Hungering for Power (Lenten Reflections)

March 17, 2010

Text: Philippians 3:4-14

That can’t be a commendable hunger, can it? To hunger for power.

It depends on what kind of power we are talking about. To hunger for Caesar’s power (or wealth or status) is ungodly, but to hunger for the power to become like Jesus is something different.

This is not a hunger for a credentialed status, even a religious status. Paul refuses to find his confidence in the “flesh,” that is, his credentials—ethnic, pure-blooded Jew from the elite tribe of Benjamin whose obedience and zeal for the Torah was exemplary, even for a Pharisee. Among God’s covenant people, few—if any—could top that resume. But Paul regarded it as garbage in comparison to knowing Christ.

This is Paul’s hunger—to know Christ. This hunger is partially satisfied through being found in Christ where the faithfulness of Christ has achieved for us a status of righteousness. It is the gift of God which we receive by faith. This is worth the loss of all our fleshly credentials.

But Paul hungers for more than a declaration that he has been “set right” (righteousness) in Christ. He yearns to be credentialed beyond a declaration. He wants to know Christ and the power of his resurrection. He wants to become like Christ. He wants to share the path that Christ walked through suffering, death and resurrection.

This hunger pushes Paul to press on toward maturity. It moves him to pursue the goal. Paul races toward the finish line, toward the full experience of God’s gift—not only through a declaration but also in existential reality, that is, in a sanctified, mature life that mirrors the image of Christ.

This is the tension in which believers live. We are declared righteous in Christ but we press on toward the goal. We know Christ but we desire to know him more fully. We are possessed by God but we yearn to possess Christ. We “set right” by faith but we also hunger to live by faith.

The Lenten season does not forget that we are “set right,” but renews our hunger to become what God has called us to be. The Lenten season does not undermine the faithfulness of Christ or replace our work with Christ’s work, but rekindles the yearning to share Christ’s life, to become like Christ.

The practice of Lent is not a fleshly credential, though it can become that for some just as practicing Torah was that from some in Paul’s day. Lent is not works righteousness. Rather, it is pressing forward. It is a letting go of the past and present hindrances in order to pursue (or strain toward) the goal of becoming like Jesus. Lent provides an opportunity to focus our pursuit.

Lent should never serve the goal of securing God’s gift of righteousness. Believers, rather than unbelievers, practice Lent. Believers, who have already been “set right” by faith, use Lent as an occasion to embrace and deepen their fellowship with God. Knowing Christ, believers hunger to know Christ better. They hunger for the power of the resurrection which transforms them into the likeness of Christ in soul now but also in body later.

Discussion Questions:

  1. What are your credentials according to the “flesh”? Socially? Vocationally? Religiously
  2. What “credential” does Paul desire in this text? How would you describe it? What does it entail?
  3. Name something for which you “hunger” in Christ for your life? In what ways do you hunger to become like Jesus?
  4. How does your experience of Lent or your pursuit of God move you forward in satisfying this hunger? What practices, values or experiences in life have brought you closer to becoming like Jesus?

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Posted by John Mark Hicks

Salvation: Sector 8

February 4, 2010

What is salvation?

In my first post in this series I proposed the below chart as a way of answering that important question. In this post I will comment on the eighth sector (8).

  Past
Justification		 Present
Sanctification		 Future
Glorification
Personal Forgiveness of Sins and Relationship with God (1) Moral (Inner and Outer)  Transformation (2) Resurrection of the Body (3)
Communal One Body of Christ: One New Society (4) Reconciliation and Social Transformation (5) The Fullness of the Kingdom of God (6)
Cosmic Resurrection and Exaltation of Jesus (7) Redemptive Emergence of New Creation (8) New Heaven and New Earth (9)

Sector 8 identifies salvation as the redemption of creation through the emergence or in-breaking of new creation into the present cosmos. This is cosmic sanctification as the groaning and frustrated creation is progressively liberated from the bondage of decay.

The church is a means toward the redemptive emergence of new creation because it is sustained by the power of the eschatological Spirit dwelling in it.  The church serves the goal, which is a creation filled with shalom, that is, a creation filled with righteousness, justice, peace, wholeness and joy. This includes not only social transformation (social ethics) but also the care, enjoyment and protection of the creation itself.

Herein lies the importance of vocation (or a theology of work) in Christian theology. Through vocation believers (and non-believers as well by God’s grace) participate in the mission of God to redeem the creation and further the goals of God’s creative act. Believers are a redemptive presence in a broken world. They work for reconciliation, to care for the creation, and to develop the potential of creation.

God did not create a perfected static reality.  He invested it with (indeed, commanded it to) change–be fruitful and multiply.  Nothing changes the world like children!  But this dynamism is not limited to procreation. Rather, it is filling the earth with the glory of God through participating in God’s agenda for the creation. It is pursuing our vocation, and the many vocations (careers) that flow from that vocational identity as divine imagers. God intended the creation to emerge, grow, develop and become with a view toward a glorious reality. This is the telos or goal of creation.

God created humanity to share the task (the mission) in achieving that goal. As junior partners with God, as co-regents in the creation, as co-creators of the future, God has invested in us the dignity, joy and value of joining God in the divine mission.

We participate in this adventure by living out our identity in vocational mission. Our careers become vocations by which we move the creation forward in redemptive, reconciling and orderly ways. Believers should not choose their careers lightly nor should they reduce their careers to money-making schemes.  Rather, careers are vocational, that is, they are callings into the mission of God. Through their careers believers become ministers in the kingdom of God as they use their careers to further the divine goal for creation. Through this giftedness, expressed as love for neighbors and the creation, God redeems, renews and reinvests in the creation.

Nevertheless, creation will groan until the final liberation from death itself. While medical advancements cheat death, they do not defeat it.  While justice grows, slavery still exists.  While moments of reconciliation bear witness to the glory of God (as in South Africa), much of humanity is still alienated from each other. The church and other human acts graced by God bear witness to and work toward the goal. But the full reality of that goal can only be achieved by God’s apocalyptic act whereby God reverses the curse and makes everything new.

Thus, while the church is an authentic means of grace within the world and for the sake of the world as the new creation already lives and moves within the world through the church, the full renovation and regeneration of the cosmos will only arrive when the kingdom of God fully comes in the coming of our Lord Jesus. We yet wait–patientily, but actively (not passively)–for that climactic and glorious moment.

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Posted by John Mark Hicks

Salvation: Sector 2

November 12, 2009

What is salvation?

In my first post in this series I proposed the below chart as a way of answering that important question. In this post I will comment on the second sector (2).  I debated with myself (which is an interesting thing to observe :-) ) whether to proceed numerically 1, 2, 3…. or to proceed temporally (talk about all the past dimensions, then the present, then the future). I finally decided on the numerical method because in this series I ultimately want to emphasize what is usually neglected, that is, the cosmic (and often the communal as well).

  Past
Justification		 Present
Sanctification		 Future
Glorification
Personal Forgiveness of Sins and Relationship with God (1) Moral (Inner and Outer)  Transformation (2) Resurrection of the Body (3)
Communal One Body of Christ: One New Society (4) Reconciliation and Social Transformation (5) The Fullness of the Kingdom of God (6)
Cosmic Resurrection and Exaltation of Jesus (7) Redemptive Emergence of New Creation (8) New Heaven and New Earth (9)

Sector 2 identifies salvation as a present experience of “moral,” both inward and outward, transformation into the image of Christ who is the image of the invisible God. Personal sanctification is the process of becoming like Christ.

I put “moral” in quotation marks because I don’t want to simply identify this transformation by ethical virtues and practices (‘good works”) though it is a significant part of what I am attempting to describe.  The danger is to reduce our transformation to “doing ethics” rather than “being Christ” and to claim the power of this transformation as rooted in our own moral efforts rather than in the empowerment of the Holy Spirit.

Becoming like Christ entails moral transformation through the fruit-bearing power of the Spirit in our lives. We struggle against the “flesh” (σαρξ). There is a conflict or war inside of us. Indwelling sin battles against the indwelling Spirit so that we are often conflicted and we sometimes do not do what we want. Personal sanctification is a progressive though imperfect struggle against the sinful nature. We are neither perfectionists nor moral defeatists in this struggle–it is a battle that can be won only on the ground of the work of Christ and by the enabling presence of the Spirit but it is a hard-won victory through cooperative grace. The presence of the struggle reveals the presence of Spirit-enabled life. Through moral transformation we are saved from the debilitating power of sin.

This moral transformation is not limited to our inwardness, but is relational and kingdom-directed. It is practicing the kingdom of God just as Jesus did. It is becoming Jesus inwardly and outwardly.

But personal sanctification is not simply about moral transformation, struggle and victory, that is, defeating sin in our lives and being filled with the Spirit. It is also about being–living in communion and fellowship with God, participating in the mutual indwelling life of the Triune God. The Orthodox call personal sanctification theosis, that is, “defification.” It is an ancient characterization of life with God which goes back to at least Irenaeus in the late second century. It is reflected in 2 Peter 1:4 through the language of becoming partakers of the divine nature. We do not become ontologically divine (that is, we do not become infinite, omniscient, omnipotent, etc., so that we are God), but we experience the divine and become participants in the divine community.

Theosis includes moral transformation but it also includes ultimately participation in divine immortality (that is, glorification). Additionally, it includes a present experience of sharing the divine life and communion.  It is about being–living, sharing, communing–with God. Theosis even claims that believers may seek and experience a union with God that is analogous to Jesus’ own transfiguration, that is, believers may enjoy momentary experiences of eschatological communion through inward transfiguration even now as foretastes of what is to come. In other words, we may know God in ways that are beyond knowing and experience the depth of God’s love in ways that go beyond mere cognition (Ephesians 3:14-19).

God is certainly present with us in the now, but our awareness of that presence and communion is limited by our own brokenness and busyness. Spiritual practices, such as solitude, still our minds and hearts in ways that open up the fuller reality of God’s presence with us and enable us to experience the joy of our future blessedness even now. Theosis envisons not only our moral transformation into the likeness of Christ but opens our eyes to see that God draws us into the experience of divine union through the Holy Spirit who cries “Abba” in our hearts.

Our personal present salvation, then, is not only about moral effort (cooperative grace) but also about existential participation in the divine community. Our present salvation is about participation–participation in mission of the kingdom of God and participation in the Triune communion.

Though this participation we become Christ(ians) in the world.

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Posted by John Mark Hicks

Wright on Justification

August 17, 2009

N. T. Wright’s new book, Justification: God’s Plan & Paul’s Vision, is primarily a response to John Piper’s The Future of Justification: A Response to N. T. Wright though he engages others as well (e.g., Westerholm). For another extended review of Piper’s book, sympathetic to Wright, see Trevin Wax’s interaction with the book as well as his interview with Wright. 

Reformed theologians and scholars are disturbed by Wright’s defense of the New Perspective on Paul (NPP) and his, as they see it, rejection of the Reformation doctrine of justification by faith alone. Guy Waters, of Reformed Theological Seminary, has written a fair-minded and on point review of Wright’s new book.  If you want to read a good Reformed response to Wright, I think that is a good place to start.

I have no desire to pursue a point by point discussion in this post. Rather, I simply want to offer my thoughts on what I think is at issue in Wright’s book. I have not followed the “debate” over NPP and justification very closely in the past few years and consequently, to some extent, I am “out of the loop” on this one. But as one who has studied Refomed theology and read widely in Wright, I want to share what I think is significant about this particular contribution by N. T. Wright.

As I read Wright, his intent is to “go beyond the new perspective/old perspective divide” and appropriate from both perspectives since “both are necessary parts of what Paul is actually saying” (p. 212). The “emphases of the old and new perspectives belong…intimately together” (p. 200). Wright intends to present “Paul’s own majestic synthesis” where “old and new perspectives on Paul come together and, though tossed and tumbled about in the process, they are transformed and transcended, and together they give rise to prayer and praise” (p. 174-175). In many ways, the old and new perspectives “sit comfortably side by side” like a “parit of theological Siamese twins sharing a single heart” (p. 118).  For example, faith in Christ is both (1) our boundary marker rather than Torah works (NPP) and (2) the means of our justification before God (OPP).

I have shared this approach to the NPP and OPP for several years. I think the approaches can be complementary rather than antagonistic. But let me first point out where the NPP (as Wright presents it) would be problematic in terms of traditional Evangelical/Reformed/Lutheran theology. While there are many exegetical issues, my concern in this brief review is the theological points of contention–the soteriological questions. Here are a few:

  • Centrality of Justification. Is the central soteri0logical doctrine of the Christian faith  ”justification by faith alone”? Protestants, based on Romans and Galatians, have generally thought so. But Wright thinks the emphasis on justification in Romans and Galatians is primarily about the question of Torah or faith in Jesus as boundary markers of the people of God. Justification is not so much about individual appropriation of the forgiveness of sins (though it includes that!), but the identification of the covenant people of God (pp. 75-76, 242). The overemphasis on Romans and Galatians–particularly a stress on justification–creates an imbalance within Paul’s own theology (e.g., what if Ephesians and Colossians had been the center of the Reformation movement?) as well as an imbalance in relation to the gospel of the kingdom in the Gospels (pp. 43, 176, 248). Justification–as traditionally explained– is one piece of soteriology, but it is not the whole of it.
  • Imputation of Christ’s Righteousness. Are we justificed by the forensic imputation of the moral righteousness of Christ? While Wright believes in a substitutionary atonement based on the representative faithfulness of Jesus who enacted the covenant for us, he does not believe it is necessary to read Paul as grounding this in the imputation of Christ’s moral efforts to our moral account (pp. 206-207, 217, 231-233). The faithfulness of Jesus is his “faithfulness unto death, the redeeming death, the dealing-with-sin death” which is the declaration that we are “in the right” (p. 203). Our present status (justification) derives from God’s righteousness faithfully enacted by Jesus and we claim this status through faith in Jesus.
  • “Works” and Salvation. In what sense are we “judged by works” on the last day?  Evangelicals, Reformed, and Lutherans have generally relativized Paul’s language in Romans 2 (and other places) such that obedience (sanctification) does not function as a criterion of judgment. While recognizing the legitimate pastoral concerns about assurance, there is–acccording to Wright–a role for works in the eschatological judgment of God through love (not merit!) empowered by the Spirit (pp. 184-189).

Without reviewing Wright’s sustained argument in the book, his positive presentation which seeks to transcend the divide on the above three points looks something like this.

  • Union with Christ rather than Justification is Paul’s central soteriological theme.  Justification (our present righteous status before God) happens through incorporation rather than vice versa (pp. 142, 151).  We are justified because we are united with Christ. If union with Christ is the central point, then we can more appropriately see how salvation is both declaration (staus–the traditional theological category of “justification”) and participation (life–the traditional theological category of “sanctification”). Indeed, historic Reformed theology has stressed this point, which Wright recognizes (p. 72).
  • The righteousness of God is God’s faithfulness enacted through the faithfulness of Christ that gives those who trust in Christ a righteous status before God. The “righteousness of God” does not refer to God’s gift of the righteousness of Christ (p. 233) but rather to the God’s covenant faithfulness through Christ (p. 66-67). Justification is a forensic declaration in terms of status, and God’s declares his people justified (p. 69). It is a lawcourt verdict in terms of status which arises out of God’s righteousness–his faithfulness.
  • The living sign of our status is a holy life enabled by the Spirit of God. Righteousness (justification) is also a term used by Paul to talk about life (or, in traditional theological terminology, sanctification). Wright’s critics claim that he is moralistic at this point and ends up saving people by their works, but this misunderstands his point. There is no “Pauline doctrine of assurance” without a “Pauline doctrine of the Spirit,” that is, where there are no signs of holy living, “there is no sign of life” (p. 237). Together, our righteousness status through faith in Christ and the living signs of that status enacted in our life by the Spirit, anticipate the final judgment of justification on the last day (p. 239). The “verdict already announced is indeed a true anticipation of the verdict yet to be announced” (p. 225), and that final verdict “will truly reflect what people have actually done” by the power of the Spirit at work in their lives (p. 191-2).

One of Wright’s major concerns is the introduction of ecclesiology, pneumatology and eschatology into the discussion of the doctrine of justification which, he believes, is lacking in some discussions of Justification. We might say it something like this:

  • The sign of present justification is “membership in God’s people” (ecclesiology) “as the advance sign of soteriology (being saved on the last day)” (p. 147). This participation in the covenant community (church) is missional–”a people based on the work of the Servant and the work of the Spirit, who now carry God’s light, truth and teaching to the waiting nations” (p. 197). The gospel of the kingdom (which is missional ecclesiology), so prominent in the Gospels, must hearld that God has created in Jesus and by the Spirit a people who celebrate their status (forgiven) through extending God’s purposes in the world (p. 248).
  • The Spirit is the forgotten member of the Trinity in many versions of Justification where God forgives sins in Christ and this is the essence of soteriology. When we recognize that righteousness is also about sanctification and eschatological judgment, then we look to the role of the Spirit as the one who sanctifies us and empowers us for holy living as signs of the future eschatological judgment (pp. 236-240).
  • The present status of believers in Christ as justified is the already of an eschatological not-yet. It is an inaugurated reality that is only “partially realized” (p. 101). It will be progressively realized in us by the power of the Spirit and eschatologically verified on the day of judgment.  Faith in Christ “includes a trust in the Spirt, not least, a sure trust that” God will complete his work when the Lord comes again (p. 107).

If we are going to use “Justification” as a comprehensive soteriological idea, then it needs to include all the elements of soteriology–ecclesiology, Christology, eschatology, sanctification, pneumatology.  If we are going to use “Justification” as a narrow identification of the lawcourt declaration of status on the basis of Christ’s work, then we should not speak of “Justification” as the center (or even the most important aspect) of soteriology since it is only one part of the whole.

If we conceive it “broadly” (and this is one possible angle since “righteousness” is used to describe many dimensions of soteriology, including past, present and future–but there are also other angles as well), it seems to me that something like the following might find some common ground between the NPP and the OPP as well as represent Wright’s point in his book:

God’s covenant faithfulness justifies (declares righteous) those who are in the Messiah because he faithfully surrendered to God’s purposes and thus dealt with sin and death through his own death and resurrection. By faith we are incorporated into the Messiah and thus participate in God’s covenant community entrusted with God’s mission in the world. Empowered by the Spirit, this community anticipates the final verdict on the last day through heralding and embodying that verdict in the present as instruments of God’s kingdom purpose to renew the creation.

If both NPP and OPP can find agreement in such a statement, then perhaps the theological tempest might calm a bit and the mission pursued more vigorously. We can only hope, I suppose.

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Posted by John Mark Hicks

Soteriology: Union with Christ (SBD 13)

June 16, 2009

[Note: I am attempting to keep these SBD installments under 2000 words each, but that is--of course--quite inadequate for the topics covered. Consequently, these contributions are more programmatic than they are explanatory or defenses of the positions stated. You may access the whole series at my Serial page.]

The Father elects, redeems and saves in Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit. Union with Christ is the umbrella expression for the totality of our salvation. This union involves all aspects of our salvation. The wisdom of God—Jesus Christ in whom God is reconciling the world—is our righteousness, holiness and redemption (1 Corinthians 1:30).

This union with Christ is both redemptive-historical and spiritual-mystical. Christ’s work is for us and with us as he identified with us through incarnation, ministry, death and resurrection. Through the election of the Father, we are united to Christ in his death and resurrection so that his death and resurrection become ours. At the same time our union with Christ is effected through the Spirit of God so that we constitute the living body of Christ. We are the embodiment of Jesus in the world as the divine presence resides in us through the indwelling Spirit. We participate in the reality of God’s kingdom through the Spirit of Christ who empowers us to be like Christ. United with Christ redemptively and pneumatically, we embody the presence of Jesus in the world for the sake of the world. Redeemed in Christ, we become the presence of Christ in the world.

The Scope of Salvation

Soteriology is individual, communal and cosmic.

Western and Evangelical Christianity have generally focused on the individual aspects of salvation, that is, “God saved me and Christ would have died for me even if I had been the only one who needed it.” Evangelical theology, consequently, has often stressed individual assurance, justification by faith and personal holiness. This emphasis has generally been linked to “going to heaven when I die” such that salvation has sometimes been reduced to the forgiveness of sin and going to heaven.

Surely God saves individuals—God saves indivdiual people. God saves me. God’s Spirit dwells in each of our bodies, calls each one of us to personal holiness and the personal presence of the Spirit empowers each of us. God works in and through individuals and relates to us as individuals. There is such a thing as a “personal” relationship with God—there is communion between God and individuals. Soteriology does not undermine our individuality though it does not sanction our individualism.

At the same time God saves a people and gathers a people together. God—the relational, communal reality of Father, Son and Spirit—created a community (male and female), redeems a community and will glorify a people. The Father called a people into existence named Israel and even now renews that same people by uniting Jew and Gentile into one people of God. Soteriology includes ecclesiology. The church, ultimately glorified in the kingdom, is the object of God’s saving work.

Even further, however, God not only saves individuals in community with others (ecclesiology) but also intends to redeem the whole creation. The telos of God is to reorder the cosmos under the headship of Jesus the Messiah (Ephesians 1:10) and reconcile everything in heaven and on earth to God through Christ (Colossians 1:20). God will redeem the creation itself as well as a people (Romans 8:18-26).

Ultimately, salvation is not about me, or us, or the creation. It is to the praise and glory of God the Father who elects a people in Christ to become the living presence of God in the creation by the power of the Spirit. This is the glory of God, that is, to rest with a redeemed people in a redeemed creation.

The Temporal Dimensions of Salvation

Applied soteriology is past, present and future in the lives of believers. Believers have already been saved, are in the process of being saved, and will yet be saved. This is exactly how Paul uses the terms “save” or “salvation” in his letters. Salvation is something already accomplished (Romans 8:24; Ephesians 2:5, 8; Titus 3:5)—it is something that happened in their own existential past. Salvation is also something yet to be experienced in the future (Romans 5:9-10; 13:11; 1 Thessalonians 5:8-9; 2 Timothy 2:10)—we will be saved in the future. Salvation is also a process which we currently experience; it is a refining fire and pleasing smell (2 Corinthians 2:15)—we are in the process of being saved.

This redemptive-historical soteriological structure is illustrated in Romans 6:22:

But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life.

In the past God freed us from sin and enslaved us to righteousness—we have been freed (justified) from sin (Romans 6:7). Yet this saving reality continues in the present as we move toward holiness (sanctification) which is the fruit of having been set free from the guilt and power of sin. Further, our goal (end, telos) is eternal life (glorification). This single verse—and we can find this emphasis in many other places in Paul—summarizes the past-present-future soteriological structure of Pauline theology. Those who have been justified (set free) presently seek holiness (sanctification) in view of the goal of eternal life (glorification).

Systematic theologians, especially Protestant ones, have generally summarized the past, present and future dimensions of salvation with the technical terms “justification” (past), “sanctification” (present), and “glorification” (future). This language is helpful as long as the temporal qualifier remains the significant point. The language is problematic when a term is strictly identified with a particular aspect of salvation (e.g., when justification becomes the essence of soteriology) or when biblical texts are made to conform to the theological language (e.g., when “righteousness” is forced into the mold of technical meaning of justification in texts like Acts 10:35).

In fact, Paul uses the language of “justified” or “righteousness” (justification) to refer to past, present and future soteriological realities. He does not limit “justification” (righteousness) to a past forensic declaration though he often refers to justification as a past event in the life of the believer (Romans 3:24; 5:1, 9). Rather, he calls believers to “pursue righteousness” (Romans 5:13, 16, 18, 19) in the present as obedient slaves of God. And, further, we will yet be justified in the future (Romans 2:6-10, 13) as we live even now in the “hope of righteousness” (Galatians 5:5).

Paul’s soteriological language is rich with diversity as his language is not rigidly tied to temporal location. Sanctification (holiness) is also past (1 Corinthians 6:11—sometimes called definitive or positional sanctification), present (1 Thessalonians 4:3—sometimes called progressive sanctification) and future (1 Thessalonians 5:23—sometimes called entire sanctification). Glorification is both present (2 Corinthians 3:18) and future (Romans 8:17). And we could do the same with other language such as liberation, redemption or spiritual. The point is that soteriology is comprehensive—it encompasses past, present and future. To limit salvation to one temporal aspect is reductionistic.

Soteriology as Definitive and Participatory

Union with Christ is not only about the event of forgiveness but the process of participating in the life of Christ. Soteriology, then, is both declarative and participatory.

God saved through a declarative act but also saves through our participation in the life to which God calls us. We are declared “in the right” (acquitted) by a divine act of righteous imputation in what theologians have historically called “justification” (or definitive sanctification) but we also pursue and become righteous through participation in the holiness of God in what theologians have historically called “sanctification” (or progressive sanctification or impartation of righteousness).

The definitive is a divine act which we receive by faith, but we participate in the reality of the definitive act through becoming what we have been declared to be in the righteous act of God. The definitive is what some call the indicative—it declares what God has done and stresses the saving act of God. God justifies, sanctifies and glorifies. The participatory is what some call the imperative—it calls us to live out the indicative in our personal lives, community and creation. Significantly, the indicative grounds and empowers the imperative.

This relationship between the indicative and imperative is common in Paul. Since we live in the Spirit, let us keep step with the Spirit (Galatians 5:25). Since God has demonstrated mercy toward us, let us be transformed by God rather then conformed to the world (Romans 12:1-2). Let us work out our salvation with fear and trembling because it is God who is at work in us (Philippians 2:12-13).

Believers do not simply receive the declaration of God’s justifying righteousness; they also pursue righteousness in order to become the righteousness of God (that is, the embodiment of God’s faithfulness in the world).

Believers are both passive and active in their salvation. They passively receive God’s justifying declaration through a living faith as beggars with an open hand, but they also actively pursue righteousness (holiness, sanctifiction) by a faith that works through love (Galatians 5:5-6) while at the same time passively receiving the empowerment (indicative) of the Spirit that enables faithful works of love.

While I think Paul maintains this balance in clear ways, many have stressed the Pauline definitive to the virtual loss of the participatory. If Western theology (especially Evangelicalism) had focused on the Gospels rather than Paul, perhaps the stress would lie on participation rather than definitiveness (as much of the Eastern church does in their concept of theosis). The call to discipleship in the kingdom of God in the Gospels emphasizes the participatory—we actively follow Jesus.

But it is not an either/or. Rather, it is a both/and. Salvation is both definitive and participatory. We accept God’s declaration by faith and we participate in God’s transforming work by pursuing righteousness, practicing kingdom life, and following Jesus. In this way we are both “justified by faith”—declared “in the right” by God’s righteous act in Jesus, and “justified by works” (doers of the law, Romans 2:13)—experience transformation through empowered right-living. The works (our “sanctification” and conformation to the image of Christ empowered by the Spirit of God) evidence our declaration (“justification”), embody our Christ-likeness, and bear witness to the reality of God’s kingdom in the world. By faith we are “in the right” (justified) and through good works (sanctification) we become what God has declared us to be.

We are declared “in the right” because we are united with Christ. United with Christ, we participate in the life of Christ as we become partakers of the divine nature (theosis). The theological goal of sanctification—our “entire sanctification” or glorification—is conformation to the image of God in Christ. We will become fully—in body and soul—like Christ in our future sanctification (resurrection).

The Triune Ground of Salvation

Faith is the means of justification, sanctification and glorification—to use Systematic Theology’s technical terms. In justification, faith receives God’s extrinsic declaration. In sanctification, faith participates in the life of Christ through works—faith works through love (Galatians 5:6). In glorification, faith hopes in the future to come and believers—those who have persevered in faith—will experience the fullness of God’s redemption.

But lying behind the imperative to believe (trust) is the ground of the divine indicative. The Father has justified us, continues to sanctify us and will glorify us. The faithfulness of the Son grounds our justification, models our sanctification and establishes glorified humanity. The Spirit generates faith in us, transforms us and will animate our bodies in the new heaven and new earth.

We are saved (justification) by grace (ground) through faith (means) unto good works (sanctification). This is God’s telos. God intends to redeem a people who will live as divine images (representatives) within the creation for the sake of the world and rest in God’s gracious, communing shalom.

So What?

Salvation, then, is about the present and the future. It is not only about living in the new heaven and new earth, but about rescue from the powers of darkness in the present evil age. Salvation is apocalyptic, that is, it redeems a people as part of the new age while still living in the old age. It is a new order within the old order—it is the kingdom of God present in the world.

Salvation, therefore, is not only about a personal decision for Jesus (e.g., a decision to follow Jesus into the water) and forgiveness, but it is also about discipleship and apprenticeship into the ministry of Jesus as a participant in the kingdom of God.

The saving work of God not only forgives but transforms. We are not only saved from sin but saved for good works (sanctification). The saving work of God not only prepares us for the new heaven and new earth but works through kingdom people in the present for the reclamation of the whole creation (both human and cosmic) for the kingdom of God. This work by God through the people of God not only involves proclaiming the good news of the kingdom but practicing the good news of the kingdom through reversing the curse.

The saving work of God manifests itself not only in believers assured of their forgiveness but in believers who proclaim the gospel and embody the good news of Jesus through “good works” (e.g., social justice, healing, benevolence, ecology, etc.). The church is the community of God that both proclaims the good news of the kingdom and practices it.

8 Comments | Theology | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by John Mark Hicks

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