The Nature of Saving Faith A

Someone may be saved without grasping the full reality of the Lordship of Christ. Someone may be saved without fully understanding the call to obedience, because no one told them about it. But listen, no one who is saved will fail to repent, will fail to submit, or fail to obey. Welcome to Grace to You with John MacArthur.

I'm your host, Phil Johnson. So why should you proclaim the gospel? Well, one obvious reason is you don't want people to go to hell, and loving your neighbor means doing what you can to spare them that fate. But the gospel message is a hard one to accept. It tells people they're sinners.

And calls them to repent. So should you soften the gospel, make it easier to accept? Well, the truth is, the Bible says the path to salvation is narrow, and you need to offer people precise directions. You need to proclaim the gospel Jesus taught, hard truths and all.

John MacArthur is helping make sure you know those precise and demanding truths in this current study. Here's John with today's lesson. John MacArthur brought a message on salvation. He argued that to tell unsaved people they must surrender to Christ is the same as preaching salvation by works. He defined salvation as the unconditional gift of everlasting life given to people who believe the facts about Christ whether or not they choose to obey Him. And one of his main points was that salvation may or may not alter a person's behavior. Transformed character, he said, is desirable, but even if no change in lifestyle occurs, the one who has believed the facts of the gospel and received Christ can rest in the certainty of forgiveness and heaven.

That's pervasive in our society. Preaching today, multitudes approach Christ on those very terms. They think there's no real price to pay. They respond eagerly when offered forgiveness. They respond eagerly when offered the prospect of heaven, victory over death. They have no sense of the severity of their guilt before God. They have no desire to be freed particularly from sin's bondage, and they certainly have no overwhelming desire to obey Christ. And I'm convinced that such people are deceived by a corrupt gospel.

The faith they are receiving and the faith they are relying on is only intellectual acquiescence or maybe emotional grasping of something or someone to solve their problems and will not save. Yet, this is the most common form of evangelism, and many are preaching this kind of weak, deceptive message. Now, I suppose we need to ask the question, is this new?

And the answer, frankly, is it isn't new at all. And if you follow church history from the fathers who lived just after the early church right up until today, you will find that this kind of gospel of easy believism has always been espoused. And people were reacting to it through all the history of the church, postulating and affirming the difference between that gospel and the true gospel. For example, pick one shining light in the history of the Christian church by the name of Martin Luther. Now, Martin Luther fought more than anyone for the truth that man is saved by what? By faith and not by works.

He never wavered on his insistence that works, however, are necessary to validate faith. In the preface, for example, of Martin Luther's commentary on Romans, he wrote this, This is not something dreamed, a human illusion, although this is what many people understand by the term. Whenever they see that it is not followed either by an improvement in morals or by good works, while much is still being said about faith, they fall into the error of declaring that faith is not enough, that we must do works if we are to become upright and attain salvation. The reason is that when they hear the gospel, they miss the point. In their hearts and out of their own resources, they conjure up an idea which they call belief, which they treat as genuine faith. While the same, it is but a human fabrication, an idea without a corresponding experience in the depths of the heart.

It is therefore ineffective and not followed by a better kind of life. They just call it faith. Luther goes on to write in the commentary on Romans, Oh, when it comes to faith, what a living, creative, active, powerful thing it is. It cannot do other than good at all times. It never waits to ask whether there is some good work to do.

Rather, before the question is raised, it has done the deed and keeps on doing it. A man not active in this way is a man without faith. He is groping about forefaith and searching for good works, but knows neither what faith is nor what good works are. Nevertheless, he keeps on talking nonsense about faith and good works. It is impossible indeed to separate works from faith, just as it is impossible to separate heat and light from fire."

So said Martin Luther. There is a false faith, a dreamy faith, an illusion that changes nothing that's not saving faith. You come all the way down into the modern time and you read writer after writer after writer affirming the necessity for a true faith which results in an absolutely and totally transformed life. There are a myriad of quotes that could be given to substantiate that this has been the character of the church's doctrine through all the years since the New Testament. But bringing it right into the modern time, a quote from A.W.

Pink, who said much on this subject, by the way, but in 1937, listen to what he wrote. The terms of Christ's salvation are erroneously stated by the present-day evangelist. With very rare exceptions, the present-day evangelist tells his hearers that salvation is by grace and is received as a free gift, that Christ has done everything for the sinner and nothing remains but for him to believe, to trust in the infinite merits of his blood. And so widely does this conception now prevail in orthodox circles, so frequently has it been dimmed in their ears, so deeply has it taken root in their minds, that for one to now challenge it and denounce it as being so inadequate and one-sided as to be deceptive and erroneous is for him to instantly court the stigma of being a heretic and to be charged with dishonoring the finished work of Christ by inculcating salvation by works. End quote.

Exactly the same issue. There was in those days a message of the evangelists which called for a belief that brought about no change and anyone who spoke against it was accused of preaching salvation by works. Pink says, salvation is by grace, by grace alone.

Nevertheless, divine grace is not exercised at the expense of holiness for it never compromises with sin. It is also true that salvation is a free gift, but an empty hand must receive it and not a hand which still tightly grasps the world. Something more than believing is necessary to salvation. A heart that is steeled in rebellion against God cannot savingly believe.

It must first be broken. And only those who are spiritually blind would declare that Christ will save any who despise his authority and refuse his yoke. Those preachers who tell sinners they may be saved without forsaking their idols, without repenting, without surrendering to the lordship of Christ are as erroneous and dangerous as others who insist that salvation is by works and that heaven must be earned by their own efforts.

End quote. Why didn't people listen? Why didn't they listen to the early fathers who espoused a faith that produced a transformed life? Why don't they listen today? Why is it that people do not hear when we say that a gospel that does not affirm repentance and confession and submission to Christ as Lord is not complete? Well, I think the answer is because the appeals of an easy believism get outward results.

Did you get that? I think they get outward results. People respond. You make the gospel easy, people respond, people come forward, they come down the aisle, you count the numbers, so many were saved. And what we have today is a form of evangelism that was really stylized and popularized by Charles G. Finney who developed the invitational system as we know it today.

Charles G. Finney was an upstate New York lawyer with no formal theological training of any kind. He had a skilled logical mind. He was converted in 1821.

He became a popular evangelist and revivalist. He believed completely that salvation was a result of a human choice. He believed that man could make that human choice because he was not by nature depraved. He had a certain bent toward sin but it was not his constitution and so he had the ability within him to choose what is right. And so Finney determined that since man could do what is right, since he was not innately depraved, that what you had to do was work on the will of man.

And if you could activate the will of man or motivate the will of man, he would make the right choice. But as you went behind the scenes to check into what was left after Finney did his work, his fellow workers couldn't help realize the small number of converts who ever remained faithful. In a letter to Finney dated December 25, 1834, James Boyle asked these questions. Let us look over the fields where you and others and myself have labored as revival ministers and what is now their moral state?

What was their state within three months after we left them? I have visited and revisited many of these fields and groaned in spirit to see the sad, frigid, carnal, contentious state into which the churches had fallen and fallen very soon after we first departed from among them. In fact, many who evaluated the ministry of Finney were convinced that sinners emotionally, but not spiritually awakened, became hardened and skeptical.

Now let me say this and I want you to hear this. Someone may be saved without understanding the full truth of repentance. Someone may be saved without grasping the full reality of the lordship of Christ. Someone may be saved without fully understanding the call to obedience because no one told them about it. But listen, no one who is saved will fail to repent, will fail to submit, or fail to obey.

That's the issue. Someone said, you know, when the gospel was presented to me, nobody told me about the lordship of Christ. Nobody told me about repentance. Nobody told me that my life needed to be in submission to Him in obedience. Well the only question is, did you repent? Do you desire to submit to Christ?

Is your heart's cry to obey Him? If the answer is yes, then thank God that the salvation was real even though the message was incomplete. Some may think that I question the genuineness of anyone who has converted to Christ without a full understanding of His lordship.

That is not the case. In fact, I'm certain that while some understand more than others, no one who is saved fully understands all the implications of Jesus' lordship at the moment of conversion. But I'm equally certain that no one can be saved who is either unwilling to obey or consciously rebellious against the lordship of Christ. And the mark of true salvation is that it always produces a heart that knows and feels its responsibility to respond to the ever awakening reality of the lordship of Christ.

Turn in Luke to chapter 14 for a moment. Verse 25, great multitudes were going along with him and he turned and said to them, Now this is Jesus giving a gospel invitation. If anyone comes to me and doesn't hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.

Now how is that for an invitation? I mean if somebody said to you, now I want you to go out this afternoon and I want you to give the gospel to all these people in the park. And what I want you to say to them is this, if any of you do not come to Christ and hate your father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters and even hate your own life, you can't be his disciple.

You'd think they lost their mind. You'd say you can't win people like that. Then he said in verse 27, whoever doesn't carry his own cross and come after me can't be my disciple.

In other words, willing to die. And which one of you when he wants to build a tower doesn't first sit down and calculate the cost to see if he has enough to complete it? Otherwise when he's laid a foundation and is not able to finish it, all who observe it began to ridicule him, saying this man began to build and wasn't able to finish. Or what king when he sets out to meet another king in battle will not first sit down and take counsel whether he is strong enough with 10,000 men to encounter the one coming against him. Or else while the other is still far away sends a delegation and asks terms of peace. So therefore no one of you can be my disciple who doesn't give up all his possessions. My, my, pretty demanding invitation.

Hate your family? Be willing to give your life? Be willing to give up all your possessions?

Count the cost. I believe in salvation by faith, purely by grace. But when God in his grace is working a true salvation it has these kind of ingredients. You see, genuine salvation requires true faith. It's not enough to have fantasy faith, dreamy faith, faith that is an illusion. It has to be faith that is the right kind of faith.

That's the issue. Yes, Paul said to the Philippian jailer, if you want to be saved believe in the Lord Jesus Christ and you'll be saved. Whosoever believeth shall be saved. But the question is what kind of faith? What kind of faith are we talking about? Now first of all to answer that question we have to say that there is a faith that doesn't save. Let's go to John's gospel, chapter 2.

We could use a lot of illustrations but I want you to follow very closely. In John 2 23, when Jesus was in Jerusalem at the Passover during the feast many believed in his name. Just note that, would you? Many believed in his name, that is in who he was. No doubt believing him to be the great prophet, probably many of them believing him to be the Messiah. They believed in his name, beholding his signs which he was doing. But Jesus on his part was not entrusting himself to them.

For he knew all men and because he did not need anyone to bear witness concerning man, for he himself knew what was in man and he knew their faith was not true faith. They believed but their believing was not adequate. It was not genuine. It was not saving faith. To put it simply he had no faith in their faith. He didn't believe in their believing. He knew it was not the genuine work of the Spirit of God. And if he talked of sacrifice and when he talked of repentance and when he talked of a cross they would be gone. And Jesus would not accept a moment's emotional decision. He would not accept a faith born of selfishness. Go to John chapter 6. Everybody would like absolution from sin and the promise of immortality in heaven.

But that could be born of sheer selfishness. In John 6.14, when therefore the people saw the sign which he had performed they said, This is of a truth. And that of course was the miracle of the loaves and fish.

This is of a truth, the prophet, the prophet, the one promised in the Old Testament the Messiah who is to come into the world. Jesus therefore perceiving that they were intending to come and take him by force to make him king withdrew again to the mountain by himself alone. He wanted nothing to do with their kind of faith. They believed he was the Messiah. They wanted to force him into their plans.

He wanted nothing to do with it. In the 66th verse of that chapter, would you please note, after his very strong teaching that you have to eat my flesh and drink my blood, you have to be willing to accept my death, my sacrifice and those things which he called for in terms of their dedication. It says, many of his disciples withdrew and were not walking with him anymore. And he separated them from the true ones when he said to the twelve, You do not want to go away also, do you? And Simon Peter answered him, representative of the true believers, Lord, to whom shall we go?

You have words of eternal life and we have believed and have come to know that you are the holy one of God. And Jesus said, Yeah, except for one of you who's a devil. So even in the midst of those who followed Jesus, there were some who momentarily believed and wanted to make him a king.

There were some who believed for a little while, but when the talk became difficult, they left. And there was Judas who never truly believed to salvation, but hung around to the very end to get what he could get out of it. Look at John 8, verse 30. And again, Jesus is dialoguing with the Jewish leaders. Verse 30 says, As he spoke these things, many came to believe in him.

Sounds good. Might sound like salvation to some, except Jesus, therefore, was saying to those Jews who had believed him, If you abide in my word, then you are truly disciples of mine. Pretty straight. That little section of scripture was the first great introduction that I ever had to this subject. You're a true disciple when you abide in his word.

Look at chapter 12 and verse 42. Nevertheless, many even of the rulers believed in him. Again, they believed, but because of the Pharisees, they were not confessing. They wouldn't publicly acknowledge him, lest they would be un-synagogued. For they loved the approval of men rather than the approval of God. They wanted the approval of men.

They were going to believe up to a point. Verse 26, back up to it, it kind of explains where they were. If anyone serves me, let him follow me.

Let him follow me. If anyone serves me, let him follow me. In John 15, again, Jesus points out the Judas branch, the temporary believer, the temporary disciple. If you abide in me, and I in you as a branch cannot bear fruit of itself, and lest it abides in the vine, so neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches, he who abides in me, and I in him he bears much fruit, but apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me, is thrown away as a branch, dries up, they gather them, cast them into the fire, and they are burned.

There are some who stay for a while and disappear. And then that most insightful of all passages with relation to this matter of faith, James 2, let's look at it very briefly. James 2, verse 14. What use is it, my brethren, very important statement, what use is it if a man says he has faith, but he has no works?

What use is it? Can that faith what? Save him.

What's the answer? No, no, can't save him. Can faith like that save?

What good is it? Verse 19 really pinpoints it. You believe that God is one. You do well. The devils also believe and shudder. That's a tremendous statement. You believe that God is one.

You do well. The devils also believe and shudder. They're one up on you. They believe and shudder. You believe and you think you're saved.

They're ahead of you. Demons have all the right theology, but they will not bow to the lordship of Christ. They will not bow to the sovereignty of God. They chose rebellion. They hate good and they cherish evil. In a sense, dead faith is inferior to demon faith.

At least they tremble. So you can see from these verses that there is a faith that doesn't save. You're listening to John MacArthur, Chancellor of the Masters University and Seminary in the Los Angeles area. And the message you heard today is from his study, The Gospel According to Jesus. You know, John, what we're seeing about the cost of being a follower of Christ, that may be a hard message for some people to hear. And along that line, John, you have a letter in front of you from a woman who, by her own admission, basically found your teaching hard to take. I'll let you take it from there.

Yeah, well, that could be true for a lot of reasons. This is a letter from Joanne down in Glendale, Arizona. Let me read it to you. I was raised in works religion. That's salvation by good works, but walked away from it at 16. At 18, I found myself in a charismatic church. Thus began 40 plus years of being steeped in the charismatic movement. Sad to say I stayed away from your books, meaning mine and your sermons, as I was told that you preached a dead gospel.

World events in 2020, namely the elections and the covid pandemic, really shook me. So I ran to YouTube to hear what all my prophetic people were saying. God in his infinite mercy opened my eyes to all their deception. I floundered for a while, not knowing what to believe.

40 years of believing in a certain way is hard to shake. But by 2022, I started listening to your teaching. My soul rejoiced and I couldn't get enough.

I now have bought many of your books and I listened to the entire strange fire conference. My soul now truly belongs to the Lord Jesus, and I'm so hungry for God's word. And she says, thank you for being faithful to teach the word of God signs her name, Joanne. Forty years of being steeped in a false understanding of religion could be a death sentence, except for the fact that the gospel, Romans one, is the power of God unto salvation.

It breaks all the bondage. That's wonderful. And through these radio broadcasts and through our books and through the Web site, audio studies, podcasts, television programs, everything we do, we are unleashing God's word in the lives of really millions of people around the world.

And it always does its work and never returns void. Thank you, Joanne, for that letter. What a joy for us. By the way, before I let you go, when you support Grace To You, you participate in giving countless people like Joanne life changing divine truth. Be a partner, sustain that partnership and pray with us. Thanks for standing on the truth. And a special thanks if you're one of the great partners who regularly supports us.

That's right. And thank you, John. Friend, if you have a story like the one you just heard from Joanne, or if you know someone who has come to Christ because of these daily radio broadcasts, we'd love to hear your story. So contact us today. You can write to Grace To You, P.O. Box 4000, Panorama City, California, 91412. You can also send an email to letters at GTY.org.

Again, that's letters at GTY.org. And just a reminder that Grace To You is a listener supported ministry. It's giving from friends like you that helps us connect people like Joanne with life changing biblical truth. To partner with us, you can mail your tax-deductible gift to Grace To You, P.O.

Box 4000, Panorama City, California, 91412. Or you can call us at 800-55-GRACE. That's 800-55-GRACE. Or donate online at GTY.org. And while you're at our website, be sure to take advantage of the thousands of free Bible study tools, including daily devotionals and 3500 sermons that will help you get all you can from your study of God's Word day by day. You'll also find free mobile apps, Grace To You television broadcasts, compelling blog articles, and more. Check our website often at GTY.org. Now for John MacArthur and the entire Grace To You staff, I'm Phil Johnson. Be sure to watch Grace To You television this Sunday, Direct TV, Channel 378. And then be here Monday for another 30 minutes of unleashing God's truth, one verse at a time, on Grace To You.