Saturday, October 23, 2010
Ephesians 2:8-10 For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith-- and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God-- not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
CONFESSING THE TRUTH: ABOUT JUSTIFICATION AND GOOD WORKS
We return again to the central truth of Scripture, the great Good News. Namely, that God counts you as righteous and holy in view of Jesus' sacrificial death.
"I cannot change at all what I have consistently taught about this until now, namely, that 'through faith' (as St. Peter says) we receive a different, new, clean heart and that, for the sake of Christ our mediator, God will and does regard us as completely righteous and holy. Although sin in the flesh is still not completely gone or dead, God will nevertheless not count it or consider it.
"Good works follow such faith, renewal, and forgiveness of sin, and whatever in these works is still sinful or imperfect should not even be counted as sin or imperfection, precisely for the sake of this same Christ. Instead, the human creature should be called and should be completely righteous and holy--according to both the person and his or her works--by the pure grace and mercy that have been poured and spread over us in Christ. Therefore we cannot boast about the great merit of our works, where they are viewed apart from grace and mercy. Rather, as it is written, 'Let the one who boasts, boast in the Lord' [1 Corinthians 1:31; 2 Corinthians 10:17]. That is, if one has a gracious God, then everything is good."
-- Martin Luther, Smalcald Articles III, 13
