Following Reformation Day, CUAA Campus Chaplain Tony Sikora reflects on faith, works and the gift of salvation in Christ.
You’ve heard the saying, “throwing out the baby with the bathwater.” This is an idiom that means to accidentally discard something valuable or essential while trying to get rid of something unwanted or bad. Roman Catholics often accuse Lutherans of doing just that when we say, with the Scriptures, that a “person is justified by faith apart from works” (Romans 3:28).
Why would they say that? Rome’s doctrine of justification requires both faith (assent to Catholic doctrine) and love (that is, works). If works are no longer required for salvation, then the whole doctrine of justification is undone. That’s their reasoning, and it continues to be an issue of contention between Lutherans and Roman Catholics to this day.
Salvation, or justification, is by grace through faith alone (apart from works). This is the bedrock of the Lutheran Reformation. Works are not required for salvation, but works are indeed required because “faith apart from works is dead” (James 2:20). Faith alone saves, but faith is never alone. On this teaching the church stands or falls. If justification requires works, it begs multiple questions: “How many works?” or “Which works?” And the answers to those questions are uncertain because Scripture clearly says, “We hold that a person is justified by faith apart from works” (Romans 3:28). “Apart from works” means by faith alone.
The baby in the bathwater is Christ and His works of salvation for us. This is our hope and our comfort. Christ has made atonement for our sin. Christ has shed His holy blood. Christ is crucified, dead, and buried. And Christ is risen from the dead. Our works play no role in our salvation; in fact, they are the problem Christ’s death and resurrection remedies.
The bathwater is the false teaching that our works contribute to salvation. And Lutherans rightly dispense with such a faulty understanding. We keep the baby, and we throw out the bathwater. We retain the biblical teaching of justification and confess that works do matter for sanctification. Faith alone (apart from works) saves, but faith is never alone. Faith does works, works commanded by God in the Scriptures and lived out in the life of believers in their vocation. Thus we keep the baby without the bathwater.
By the Rev. Tony Sikora, campus chaplain
For another article on the Reformation, read A gracious God for a sinful monk.
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