Tag: justification

Here is a link to the fourth article: https://bookofconcord.org/augsburg-confession/of-justification/

This is where we begin to see a significant difference between Lutheran and Roman Catholic teaching. Luther famously asserted that “justification is the doctrine on which the church stands or falls.”

To be clear, the Roman Catholic Church agrees that “men cannot be justified before God by their own strength, merits, or works.” Like Protestants, Catholics believe that salvation can be found only through faith in Christ.

The Catholic theologians who responded to the Augsburg Confession agreed with the bulk of this article. However, they added the following caveat: “Nevertheless, all Catholics confess that our works of themselves have no merit, but that God’s grace makes them worthy of eternal life.” (Roman Confutation, Article IV). In other words, an unbeliever cannot be saved. However, a Christian, through the power of the Holy Spirit, is enabled and empowered to do good works that please God and merit salvation. This concept is known as “infused grace.”

The problem with infused grace is that it weakens (or may even destroy) the assurance of the believer: I still have to do my part to ensure I get to heaven. At the time of the reformation, a concern was that many people were expending a great deal of time and money on works such as pilgrimages and fasting for the sake of their own salvation, while neglecting the needs of their neighbor.

As Lutherans, we find insufficient Biblical evidence for the concept of infused grace.

To the contrary, we believe the scriptural teaching is that justification is entirely the work of God. Because of what Christ has done, his righteousness is credited to us the instant we believe. If we believe, this too is a gift. There’s nothing more that needs to be done. This teaching come through clearly in Romans 3 and 4.

Another good passage is Ephesians 2:8-9: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— not by works, so that no one can boast.”

Of course, this doesn’t mean that believers will simply sit on our laurels! We will see in later articles that once a person is justified, they begin to do good works that please God. However, we hold that these works don’t earn us anything — rather, they are a response of gratitude — the fruit of a life transformed by grace.