Faith: The Instrumental Cause of Salvation

Justification by Faith Alone and the False Ways People Think They Are Saved

Well, good evening again. We are continuing tonight with our study of Soteriology, and we are continuing the study that we began last week on the subject of justification by faith alone. Last week we mentioned that there are various ways that people feel like they are justified, and remember what justified means, it means to be declared righteous, it means to be made right with God, and there's a lot of ways that people feel like they are justified that are unbiblical.

I gave you three last week. The first was justification by death, universalism. People say, he died, he must be in heaven. So that's the idea of universalism. And then there's justification by works, or what we call legalism.

People say, he was a good man, he did good things, he was a captain of the lodge, he gave to the children, he did all this good work, and he was a good man. And people think of justification by works.

Certainly that's not biblical. And then you have what we call religionism, or justification by the church. People who think that because they've been baptized, or because they've participated in the Lord's Supper, or because they've tithed, or because they have their name on a membership roll, that somehow that makes them saved.

And yet we know that it is in the simplest and truest sense that there are a lot of people who are church members who are not genuinely saved, as sad as that is. So we are not justified by death. We are not justified by works.

And we're not even justified by our religious observances. What then are we justified by? Well the Bible teaches that we are justified by faith alone. Turn in your Bibles with me to Romans chapter 1. And I was racking my brain earlier, because if you know, if you remember, this is a continuation of last week's lesson.

And I know that last week I mentioned Galatians 2. But I could not remember if I went to Romans 1. And I didn't have time to go back and listen to the recording. So if what I'm about to say is a little bit of a rehearsal of last week, I'm going to ask you to indulge me.

Because I do think it's very important that we understand this passage. Romans 1 verse 17. And in fact, we're going to pick up the context at verse 16. This is the passage that often is attributed to the true conversion of Martin Luther.

He says that when he read this passage, it was like the heavens were opened to him. And the true gospel, the true understanding of the gospel was so clear to him based upon this particular section of Paul's letter to the Romans.

You guys may know this, but I may or may not know this. I do a daily podcast that I've been putting out on video. It comes out in email and on Facebook. And I just did a video on this passage. So if you happen to be one who watches those, you'll hear me talk about some of what I'm going to say tonight.

Because we are now in our Bible reading, we're fixing to start the book of Romans. And I do a couple passages a day. And this just happens to be the one that I think is for tomorrow, actually, either tomorrow or Friday.

So he says this, for I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it, that is in the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith as it is written, the righteous shall live by faith.

And that is a quote from Habakkuk chapter 2 and verse 4. Now the point that I want to address from this passage is when the apostle says that the righteousness of God is revealed from faith. And in the ESV, it says for faith, but I'm in a moment, I'm going to show why I don't think that's the best way to translate it.

But I am writing it out. He says the righteousness of God is revealed from faith. And here's I'm just going to go ahead and correct this. I don't believe the word for in, in, in our modern use of the word for is the best way.

I think the best way to translate this is the word too, because the concept that is being explained by the apostle Paul is from faith to faith, meaning faith first to last. And if you look at your ESV, if you happen to have an ESV, you'll notice there's a superscript next to the word faith.

And if you follow that down to the bottom, that's actually what it says. It says the righteousness of God is revealed from faith beginning and ending in faith. And that is the concept is that our salvation, the righteousness of God, which is revealed to us, which is revealed in us is ours by faith alone from faith to faith.

And there is nowhere in that that we add any type of works. There is nowhere in that where we add our own obedience. If it's from faith to faith, it's another way of saying it's faith and nothing else.

It is faith alone. Now, when we consider the idea of being justified by faith alone, that should cause us a great amount of joy because it reminds us that we are not justified by having to fulfill some list of duties.

We are not justified by, for instance, being baptized as important as baptism is. We are not justified by participating in the Lord's Supper as valuable as participation in the Lord's Supper is. And we are not justified by even coming and worshiping God as important and necessary as worshiping God is because there is nothing that we do that brings about our ultimate justification.

We are justified by faith alone. And if you look down at verse, well actually you got to go a couple of chapters over to chapter 3 verse 28. I think this is when we looked at last week. You'll notice in chapter 3 verse 28, the whole first three chapters of Romans is Paul explaining the sinfulness of man and the way that a man is justified is not by works but by faith.

And he says in verse 28, For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law. Now that is a very important passage historically because if you were to read the Luther version of the Bible and if you remember Luther was held up in Wartburg Castle and while he was there he translated the Bible from the original languages into his native language of German.

And that was one of his greatest contributions to the Christian faith. And when he translated the Bible into German he included the word alone. He says we hold that one is justified by faith alone apart from works of the law.

And someone might say well that is wrong of him to do that. And some people have questioned his integrity. Oh is that a dastardly deed? The Bible says we shouldn't add or take away from the words of the living God.

And so by adding the word alone has he made an irredeemable mistake? And again some believe that he did. However what Luther was doing was he was translating what we call the dynamic equivalent or the sense of the verse.

It was not a literal but a meaningful translation. And I'll give you an example. The King James Bible does this in Romans chapter 6. In Romans 6 it says shall we continue to sin that grace may abound?

And the King James says God forbid. Well the word God is not in the Greek and the word forbid is not in the Greek. Shall we continue in sin so that grace may abound? Meganoita is the Greek and it means no existence in the literal.

It literally means may it never be. That's why more modern translations translate it. Shall we continue in sin so that grace can abound? May it never be. May it never exist. May that thought never even come into our mind.

But the King James translators in an attempt to try to translate it in a equivalent to something from their day that had a strong meaning they said God forbid that we should ever think such a thing. So when Luther was translating the words of verse 38 chapter 3 verse 38 and he says we are justified by faith apart from works of the law he wanted to stress the idea that what Paul is saying here that is if we're not justified by the law and we are justified by faith then we must understand that it is faith alone.

If we are justified by faith and the law then it's not faith alone. If we're justified by faith and the sacraments then it's not faith alone. If we're justified by faith and church membership then it's not faith alone.

If we're justified by faith and tithing then it's not faith alone. If we're justified by faith and our commitment to worship then it's not by faith alone. So Luther as he's translating Paul here says we need to help people to understand that the meaning behind this the heart of the Apostle here is to point to the fact that we are saved we are justified not by works of the law but by faith alone.

Justification by Faith in Galatians and the Law’s Inability to Save

Turn with me to Galatians 2. Now keep in mind Galatians is later in your Bible but it's actually earlier in history. Galatians 2 was Galatians is one of the earliest of Paul's writings and yet his theology is the same when it comes to the doctrine of justification.

In Galatians 2 verse 15 he says this we ourselves are Jews by birth and not Gentile sinners yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ. So we also have believed in Christ Jesus in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law because by the works of the law no one will be justified.

And if you've taken any time to read through Galatians he says that over and over and over again that justification being declared righteous before God does not come by the law. In fact if you take the law and say I'm going to hold this law and I'm going to make this law my foundation and this law is going to become my avenue of justification all you will find yourself being is more and more and more condemned.

The law does not have the power to save. It only has the power to damn. So how many of you have ever seen now I know many of you have read it you've read the Pilgrim's Progress but how many of you have ever seen the digital animated version of the Pilgrim's Progress.

It is very good in fact Brother Andy I know you love the Pilgrim's Progress we've talked about this I think we ought to set up a viewing one day. The film is really really good and it's digital animation so think like Pixar type thing so it's not animated it's like digital.

In the movie as Christian the main protagonist is making his way toward the Celestial City he's sent off and just as in the book sent off on various paths by different people worldly wise men and others who send him off in different directions to try to thwart his journey to the Celestial City and at one point he is he sent to the mountain of the law and the visual in the film is so spectacular because it's a mountain with a face that talks and it says climb climb and ascend the mountain of the law and as Christian begins to try to climb every time he goes to put his hand up to grab and pull himself up a new law will extend from the mountain and knock him back down and as he tries to go higher every time he tries to step up Law Mountain there's just one after the other after the other of these condemning laws just overwhelming him until the mountain stands as if it were like a cliff above him about to crush him under its massive weight.

That's the picture of one who would try to be saved by the law you may do well to keep even one of God's laws and you probably can't even do that perfectly. But if you try to justify yourself by law if you try to justify yourself by what you are able to accomplish you will always find yourself desperately desperately wanting.

We are not justified by works. We are not justified by the law. We are justified by faith alone. Now the reformers were brilliant theologians and one of the things that the reformers gave us as a faithful inheritance was they gave us copious amounts of writings and commentaries and that they had thought through these things.

This wasn't just a whim for them. I mean they wrote tracks and they wrote books and they by the time when Calvin was not even out of his 20s he had already written the first edition of the Institutes of the Christian Religion which is an entire systematic theological library that he had written himself and as a young man and it's still in use today as having been edited but it's still in use today.

Powerful powerful work. And so the reason why I bring up their thoughtfulness is because when we consider the fact that some people say oh you just believe in sola fide you just believe in justification by faith alone the reformers didn't just say it but they thought through it and they acknowledged that it needs to be understood rightly because there are those who would misuse justification by faith alone especially the libertines the ones who would say well if we're justified by faith alone then that means we have no responsibility to any good works.

If we're justified by faith alone that means we have no responsibility to the things that I mentioned baptism Lord's Supper the church and tithing and all those things. All of those things are unnecessary because we're justified by faith alone.

And certainly that's not what the reformers were teaching but what they were saying was all of those things are the fruit of righteousness not the cause. All of those things are the fruit not the cause.

Faith as the Instrumental Cause of Salvation

And so tonight I want to talk about an important word and it is the word cause. I want to ask a question. I'm gonna invite you not to answer out loud but I would like for you to answer in your mind and hopefully I'll be able to help you think through this.

But again if I got you to all raise your hand and answer the question and we might end up in some kind of a long dialogue. And I'll tell you this on Thursday mornings when I preach at set free those guys stop me a lot when I'm preaching and so a 30 minute message will go for two hours because they're just willing to ask and I wish I could take every question.

But for this I just want you to think about your answer and let me ask the question. Does faith cause salvation. So think about it. Don't answer. You don't even rock your heads whatever. Just think about the answer to the question because it's an important question and it is a question that the reformers dealt with.

Does faith cause salvation. Now that we have I've given you a few seconds to think about whether your answer is yes or whether your answer is no or whether your answer is I don't know. We have been saying since the beginning of this lesson that justification is by faith alone.

And ultimately justification is the first of many things that are involved in our salvation. And so you could say in shorthand terms salvation is by faith alone. But then you take a step back and say but wait a minute the classic the classic formula is not that we are saved by faith alone but that we are saved by grace through faith.

Right. If you think about Ephesians 2 and the word by and the word through are used there but they're used one is referencing grace. You're saved by grace and you're saved through faith. So your first instinct when I asked you are you is faith the cause of salvation.

You might have said no grace is the cause of salvation faith. And then you say well wait. But faith also has a part to play and so it can become a confusing question. And so what I'd like to do now is I would like to propose the idea that there are different types of causes that we need to understand and I want to read to you a quick quote.

This is from Dr. Sproul. We say that justification is by faith alone and the word by in that slogan was part of the 16th century controversy. By refers to the means by which something is brought to pass.

This controversy therefore concern the instrumental cause of justification. Today we do not speak much about instrumental causes. In fact that language goes back to ancient Greece when the philosopher Aristotle distinguished between various types of causes.

And so that's what I want to share with you tonight. I wrote this last week and didn't get to get to it. When Aristotle taught about the idea of causation he said we can't say causation is simple. Causation is actually quite elaborate.

And he broke causation down into several ways. Can you see Jackie I know you're having trouble. We have the efficient cause the formal cause the material cause the instrumental cause and the final cause.

The best way to give the example of this is to give the example as did the early church father Augustine. He gave the example of a sculptor building a building his masterpiece. He's going to build a statue and so the efficient cause the working cause.

If you want to the efficient cause is the sculptor. If it were not for the sculptor there would be no statue. Right. He is the one who is the one doing the work. He is the efficient cause. If it were not for him there would be no end result.

So he is the efficient cause a necessary cause. Agree. The next would be the formal cause. Not. Some of these are explained a little differently depending on what textbook you read. But the formal cause is typically seen as the plan.

Okay. So the sculptor sits down. He says okay I'm going to make a statue of a man and I want the statue to be life-size. So the man's going to be six foot tall and he's going to be about a normal size man of about a hundred and eighty pounds.

And so we will we will have to have a stone. That's that size. We're going to have to have the tools that are necessary and all the things are going to go into making this. So he sets down and he writes out his plan.

And so the efficient cause is him. But the plan is still part of the cause wouldn't happen without the plan. The third is what we would call the material cause the material cause. Think about the word material for a moment.

What is the material cause of a statue. The stone. The stone itself. If it were not for the stone could you have the statue. No. You would have to have the statue to make the or you have to have the stone to make the statue.

If he had a plan and he had a person but he didn't have a stone then he would be he would have an insufficient amount of cause because the stone is the cause in the sense of it being the material cause.

But then you have what's known as the instrumental cause. What is the instrumental cause in the sculpting of a statue. The tools. Thank you brother. The instruments. And what are we. You and I have done a lot of work together brother Dan.

What do we say about tools. We love tools. The right tools. Right. Yeah. Right. The right tools. Right. The right tools for the right job. And what we say. The carpenter is only as good as his tools. You know he's better tools make better carpenter.

Right. So he's got to have the tools. He's got to have the right ones. Those are his instruments. And those are a cause. If all he had was his bare hands and a big stone unless he was really good at some kind of karate chop he's not going to be able to make any kind of good-looking statue with his bare hands.

He's got to have the instruments the tools to make it work. And then what is the final cause. The final cause is the statue itself. That's the purpose. That's the reason that there that's the reason the sculptor had a plan.

That's the reason the sculptor got a stone. That's the reason why the sculptor put together his tools. And and that's the reason for all of the conversation is that the final is the statue itself. So we have five different causes all of which make up the final result.

The Father, Son, and Spirit as the Efficient Cause; Christ as the Material Cause

Therefore let us look at this from the perspective of salvation. The efficient cause of our salvation is God the Trinity God the Father God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. From eternity past they had a plan formal cause.

They covenanted within themselves to save a people. They chose to do that. And when I say they I have to be careful because I'm tempted to want to use the personal pronoun in the singular because God is one.

But yet at the same time we know that within the within the Godhead there is inner relativity. And so God speaks to himself as the Father and as the Son and as the Holy Spirit. And they have always been.

And so there's an interrelated relationships whereby they are able to discuss and come conversate in it some in some way shape or form. There was a plan that was made we call it the plan of redemption.

What is the material. What is the material cause of our salvation. This is important easy to remember. The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone Christ for it is his and brother Andy mentioned it earlier the active and passive obedience of Christ.

Right. He actively kept the law he passively went to death. And in that he is the cause. He is the material cause of our salvation. He is the stone. He is the foundation. Without him there would be no found there would be no set like that.

Like without the stone there would be no sculpture. Without Jesus there would be no salvation. And so Christ in his active and passive obedience is the material cause. But what then is the instrumental cause.

Beloved. The instrumental cause from the perspective of the reformers and I believe they are correct is faith. That is that by which we take hold of the Savior. That is that by which we become part of the family of God.

And what is the final result. What's the final purpose. The glory of God. The final cause of it all. Why did God do it. What is the end. What are we looking forward to. What are. What's the final result.

The glory of almighty God when at the end of time the Lord Jesus Christ will come and he will give to the father the kingdom and God will be all in all. And his enemies will be made his footstool. And those who have rejected him will be cast into outer darkness.

And those who have believed on him and by faith received him they will be welcomed into the kingdom and they will be made part of the family of God forever. And so the glory of God is the final cause.

Justification by Imputation, Not Infusion

And you say well what is the what is the why do this is just because it's a great illustration. It is a great illustration. But that's not the reason this part and we change colors here this part right here this fourth one that's really where the distinction between the reformers and the Roman Catholics was made because according to Roman Catholic theology the instrumental cause is not faith but it is baptism.

The instrument that God uses is not faith but the action of baptism. Baptism sacramentally confers upon the recipient the grace of justification. In other words the righteousness of Christ is poured into the soul of the one receiving baptized.

That pouring of grace into the soul is called infusion. So Rome does not believe that people are justified apart from grace or faith. But that justification comes about as a result of an infusion of grace by which human righteousness is made possible.

You see grace is infused not imputed. Reformers say it's imputed or granted or credited. The Roman Catholic would say no grace is not credited or imputed. Grace is infused meaning it's as if it were poured in through the waters of baptism.

And therefore baptism is the instrumental cause of salvation and not faith. The reformers would say no the instrumental cause is not baptism. The instrumental cause is faith. As soon as people take hold of Christ by faith the merit of Christ is transferred to them.

Rome holds to justification by infusion. But Protestants hold to justification by imputation. The Roman Catholic Church says God declares someone just only by virtuous cooperation with the infused grace of Christ.

Protestants on the other hand say that the ground of justification remains exclusively the righteousness of Christ. Not the righteousness of Christ in us but the righteousness of Christ for us the righteousness that Christ achieved in his perfect obedience to the law of God.

The righteousness. The first part of the ground of justification is applied to us when we put our trust in Jesus Christ. The other part of the ground of justification is Christ's perfect satisfaction of the negative sanctions of the law in his sacrificial death on the cross.

This means we are saved not by the death of Jesus but also by the life of Jesus. His death satisfies our sin debt but his life guarantees us righteousness. Therefore we discuss the passive and active.

The active living out the law of God the passive receiving in himself our death. And therefore when we say we are justified by faith we have to finish it. We're justified by faith in Christ. You see the instruments are dealing with the material and the material is Christ.

This is the true grounds of our salvation. The true grounds of our justification is what we're trusting in Christ himself who is the better phrase who we are trusting in. He is the material cause he's the foundation.

He is the one without which there would be no salvation. And so if I ask you the question again does faith cause salvation. You could say faith in the finished work of Christ. Because it is the finished work of Christ that ultimately provides the ground for our salvation.

No man will be saved apart from faith in Jesus Christ. And no man who has faith in Jesus Christ will be put to shame. When Paul wanted to defend the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Paul cited one Old Covenant Old Testament character.

More than any other he cited Abraham. Why did Paul cite Abraham. He cited him in Galatians 3 5 to 9 and in Romans 4 1 to 3. Why did Paul always cite Abraham when he was looking to explain the doctrine of justification.

It is because of this. Abraham lived before the law. Abraham lived before there was the Ten Commandments. Can you imagine he lived before the Ten Commandments. He lived before the Levitical priesthood.

He lived before the sacrifices that were made in the temple. He lived before the temple. He lived before the tabernacle. He lived before all of that. And yet he was right with God. How Genesis chapter 15 and verse 6 says these simple words.

And Paul quotes these words multiple times in the New Testament. Genesis 15 6. Abraham believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. Remember that it wasn't a matter of Abraham doing some religious exercise and God infusing grace.

No he believed God and God credited to him or imputed to him the gift of righteousness. Whose righteousness did Abraham have. It was still Jesus's. Because whether it's before the cross or after the cross everyone who has ever and will ever be saved is saved by the work of Jesus Christ.

This is why in John 8 Jesus in talking about Abraham said Abraham long to see my day. He saw it and was glad. And they said you're not even 50 years old. How can you say Abraham looked forward to the day that you would come.

And Jesus said before Abraham was I am. Abraham knew that the Redeemer was coming. Moses knew a Redeemer was coming. Paul tells us the Redeemer has come. But the way we are saved is the same way they were saved.

Not by works of righteousness that we have done in keeping the law but by faith in the finished work of him who kept the law for us. We are not justified by what we do but by faith in him alone. We'll finish there father in heaven.

I thank you for this opportunity to look at your word to discuss the concept of what it means for salvation to have a cause and Lord. To look at the various ideas of causation and how they work out. And Lord.

This has been hopefully more than just an exercise in philosophical depth of study. But Lord help us to truly understand what it means to be justified by faith and Lord. For those who have a hard time those who struggle with doubt help them to understand that salvation is by faith alone in Christ alone.

And the righteousness of God is revealed from heaven. And the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith with nothing in between Lord. Help us to understand. Help us to trust ever more in the fact that you save us not by our good deeds but because of Christ and it's in his name.

We pray. Amen.