Posted on by Abe Austin

Faith vs Works- The Argument for Faith

I shared in the last post how Christians have argued for ages as to whether man is saved by grace through faith, or whether he is saved by works. I suggested that this may be a false dichotomy, that there may be a way to put both faith and works into a position of primacy, even if that initially sounds like a contradiction. Thus, I am not here to diminish the importance of either, but rather to fully embrace both. So let us begin by reflecting on scriptures that express the preeminent quality of each. Today we focus on the ones that emphasize grace and faith.

Grace and Faith)

For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast, (Ephesians 2:8-9).

Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the deeds of the law, (Romans 3:28).

And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work, (Romans 11:6).

Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified, (Galatians 2:16).

Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; (Titus 3:5).

My Own Reclamation)

The message of these verses is clear: salvation comes by grace, through faith. And to these ancient words let me also add my own testimony. I have shared before how I walked a dark path of addiction, how I eventually turned my life over to Christ, and how he reclaimed my soul immediately, long before I had done anything to deserve it, and since that time I have known that I am truly saved by grace. The only action that I really did was to put my faith in him. I didn’t earn redemption, I didn’t fill a quota before he accepted me, I just trusted him, and he saved me because he wanted to.

Having had this personal experience, I would not accept any theology that denied this reality. Salvation comes by grace to those that exercise faith. This is a fact. And now, still keeping that in mind, we will dedicate tomorrow to seeing how it is also true that salvation comes through our works.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Faith vs Works- The Problem

A Seeming Contradiction)

Jesus taught, “Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven,” (Matthew 7:21). Clearly, simply confessing Jesus as your savior and relying on faith is not sufficient to be saved. As Jesus says, we have to do the will of his Father. We must rely on good works.

Oh wait, but in the very next verses Jesus says, “Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works? And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity,” (Matthew 7:22-23). In these verses, the people are describing the good works that they did in his name, yet they too are rejected. So maybe the works aren’t that important?

It does occur to me, that Jesus might possibly be describing two different groups of people here. Perhaps he saw our very day, where we have people that claim salvation by faith alone, and other people who claim salvation by their works, and in these verses, he calls both out as hypocrites and refutes both their theologies.

It certainly does not seem a good thing how this faith vs works debate has divided believers for thousands of years. Could it be that Satan fosters divisions such as this between the believers, goading each side to entrench more firmly on their own false belief, while all the while there was a simple truth that could have unified both camps?

Both Essential)

In this study, I will consider the scriptures that have caused the most confusion and division on the matter, the insufficient attempts that have been made to reconcile them, and finally I will illustrate how the LDS practice of proxy ordinances for the dead fully accounts for both views. I should point out that not every reader will be able to accept that solution, due to theological differences. Even so, I do think it will still be instructive for those readers to dive into this conundrum and start to wonder whether it is possible for there to be some solution to it.

I do believe that God’s word is true, and that if Jesus and his disciples made two different assertions, then we should assume that both of those assertions are true. If the two assertions seem contradictory, then rather than assume that one of them is wrong, we should assume that it is our perspective and interpretation of them that is off. Perhaps we need to think bigger, or change our view, or look through a different lens, that we may properly see how the two truths align in one.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Faith Tried

Everyone’s faith looks beautiful before it has been tried
But at some point, each must prove whether it is actually useful
Thus, all faiths must be strained, and many of them broken,
To find beauty that can also hold true

Posted on by Abe Austin

Moral Growth and Decline

If we think that people hundreds of years ago had morally despicable views, and that now we have a better view of the truth, we ought to consider why. What beliefs and values did our forefathers foster that led them to become more moral, leading to where we are now?

And if we are now prying those beliefs and values from the public square, if we are rejecting the faith of the very people who made the world a better place, what do we expect to happen to our morality in the next hundred years?

Posted on by Abe Austin

Seeking Signs- How Far Will You Pursue?

Waste of a Miracle)

There are those that say they will only believe in God if He will show them an irrefutable sign of His existence. They say, “If God is real, and He really cares about having me believe in Him, and He knows me perfectly, then He knows that I need physically observable evidence of Him.” They suggest things like a message written in the stars, or God descending to the earth in all His glory, or a booming voice sounding from heaven. Those would be strong, undeniable proofs of God’s existence, and surely that would bring many more people to accept Him as their Lord, so why not just do that?

To that I say: And what will you do if God does not show up with these great, undeniable signs? Will you continue to pursue the knowledge of Him?

The answer: I will do nothing, and I will pursue no further.

And to that I say: Why would God ever waste His time on someone with that attitude? Why manifest Himself to someone so fickle and disinterested? Frankly, you don’t seem to actually care all that much whether God is real or not. Are you genuinely quivering on the edge of remaking your whole life to follow Him just as soon He shows you a miracle? I find that hard to believe.

Pattern for Belief)

People hear that God wants us to believe in Him, and from that they assume that the onus is on Him to do the convincing. But two things can be true at once. God can both want us to believe in Him and also be perfectly willing to let us go if we don’t care enough to take the first step.

To be clear, I do believe that God pursues on His end, but I also believe He always stops short of making us believe in Him. In my experience, He always requires us to make at least one step in total faith. We have to do something because we believe it is right, not at all sure that it will turn out well, and that is when He appears to us.

If, on the other hand, we see that step before us and say, “no, God, not until you show me a sign,” He will let us go.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Knowledge vs Practice- Belief, Action, Testimony

The Process)

I mentioned in the first post of this series that there is a pattern of possessing knowledge of a first order, putting that knowledge into practice, then obtaining knowledge of a second order. Put in theological terms, there is first knowledge that gives man faith. It isn’t perfect, but it is enough to make him step out and take some sort of action. He does what he feels God requires of him. When he does, he sees the hand of God delivering the victory, and now his incomplete knowledge is replaced with a sure testimony, which is knowledge of the second order.

This pattern repeats over and over throughout the scriptures. Let us look at just a few examples of it.

An Honest Father)

In the gospels, there is the story of a father who brought to Jesus his son that was under the cruel control of an evil spirit. The man pleaded with Jesus to heal his son, to which Christ replied, “If thou canst believe, all things are possible to him that believeth.” The man, in pure honesty replied, “Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief” (Mark 9:24).

Clearly this man had knowledge or faith, of a type, but it wasn’t perfect, and he knew it. Still, it was enough to lead him to act, to seek out Jesus, and next we read how Jesus did, in fact, heal the man’s son, presumably also fulfilling the man’s request to “help his unbelief” and replace it with something surer. Because the man acted on partial knowledge, a miracle occurred, and fuller knowledge took its place.

Peter’s First Steps)

We also have the example of one of Peter’s defining moments. The story begins with the apostles in a boat, seeing Jesus approaching them, walking upon the water. As a witness to this miracle, Peter is filled with the confidence to ask Jesus if he may come join him on the water. Jesus’s one word response was “Come,” and Peter stepped out onto the water. Miraculously, even though Peter was not the Son of God, the water held him up, just as it did for Jesus.

So, Peter was a witness to something that gave him faith, and that faith led him to act, and that act would have removed all doubt in his mind that all things were possible through their Lord and Master, even mastery of the elements.

Gideon’s Army)

Going back to the Old Testament, there was a time where the Israelites had given themselves over to idolatry and were grave danger from an approaching army of the Midianites. God spoke to a faithful man of Manasseh, Gideon, calling on him to restore the people to their former obedience and liberty. Gideon believed God’s message, but like the father in our first story, there was clearly also a part of him that still held to unbelief. He laid out an offering before the Lord, and after it was consumed by a miraculous fire, he gained the confidence to go and tear down the false idols of his people.

But that wasn’t the end of it. The Midianite army was still approaching, an innumerable host, and Gideon still needed to take his small band of warriors to fight them. Once again, Gideon asked for two signs, laying out a fleece of wool, and one day asking that God would put dew upon the wool and not any of the ground, and then the next night asking that God would put dew on the ground but not any on the wool. After the Lord obliged to both requests, Gideon took his army, whittled it down according to God’s commands, and miraculously confused the Midianite army into destroying themselves.

So, Gideon was given one sign, providing him enough faith to carry out one bold deed. Then the confidence of that deed, combined with two more signs, gave him the faith to carry out an even bolder deed for the Lord. Knowledge led to action, action led to greater knowledge, greater knowledge led to greater action, and we can clearly see a cyclical pattern.

How the Lord Works)

Think also of Abraham being given a son in his old age, providing him the confidence to then give that son up on the altar. Also, in the Book of Mormon, the Brother of Jared gained knowledge of God’s power through multiple miracles before the Lord tasked him with finding a divine solution of his own, the fulfillment of which resulted in seeing the finger of the Lord.

There are many examples of this pattern of knowledge-action-greater knowledge, so many that it seems that there is a fundamental principle in it, a template for how the Lord works with people to lead them to greater and greater things. First, He gives us a sign, providing just enough knowledge of Him and His ways to be emboldened to action. Then, when we do act, even in our imperfect knowledge, the surer testimony replaces the weaker knowledge, and the cycle continues. Thus, knowledge and action go hand-in-hand in the plans of the Lord. We are not meant to be led by just one or the other, we must iterate across both to become the spiritual giants we were born to be.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Evidence in the Lack of Evidence

At key points in life, you must choose between that which is most beneficial to you and that which you know to be right. You will have to decide if you follow your conscience, even when there is no reason to assume a positive outcome for yourself.

It only stands to reason, however, that if you ever want to live in the hands of the supernatural, beyond the confines of mortal logic, that at some point you must make a choice just like this. Earthly outcomes follow choices based on earthly evidence. If you ever want a heavenly outcome, at some point you must leap with nothing earthly in view to catch you.

Thus, watch for these moments where there is no evidence that things will work out well, and in those moments take courage in the knowledge that the lack of evidence is the greatest evidence of all.
Posted on by Abe Austin

If God Can Do Anything

Because I believe that God can do anything, I believe that He can make any desired miracle come true for me! But even more impressive, because He can do anything, He can also make things work out without the miracle. Indeed, it requires less faith to believe that God can change the world to match my heart, than to believe that God can change my heart to survive in spite of the world.

Believe in the bigger God. Believe in the God who can make you whole, with or without the thing you most desire.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Is the Old Testament God Evil? – Response to Common Defenses #1

Yesterday I shared some of the common defenses to criticisms of God commanding the destruction of innocents in the Old Testament. I divided those defenses into three categories, and I would like to respond to each of those categories one at a time, explaining what I find convincing or unconvincing about them. Today, I will look at the first category, which was defenses that say that God never actually commanded such a slaughter. Here are two examples of this argument:

  1. God is exaggerating. If I say my favorite sports team “murdered” the other team in last night’s game I’m using the exact same sort of hyperbole. We never do read a verse describing the actual slaying of children, it was only the enemy army that was killed.
  2. This was the work of man, not God. Either corrupt leaders claimed to do this under God’s command, or translators misattributed these messages to God when it was really called for by man.

I wanted to start with these arguments because, frankly, I find them particularly unhelpful. That isn’t me saying that these claims are false, for all I know they could be completely valid, I’m just saying they are only conjecture and that they dodge the real issue.

Personally, it does not bother me to say that the Bible is the word of God…seen through a human lens. I am fine with acknowledging that it has several different versions of the same stories, not all of the details agree with one another, there is the possibility of human malfeasance and error, and some cultural nuances are lost on most of today’s readers. Because of all this, it is possible that when I read a passage, I am not actually getting the pure intention with which it was originally spoken.

But I think it is a dangerous to make oneself judge over which parts are genuinely from God and which parts should be cut out of our faith. To those that say that these passages are misinterpreted, or misattributed, or misunderstood, my reply is, “well, you may be exactly right…but what if God really did say this?”

If your testimony is dependent upon a particular reading of the Bible, and at some point you learn that your reading is false, does that mean that you no longer believe? If we can only accept God with the understanding that He did not order the destruction of these Canaanite nations, then must we reject Him if actually He did make that order? Is that the same conditional faith that we wish to inspire in others? To put their whole hearts and trust in God…well, as long as He didn’t order the destruction of the Canaanites?

Speaking for myself, I don’t know whether God really commanded the slaughter of innocents, but I seek to maintain my faith in Him regardless of whether He did or not. I seek to be able to trust in Him no matter if I understand His reasons or not. To that end, I choose to interpret these difficult passages as literal and accurate, so that I may work my heart into a place of believing no matter what.

Summary)

To be clear, I’m not saying that it is worthless to learn the evidence that lays behind these sorts of claims. I’m all for educating people to the fact that God may not have really commanded this thing. As long as that is not the end of the discussion, as long as there follows: “but even if He really did say to slaughter every man, woman, and child, I am still at peace because…”

Which is exactly what I hope to establish as I pursue this study. Thus, tomorrow I will continue by responding to the defenses that are designed to maintain faith in God regardless of Him ordering such a destruction.

Posted on by Abe Austin

Scriptural Analysis- Exodus 23:10-12

10 And six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof:

11 But the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still; that the poor of thy people may eat: and what they leave the beasts of the field shall eat. In like manner thou shalt deal with thy vineyard, and with thy oliveyard.

12 Six days thou shalt do thy work, and on the seventh day thou shalt rest: that thine ox and thine ass may rest, and the son of thy handmaid, and the stranger, may be refreshed.

Today the laws of the sabbath are expanded and we are given the concept of a sabbath year, which is that after six years of working the field, then the field must be left to rest for the seventh. This is actually very practical, as sowing the same land over and over will take out all of its nutrients, and giving it a rest year to replenish those nutrients is better in the long run.

Of course, the land might naturally produce even without sowing. Vines and trees would continue to produce their grapes and their olives, and these were to be left for the poor and the animals. One can see why Jesus would later reprove the Pharisees for missing the point of the sabbath. From these verses it is clear that the sabbath was for the people, not the people for the sabbath.

Of course, for the owner of the field, having a year of no productivity would require an act of faith. When the Israelites were given manna they were told that God would allow them a double portion on the day before the sabbath, so they wouldn’t have to gather on the rest day. Once again, the owner of the field would have to trust that God would provide enough surplus in the six other years that he could rely on what he had stored up through the seventh. The Israelite might pursue his own wealth and ambition, but every seventh year he would be drawn back to remember his constant dependence on the Lord.