Thursday, October 26, 2017

John Piper is Wrong on Works


We interrupt this monologue on gentrification to report - or, more accurately, retort - on Minnesota pastor John Piper's surprising claim that salvation by works is Biblical.

Last month, the megachurch preacher, famous within Christian circles for being a Reformed Baptist, surprised many evangelicals by claiming that works (good deeds) are indeed a part of God's plan of salvation.  In other words, Piper now appears to be arguing that for a person's salvation to be Biblically genuine, it's not just faith in Christ that God requires.  Piper says that a person who claims to be "saved" must also perform good deeds.

Which, disturbingly, flies in the face of the historic "Five Solas" of the Reformation, whose 500th anniversary the Protestant Church is celebrating this year.

The "Five Solas" are:
  • Sola Scriptura (“Scripture alone”): The Bible alone is our highest authority.
  • Sola Fide (“faith alone”): We are saved through faith alone in Jesus Christ.
  • Sola Gratia (“grace alone”): We are saved by the grace of God alone.
  • Solus Christus (“Christ alone”): Jesus Christ alone is our Lord, Savior, and King.
  • Soli Deo Gloria (“to the glory of God alone”): We live for the glory of God alone. 
One of the main reasons we had the Reformation involved the Roman Catholic Church's insistence that people needed to perform good deeds in order to receive salvation.  But that requirement is nowhere to be found in the Bible.

What are found, however, are verses like James 2:14-26, in which phrases like "faith without works is dead" have been mischaracterized as proof texts for works-based salvation.  Taken in the entirety of Scripture, the phrase "faith without works is dead" means that if a person truly, genuinely appreciates God's love for them, and Christ's sacrifice on their behalf, and desires to honor God out of love for Him and His truth, then a natural outflow of that faith and love will be good works.

But there is no ulterior motive for those good works.  Otherwise, they wouldn't be "good," would they?  Believers in Christ don't do good deeds because we're supposed to.   We can't brown-nose our way into Heaven.  We do good deeds as a way to show our loyalty and affinity to our Savior.

When Christ told the wealthy young man to go and sell his possessions and give the money to the poor, that wasn't so the young man could prove his salvation.  Christ wanted to show the young man that unless his heart had been changed by the Gospel, he would find the prospect of suddenly having no earthly riches distasteful.  Which, indeed, was true, because the young man couldn't bring himself to follow Christ's command.  But that wasn't the reason he refused Christ.  He refused Christ because His heart was opposed to the Gospel, because the Gospel calls us all of us who follow Christ to turn aside from everything else - everything! (gulp!) - and follow Him alone.  That is very hard for any of us to do.  And we all fail at it, to one degree or another.

That's why God looks at our heart.  He knows our motives, and our desires.  He doesn't look at our deeds to determine our worth, or our salvation.  Shucks, plenty of unsaved people who profess no faith in Christ whatsoever do plenty of good deeds all the time.  So, does that mean they're saved anyway?  Or maybe half-way saved?  Can one be "half-saved"?  No.  So why should good deeds play as crucial a role in our salvation as Piper now says it does?

Simple answer:  It doesn't.

"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."  Bam!  There it is.  Straight from Ephesians 2.

None of this is to say that people who claim faith in Christ don't need to act like it.  Because straight on the heels of "for by grace you have been saved," comes this:

"For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them."

One follows the other.  And to a certain degree, works act as a sort of proof for salvation.  But works aren't part of salvation.

Don't believe me?  Let's think about this for a minute.  Supposing we actually have to do good works as part of our guarantee of salvation.  Define "good works."  Are they things for which I get absolutely no ancillary benefit?  Just purely out of the "goodness of my heart"?  Or do things that benefit both me and somebody else count?

And how much good stuff do I need to do?  Does Piper enjoy a greater degree of salvation because he's led more people to the Lord than, say, Tim Keller?  Or your pastor?  Or me?  Or you?

How much money do you give to the poor?  How much do you tithe?  Do people who give more money than you do get a greater confirmation of salvation?

Remember the Widow's Mite?  Christ said that the widow who gave all she had - two copper coins hardly worth anything - gave a more valuable gift that the large offerings far wealthier people calculated they could afford to give out of their abundance.  How could Christ say that, unless faith is what counts, and not works?

"Good" is a relative concept.  So, actually, is "works."  What about works we don't do, such as sins we're tempted to commit, but don't?  Other people don't see those, so do they count towards salvation?  Do other people need to see what we do for our deeds to count?  Can we bank our good deeds, so an overage can somehow cancel out some of our sin debts?

Do you see how nutty this "works" stuff is to us Protestants?  And do you know why?  Because it was the same type of stuff people like Martin Luther were struggling with back when he ended up nailing his 95 Theses to the church door in Wittenberg, Germany.  On All Saints Eve, October 31, in 1517.

The pivotal moment when the Reformation began.

The Bible doesn't tell us how much good works is enough for salvation, BECAUSE WORKS DON'T GUARANTEE SALVATION.

Only faith guarantees salvation.  Faith, through grace alone.  In Christ alone.

Amen.


No comments:

Post a Comment

Thank you for your feedback!

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.