Ahhh, you have very articulately described the “hell” that I am in right now. So, what does this mean???

Hi, Lisa.

What it means is God Himself has planned and already conducted your rescue from that hell. Remember, God says He loved this sinful world so much He sacrificed His Only-Begotten Son on the cross to save us all including you and me. Trust in Christ and heaven is yours.

Works? The believer does works just like the living person has brain waves.
The believer cannot help doing them any more than a person can stop the neurons from connecting in his brain, any more than he can stop his heart from beating, any more than he can quit breathing.

Think about the thief on the cross that believed. When you’re nailed to a cross, there isn’t much you can do. But the thief could not stop himself from doing a good work. He believed, so he told the other unbelieving thief to knock off bad-mouthing Christ (Luke 23:39-43).

Lisa, believers don’t know all the good they do. Matthew 25:31-46 talks about judgement day. If you look at verses 37-40, you’ll see those folks made righteous by trusting in Jesus will be clueless about the good deeds they did.

Christ says we don’t know all the good we who count on Him for our salvation do here. Anyone who says we have to have works to be sure we have faith is arguing with God Himself!

I hope and pray the Christ who died so you can live will lift you out of your private hell. Someone has misled you. Cling to Christ. He loves you and has saved you. The works are there. God says so. Trust Him.

John Cannuck

It seems to be the same story no matter the starting point. For me I converted at the age of 33. But it was not long before that stuff sunk in. It started with my baptism and didn’t even let up until about 3 years ago (I’m 41 now). The depressions it drove me too were unreal. And here’s the funny thing, before conversion, I was the type that NEVER thought I could be driven to depression or thoughts of suicide. But when that stuff hits you and you wonder “I know but is it for me”, you get caught in a spiritual trap that ONLY the Cross, objectively, can pull you out. And I can tell you what, it is CRUCIAL to have an understanding of the sacraments as “giving Christ”, otherwise the devil will take your baptism and use it as a Law against you. Getting stuck on “the timing of baptism” leads you down that path too. It was like hearing the Gospel afresh when I read Luther on baptism, man it was sweet. I think many, as I was, in such church situations are terrorized to admit their struggles because so much is placed upon the “new life” in that sense. And no one in those churches will simply GIVE Christ. The thing is is that it doesn’t come at you in an overt legalistic way. I told my wife, “It’s not “legalism” in the sense that we tend to think of it due to TV and plays. This scowling dark smoking back room plotting Pharisee slinking around laying legalism on you, though I’m sure that exists. One could almost recognize that coming a mile away now days. No, not at all, it comes with big smiles and well meaning intensions and nice little helps.”

I thought about this the other night, because it was so much my own struggle. Somebody ought to right a book that does nothing but cover and maybe even entitled, “Yes I Believe the Gospel, but How Do I Know It’s for Me!”. And address that issue from the Word to the Sacraments. I’ll bet there are tons of Christians out there stuck in churches where that alone is the biggest internal issue that everyone is afraid to talk or ask about for fear of revealing, “I’m not living up to the implied but not explicit house rules”.

In Christ’s Sufficiency Alone,

Larry Hughes
Kentucky

This leads to a psychological crisis in some people. I dealt with a severe depression from childhood that just got worse and worse through my activities in a church. Became increasingly dysfunctional and for a time lost my family.

People are told that they are a new creature in Christ and teach it in such a way that people then think that their faith in Christ, if they really are in Christ, would show some difference somehow. When this does not happen then the conclusion is “I must not have enough faith and I must not really be in Christ”. Never taught to rest in Christ’s work as it says to do especially in Hebrews.

Now I understand that being a new creature in Christ is first from God’s perspective (that now He can see me clothed in righteousness because of the work of Christ) and “walking in the Spirit” was being able to say, as I see my sin, “Wow, I am like this and You knew it before I did and still love me”. That relieves a lot of inner turmoil.

steve s

I know this is way off the post but it just slammed me to think about. It’s a war I’ve found in my own thinking.

This is a bit of a side bar but something occurred to me the other day when pondering an issue that seems to be an ever increasing plague in the church today concerning justification and assurance. This occurred to me as creating a greater hell for the conscience of the believer than just rank “justification by works”.

Some of today’s confusion rests around these two thoughts given or at least heavily implied by many who profess, teach or preach “justification by faith alone” (that is in Christ’s cross). Many say on the one hand “You are justified by faith alone” with great vigor and conviction as formulated during the reformation. Then they come back and say or imply that assurance, at least true and final resting assurance, must come by “good works” or “fruits produced” in their professing, teaching or preaching.

Now justification by faith alone in Christ alone is really another way of saying, “You can trust without a shadow of a doubt that you are just before God for Christ’s sake alone.” Or, “assurance, true and final resting, comes from Christ’s work alone”. And those who come back and say, “assurance, at least true and final resting assurance must come by “good works” or “fruits produced””, are saying in another way, in reality to the conscience, “justification (at least that that can be rested, assured or trusted in) is by good works and fruit”.

Here’s why this dual situation, justification by faith alone + assurance in fruit/good deeds, is a greater hell than just a naked “justification by works”. At least justification by works (Islam, RCC and all world religions of any given name) offers the conscience, albeit false, A WAY to be justified. Later you will busy yourself and find your self in trouble (Luther’s experience), but at least it sets forth an initial path to torture you on and on which to begin some motions toward traveling. But the dual justification by faith alone + assurance in fruit/good deeds – in one conscious thought leaves you dead in the water. Because one thinks, “OK, I’m justified by faith alone and works damn me and I cannot trust in works or rest in them (rest, faith, assurance and trust are closely linked if not the same in the conscience). BUT I’ve got to have some good works or fruit to be assured, rest and really trust (faith) that I AM actually justified. See how that works in one conscious thought. If you pursue works for assurance your conscience says, “Your damned because it is ‘faith alone’” and you can never rest. If you really take the leap and get out there on a limb and dare to trust in Christ alone, then in comes the “BUT you need some fruit to REALLY be assured”.

Thus, this dual dilemma forms, today worse than Rome ever dreamed up, not at least a false path (i.e. pursuing works) – but rather a paralyzing death point upon which one doesn’t know what to do or believe or when to trust or rest or be assured. All is lost for this poor soul and not even the stark demarcation between faith alone and works is given. On the one hand one cannot pursue faith alone and on the other hand one cannot even in a deceived way (not that that is good) pursue works. This man is truly trapped!

Larry Hughes