Transcription
It seems that folks who come to faith like the distinguishment you made. It, you mentioned it earlier between our views of salvation, right? Where, um, you guys see salvation as an ongoing process. And there's a, uh, in in my circles, there would be a distinguishment between the justification of the, the binary, are you justified in the sight of God, uh, versus a the sanctification, the the the continuing on of the spirit transforming you. Uh, so, so, so being justified before God versus being, you know, justified before the world, or positional holiness versus practical holiness, right?
So, so Protestants generally, and I want to say, I feel like some Catholics kind of make this distinguishment, is that there's a justification that happens because of what Jesus did, that the debt is paid, it is taken care of. Um, and so we're saved by grace through faith. But then our position would be, and we're saved to good works. So, we should obey Jesus' command and get baptized. We should, uh, go to church every Sunday. We should do these things, uh, because they're commands. But our, uh, we would, we would separate justification and sanctification. You guys use this as, uh, the language that I understand is, you're, you are saved, you're justified, you're being saved. We would say you're being sanctified and you will be saved in heaven. Um, the resurrection. Yeah. You're, you're going to be resurrected. You're going to be glorified. You guys will probably call this theosis, deification. Our language is going to be a bit different there, but it's similar, similar concepts.
Um, do you reject that view of justification? That, that, and, and, and is this because of like, like because of church history and church councils, or because, like, when I read Romans and I read Galatians, like there seems to be this consistent Paul doubling and tripling down and that we're justified, um, being a thing that has happened because of the cross, like we're justified because of what Jesus, you know, you know, all the verses, I mean, I could pull them up, but you know, the verses I'm like, Romans 8, and all are justified freely by his grace, the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. So it seems to be this binary of justification, and then we get to work out our salvation. We work in what Jesus has worked, uh, we work out what Jesus has worked in.
Uh, you would disagree with that on the basis of scripture, or primarily scripture, or church history?
Well, scripture, uh, philosophy, and church history, all three.
So, give me the scriptural pitch on why justification by grace through faith alone is, is bad.
Well, the phrase is not bad, but what is meant by the phrase and what we think the phrase means. So, uh, being formerly a Calvinist, you know, solid day proponent myself, I understand where you guys are coming from and how you would read the text. First thing I would say is that, um, when you look through, say, the Gospel of John, and when, when Jesus talks about the way that God's declaration works, it seems to be efficacious when he speaks. So, for example, when he speaks, he creates, the world is created. There's no declaration that doesn't achieve a metaphysical or ontological effect. So, for us, the idea that you could divorce the legal status from the ontological or metaphysical status is not possible. And especially when you go back to Luther. Um, Luther is really the first to propose this because he's influenced by two people, Gabriel Bile and William, and they're the most famous medieval nominalists. I'm not saying that Luther was identical to nominalism, but that he explicitly read them and and said that their philosophy helped him figure out how you could be in an imputational legal status without ontologically having that status. So, there's a divorce between the term, the word nominalism, nameism, and the ontological status or the reality of that that you possess. Okay, let me.
Conclusion then, I'm going to go back to scripture. But the point being, I'm, I'm blending the scripture and the philosophical point. Is that in the ancient and medieval world, there were no nominalists, and so nobody had yet divorced the name or the term from the ontological reality. So, if God declares something, so it must actually, in reality, in re be so. So, if God declares us righteous and just and transformed and illumined and in Christ, etcetera, we actually have to be that. And so there's no such thing as a purely legal imputational righteousness. So, that's the philosophical point. But back to scripture, I would argue that again, when God speaks, it's efficacious. In, uh, all those passages like in Romans when he talks about being baptized into Christ, or Titus 3 when he talks about the washing of regeneration, we see those as actually referring to the actual sacramental rite, and there's no reason to divorce them. So, the Protestant presupposition is that to maintain the legal imputational solid position, we must divorce the celebration of the rite from the regeneration or the spiritual effects. And we don't believe that. We think that they're united. Even Luther believed that, and so did Augustine.
Yeah. Well, because they taught baptisteration.
Right. Right. Right. So, so when I'm looking at, like, I think this glues what you just said together, right? This is Philippians chapter 2. I'm sure you know it. Uh, can you, can you, can you read that?
I don't want to.
Yeah. Okay. So, yeah, work hard to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear, right? Which we would all say yes and amen to that. For God is working in you and giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.
Right? So, there's this, that seems to be a bridging. I don't know if bridging is the right word, but but it seems like what you're saying there is an ontological shift that happens. Our heart of stone is replaced with a heart of flesh. God gives writes his, uh, law on our hearts. And so then when we're reading Romans, right?
Well, by the way, in that passage that you just read,
Yeah. Yeah. I go back.
The Greek word is energeia. It's energeia.
Which, which.
So, it's the power. So, that Paul uses energeia and dunamis in the New.
For this word power.
That's, uh, if I recall, this is dunamis, but in, in, uh, uh.
It's, yeah, energeia. This is.
He uses energeia and he uses dunamis, and that's has to be, by the way, I'm just pointing out that teaches the essence distinction, but go ahead.
Okay. No, no, no. I don't. I, by the way, I don't.
Just look up in Blue Letter the Paul's usage of energeia.
Yeah, this is, this is energeia in the Logos Bible software. So, I don't have an issue with the distinction of energies. I don't, I don't need to.
But what I'm saying is that that also, by extension, I'm not trying to deflect because you can go back to the passages. But where I was going to go next was that the essence-energy distinction isn't just an abstraction. It's unique. Only the Orthodox Church teaches the essence distinction. And that has to be an ontological reality that we're participating in. Protestantism teaches through the covenant. If you mean classical Calvinist type stuff, the covenant of works.
Actually ends up making Jesus into an historian Jesus who merits a status of grace. And it's not an ontological position that he has as the Son of God. That's because if, if you're a Calvinist, you believe in the.
I'm not a Calvinist.
Okay. Well, the covenant of works in a Calvinist position of justification means that Jesus fulfills the covenant of works to grant us the perfect legal status that he kept the law.
Okay.
Right. So, I, I mean, yeah.
Even if there's not a covenant of works, Luther thinks that Jesus perfectly keeps the law to give us that righteousness.
Got you. Yeah. Imputed righteousness. I understand there. But covenant of works.
Even if you don't, if you're a Lutheran, you don't affirm covenant of works, it's the still the same principle that Jesus keeps the law.
Right.
Right. And so the righteousness that we get is a legal status.
Yes.
This is not a legal status primarily. It's an ontological reality. Thus, the legal status reflects the ontological reality, not the other way around.
Legal status reflects the ontological reality.
Right.
In the, in the Protestant view.
So, it's both. What I'm saying is that it has to be the two together. You could never have a situation where I'm filthy rags, but God sees declares me righteous. That would make God a liar.
That's our point.
Uhhuh. Well, it's because of the, the blood of the blood of Jesus and a sacrifice and atonement that happens that.
Then I have to ontologically be righteous.
Well, I think you have a heart shift and a desire that's an inside-out change. So, one has an ontological change of, uh, heart because of being justified before the scriptures, right? The change in you has nothing to do with your justification. That's an effect of justification in classical Protestantism.
Uhhuh.
The change in you, say that one more time.
The new heart, the change that occurs in you in classical Protestantism, whether Calvin or Luther,
Yeah.
Is not anything to do with your justification. It's an effect of the justification that Christ wrought.
Uhhuh.
Okay.
And I'm saying no, that's not possible. You cannot divorce the legal status of being righteous or just.
From the ontological reality.
But the Protestant position requires that to have imputational righteousness.
Okay.
And the ancient medieval world were not nominalists. So nobody believed in a purely imputational legal status. It doesn't exist in the ancient world.
So, so what you.
Do you know Alistair McGrath? He's the famous Protestant.
No.
So, he wrote a book called Justitia Dei, and it's about this point that.
Through his research as an Anglican, he came to the position that he could not find in the ancient medieval world a position that justifies a purely legal status.
Which is what is required for the Luther, Calvin, classical Protestant position.
Because they didn't believe that in the ancient world. You didn't have Bile and Ockham yet who proposed the divorce between the ontological reality and the naming of that has to happen first before Lutheran.
And so what you're saying is in the ontological reality, there has to be works to to prove the justification. Is that what you're kind of getting at?
For us, there's no difference between justification, sanctification, glorification. That's why Paul in 2 Corinthians 3 says that in this life, you can experience glorification.
Mhm.
So, it's not a stages like the Protestant Ordo Salutis sets up.
Well, I don't know if it's in stages in the, in the, in the, in the.
Well, again, I'm not, I'm not trying to be a, a Protestant.
I know your position, but like the classical reformation.
Sure. Sure. Sure. I'm looking, I'm just trying to look at the scriptures and I'm saying, man, it sure does seem like there's a consistent declaration of justification over the believer in that, let me, in that they don't, they don't have to walk on eggshells. They don't have to have the dread of, if I'm going to heaven or not, if I'm producing enough works or not. That they are justified. And that anyone that's justified, anyone that is now a child of God should and will act accordingly. If my son is my son, he's my son and acts accordingly, even if he messes up, he still remains my son. Right? And so that, that, that's what I'm getting at. Now, he's also obedient and he also produces good works, but the good works that he produces aren't what make him ontologically my son.
What makes him the son, or what makes a person the son, is baptism. We believe baptism is where we were regenerated. It doesn't mean that if you die in the way of your baptism that you're not saved, because we've always seen catechumens that die or whatever, they're considered part of the church. Some of them are martyrs and saints in the Orthodox Church.
So, sonship is in the scriptures connected to being baptized into Christ. So, every time in like in the book of Romans, when you're baptized into Christ, right? That for us, there's no reason to divorce that from the actual sacrament and ritual baptism. And that's what the church fathers all teach. Likewise, the warnings about apostasy are real warnings. So, you can cease to be a son. You can taste of the heavenly gift. You can be enlightened. We think that's an ancient term for baptism, right?
Being washed. Hebrews 6, right? The parable of the sower. New life can spring up and it gets withered out and died. So, we think those those warnings are real warnings to being in the covenant and removing yourself from the covenant, because in every one of God's covenants, whether it's Adamic, or whether it's Abrahamic, there's sanctions and penalties for leaving and and defiling the covenant.
Sure.
But wouldn't that be going back to like intent and a desire to leave said covenant? Not a, hey, I messed up. I I fell short. I I sinned in a way. I don't, I don't think you guys have the same like grave sin, uh, mortal sin.
Not mortal sin, but like you can apostatize because Hebrews 6 is saying if you leave Christianity, go back to Judaism, you are.
Apostatize. I'm not really care to the apostasy thing. I don't, that's a, that's a whole separate conversation.
No, it's not though, because it shows that justification cannot be purely legal or imputational. There has to be an ontological reality connected to justification itself.
Works in your in, and that that looks like works and well, sacraments that I would categorize as works. Is that fair?
Well, Jesus says, for example, that faith is a work. This is the work of God that you believe in him whom he has sent. So, faith is a work in our view.
Okay.
And so likewise.
I think Calvinists also believe faith is a work. That's interesting because they believe regeneration precedes.
Faith. You first have to be born again to have faith, and they see faith as.
But they would say it's an effect of regeneration, and that even the faith that you have isn't the basis for the justification. It's an effect of justification. The Calvinist scheme. Do you think this view where someone is only justified if they're ontologically justified, meaning that it's all one long process? Do you think that it creates a, I'm not, I'm trying to say this in a way that is not disparaging, um, a paranoia about one's eternal state, a walking on eggshells, a dread, a fear, an uncertainty that according, I mean, you can correct me if I'm wrong, but according to your own soteriology, you can be Eastern Orthodox and not go to heaven. You can do all the sacraments.
There's many people invited to the marriage feast who are thrown out.
Right? And so, so what, what I'm getting at, Jay, is that like, it seems like I have more confidence in your salvation, that you're going to go to heaven, than the position is than you do. Like, I believe you're justified because you believe in Jesus and because of the penalty paid on the cross, like you're in a right standing outside of all of our disagreements theologically, and you not thinking I'm truly saved or whatever. I have more confidence in your salvation in the Eastern Orthodox folks who follow me than they do.
Is it, doesn't that create a despair? And maybe you will say, "Well, you're just arguing pragmatically. Who cares? The truth is the truth." But can you see how that people can come to that conclusion?
Sure. I mean, I had the same sort of thought process when I was first moving from Calvinism to Catholicism. I was concerned. I'm just, I'm not trying to be disparaging or condescending, but I understand the thought process and where you're coming from.
And do you, do you, like, is that a a healthy way to live spiritually if I'm always walking on eggshells and I'm always uncertain about if I'm going to go to heaven or not because I got to keep doing stuff. I got to keep producing work.
Well, one thing I would say is I don't think any of us actually escapes that question, because most, I don't know about you, but most Protestants that I've met, and even Calvinists, and and and once, most of those people still admit the possibility of self-deception, and psychological trickery or delusion. You could fool yourself into thinking that you're regenerate or that you have assurance of salvation, and it could be a deception. So, from an existential vantage point, I don't think anybody escapes that possible concern or doubt or fear.
I'm with you. I'm with you.
You could theoretically say, well, but I believe in the doctrine of assurance of salvation, all this kind of stuff. And so I've bypassed that. It's not a problem for me. And I would just simply say, again, there's so many warnings in the New Testament that I think we have to take both.
That's a possy.
For, for us, uh, like we would say that the purpose of the sacraments is to help have that assurity and to have the knowledge that we have grace.
Okay.
I don't know that I have, as Augustine said, the gift of perseverance to the end. Jesus says, "He that perseveres to the end will be saved." So, I have to persevere until the end. I don't know whether I will, but I do trust that God will give me the grace and the means to persevere. So, if you want to think of it in an Augustinian way, I would say I could agree with his position that God gives us the means to persevere to the end. It is all gifts of grace, but I do have a a necessity to synergize and be faithful to the covenant to persevere to the end to get to access to the means of grace like the sacraments.
Sure.
Jesus says, "You have to eat my flesh and blood to be saved." And that means.
Those who love me obey my commands.
Exactly. In a general sense, we're going to keep doing that.
Yeah. I, I guess what I'm, what I'm, what I'm getting at, and some of the folks that I see that are coming towards Eastern Orthodoxy seem to have a crippling fear and anxiety around their own salvation. And I think you're probably a more seasoned person in the faith where you maybe are, I don't know, more educated, more nuanced to it, where I'm saying on a very practical level.
I believe if someone's placed their faith in Jesus, that they're going to heaven.
And that they're going to produce good works because they get to, and because God is that good, right? Like, I'm with you. Continue on. We, maybe I'm self-deceived. Continue on in the sacraments. Continue on working out my salvation. Continue on producing. But it's not those works that are saving me. It's that I get to do works that I'm saved. And, and so it's not, it's not a, I'm not, not advocating for, uh, someone saying that, you know, maybe someone can and can't anomize. I'm saying I don't want to find out. I don't want to know. God is so good to me that I'm going to keep going to church. I'm going to keep reading my Bible. I'm going to keep in fellowship. I'm going to keep taking communion. I'm going to keep doing those things because he's that good that the least thing I could do is to offer up my bodies as a living sacrifice back onto the to Jesus.
I would say if you look at Romans 4, and this, I'm bringing this up because I noticed that, um, James White recently responded to what I'd said about this passage. If you look at Romans 4, when Paul talks about the justification that Abraham underwent, he cites a very specific chapter. It's Genesis 15. And the problem is that in the classical Protestant view, or in the idea of the transition from wrath to grace, this is a pretty common Lutheran Calvinist idea that at one point we are under God's wrath, children of wrath.
Then we believe, and there's that transition from wrath to grace, right? Where now we're a friend of God. We're no longer under his wrath. He's our father, not our judge, right? Um, Paul in Romans 4, this key passage about solid day, supposedly does not cite the first chapter that's supposed to be, and should be, if the Calvinist classical Protestant reading is correct of solid day, it should be Genesis 12.
But he cites Genesis 15 as where Abraham is declared righteous. But Abraham has already, he's already been doing three chapters of good faithful works. Now, when James White responded to this, he said, "Okay, he bit the bullet and was like, Abraham wasn't justified until Genesis 15."
Mhm.
But he's already doing good works that God clearly accepts. Um, to me, that's a point that is a clear proof that you would have to say Paul made a mistake for where he's citing in Genesis for Abraham's transition from wrath to grace.
And if I'm correct, then it's not a proof text for solid day. It's a proof text that the righteousness of God.
Is the actual uncreated energy in you. It's not a legal state.
The uncreated energy that you possess if you're a son of God and participating in the in the divine energies, the dunamis and the energeia.
That's what.
Leads to the legal state.
Not the legal state. And then that makes you.
Interesting. Yeah. I, I guess I just see identity in terms of who I am in Christ as a neither inside out or outside in. It's a top-down thing, right? So, like society would tell us that your identity is what you're good for from a utilitarian standpoint, right? So, if you're in high school, you're an athlete, that's your identity. You're good for the outside-in contribution you have, right? And then now with the crazy transformer stuff, identity is subjective to whatever you think it is. It's inside out. It's whatever I feel I am. Right. Whereas if I'm looking at the layout and in your reference, you're correcting at your.
Baptized into Christ.
Right. Right. So, so when we're looking at Romans 4.
Right after this.
He cites to your point Genesis 15, and then right after that in verse 5, he says, "However, the one who does not work but trusts God who justifies the ungodly, their faith is credited as righteousness."
This is in the context of Jews in Roman, in in the church in Rome, who think that.
They can be justified by also keeping the Mosaic law. And Paul is using Abraham as the paradigm example of the first quote Jew. Jews think that Abraham was the first Jew.
And Abraham doesn't have, at this point, even in Genesis 15,
The totality of the law or the Mosaic law. Right? So Abraham is justified.
He's not, uh, the, it's Genesis 15. It's after he was called out of the Ur of Chaldees in Genesis 12.
Uh, it's after three chapters of good works, right?
Mhm.
And so it's at this point that Paul says he is called the friend of God, or he's made righteous. So, there's three separate, 12, 15, well, four, 12, 15, 22. And in all of those interactions between God and Abraham.
There's not any one place where he's quote saved. He's saved in all of these actions.
And he's working in faith.
Not according to Mosaic law or Mosaic standards. So, Paul's whole point is that righteousness is not contingent upon Mosaic law. It's contingent upon actually having the uncreated grace of God in you.
Mhm.
Which, which we would all agree with.
Well, I don't, I've never heard of a Protestant who believes in uncreated grace, but maybe you do. I don't know. Maybe you're.
I'm not being, I'm not being a douchebag, but I'm saying like, maybe you're one of the first.
Well, uncreated grace. Are you talking about the dogmas, energies, the energies distinction? Is that what what you're meaning by that?
Which is an Orthodox teaching.
Yeah.
Not a, not a historic Protestant.
No, I, I'm not, I'm not saying it's a historic Protestant teaching. Keep, you're kind of, um, in your arguments here, you're referencing a lot of Calvinistic teaching, which I don't really hold to Calvinism or any, any, I'm not a Calvinist, right? So, I understand what you're saying. I'm just.
So, so if you say something that sounds true, Jay, I'm going to say, "Oh, that sounds true, Jay," whether it's Eastern Orthodox, Catholic, or Protestant.
Okay, that's fair. That's, that's me cheating. That's fair. I'm typically, in my mind, because I don't know all of your positions, I'm just arguing against what's called classical Protestantism, that would be like the confessional Lutheran, the confessional, you know, Westminster Confession.
Fair enough.
Uh, you know, Dort, the classic Protestant confessions.
Uhhuh.
And so, from your paradigm, when Paul is writing in Romans and he's doubling down on this justified, justified by grace, justified by faith, justified by grace, when it's happening in Galatians, when it's happening in other parts of scripture, from your paradigm, you would say that's exclusive to the Judaizers and him trying to correct their backdooring of the law.
Well, I would say ex, not necessarily exclusive, because a lot of the passages are dealing with that, but not all of them.
There are there are places where, you know, like in Romans 2, I think he's talking about Gentiles. He's not just talking about Jews.
Sure.
Sure.
Yeah. So, so, so then in, in, in your framework, you would reject the idea of a top-down identity where one is declared righteous, made righteous because of Jesus on the cross, because of the work, the fulfillment of the law of Jesus on the cross. And then from that, they then are behaving and living differently. You would say that that's a a heresy, or would you just say we're incorrect? Like, where would you categorically put that?
No, I do think that solid day is a heresy. Justification by faith alone is a heresy. I would say so. So, so all of these scriptures are, um.
Yeah, I, I guess I'm just having trouble understanding how you reconcile the presupposition is that this is all legal status first and foremost.
And then anything after that is something else that's sanctification or something like that.
Cooperating with the Holy Spirit.
Correct. And what I'm saying is that there is no such thing in the ancient medieval world as McGrath admits in Justitia Dei as a purely nominal legal standing that is not directly connected to or necessitated by the actual ontological reality.
So, in classical Protestantism, it's called the Ordo Salutis, the order of salvation. That's what you were talking about. We talk about justification, sanctification, glorification. That's the order of salvation. We would say, and I'm arguing that that's premised on a late medieval philosophical development, that this alone shows that Paul could not have taught the legal status because nobody in the ancient medieval world was nominalist. And if that's true, then these assumptions as to what Paul means are wrong. That's my argument.
Is it possible that there was some drift in the ancient medieval world and what Paul taught was closer to the Protestant position, and there was drift, and then the reformers came back, who are always reforming and trying to get back to what Paul taught? Could you see that from our paradigm, at least?
Uh, well, no, for various reasons. I, I wouldn't be able to admit that because of course.
I said I admit that. I said see it from our paradigm. I understand you wouldn't admit that.
Well, I think you could. I understand why you might think that. Okay. But it would mean that the church didn't understand the gospel for 1500 years, which is what Day admits.
I, I don't know if they didn't understand the gospel. I think perhaps there were some some, uh, doctrinal developments, shifts, some things that that that shift. I'm not one of those, uh, great, there was a great apostasy kind of guys. I'm not, I'm not saying that.
Well, it would mean that nobody. But that's the point of Day, by McGrath, is that no one taught Luther or the Protestant solid day until Luther and Calvin.
But I mean, Luther and Calvin are also pulling from Augustine, or so they say.
Yeah. Yeah. But Augustine believes in baptisteration and the necessity of works. If you read, uh, on the gift of perseverance and on, uh, operative and cooperative grace, he doesn't believe the process.
I, I guess what I'm getting at is like the, the, we believe in works. We just don't believe works are what save us. Like, I believe we should produce good works. This is why the free grace community gets mad at me because, I'm sure you're familiar with the free grace position, right? So, like, yeah, like I would say, no, that's bad. Like, that's scary stuff where you could say like someone can profess Jesus at one point in time and then live like the devil and even become an enemy of the gospel, and they're still saved. I would say, you, I absolutely reject that.
Um, so I believe in works. I just don't believe works are the things that positionally make us holy. I think great works are the things that practically make us holy.
I understand.
Yeah. So, uh, fair enough. Okay.