Saving Faith Shivers at the Spectacle

Green Baggins has resumed his treatment of my book, “Reformed” Is Not Enough, and so we come now to the chapter on apostasy. But before we get to that, Lane addresses a question I raised earlier about the difference between a corrupt church and an apostate church. As Lane puts it, “The question, then, is whether or not a church has to have justification by faith correct in order to be a true church. I asserted that a church that gets justification wrong is apostate, not merely corrupt.” Lane qualifies this by saying that a church doesn’t have to affirm justification by faith alone “using those exact words,” but that they do have to get the substance of the thing right.

My chief objection to this is that it is a denial of justification by faith alone. Now I am not saying that Lane is apostate, because this is precisely the point where we differ. We are not saved by works, and this includes our intellectual and doctrinal works. There are people who would do poorly on the “justification by faith alone” portion of their theology exam who are nonetheless saved people. And there are people who would ace that section who are damned. We are not saved by works. Not by willing, not by running, not by smiling, not by thinking, not by catechizing, not by affirming, not by Westminster-confessing, nada, zilch, zip. All our works have corruptions in them and are received by God because they are presented to Him in the perfections of Jesus. This includes our doctrinal works, which are frequently all screwed up. We sin daily in thought, word, and deed.

Now when we are saved, we are subsequently and gradually transformed through the infused righteousness of Christ. But as Lane points out, this infusion is our sanctification, not our justification. When we are deciding if a person or a church is apostate, we must be very careful about looking at any kind of works. This includes works of infused catechesis.

Lane has asserted his point several times, and clearly enough, but I am still not sure he really means it. When this issue came up the last time, I pointed out that this does not just enable Lane to pronounce Rome apostate, but also cleans out a good portion of the Protestant evangelical world as well. Lane is very specific that if a church teaches that “the righteousness of Christ becomes ours only by infusion, and not by imputation” then that church is apostate, not corrupt. This means that according to Lane the precision of the Reformed standards is required (in substance, although not in terminology) in order for a church to stay out of apostasy, in order to keep its lampstand from being removed.

But the precision of the Reformed standards is like an electrical schematic diagram, showing how all the lights in the house turn on. Being justified means that the lights are actually on. Now I want all our ministers to know the schematic diagram — and if they don’t, our houses will soon be dark. It is not an unimportant thing. But someone can live in the light without knowing the first thing about electrical theory, and they can even have some very odd ideas about what makes the electricity work. Someone’s heart/trust can be in Jesus (the lights are on) and still have their heads full of bogus electrical theory (which if some actually used to wire a house, would result in a dark house). This is because we are saved by grace through faith, and not through a correction understanding of grace through faith. When a church is not apostate, it is the grace of God plus nothing. And when a church is not apostate, it can still be filled with all kinds of various corruptions. “The purest churches under heaven are subject both to mixture and error” (WCF 25.5). Some of those errors might be under the head of justification, and, looking around at the evangelical world, they usually are.

This is not to dispute Luther’s dictum that justification is the article of a standing or falling church. I do believe that. But falling is not the same as fallen. I also believe that doing all the wiring in the house correctly is the article of a standing or a burning house. But a bad risk of burning is not the same as burning, and burning is not the same as burned.

One more angle and I am done with this point. Since this point is so clear to Lane, I would suggest that he draft a series of questions for a test that theologians of various communions could take. The questions would have to be specific enough to keep the papists from passing it (no softball questions like “Are we saved by Jesus?”), and general enough to keep Billy Graham from flunking it. And if a theologian, representing his communion accurately, missed just one question, then that church would have to be declared apostate. Think for minute. Why is it not clear that to administer a test like this, on these conditions, is actually a demand for justification by works? So it is true that we are justified by faith alone. It is not true that we are justified through a proper understanding of justification by faith alone.

Now, to the questions that Lane raised in his treatment of my chapter on apostasy. First, let me clear a couple things out of the way. I have no problem with understanding many scriptural expressions as a “judgment of charity.” I believe that this does explain many passages. When I am preaching to the wheat field, I address them all as wheat, even if I know there are probably tares mixed in. This is a judgment of charity.

But what the judgment of charity does not explain are those covenant members who are being described in Scripture in the process of falling away. When tares are addressed together with the wheat as wheat, no problem. Judgment of charity. But when tares are being addressed as tares, and in that condition their relationship to Christ is described as having a certain reality to it that they are in the process of losing, that cannot be explained as a judgment of charity. Examples would include, but not be limited to: 1. “Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace” (Heb. 10:29); 2. “If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned” (John 15:6); 3. “Well; because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be not high-minded but fear” (Rom. 11:20).

This last example brings us to the question of hypothetical warnings. Lane argues, quite properly, that the warnings are used by God as one of His means for keeping the decretally elect from falling away. We have no disagreement on that point. But there is a related disagreement. The decretally elect are not just kept on the straight and narrow by propositional warnings. They are also kept there by the actual condemnation of covenant members as warning examples. The Roman Christians who were warned to stay in the olive tree by faith did not just have the warning on paper. They also had the example of former branches (whose branchiness was just as branch-like as their own) lying on the ground of the olive orchard. Now if the elect are going to be served by written warnings, they can also be served in the same way by the warning examples. If they look at the olive branch on the ground and say, “Well, that could never happen to me,” then they are drawing precisely the opposite meaning than the one Paul is urging upon them. “Be not high-minded, but fear.” What are you doing to the warnings when you rush in with an untouchable ordo, tell this branch about decretal election, and tell him he does not need to fear? What are you doing that for? He should already know about decretal election — he just read about it a few chapters before in Romans. He believes in it, and so do I. But whatever we do with the doctrine of decretal election, we must not manipulate it such that we become what Paul is warning against here — high-minded. Saving faith trembles “at the threatenings” (WCF 14.2). This means that saving faith shivers at the spectacle of fellow Christians falling into the hands of the living God. “The Lord shall judge his people” (Heb. 10:30). It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God (Heb. 10:32). We look at the master gardener sawing a branch off right next to us, and we should think yikes. This is not a denial of decretal election. As Lane points out, it is one of the ways that God’s electing purpose is fulfilled. And to claim that the bad examples have nothing to do with us is therefore to interfere with God’s purposes in establishing the decretally elect in their assurance.

To conclude, and to answer another question of Lane’s very quickly — does the reprobate covenant member have any part of the ordo? No, of course not. Do some of the words found in the ordo admit of more than one meaning or application? Yes, of course. Lane says, “Christ is undivided, as Calvin would say. We either get all of Christ or none of Christ.” If we are talking about final salvation, this is of course true. But we can express another related truth in this way: covenant members always get all of Christ — but it is the entire Christ as Savior or the entire Christ as judge. And this is not at all inconsistent with the previous sentiment.