since this man aspires to one day be a full-time minister to God’s flock. Here are a few of my thoughts that I have shared with him.

The Problem with a Free Will
In our conversations, the topic that came up the most is that of the “free will of man.” This notion comes chiefly from the exhortations in Scripture to believe upon Christ and to repent by obeying his commandments. It is presumed from these exhortations that if something is commanded by God that it is by necessity possible for men to obey those commands by their own volition apart from any supernatural work of God. This is a natural presumption, and I am sure that most of us who have come to Christ have believed this very thing at one point in our walk with Christ.

The reason that it is such a natural presumption is because we by our nature are radically self-centered. We by nature presume that what is true can be surmised by our five senses, and if we do not detect these things by our senses, we naturally believe that they do not exist. And this is precisely how the doctrines of free will come about, because men in their self-centered state feel as though they are free to make their own decisions, and thus when one follows Christ, he believes that he came to Christ on his own accord not that Christ had by the Spirit drawn that person to himself.

We, therefore, should not be shocked or dismayed when those who come to Christ think that they did so by their own free volition, but we should understand how natural this is and understand that it is an opportunity for instruction and correction not for division and labeling heretics. Much too often we presume that men have received right doctrine and have railed against it, when in fact they may have never been posed with the right doctrine before and may have never been given opportunity to change their minds and hearts accordingly. We must assume this in love with those who are merely new acquaintances and therefore not be so quick to label them as heterodox when they might have never been confronted with the truth. Those who are leaders and teachers in the church are another matter entirely, for they profess to know the Scriptures and also lead and teach others, and therefore they must be dealt with as false, for they have either, one, understood the teachings of the Scriptures and railed against them, or, two, they have not understood the teachings of the Scriptures and therefore should not be in a position of leadership or instruction in the church.

When dealing with those who are not teachers in the church, I believe that it is fitting to deal with the false notion of free will in the same manner which the apostle Paul deals with it in his epistle to the Roman church. In the epistle, the apostle Paul begins by demonstrating the foul, natural state of men apart from God. He demonstrates this both with the Gentiles (Rm. 1:18-2:16) and the Jews (Rm. 2:17-3:8), so that the conclusion to which his reader comes is that neither group is better off than the other, for both are under the slavery of sin apart from God (v. 3:9), and that, “None is righteous, no not one; no one understands, no one seeks for God” (vv. 3:10, 11). Therefore, all men apart from God are foul and self-seeking, and thus no one is self-justified by the law, for all men are transgressors of the law and are condemned by it.

Since, therefore, men are in such a state under sin and the law that they cannot be righteous, they cannot understand the ways of God, and they cannot seek God, God must do a supernatural work in them before they can be righteous before him, understand him, and seek after him. This is the reason why the apostle begins the next section of his discourse, writing, “But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law … the righteousness of God through the faith of Jesus Christ for all who believe” (vv. 3:21, 22; translation mine). This is the same concept with which the apostle begins his discourse in v. 1:17, namely that, “The righteousness of God has been revealed from faith for faith,” or, in other words, from the initiatory and perfect faith of Jesus Christ imputed to those who would have faith. This notion is seen elsewhere in the apostle’s writings that faith is gift (Eph. 2:8), and therefore it is concluded in both instances where this doctrine is shown that its purpose is so that all boasting is excluded (cf. Rm. 3:27; Eph. 2:8).

The problem with the doctrine of free will is that it does not view faith as gift from God, but it views faith as a personal decision about the Good News of Christ without any prompting or revelation from the Spirit of God. It believes that any man can hear the Gospel and believe it in his natural state, though the Scriptures declare that men are blind, dead, and enslaved to sin apart from the work of God (cf. 2Cor. 2:1-6). Therefore, since those who believe in the free will of man believe that any man can believe the Gospel on his own accord, personal boasting is not excluded, for a faith that is based solely upon the freedom of man is a faith that can be boasted in. Contrarily, a faith that comes from the work of the Spirit of God alone cannot be boasted in, for we who believe did not come to Christ, but Christ came to us and removed the veils from our eyes so that we could see Christ as he truly is and believe on him (cf. 2Cor. 3:12-18).

It is for this reason that Christ tells Nicodemus that he must be born again by the Spirit and that the Spirit blows and regenerates whomever he wishes, and why the New Birth by the Spirit of God precedes the declaration, “Whosoever believes on Christ will not perish” (Jn. 3:16). For new birth must precede faith so that, as the apostle declares later in his letter, “[Salvation] depends not on human will or exertion, but on God who has mercy” (Rm. 9:16).

The reality is that men do have a will, but it is not a free will. For because of our creaturely state and the ordinance of God, no man can be free. We, however, perceive that we are free, because we make decisions every day, however, in reality, every decision that we make is dependent upon our slavemaster. For the apostle declares that all men are slaves, and the matter is not whom you choose as your slavemaster, but which slavemaster has chosen you. For, as no earthly slave has subjected himself willingly to his master, so no man has subjected himself willingly to sin or to God. For all of us have been born into subjection to our slavemaster sin by the deed of our father Adam (Rm. 5:12-21), and the only way that we are released from our slavery to sin is to be redeemed (i.e. purchased from slavery) by Christ and brought under the slavery of God (cf. Rm. 6:22). And it matters not our religious background or our desire to keep the law of God for life (cf. Rm. 7:7-25), but it matters that what we could not do in our slavery to sin and fleshliness, God has done through the emancipating work of Christ and his Spirit (cf. Rm. 8:1-4).

However, we who understand these things must realize that this understanding of the work of God is not a part of justification, but it is a part of sanctification. For no man understands perfectly his state before he comes to Christ, but he merely knows the command, “Believe and repent.” However, this understanding of the will of man is a necessity in our sanctification, for through it the fruits of humility and gratefulness are produced, and our God is a jealous God, and he will not give his glory to another (cf. Is. 48:11). Therefore, I exhort you, brothers who understand these things, to realize that all are Arminians until they have been rightly sanctified, and to be patient and loving to your brothers who believe that their wills are free, and to instruct them in love as to the true nature of the Gospel.

The great purpose of the apostle in writing his letter is this: “To bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of [Christ's] name among all the nations” (Rm. 1:5). We know this is the great purpose of the apostle for he ends his letter writing:

Now to him who is able to strengthen you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery that was kept secret for long ages but has now been disclosed and through the prophetic writings has been made known to all nations, according to the command of the eternal God, to bring about the obedience of faith–to the only wise God be glory forevermore through Jesus Christ! Amen (vv. 16:25-27).

Additionally, the apostle commends the church at Rome at the letter’s beginning, writing, “I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because your faith is proclaimed in all the world (v. 1:8), and he commends the church at the end, writing, “For your obedience is known to all, so that I rejoice over you (v. 16:19). Therefore the letter’s purpose and the basis of his commendation are one, namely the proclamation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ that is fulfilled by faith and obedience.

If this is indeed the purpose of the apostle, how then does he flesh out this purpose? He does so in vv. 1:16-8:17 by addressing the greatest issue that faces the world and the church, namely righteousness and its lack, and how faith and obedience fulfill righteousness. Regarding faith’s relationship to righteousness, the apostle declares that it is through faith that we are counted as righteous. He writes:

But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through the faith of Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are [made righteous] by his grace as gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as propitiation by his blood to be received by faith (vv. 3:21-25).

Therefore, it is by faith that we are justified (i.e. made righteous) in the sight of God.

Also, faith is not initiation into righteousness alone, but it is the manner by which those who have been made righteous live. For the apostle writes earlier, “For in [the Gospel] the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith (see v. 3:22), as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith” (v. 1:17). Therefore, faith is both the means by which the saints of God are made righteous and the manner by which the righteous saints of God live until that Day when faith yields to Sight.

While it is by faith that we are counted righteous before God (cf. v. 4:5), it is through obedience that we become righteous. After introducing the doctrine of baptism and the freedom from sin it affords, the apostle writes:

Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin which leads to death or of obedience which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have now become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness” (vv. 6:16-18).

Also concerning this baptism unto obedience, God in Ezekiel declares:

I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you shall be clean from all your uncleannesses, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. And I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes and be careful to obey my rules.You shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers, and you shall be my people, and I will be your God (Ez. 36:24-28).

Therefore, because of baptism, obedience is a necessary component of salvation, for obedience leads to righteousness, and righteousness leads to sanctification, and sanctification leads to eternal life (cf. 6:16-23).

Some will be quick to object: “Is this not justification by works?” It is in a way, for salvation comes both through faith and obedience. What distinguishes a saint’s justification by works from the reprobate’s attempt to justify himself by works is the Spirit of God. For opposed to fleshly attempts to keep the law so as to attain life (cf. vv. 7:7-25), those in whom the Spirit of God dwells keep the law by the Spirit of God alone. For it is the Spirit alone who gives the saint a new heart by circumcising it (cf. v. 2:29), and it is the Spirit alone who compels men to obedience. Both faith and obedience are the work of God, as the apostle writes elsewhere:

For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them (Eph. 2:8-10).

Therefore, since it is God who opens eyes to his glory so as to produce faith, and it is God who makes men his slaves and causes them to obey him (cf. v. 6:22; Ez. 36:27), all grounds for boasting in faith and works is removed. For salvation “depends not on human will or exertion, but on God who has mercy” (v. 9:16).

For this reason, the apostle contrasts the fleshly inability of keeping the law with the Spirit’s ability in Romans 8. He writes:

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done, what the law weakened by the flesh could not do, by sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh, in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit (vv. 8:1-4).

Therefore, the Gospel is about both faith and obedience, and it is faith and obedience that comes from God alone. For as James writes, “Faith without works is dead” (Jm. 2:17), and as Christ declares, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments” (Jn. 14:15).

But what is the purpose behind the apostle’s desire “to bring about the obedience of faith among all the nations”? As we have already seen, faith and obedience are necessary for righteousness. Therefore we should ask, “Why righteousness?” As the apostle writes later in the letter in his discourse concerning divisions, “The kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit” (v. 14:17). Paul, therefore, is concerned about the Kingdom. For in encouraging the Gentiles (i.e. the nations) to be righteous (cf. vv. 1:16-8:18) and to seek peace (cf. vv. 12:1-15:7), he is encouraging the church at Rome to live as citizens of the Kingdom of God which is comprised of the nations and whose overseers are peace and whose taskmasters are righteousness (cf. Is. 60:17). Therefore the epistle to the Romans is the prayer, “Thy Kingdom come; thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven,” and the exhortation to the church to be the Light of the Kingdom to the world.

Justification by Acceptance rather than Justification by Faith
As those who claim to be Evangelical Christians–those who bear the very word Gospel (euangelion) in our self-made title, one would think that we would be quite sure about the Gospel to which we claim such allegiance. Yet in spite of our nominal allegiance, we find in modern Evangelical Christianity in place of the Gospel call given exclusively in Scripture by Christ and the apostles, namely, “Believe and repent!”, there is now almost exclusively the call: “Accept Jesus Christ as your personal Savior, and ask him into your heart.”

What ought to be quite startling is that the phrase we have so endeared—”Accept Jesus Christ as your personal Savior” is never used by anyone in the New Testament. Never. And this is not merely a point of semantics, for “accepting Jesus Christ” and “believing in Jesus Christ” are not synonymous phrases. In fact, they are quite different, and its shift is indicative of the philosophical shift that has occurred within the Western Church.

The Propagation of Free-Will Philosophy
If you think just for a second about the differences between “accepting” something and “believing in” something, it becomes quite apparent why the shift in language has changed from that of the Bible and the reformers. “Accepting” something by necessity demands an act of the will. It is an exertion. It is a work. It, in its connotation, is an evaluation of possible choices and choosing that which is most advantageous to the soul. In the case of modern evangelism, it is demonstrating to a person that life with Jesus is better than life without Jesus and to convince that person to say a prayer that “seals the deal” and causes the Holy Spirit give birth to him. The great majority of modern evangelism works in this way, be it done in “Hell, fire, and brimstone” presentations or in pretty tracts that purport an abundant life in Christ.

On the other hand, faith or belief in something is quite different from accepting something. Faith is not an exertion of the will. Faith is not a choice. It is a natural ascent to that which is true because one knows it to be true. For example, one believes that the sun will rise in the morning, because he has experienced a sunrise every day of his life and thereby knows that it will rise again. Faith in Jesus Christ is no different than faith in the rising sun. One believes that Jesus Christ is Lord because he has experienced Jesus Christ. He believes in Jesus Christ because Christ had shown himself to him. Just as Paul on the Damascus road saw Christ because Christ burst out of heaven and revealed himself to him, and then Paul by necessity believed, so God shines “in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2Cor. 4:6), and we believe.

Faith, therefore, is by its nature a natural reaction to a supernatural revelation. Just as a tap on the knee with a rubber hammer produces a reflexive kick, so God’s revelation of himself to a man creates in that man faith.

For this very reason, Scripture does not hesitate to say at some times that a man is justified by faith and at others that he justified by the work of Christ. For faith is not work that adds to the work of Christ, but it is the natural reaction of the revelation to our hearts that God has set us apart for himself through Jesus Christ. The apostle calls this action by God the “circumcision of the heart by the Spirit” in Romans 2:29, for we who were once far off have been brought under the Covenant and set apart for holiness and obedience through the work of Christ so that he might be the firstborn of many brothers (cf. Rm. 8:29).

Acceptance: Making Faith a Work
As we discussed earlier, the great difference between “acceptance” and “faith” is that the former is an exertion by reason and the latter is an affirmation of what one sees and experiences. The shift in language from the biblical and reformational “Believe and repent” to the present “Accept Jesus as your personal Savior” is an accommodation to human philosophy not to greater understanding of biblical truth. Our post-Enlightenment and American minds are so destroyed by our thoughts of liberty and pursuits of happiness that we cannot begin to grasp doctrines that teach otherwise. So instead of being transformed by the renewal of our minds by Holy Scripture (cf. Rm. 12:2), we are conformed to the philosophies of this world and attempt to ram the triangular peg of Scripture through the square hole of human philosophy.

Therefore in today’s context, faith is no longer a meritless assent to the work of the Almighty, but it is the work of our souls “to get right” with God. Despite clear teachings to the contrary, we explain away texts that do not fit our philosophies (and never explain them for that matter), or we avoid them altogether. We then take the analogies and pictures that Scripture gives us to show our whole dependence of God, and we twist them so as to make us the meritors rather than the meritees. If, for example, we were confronted by Nicodemus today and were asked to give instruction as to how the old man might be born again, we would not answer like Christ, who said “The wind blows where it wishes, and you hear its sound, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit” (Jn. 3:8), but we would say, “Accept Jesus as your personal Savior, and then you will be born again.” You know, just as we accepted our parents as our personal parents before we were born the first time around.

For this reason, we cannot comprehend what the apostle writes in Romans 3, “Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded. By what kind of law? By a law of works? No, but by the law of faith. For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law (vv. 27, 28). We cannot comprehend this saying, because we can boast in what we call “faith.” If faith is truly looking at the option of Jesus Christ and looking at other options and accepting Jesus as our Savior on our own accord, then we do have something to boast in. We can say of ourselves, “We were more intuitive than those who do not believe,” “We are more predisposed to godliness than unsaved Jane over there,” “We are just smarter than every atheist that is on the planet,” etc. But if faith is, as John Piper put it, merely the cry of a newborn child of God, then we have as much reason to boast in our faith and salvation as a newborn has in crying and being born.

Next: The Doctrinal Ramifications of the Death of Justification by Faith

Yet the Scripture’s unabashed proclamation of God’s meticulous sovereignty and his great power are never presented as justification for a “que sera, sera” attitude toward life. Proverbs 16 exists as a demonstration of this, holding together that which cannot be comprehended by the human mind, namely that a godly man plans and commits his steps to the Lord, yet the Lord has already established his steps. The apostle Paul puts it this way: “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work his good pleasure” (Phil. 2:12, 13). Therefore we are to work, for God is working in us.

Until recently, I had no problem with the notion that God is working in me. I enjoyed such a thought, and I loved my theology that concentrated so much upon that aspect of my existence. Where I fell short was not in my theology (for it was indeed true and remains true), but it was in my practice. For God’s work in a person by the greatness of that work has an effect that is both healthful inwardly and demonstrative outwardly. For just as a healthy tree evinces its health by bearing good fruit, so too do those who have been made healthy by the Spirit of God bear the fruit of the Spirit. For as James rightly concludes, “Faith without works is dead” (Jm. 2:17).

As is the case of all of those who are being conformed into the image of Christ by the Spirit, my deficiencies have been brought before my eyes degree by degree. The most recent of which is the subject of this journal, and thus far in my life, it has been the most difficult to fulfill. Whereas other things might be remedied by seemingly simple solutions, e.g. lust by treasuring God, falsehood by love for the truth, etc. mine and my wife’s journey to freedom from debt has no simple solution. For debtors do not vanish with a change of heart, therefore much planning has had to accompany our change of heart.

For this reason, I have been forced upon terribly unfamiliar ground. For I desire to honor God by ridding myself of my financial slavemasters, yet that goal cannot be achieved apart from careful planning. Therefore, for perhaps the first time in my life, I have had to make a plan to honor God in a particular aspect of my life. And though I would like to report that my faith has proved true throughout, I would be a liar if I claimed it so. For by God’s good pleasure, he has made it so that we cannot make one step apart from the clear move of his Providential hand. While at times this has been for me a comforting and validating reality, I must admit that at times it has caused me who is anxious about nothing to be an anxious man.

This was demonstrated yesterday, Monday, August 24th, when a week from closing on the land that we are seeking to purchase and eventually to live on, I, after not hearing from the seller for several days, attempted to call the seller to verify that everything was set to close on 31st. I called the seller and left her a voicemail, but I heard nothing back from her that day. And throughout that day, questions of doubt incessantly popped into my mind: “Why has she not returned my calls?” “Is she attempting to back out of the contract?” “Will she be there at closing?” “Will we have to take her to court?” On and on the questions persisted, and no thoughts about the sovereign hand of God could quell the anxiety. I knew I was being faithless, yet no repentance could ease the unfamiliar feeling of unease.

Finally, by the grace of God, my anxieties were relieved, but not without the realization that I still have far to go in my trust in God. For whether or not this land is acquired by us in this life and whether or not our godly pursuit to unindebtedness if ever realized, I must understand that no pursuit in this life, no matter how godly and right, ends in this life, but it ends in the life to come–at that point when my Blessed Hope shall be realized. For to hope in anything less breeds anxiety and faithlessness. For it is in that future Hope that we were saved (cf. Rm. 8:24),and it is for this reason that all things work together for good to those who love God, for the culmination of all things will be revelation of the sons of God in glory (cf. Rm. 8:28; 19).

By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin. He considered the reproach of Christ greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt, for he was looking to the reward (Heb. 11:24-26).

“Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also,” was the declaration of our Lord to those who would listen on the Sermon on the Mount, and it is the testimony of countless lives of men and women who have looked upon the offerings of this world and upon the suffering that comes with Christ and forsook the former for the latter.

It is counter-cultural declaration, and as such, it brings with it its own reproach. For any who would verbally declare in a materialistic culture that materialism is not the means to joy is bound to receive reproach in some form. However, the greatest reproach comes not with one’s verbal testimony but with the way in which he lives his life. For there may be many who are willing to admit with their lips that true joy exists outside of material goods, but the testimony of their lives is a different story. And it is from these, from those who argue against materialism with their lips and argue for it with their lives, that one who lives for Christ by forsaking material pleasures receives the greatest amount of animosity. For it is the ones who give lip service who have the greatest amount to lose. For if even one exists in their midst who lives outside the material snares of the world, it is this one who, as it were, rats them out and shows them to be false. For these who forsake the world act as Noah did to his perishing generation, as a condemnation of their faithless lives (cf. Heb. 11:7).

And it is those who give lip service to Christ who create the dichotomy between joy and happiness. For, etymologically speaking, the two are one, yet those who hold fast to the world and its pleasures while attempting to hold fast to Christ, though finding the joy of the Lord throughout the Scriptures, find little happiness in him in their hearts. For their joy is not that of Moses who considered the reproach of Christ as greater wealth than the treasures of Egypt nor is it that of the apostle Paul who declares, “We rejoice in our sufferings” (cf. Rm. 5:3). For their treasure is not the same as that of Moses and Paul, for if it were, they would be happy in their lives, knowing that Christ is glorified in them. As it is, few have happiness or joy in the Lord, because the Lord is not their treasure.

What is your treasure? Is it the material pleasures of the world or is it the suffering that comes with being named with Christ? For if you find little joy in being reproached for the sake of Christ, you will, by necessity, find little happiness in this life.

By faith Enoch was taken up so that he should not see death, and he was not found, because God had taken him. Now before he was taken he was commended as having pleased God (Heb. 11:5).

The story of Enoch is one of the more interesting in the Genesis narrative, not necessarily because of his life, but because he did not see death. We find in Genesis 5 that Enoch walked with the Lord, and he did so all the days of his life by his faith in the Lord. Therefore God was pleased with Enoch, and, in his good pleasure, took Enoch so that he would not die.

The testimony of the life of Enoch is a great one indeed, for Enoch’s taking from this earth by the Lord at the relatively young age of 365 demonstrates, first, where Enoch’s hope rested. Had Enoch desired this life and its present luxuries, he would have likely lived, at those before and after him, past nine hundred years. However, as it was, Enoch’s greatest treasure was the Lord, and the Lord saw fit to give him the desire of his heart, expressly God himself.

Secondly, the narrative of faithful Enoch is the first explicit demonstration in Scripture of the Inheritance that waits for those who walk with God. Since God’s pleasure in the life of Enoch was manifested in Enoch’s being taken from this earth, it shows that the true Inheritance of the Lord does not rest in this life but in the life to come. Therefore, the taking of Enoch exists as a testimony to all those who follow him of the great future that lays in store for those who walk with the Lord in this life.

Thirdly, as did the acceptable offering of Abel, the taking of Enoch testifies to the coming One who would redeem his people from their sins and from the guilt of Adam. For if this Provision was in question, Enoch would not have been taken, for he, being a son of Adam, was by necessity a sinner and guilty before God for his sins and his first father’s sin. However, since God had already ordained a Provision for sin (cf. Gen. 3:15) and because of the certainty of the his Promise, God was able to cast Enoch’s transgressions upon that Provision and take him into Eternal Rest.