The Five Solas: Sola Christus

Sola Scriptura, Sola Fide, and the Reformation’s Authority Question

Okay, so as you can see, we're on, it's actually the fourth sola, believe it or not, we're on sola Christos. So the five solas of the Reformation, these were truths that were rediscovered after the Reformers came and opposed the Roman Catholic Church.

Anyone remember the formal cause of the Reformation, what that was?

Huh?

Huh?

The Bible, sola Scriptura, right, Scripture alone, it's a question of authority. The material cause of the Reformation, anybody remember what that was? Faith alone, right, sola fide, and that word, Hedy had a good question, that word material doesn't mean made of substance, it means essential or vital.

It's a material, it's an essential to our faith, actually. So today, we're going to go through sola Christos. The two main issues that divide us, Protestants, from the Roman Catholic Church is the source of religious truth for the people of God.

We hold that there's one sole infallible authority, the Scripture. They hold that there's three. They believe that the Scripture is infallible, but they also hold to the teaching magisterium of the Church and tradition as being infallible.

So they call it a three-legged stool, whereas we look at the Scripture and say, no, by very nature, the Scripture is God-breathed, everything else isn't. Tradition is never God-breathed, and certainly, humanity is not God-breathed, in the sense that they're infallible.

Second issue is how man is made right with God. How can a sinful man be brought into the presence of a holy God? We maintain that the Scripture teaches that it's by faith alone. So we've seen that Scripture alone is our authority, and salvation is by faith alone.

Today, we maintain that salvation is by faith alone through Christ alone, aside from any other person, church, or authority. In addition to the Roman Catholic belief that Scripture by itself is insufficient, they believe that there is no salvation outside of the Roman Catholic Church.

In other words, outside of the Pope, Mary, or the priesthood, the sacraments, all of those things. Again, this is a question of authority. And I just want to remind you, before we start scoffing and think that this is a bash the Roman Catholic Church teaching, it's not.

We have to remember that those are people created in the image of God, and rather than getting riled up and ticked off at the Roman Catholic Church, although we should have righteous anger against that teaching, our hearts should go out to people who believe this.

Because there was a point in time, if you were raised Roman Catholic, you held to this stuff too, knowingly or unknowingly. So before you start mocking someone for what they believe, recognize that God's placed His Spirit in you and called you to be an ambassador.

You were saved by grace through faith. That's what you need to present to them, not mocking them. So what is Solus Christus? The belief that salvation is accomplished through the atoning work of Christ alone, apart from individual's works, and that Christ is the only mediator between God and man.

There is no one else between God and man that you must go to. And our belief is that it holds that salvation cannot be received apart from Him only. Reformed theology affirms that scripture, grace, and faith all emphasize that salvation is by Christ alone.

That is, Christ is the only Savior. The church is not the Savior, the teaching magisterium of the church is not the Savior, Jesus' earthly mother is not the Savior. And we see this all over scripture, Acts 4 .12, there is salvation in no one else.

There is no other name unto heaven given among men by which we must be saved. It's the name of Jesus only. When we say Christ alone, we mean, first, Jesus is the only way of salvation. No other world, religion, faith, or system of belief will result in salvation, heaven, or the like.

John 14, right, no man comes to the Father but through me, Jesus says. This excludes pluralism and universalism. Anybody want to venture a guess at what universalism is, and what pluralism is, and how they're different?

Alright, pluralism is basically the belief that all religions get you to heaven by virtue of their system. So Islam gets you to heaven, Judaism gets you to heaven, Christianity gets you to heaven, Hinduism gets you to heaven by virtue of their system.

Universalism says that everybody gets to heaven, but it's by the virtue of Christ. Jesus' grace extends to the people in the other religions, and based on His grace, you.

Get there.

So everybody gets to heaven. Some people go to hell first, but hell is a refining fire, and eventually they'll get to heaven. So there is no eternal death, okay, that's going to end at some point in time, and everybody's going to be brought into the presence of God.

Those are heretical teachings. We believe it's Christ alone, there's eternal life, and there is eternal death. There's an eternal hell that people are going to go to because of their sins. So on our system, human effort is futile.

We're saved by God's effort in Christ. In other words, Christianity alone is the truth, and all other world systems are false. Second, it's Jesus' work alone that earns or attains salvation. Jesus' life and death on the cross were sufficient to pay the price of our salvation.

No man can add to or take away from his finished work based on his own merit. We don't add something to the perfect, finished work of Christ on the cross. The moment we think something we do, we can add something we do to the cross of Christ.

You ruined it! Because anything that you've done comes by way of your nature, which is sinful. So now what you've taken is a perfect work and drew a marker on it. You've ruined it. You don't go into the Natural Museum of Art, see the Mona Lisa, and say, hey, let me touch that up.

The moment you write on one of those paintings, you've ruined it. And we see this in Colossians 2 .14, having forgiven us all our trespasses by canceling the record of death that stood against us with its legal demands.

This, he set aside, nailing it to the cross. We talked last week about penal substitutionary atonement. He completes the law, he's a substitute, and makes atonement for us, satisfaction to God for our sins.

Third, we go to Jesus alone for salvation. We go directly to our high priest and mediator. He is the only mediator. It's unbiblical to go to anyone or anything else to be saved. There is no need to go to any person, any human priest, or any church for salvation, since salvation is of the Lord.

Now that's in Jonah. What does that word Lord mean? Jehovah. Salvation is of the Lord. And since salvation is of the Lord, the Lord being God, Jesus is God. In the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, the Word was God.

Jesus is God in the flesh. Matthew 121, he will save his people from their sins. They shall call his name Immanuel, which means God with us. In the opening chapter of each of the four Gospels, each one of them proclaim Jesus is God.

That, again, is Christian teaching. So when you go to Jesus for your salvation, you're going directly to God, okay? And that's who we're supposed to go to. We urgently need to hear Solus Christus in our day of a pluralistic theology, which has such a low view of scripture.

This is what happens when you negate scripture or you add something to it. As Carl Brayton says, there's currently underway a strong trend in both Protestant and Roman Catholic theology to call into question the classical Christian confession that Jesus Christ is the one and only Savior of the world.

I like this by A .B. Newborough. He famously said of the old theological liberalism, the end result is that today many proclaim and worship a God without wrath who brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of Christ without a cross, all right?

I personally met somebody who was a minister who told me that the cross is old news.

That's old.

You don't need the cross anymore. And at that time, I was a little immature in my dealings, and I came back at him, and it was in front of a group of people. I said, you can't have that. You can't have atonement without a cross.

And it got animated. It's okay. So what did the reformers say? Luther said that Jesus Christ is the center and circumference of the Bible, meaning that who he is and what he did in his death and resurrection is the fundamental content of scripture, right?

The scriptures are about Christ. Zwingli says in his second thesis, the sum of the gospel is that our Lord Jesus Christ, the true son of God, has made known to us the will of his heavenly father and redeemed us by his innocence from eternal death and reconciled us unto God.

He continues, therefore, Christ is the only way of salvation. He says, whoever seeks or shows another door errors. Yea, is a murder of souls and a robber. So if you could say that Jesus gets, that people get to heaven or to the father a different way, you're a robber, a murderer, he's saying.

He goes on to say a couple more things. And I'm just going to go through these quick. Christ is the head of all believers. Christ is the only mediator. Christ is our righteousness. I failed to put that scripture in last week's lesson on faith alone.

You know, we're justified by faith alone. Jesus' righteousness is imputed to our account. In the Old Testament, God is called Jehovah Sikhenu. It means the Lord is our righteousness. So even in the Old Testament, it says that our righteousness is going to come from the Lord, not ourselves.

All spiritual superiors should repent without delay and set up the cross of Christ alone or they will perish for the axe is laid at the root of the tree. Okay, here's the most important part of this presentation.

We're going to go to the scriptures. Don't listen to anything I say. Listen to what the scriptures say. If you're convinced by the scriptures, praise God. Don't be convinced by me. I'm convinced by these scriptures, but you need to be.

Watch.

The Scriptures Testify About Christ

What are the scriptures, first of all? Anybody want to venture? What are the scriptures? God's word, yes. The scriptures are the testimony of Jesus Christ. If you're saved by God, okay, every one of you has a testimony.

The scriptures are the testimony of Jesus. Who he was in heaven, what he did when he came to earth, what he took on, what he accomplished.

At the cross.

The Bible is about Jesus, not you. You're included in it once you place your faith and trust in him. Now you're part of the church. You're a believer. Jesus is the promised Messiah who fulfilled the Messianic prophecies of the Old Testament and to whom the whole Bible points us to.

The whole point of the Bible is Jesus. He is the word made flesh. Luke 24, 27, and beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he, Jesus, interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.

The Old Testament pointed towards Jesus. First Peter 1 .10, concerning this salvation, the prophets who prophesied about the grace that was to be yours searched and inquired carefully, inquiring what personal time the spirit of Christ in them was indicating when he predicted the sufferings of Christ and the subsequent glories.

They had the spirit of Christ in them in the Old Testament and were looking forward to who was this going to be and what was he going to do? John 5 .39, memorize this scripture, especially when you're talking to Jehovah's Witnesses.

You search the scriptures because you think that by them you have eternal life. These are the scriptures that testify about me, yet you refuse to come to me for life. How many times do people want to wing you to a church, want to wing you to a theology, but don't want to wing you to Jesus?

They want you to go anywhere else but directly to the Messiah. We when we're out on the streets, we want to wing you to Christ. Once we wing you to Christ by the Holy Spirit, opens your eyes, and you place your faith and trust in Jesus, you start reading the word, his sheep hear his voice and they obey.

Him.

It's real easy. Okay. Continue. John 14 .6, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. Now people, some people are going to argue, no, all roads lead to God. And if they persist, I actually, at some point in time, I realized, you know what, let me just go with them.

I said, listen, all roads do lead to God. As judge, only one leads to him as father, which do you rather?

You're right.

All roads do lead to God. You're going to stand before him, have to give an account of what you've done. Do you want to stand before God as your judge or do you want to stand before God as your.

Father?

The only way to stand before God as your father is through Jesus, to be adopted into the family and be a son or daughter of God. John 16. And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin, righteousness, and judgment concerning sin because they do not believe in me, Jesus.

When the spirit of truth comes, he will glorify me. So the third person of the Trinity is saying, I'm here to talk to you about Jesus, to convict you and point you to him. That's the third person of the Trinity pointing you to Jesus.

Second, 1st Timothy 2 .5, for there is one God and there is one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. He's our mediator. We go to him. Matthew 11, come to me, all who labor and heavy laden, I will give you rest.

Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart and you will find rest for your souls. My yoke is easy and my burden is light. Jesus says, come to me. We're going to get more heavy into what Jesus says.

John 6 .37, all that the father gives to me, Jesus, will come to me, Jesus. And whoever comes to me, Jesus, I, Jesus, will never cast out. For I, Jesus, come down from heaven not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent.

Me.

And this is the will of him who sent me, that I shall lose nothing of all that he has given me but raise it up on the last day. Who is this about?

Jesus.

He seems like an egomaniac. It's all about me. But he's the savior. Of course it's about him. It's about him and how he's going to rescue you. But notice he's talking about me. You need to come to Christ, not anyone or anything else.

Very important. John 7 .37, on the last day of the feast, the great day, Jesus stood up and cried out, if anyone thirsts, let him come to me. And drink. For whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.

Now, when he says, whoever believes in me, as the scripture has said, what scriptures is he talking about?

The Old Testament.

The New Testament wasn't written yet.

Right?

So he's pointing them to the Old Testament, saying, it's about me. Come to me. Luke 18 .6, but Jesus called to them, saying, let the children come to me and do not hinder them, for such belongs to the kingdom of God.

In other words, you come to Christ with childlike faith.

Right?

Let the children come to me. Continuing with the scriptures. John 10. Truly, truly, I say to you, he who does not enter the sheepfold by the door, but climbs in another way, that man is a thief and a robber.

But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep. Jesus says, I'm the door. If anyone enters by me, you will be saved. I am the good shepherd. I know my own sheep. And my own sheep know me. John 10.

But you do not believe, because you are not among my sheep. My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. Whose voice are they listening to? Jesus's. And they are his sheep. John 8 .47.

Whoever is of God hears the words of God. The reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God. So anyone who is trying to get you to go to something else besides Jesus is not hearing the voice of God.

They are not of God. You need to witness to that person and give them the gospel so that they come to Jesus. John 15 .5. For apart from me, you can do nothing. I know this sounds redundant, but you see why I'm doing this?

You have to come to Christ. It's through Christ alone. He doesn't say, come to me and my church, come to me and the Pharisees, come to me and my mom, come to me and the Pope.

Me alone.

For in Christ Jesus, in Christ Jesus alone, you are all sons of God through faith. In other words, it's faith in Christ alone. Not faith in Christ plus anything else. Now, I'm going to go through this stuff with regards to the Roman Catholic Church.

Remember, knowledge puffs up, but love builds up. I don't want you to say, well, I know this, therefore I'm superior to a Roman Catholic. You need to say, it's by the grace of God that I know this, and love builds up.

I love my Roman Catholic human brother, right? They are human beings created in the image of God, and our hearts should break if they don't clearly see what the scripture says. So this is what happens when you deny Christ alone.

Salvation, according to them, is through the Catholic Church alone. The Second Vatican Council's decree on ecumenism explains, for it is through Christ's Catholic Church alone, which is the universal help toward salvation, that the fullness of the means of salvation can be obtained.

So you have to come to the church, and through the church, you can get to heaven. Now, for us, we come to Christ, and when we're baptized, we're part of the body of Christ. The church is of vital importance, but you need to come to Christ to be into the church, and then we look forward to eternal life.

We don't come to the church, follow its rules, and hopefully get there at the end, if we've obeyed enough.

Heaven is God's reward for good works.

This is the catechism of the Catholic Church. In every circumstance, each one of us should hope, with the grace of God, to persevere to the end, and obtain the joy of heaven as God's eternal reward for the good works accomplished with the grace of Christ.

So they do say that it's with God's grace, but our good works are part of what attains.

Or earns salvation.

That's not what Jesus says. That's not what the Scripture said, and we went through that last week. When you deny Christ alone, you deny the Scriptures. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this, not of your own doing.

It's the gift of God, not the reward that you've earned. It's not a result of works, so that no one can boast. If it was God's grace plus your works, you would have something to boast about when you.

Got there.

Look, I did it. This person isn't in heaven because he didn't cooperate with the grace of God, but I did. The only reason you get eternal life is because of what Christ did alone. For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by His grace as a gift.

Gift is something that someone freely gives you with no strings attached. Imagine on your birthday people give you gifts, but then they say, hey, listen, by the way, I just got you a nice shirt. You got to wash my car.

That's not a gift, okay? But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for in Christ Jesus you are all sons of God through faith, not your works. What happens when you deny Christ alone on observing the commandments to attain salvation?

Catechism of the Catholic Church says, the mission of teaching all peoples and of preaching the gospel to every creature, so that all men may attain salvation through faith, baptism, and the observance of the commandments.

Who's observed the commandments here?

No one.

Who's observed any of the commandments in the Roman Catholic Church?

No one.

This is just Old Testament Judaism. Catechism of the Catholic Church, in the treasury of merit, too, are the prayers and good works of all the saints, see how there's an emphasis on good works, and all those who have followed in the footsteps of Christ the Lord by His grace and have made their lives holy and carried out the mission of the Father entrusted to them.

In this way, they attain their own salvation, and at the same time, cooperated in saving their brothers in the unity of the mystical body. This is an overemphasis on what works are. All good works are the fruit of our salvation, not the basis of it.

We're not standing on our good works, we're standing on the perfect work of Christ alone. You missed that. You missed the gospel boat. Their version is not good news. It's what Jesus did. Yeah, oh, everybody needs Jesus, but now you need to do something.

That's not good news.

Yes.

The Lord Himself affirms that baptism is necessary for salvation, basing itself on scripture and tradition. The council teaches that the church, a pilgrim now on earth, is necessary for salvation. The sacrament of penance is necessary for salvation for those who are fallen after baptism, just as baptism is necessary for salvation for those who have not yet been reborn.

So for the Catholic Church, it's faith plus, plus, plus, plus works, plus penance, plus the teaching magisterium, plus everything that they tell you. For the Christian, it's Christ alone, His cross alone.

It was accomplished at the cross. Galatians, I have been, this is Paul, I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh is by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.

I do not nullify the grace of God, for if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for no purpose. So now they're going to say, well, Christ did die for a purpose. It was to enable you to do the good things you need to do.

Christ's work at the cross is a finished work. It is finished, he says. He's paid your debt in full. Continuing on, I'm sorry, the church affirms that for believers, the sacraments of the new covenant are necessary for salvation.

Service of and witness to the faith are necessary for salvation. The authority of the magisterium extends also to the specific precepts of the natural law, the Ten Commandments, because the observance demanded by their Creator is necessary for salvation.

This leaves us with a works-righteousness-based salvation, something that humanity can never attain on its own. This negates the righteousness of Christ being given to you as a gift. However, the odd thing is, out of the other side of their mouth, they said that you can be saved without knowing the gospel of Christ.

Those who, through no fault of their own, do not know the gospel of Christ or his church, but who nevertheless seek God with a sincere heart and move by grace, try in their actions to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience, those too may achieve eternal salvation.

So this is what you do. The Catholic Church is necessary, all the sacraments, the commandments, you have to.

Keep those.

But if you don't know that, go by the dictates of your heart and sincerity, and you too can get salvation. The only people who can't get salvation are Protestants who trust in Jesus Christ alone for their salvation.

Those are the only people who can't go.

Everybody else, you're in.

Don't worry.

What does the Bible say about trusting your own heart?

You're a fool.

Don't trust in your own heart. Absolutely not. Muslims. Catechism of the Catholic Church. The Church's relationship with the Muslims, the plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator in the first place, amongst whom are the Muslims.

These profess to hold the faith of Abraham and together with us adore the one merciful God, mankind's judge on the last day. Muslims do not believe in the same God we do, and they're happy to tell you that.

They tell you that they do not believe that Jesus is God. They do not believe in a Trinity. In fact, the Koran messes it up and says that the Koran puts Mary in the Godhead and makes the Trinity Father, Son, and Mary.

So Muslims will tell you, we don't believe in the same God as you. True Muslims. Same thing as true Christians. You're going to get other Christians that say, oh no, they believe in the same thing. And secular Muslims, they say, yeah, all roads lead to heaven.

But true Muslims, true Jews, and true Christians all disagree with one another and they're.

Okay with it.

We should be too. We should be willing to talk to people about this and stand on what we stand on, Christ.

Alone.

Mary, the Co-Redemptrix, and the Roman Catholic Parallel to Christ

Okay, even worse things result. Don't groan. Please, please, your heart should go out to these people. The Roman Catholic Church says Mary made atonement for the sins of man. Mary, by her spiritual entering into the sacrifice of her divine Son for men, made atonement for the sins of man, de congruant, congruous merit.

She merited the application of the redemptive grace of Christ. In this manner, she cooperates in the subjective redemption of mankind. That's blasphemy. Even worse things happen. I use the word worse, I know it's not that.

Mary crushed the head of the serpent. All our hope do we repose in this most blessed virgin, in all the fair and immaculate one who has crushed the poisonous head of the most cruel serpent and brought salvation to.

The world.

Mary delivers our souls from death. You, Mary, conceived the living God and by your prayers will deliver our souls from death. Mary brings the gifts of eternal salvation. By her manifold intercession, she continues to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation.

Several years ago, I did a talk about Mary aimed at bridging the gap between us and Roman.

Catholics.

I'm going to put a link to that if you want to look at the video on the Reform Rookie. I'm going to put a link to that. It's not a video, it's an audio. It goes into much deeper detail. Even worse things happen.

Mary is preparing a home for you. This mother is waiting and preparing a home for you. Who says that they were preparing a home for us? Jesus. I go to prepare a place for you. Everything that Jesus does, they set up a parallel to Mary.

Jesus is going to redeem you from your sins. Mary's co-redeemer. Jesus is the only mediator between God and man. Mary's the co-mediatrix, the mediatrix of all graces. Everything that the Bible says that Jesus is, they have a parallel with Mary.

This should break our hearts. It's heartbreaking because people devote their lives to what the teaching magisterium of the church tells them to do. Mary hears your prayers. May the blessed virgin hear your every prayer.

Eventually, the absolute worst thing happens. I don't know if you could read this, but I highlighted this. This is a prayer from St. Alphonsus Liguori, who's a doctor of the Roman Catholic Church. There's only seven of them ever in history.

He's a doctor of the Roman Catholic Church. He writes, I worship thee, great queen, and give thee thanks for the many favors thou hast bestowed on me in the past. Most of all, do I thank thee for having saved me from hell, which I had so often deserved.

I promise ever in the future to serve thee, the Bible says worship and serve the Lord your God alone, to serve thee and do what in me lies to win others to thy love. In thee I put all my trust, all my hope of salvation.

Receive me as thy servant and cover me with the mantle of thy protection, thou who art the mother of mercy. Any Christian, true Christian, cannot pray that prayer. You cannot pray that prayer. Listen, if you want to listen to Mary, go to John 2.

Jesus was also invited to the wedding with his disciples. When the wine ran out, the mother of Jesus said to him, they have no wine. And Jesus said to her, woman, what does this have to do with me? My hour has not yet come.

His mother said to the servants, do whatever he tells you. I'm just going to point you to Mary. Do what Mary tells you to do. You want to honor Mary?

Fine.

We honor our mother and father. She's the mother of the human Jesus. Do what Mary tells you to do. She says, she points to Jesus, do whatever he tells you. How many times did we hear Jesus in the scripture say, come to me, come to me, come to me?

The scriptures point you to me, come to me. So yes, do what Mary says. Mary says, go to Jesus, go to him. So Jesus' offices. What was Jesus while he was here on earth? And this again is in the Ketcher's Catechism.

If you haven't gone to that section, you should check this out. Acts 3 .22, the Lord God will raise up for you a prophet like me from your brothers.

Okay.

Hebrews 5 .6, he says, as he says also in another place, you are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek. Psalm 2, as for me, I have set my king on Zion, my holy hill. Jesus is our prophet, our priest, and a king.

Okay. What does a prophet do? Prophet speaks on behalf of God to the people. A priest speaks on behalf of the people to God. So Jesus comes as prophet. He tells us what God expects. Trust in me. God sent me so that you can place your faith and trust in me.

Then he intercedes in John 17 in his high priestly pair for those who the father gave.

Him.

So he's the priest.

Okay.

And then God sets him up as king. He ascends into heaven and sits at the right hand of God, the father. Jesus is our prophet, priest, and king. You need not go to anyone else but him. Christ is priest.

This is really important too. So mankind starts off, right? You're born into this world. Some say a tabula rasa, a clean slate. We don't believe that. You're born. You need perfect righteousness. The problem is you have an infinite debt.

You're born with a sin nature and out of your sin nature, you're going to begin to sin. You don't sin and then become a sinner. You have a sin nature first and out of that nature, you sin. So this is our condition.

We have an infinite debt that we need paid. That's for mankind. But for the Christian, yes, there's a debt. But Jesus, as your savior and high priest, guess what? That debt is forgiven. So now if your debt is forgiven, what does that do?

That gets you to even.

But that's not where you need to be. You need your debt erased and you need positive righteousness placed into your account. So not only does Jesus erase the infinite debt that you owe. He adds infinite, perfect righteousness into your account so that you can stand before God, not in your own righteousness, but in the perfect righteousness of Christ.

Now we have relationship with God through Jesus, our Lord, without the fear of his wrath being poured out upon us.

Why?

Because we have the righteousness of Christ on our behalf. No human being can have the same righteousness as Christ in and of themselves. It has to be given to you as a gift. The whole Reformation was about that one little qualifier alone.