Arguably the best-known figure of the Reformation, Martin Luther considered justification by faith alone—sola fide—to be the article on which the church stands or falls. Indeed, it was the Reformer’s position that it is by faith alone that we receive the righteousness of Christ and thus participate in him, such that we can stand before God as spotless. Luther gained this understanding through wrestling with the book of Romans. We see a glimpse of his reading of that book in thesis 25 of the 1518 Heidelberg Disputation:
25: He is not righteous who does much, but he who, without work, believes much in Christ.
For the righteousness of God is not acquired by means of acts frequently repeated, as Aristotle taught, but it is imparted by faith, for “He who through faith is righteous shall live” (Rom. 1[:17]), and “Man believes with his heart and so is justified” (Rom. 10[:10]).
Luther reorders faith and works: works is the result of that declared righteousness which comes from God, rather than the cause that merits God’s favour. Luther thus refocused the Christian life: it is now centred not on measuring one’s works but on the God who gives grace.
Medieval and Catholic positions of how righteousness is obtained focused on human beings doing their best and contributing their part while anticipating that God would count them as worthy of merit (congruent merit), thus leading to an unhealthy introspection that troubles the conscience. In contrast, Luther focused all of his emphases on the God who confers righteousness: “For this reason he does not seek to become justified or glorified through them, but seeks God.” This leads to Luther articulating righteousness in two ways: passively and actively. Before God, we have a passive righteousness which receives his word and redemptive acts in Christ. As we live by faith, we have an active righteousness which pursues the good of our neighbour. We receive righteousness and live out of that by loving our neighbour.
We are righteous, then, not by virtue of our works or intrinsic righteousness, but by virtue of the righteousness of Christ––an alien righteousness that is declared ours by God’s word, which is received by us through faith alone. Luther argues that the righteousness from God consists not in recognition of anything we have done but in a declarative and creative act of God. While the former posits God as recognizing the reality of our works and sees them as in some way worthy of merit, the latter claims that it is God’s word which creates the reality that he loves in us. Hence, thesis 28 of the disputation says this:
28: The love of God does not find, but creates, that which is pleasing to it. The love of man comes into being through that which is pleasing to it.
Far from being a legal fiction, then, the word that is received by faith alone is a creative act of God: it does not merely change one’s status before him;it reveals and kills sin while vivifying sinners into new life.
Luther’s views here developed and transformed what he learned from his medievalist and nominalist background under the tutelage of the likes of Gabriel Biel, which emphasized that the divine word and will have the power to alter and create new realities. God’s dealings with his creatures are not constrained by external realities or creation. Instead, he deals with creation by his ordained power. God owes no one anything, and can do as he pleases. Creatures must trust his word on its own terms. The upshot of this for faith and one’s relationship with God, then, is that though creatures are not really worthy before him, God can declare them worthy, and indeed, by faith, that same word transforms them. Faith grasps God’s revelation.
Living by faith, then, is no mere assent, nor is it a work that merits God’s favour, but rather that which orients the whole of human life. Outside of faith, doing works only adds to one’s guilt, for it wrongly presumes that God’s favour can be gained outside of trust in his word and Christ. Through faith, however, works follow the creative word of God that changes one’s status and nature by grace. The status that God gives to us goes hand in hand with the new reality of who we are by faith.
Sola fide, then, as articulated by Luther, is much more than what is perhaps assumed in contemporary evangelical discourse, in which it is primarily meant to communicate that our judicial status of righteousness is gained by faith alone in Christ. Living by faith alone is meant to encapsulate the proper relationship between human beings and God, for it expresses God for who he is: the redeemer who promises and the one who bestows life. Simultaneously it expresses us for who we are: creatures dependent upon the word of God. Faith, then, is related not just to the judicial aspect of salvation, but to the whole of the Christian life—it grounds proper piety and moral action before the presence of God and the world. Retrieving a proper understanding of sola fide, then, should cause us to avoid the mistake of thinking that salvation by grace provides a license for libertinism or moral laziness; it is instead an anchor for proper Christian living just as much as it grounds our status before God.
Nathaniel Gray Sutanto is currently a doctoral candidate at New College, the University of Edinburgh. His academic writings have appeared, recently, in the International Journal of Systematic Theology and the International Journal for the Philosophy of Religion. He is also an elder and theologian at Covenant City Church (CCC), Jakarta, Indonesia. You can follow him and CCC on Instagram: @graysutanto and @covenantcitychurch.
