Sola Fide
Regardless of where one stands concerning the state of the American church today few can deny that faith is a very popular concept. ‘Faith’ has soared to new heights even as other biblical words such as justification, propitiation and redemption have fallen out of our collective spiritual lexicon. For many faith is the gateway toward the good life. It is the key that unlocks the door to a life of prosperity, achievement and full health.
Others view faith as an undefined belief in something beyond themselves. This is to perhaps distinguish them from those who operate from purely naturalistic mindset. In the political arena it pays to be a person who has faith in some kind of Christian based faith system. And all in all our culture is one that views having faith as more a less a positive thing.
But what is biblical faith and why is it necessary? A fourth sola that sprang from the reformation is sola fide or faith alone. The Cambridge Declaration of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals states ’We reaffirm that justification is by grace alone through faith alone because of Christ alone. In justification Christ's righteousness is imputed to us as the only possible satisfaction of God's perfect justice.
We deny that justification rests on any merit to be found in us, or upon the grounds of an infusion of Christ's righteousness in us, or that an institution claiming to be a church that denies or condemns sola fide can be recognized as a legitimate church.’
To get a better handle on that statement it’s necessary to provide some brief but important background. We begin with the reality that humanity’s chief problem and most pressing dilemma is that we are natural born sinners who are not in a right relationship with the living God. And while that might seem not be that big of the deal the truth is that all those who remain out of a right relationship with God are destined to be the eternal objects of His fierce, certain, passionate and righteous anger. Our main problem isn’t that we are poor, broke, in poor health or even part of a marginalized class of people. No, our main problem is that we have declared war on the living God and have lost badly.
Compounding this problem is the fact that there is nothing within ourselves we can do to rectify the situation. We cannot educate, exercise, organize, work or even vote our way out of this dilemma. Nor can we hope that God will forget, compromise Himself, His holiness or His law to accommodate us. The bad news is that left to ourselves we would live and die as sinners in the hands of an angry God who will by no means fail to punish the guilty.
There is good news however. God Himself has provided the very righteousness needed to be accepted into His presence in a state of permanent delight and honor. In other words humanity doesn’t have to worry about providing the righteousness needed to be acceptable before God because He’s already seen to that. That righteousness is embodied in the person and work of Jesus Christ. Jesus lived a perfectly righteousness life according to God’s law during all the years of His life here on earth. He therefore is the perfect fulfillment of the man spoken of in Psalm 1 and Psalm 15. Consequently, Jesus is the only human to ever earn a permanent place of favor before God the Father.
And here’s where the good news gets even better. Jesus will give that perfect permanent right standing to anyone who believes in Him. In the book of Romans Paul wrote it this way ‘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 faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. Romans 3:21-22a.
This is where the word faith and the term faith alone comes in. First of all biblical faith isn’t a force or medium that unlocks the key to the storehouse of God’s material blessings. Nor is it an undefined feeling that there is something up there bigger than me. Biblical faith as relates to salvation is a firm conviction in the person and work of Jesus Christ for full, complete forgiveness of sin and a perfect, permanent right standing before God the Father. Faith alone is the conviction that anyone can obtain the forgiveness of sin and Christ’s perfect righteousness by having faith in Christ alone.
Among other things this means that we obtain a right relationship with God not because we were born poor or are apart of an oppressed people. We are not justified (i.e. declared righteous) based on our ethnicity, our morality or because we’ve suffered a bit more from life than others. Those who will be counted as having their sins forgiven and granted a perfect permanent right standing before the living God are those who have faith alone in the finished work of Jesus Christ.
For Christ, His Church and The Truth
Lance Lewis