Here is a quick response to Lane’s latest, and then I am content to move on.
First, I don’t object to detailed grammatical exegesis, and I don’t object to it in the Thessalonians passage that Lane was dealing with. I was simply pointing out that we were talking about the kind of problem that remains right where it was after all the exegesis is done. When I said “these texts cannot be properly understood with that kind of analysis,” I was referring to the question that was before the house. Those texts can, of course, be parsed in edifying ways. My argument was that such analysis in our debate was simply beside the point — not that it was beside every point. I will make that point again in my third comment here.
Second, when I used the illustration of the bride and groom I confess I thought of the possibility of miscommunication on chronological issues, and so I should have made some kind of qualification there. I know that Lane does not believe in a chronological separation of justification and sanctification, and should have said so. But again, I think this is beside the point.
Now the third point — is evangelical, justifying faith obedient faith? This is the issue, and it a good place to test Lane’s commitment to good and necessary consequence. Evangelical, justifying faith has to be obedient faith if it is rendered in response to a command from God to have evangelical, justifying faith. So then, does God command true faith? Does He command us to believe in Him sincerely, from the heart? If so, and we do, then we are obeying. If not, then our faith is neither obedient not disobedient — it may be a third other thing, but only if God did not command it.
Lane is very clear here. He says it is an “all-important point” to say that “faith is not related to the category of obedience when it comes to justification.” He does this wanting a third way, a third option — something that is neither obedience nor disobedience. “Because I do not say that faith is an act of obedience does not in the least imply that I am advocated that faith is an act of disobedience.” Now just for the record, I know that Lane does not describe evangelical faith as disobedience — he wants it in another category entirely for the sake of saving his particular construction.
But he may only have this third option if God has not commanded us to believe in this way. If He has, then it is fully acceptable for classical Protestants to describe our obedience to the command to believe as obedience. If God has not commanded us to believe, then our faith may be described as a third thing — an offering, a voluntary motion of the will, or something else. But if God says do x, and we do x, even if He gives the gift of doing x, the motion of doing x is obedience. That is the word we have for doing what we are told — obedience.
Lane has only two options if he wants to avoid checkmate here, and both of them are the equivalent of overturning the chessboard and throwing the pieces around the room. He can deny the authority of good and necessary consequence — if all dogs are mammals and Fido here is a dog, then Fido is a mammal. If doing what God says to do is obedience, and true faith is doing what God says to do, then true faith is obedience. So Lane could say, if he wanted, that he is tired of Aristotle. But if he does that, then all bets are off and anybody can believe anything he wants. Everything is then orthodox. Or not. Whatever.
The only other option is to maintain that God has never commanded us to have true, evangelical faith, which is the only kind of faith that is the instrument of justification.
Otherwise, checkmate. I am not saying this lightly, and I am not doing a touchdown dance while I say it. These are important issues. The issue of obedient faith is not all of the Auburn Avenue controversy, but it is a good third of it. And we have gotten to the point where, to escape the correct conclusion, we must deny good and necessary consequence, or we must say that God never told us to have true faith.
The only alternative left is to say that faith, the instrument of justification, is an obedient faith. Now if we do this, it is perfectly acceptable (and necessary) to add that this “obedience” must not be confused with the obedience of our good deeds throughout the course of our sanctification. I wouldn’t mind Lane saying that, because that is what we say. Our faith is obedience, true enough, but it is not the kind of obedience that can be confounded with helping little old ladies across the street.
But if Lane does not want to accept these alternatives, as I have no doubt he does not want to do, then he has an obligation to specify exactly what true, evangelical faith (in response to God’s command) is doing, if not obeying. If it is neither obeying nor disobeying, what is it doing in response to God’s command? Like I said at the beginning, I am willing to move off this point, but as I understand it, Lane cannot afford to.