About The Series In General
This will be the final entry directly on the subject of sanctifying grace being given in the Lord’s Supper. In past entries we have looked at: The Frequency Of The Lord’s Supper, If The Lord’s Supper Is Magic?, and Calvin’s View Of The Lord’s Supper. In the next few entries we will be turning to other aspects of the Lord’s Supper before moving on to baptism. Today we will examine the objection to the view that sanctifying grace is given in the Lord’s Supper which argues that such a view does away with the Protestant doctrine of “Faith Alone”.
Stating The Objection
The objection has been stated on here in the following form:
Our FAITH is what bestows grace (and that faith is also a gift from God). Belief in magic rituals that “force” God to bestow grace is unbiblical. Grace is not something we do acts to earn, it is a gift granted despite our complete inability to do anything to deserve it…
And summed up as
Grace granted as the result of an act isn’t grace, it is a wage that was earned.
Since sacraments have already been distinguished from “magic” in a previous post in which were given biblical examples of acts brining about God’s grace not being considered magic, I will first only briefly address the magic comment before moving onto the main trust of the argument.
What Is Magic?
Magic is the act of relying on a supernatural force to bring about some desired end. The supernatural force is under the command of the magician and in popular cultural is usually brought about by some kind of ritual.
A Christian sacrament on the other hand is a gift given by God to help the church perform it’s mission on earth. It is God who brings about the result of the sacrament, it does not rely on any power in the one who performs it. Whereas magic attempts to either appease or control of a supernatural power or being into performing the whim of the magician, there is no appeasement or control in a sacrament. Man does not force God to given grace in a sacrament, God freely gives it because it is a gift to the church.
A Comparison To Prayer
Why sacraments are accused on being magic, and doing away with “Faith Alone” and not prayer confuses me. One way to think of sacraments are prayers of physical matter. In prayer Christians ask for grace to be given them (Lord give me the strength to overcome XYZ so I can conform more to Christ) and in the Lord’s Supper one takes the bread and wine expecting help to become more like Christ. The only major difference in this respect is that one is spoken, and the other a physical action. If sacraments are magic rituals, then prayer is magic enchantments. We will return to this comparison of prayer later.
The Doctrine Of Faith Alone
No Protestant will argue with the importance of faith in the life of the believer. No Protestant will argue with the statement that “It is by faith alone that one is justified.” However, Protestants will differ on what that statement means. The first Reformers who championed the doctrine saw no contradiction between that doctrine and the belief the the sacraments bestow grace.
As we saw in the last entry, that was Calvin’s view, and it was also Luther’s, the greatest champion of the doctrine to to mention the hundreds of other Reformers who held similar views. One could argue, and it often is, that those Reformers were still caught up in some Roman Catholic doctrine and it was left to others to shed the remaining Roman Catholic doctrines. While such an argument may be made, futility I believe, all I wish to point out is that historically we need not see a break between sacramental grace and the doctrine of faith alone.
How Is That Possible
One modern evangelical writer who has bucked the trend of seeing the Lord’s Supper only as an act of remembrance, and has made room for grace being given in it is Wayne Grudem. Chapter 48 of Grudem’s Systematic Theology is entitled “Means of Grace Within The Church” and will be used to explain why sacraments and the doctrine of “faith alone” are not mutually contradictory.
Grudem begins by asking the question:
All of the blessings we experience in this life are ultimately undeserved - they are all of grace. In fact, for Peter, the entire Christian life is lived by grace (1 Peter 5:12).
But are there any special means that God uses to give additional grace to us? Specifically, within the fellowship of the church are there certain means - that is, activities, ceremonies, or functions - that God uses to give more grace to us? Another way of formulating that question is to ask whether there are certain means through which the Holy Spirit works to convey blessings into the life of the believer. Of course, personal prayer, worship, and Bible study, and personal faith, are all means through which God works to bring grace to us as individual Christians. But in this chapter we are dealing with the doctrine of the church, and we are asking specifically within the fellowship of the church what the means of grace are that God uses to bring blessing to us.
Grudem identifies 11 activities, ceremonies and functions that God uses to bestow grace on the believer (For example; teaching the word, prayer, worship, giving…etc). Two of them are ceremonies (Baptist and the Lord’s Supper) which are which are the sacraments. It is important to note that in Grudem’s understanding, and all orthodox Christians, these means are only avenues that the Holy Spirit uses. The ritual in and of itself does not bring about grace, but it is the Holy Spirit working through them that does.
On the Holy Spirit working through the sacraments Grudem is lock step with Calvin who said in section 19 of his Short Treatise On The Lord’s Supper:
But to understand this advantage properly, we must not suppose that our Lord warns, incites, and inflames our hearts by the external sign merely; for the principal point is, that he operates in us inwardly by his Holy Spirit, in order to give efficacy to his ordinance, which he has destined for that purpose, as an instrument by which he wishes to do his work in us.
Not Ex Opere Operato
Ex Opere Operato is a Latin term that means that the work of the sacrament being performed confers the grace to the recipient, for the sake of our discussion, regardless of their faith. Such a belief would do away with the Protestant doctrine of “faith alone”, but Grudem is clear that this is not what he means:
But on a Protestant view, the means of grace are simply means of additional blessing within the Christian life, and do not add to our fitness to receive justification from God (However, the Anglican Church teaches that baptism is “generally necessary” for Salvation [My Note: We will deal with this in a later post if we get to baptism]). Catholics teach that the means of grace impart grace whether or not there is subjective faith on the part of the minister or the recipient, while Protestants hold that God only imparts grace when there is faith on the part of the persons receiving these means.
Once again we can turn to prayer to see a correlation. Prayer must be made in faith, in fact prayer is an act of faith. It must be made by someone who is trusting in God, and they put that trust into action by, as the Westminster Shorter Catechism says “…offering up of our desires unto God, for things agreeable to his will, in the name of Christ, with confession of our sins, and thankful acknowledgement of his mercies.” The fact that the faith of a person is acted on in a way commanded by God to receive grace does not do away with the supremacy of faith in prayer just as it does not do away with it in the Sacraments. In the sacraments the faith of the person is acted on through the means that God has ordained (Baptism or the Lord’s Supper) and it is because of faith that the grace is given, just as in prayer.
Why Then External Ritual?
The obvious question at this point should be; “If it is faith that is what matters in the sacraments, why bother with the external sign?” This is a huge question and one that I can only deal with in part in this entry. For an excellent extended answer see Evangelical Is not Enough by Thomas Howard The simple answer, and one that I heard given this past weekend, is because God commands it, but such a view seems to make the sacraments into a burden instead of the gift that they are. Yes God commands participation in Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, but He does it for our own good. To base participation in them on a command is akin to saying the reason your use a gift is because your dad who gave it to you our of love forces you to. God knows that humans enjoy ritual, that the physical is something that humans need to connect with, and there is so much meaning locked up in the sacraments that participating in them makes the gospel come alive in ways that reading about them can not bring about.
Conclusion
Are sacraments magical? No, they are means that the Holy Spirit use to bring grace to the Church. Do sacraments do away with faith? No, faith is the heartbeat of them. They are nothing without faith on part of the recipient. Is there nothing then to the external ritual of them? No, God has ordained the rituals of the sacraments, they are the means that our faith is expressed. Will this explanation satisfy everyone? No the debate that been going on in Protestant churches since Luther and Zwingli, but I hope at least to have done away with some misconceptions on the topic.
Bryan, thanks for the series. Especially for writing it when you know that not very many here are going to agree with you.
I have to say that I do not understand Grudem’s language of “more grace.” Do we not have enough grace to save us by the faith we have in Jesus Christ? I fail to see what “more” of something that has already done its work is going to do for us.
Bryan, I too can appreciate your willingness to write something people are not in agreement with. That said, I still disagree but I understand your position better now. I found this quote from Grudem quite telling:
“Catholics teach that the means of grace impart grace whether or not there is subjective faith on the part of the minister or the recipient, while Protestants hold that God only imparts grace when there is faith on the part of the persons receiving these means.”
I believe that the Bible supports both views of grace. In fact, I believe that faith is impossible without grace and so the fact that we are even able to have faith is a work of grace. But yeah, perhaps Protestants have not emphasized what Grudem calls the Catholic teaching in this regard. Certainly grace is extended to all, even unbelievers.
44But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you;
45That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.
(Matthew 5:44, 45)
Colin, I believe the distinction Grudem is making with “more grace” is similar to the one I make between “saving grace” and “sanctifying grace”. I think that becasue in his 3rd formulation of it he’s saying “Another way of formulating that question is to ask whether there are certain means through which the Holy Spirit works to convey blessings into the life of the believer”. So he’s talking directly about how God works in the life of the believer instead of how a person is saved.
Chris (sorry to post this here),
My emails are being rejected by your spam filter. I don’t know if you can put me as safe or something?
There is a great deal of human logic in this blog posting, and not a lot of Scripture. The one that WAS cited seems to take away from the “magical sacraments” idea, indicating that for a believer EVERY act is an act of faith that results in grace.
Sure, communion may “grant grace” in the same way that prayer and singing songs of praise do. The comparison of the sacraments to prayer is in fact a good one. The words of a prayer themselves have no meaning. Even the most eloquent of speakers requires the Holy Spirit to “translate” for them into words that cannot be uttered. What is important is the seeking of unity with God and the submission and obedience to His will.
In the same way that reading the Bible “bestows grace” since it reminds and focuses us on the truth of what Christ did for us, so also do communion and Baptism. They are “outward reflections of inner change”. They do not CAUSE the change, they reflect the change that has already taken place. I completely agree though that communion is a powerful and meaningful symbol that ought to be performed reverently “as often as [we] do it”.
Colin, I don’t know why it does that sometimes. I can’t fix it. You might try it again. I have another address that I will email you, but I rarely check it.
I’m not sure where the magic term is significant.
It seems more appropriate to look at and use the term “miracle”.
A miracle is an event that by definition in supernatural; outside the laws of nature. With a belief in a supernatural being, God, miracles are possible that are events “above” nature.
Of course there are many miracles referred to in the bible, that often defy the laws of nature. This would not be surprising for a believer. One could argue that there are many compelling examples of miracles today. The term “magic” in my book is usually associated with witchcraft and other cases that are linked with the other end of the supernatural spectrum like the Devil or demons. It’s my contention that a supernatural event or being for that matter is of one or the other; i.e. of God or of Satan’s side of the supernatural.
With that clarification, if we are talking about sacraments from God and instituted by Jesus, it’s fair to call them miracles with God’s Grace as it involves a supernatural interaction in our natural life.
The book “Miracles” by CS Lewis does an excellent job developing this concept.
It’s also quite reasonable to have a sacrament or a miracle not make “sense” in our minds as our capacity to understand supernatural things are beyond our comprehension. When we apply our earthly knowledge in a almost secular manner, these things probably seem bizarre.
The Last Supper and many of Jesus words to his Apostles prior to his death didn’t make any sense to the Apostles. These Mysteries require the gift of Faith and Grace for us to accept and receive.
Having something the Bible teaches not make sense it one thing. Have something developed whole clothe from human logic with NO Biblical support is another. Where we make up stuff that isn’t in the Bible, it doesn’t matter much whether it appears “bizarre” to earthly knowledge. The fact that this doesn’t make sense Scripturally OR logically though just makes it that much more obviously wrong. Find me one passage supporting the idea that taking communion confers grace. There is definitely one claiming that taking it disrespectfully will confer damage, but nowhere does the Bible teach that Communion is any more significant than any other act of obedience we perform (except that it provides us a clear reminder of what Christ did for us).
If the Bible says something apparently bizarre, I will accept it. If men say something apparently bizarre, I retain my right to be incredulous.
Atanamis, I wasn’t trying to quote a lot of scripture, perhaps I assumed that people would recognize the different understanding of the verses that this view comes from and I guess I was mistaken in this…however, there is a biblical basis and Grudem lays it out on page 954-955 of the first edition of his Systematic Theology. I’m sure you’ll take issue with his interpretation but since I don’t have time this week to write my own here is what he says:
Grudem doesn’t completely spiritualize what Christ says about the Lord’s Supper, nor does he understand it in the way the Roman Catholic Church does. He takes the Reformed middle road (so he gets hit from both sides). You can disagree with his understanding of the passages (As in, does John 6 have any connection to the Lord’s Supper?) but the Reformed tradition is in this respect is based on scripture, but I was going for a more philosophical defense of this doctrine in these post since I thought that the various debates over the verses in question were well known.
Jesus had no problem referring to God as Father - specifically. Several times referring to Him as Abba (Daddy). When people want to refer to verses in scripture which describe God as a mother hen or a woman in labor you are really misinterpreting the point. Those phrases are similes. The definition of a simile is a figure of speech that expresses a resemblance between things of different kinds - usually using ‘like’ or ‘as’. Every single one of those verses that were referenced earlier begins with the word as. That is a simile. It is a comparison to the original - not the real thing. Jesus repeatedly referred to God as Father. Why do we want to change that image? I understand people have had horrible experiences with earthly fathers, but come on - what better image then to compare that God our heavenly Father is NOTHING like that! Someone very close to me was raised by an abusive, apathetic, non-loving earthly father. In fact, the person will only refer to him as his B.F. - biological father. I don’t have time to tell you the things he suffered because and from this man. But he has NO problem whatsoever in seeing God as his Father. God is the Father he never had. He is the complete opposite of his B.F. It brings him comfort to know that God the Father is all of the things his earthy father was not. And now that he is a father himself, he strives to be like God the Father and not his BF. Though he admits his BF was a great teacher because he taught him that he did not want to be like him. I do not think that is a valid argument or excuse for people refusing to address God in the masculine form. It’s an excuse. Period.