Latest / THE BELIEVER'S CHURCH | Let’s Build Our Faith Together / Faith plus works is a damning lie.
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: It's often said we don't find justification by faith in
- 0:04Speaker 1: Christ's preaching, but only in Paul, the Apostle Paul. You
- 0:08Speaker 1: went back to Christ and said, no, in that parable
- 0:10Speaker 1: he tells of the publican and the sinner.
- 0:13Speaker 2: Luke 18, there's two men come to pray. One is
- 0:17Speaker 2: a Pharisee who says, lifts up his eyes and says,
- 0:21Speaker 2: I thank you that I'm not like other men like this,
- 0:23Speaker 2: you know, publican over here. I tithe, I fast, I
- 0:26Speaker 2: do alms, whatever. And the publican won't so much as
- 0:30Speaker 2: lift his eyes toward heaven. He's looking down at the ground,
- 0:33Speaker 2: pounding on his chest, a symbol of sadness, remorse, and says, God,
- 0:37Speaker 2: be merciful to me, a sinner. And Jesus says, that
- 0:41Speaker 2: man went home justified. That is justification by faith alone.
- 0:46Speaker 2: That's a sinner with nothing. God justifying the ungodly, to
- 0:52Speaker 2: use the words of Paul.
- 0:53Speaker 1: Exactly. And the one who wasn't justified was the guy—
- 0:56Speaker 1: Was the one who had all the works. Right, and
- 0:58Speaker 1: he's citing all the rituals he went through.
- 1:00Speaker 2: And mark this also, Phil. The Pharisee not only had works,
- 1:03Speaker 2: he had faith. He had faith. He's talking to God. Right.
- 1:07Speaker 2: So he had faith, but he believed that his works
- 1:13Speaker 2: sort of validated his faith and moved him into the
- 1:16Speaker 2: category of acceptance with God. And Jesus said, absolutely not.
- 1:19Speaker 2: Faith plus works is a damning lie. The man with
- 1:23Speaker 2: nothing to claim but faith alone, crying out in repentance
- 1:27Speaker 2: for God to be merciful to him, he was the
- 1:29Speaker 2: one who went home declared righteous.