In this episode, Trent and Jimmy Akin team up to debate two Protestants, Samuel Nesan and Dr. Stephen Boyce, on the doctrine of justification.

Transcription:

Host: Alright. All right. Thank you you guys for joining me. Thank you. Thank you for joining me. I’m excited for this one. I’m glad we was able to hash out all the information. If you guys only understood how I was standing by my phone in my email, look for correspondence between you guys, man, trying to make sure you guys get the information to each other. Man, it was a long state, a long ordeal, put it that way. But I appreciate you guys dealing with being patient and everything. So we’re going to jump into this debate, but before we jump into it, I’m going to give you guys a chance to introduce yourselves to the audience. Let ’em know what you do. Blogs, YouTube channel. Y’all are popular guys, so they probably already know who you are, but you never know. It may be one or two out there that do not know who you are all. So start with Trent and Jamie, if you don’t mind giving a quick introduction of yourself.
Horn:
Well, my name is Trent Horn. I am a Catholic apologist. I am a staff apologist Catholic Answers been there for about 12 years. I have a podcast, the Council of Trent, C-O-U-N-S-E-L, bill on iTunes, Google Play, and of course on YouTube. I’m the author of I think about a dozen books by now and I’m married and have three children.
Akin:
Alright, Jimmy. And my name is Jimmy Aiken. I’m a Christian apologist and a Catholic apologist in particular. I am the senior apologist at Catholic Cancers. I’ve been working there for over 30 years now and I’m on a bunch of podcasts. The most famous one, which is in this week, it’s a top 10 podcast on Apple for documentary podcasts. It’s called Jimmy Aikens Mysterious World. I look at all kinds of mysterious subjects and it’s family friendly show and you can get to it by going to mysterious fm.
Host:
Alright. All right, thank you Trent and Jimmy for joining me. Appreciate it. All right, Dr. Steven, boy and Sam, I got your name screwed up, but don’t worry about that. Go ahead and give a quick introduction yourself, Sam, one of y’all.
Nesan:
So can you hear me?
Host:
Yeah, we can hear you. You’re breaking up a little bit, but let’s see if it stables itself out.
Nesan:
Perfect. Alright, well I’m Samuel, not Steven Bo, I wish. Yeah. But yeah, I’m an Christian apologist and I’m also the director of the Great Commission Apologetics program at Malaysia Baptist Geological Seminary. I teach there, I’ve been teaching there since 21. And I’m also the co-founder and president of Explain International and Ministry dedicated to equipping Christians to explain their faith in fulfilling the Great Commission.
Boyce:
And I’m Steven Boyce. I am an apologist as well. Specifically have my own program called Facts, which is an acronym for Fathers apocryphal, Canon texts and scripture. Our main focus is particularly early church history in defending the Christian faith from its early formations. I’m also a part of a scholarship working in the scholar program with RTB Reasons to Believe with Dr. Hugh Ross, which is mostly in the sciences, but lately they’ve been bringing in textual criticism and canonicity as well, which is what I did my PhD in. I’m also a teacher, I teach apologetics to 11th to 12th graders and high school and I’m also an adjunct professor in addition to what Samuel does with Malaysia Baptist Theological Seminary. I’m also an Anglican and have recently been working with the Anglican diocese that I’m a part of the Diocese of the Carolinas where fax has been sanctioned to be used a part of its equipping process.
Host:
Alright, thank you guys for those introductions and we’re going to jump right into it. And the topic of today’s debate is how should we understand justification? We’ll be approaching this from a biblical and a historical church historical standpoint. A first part of the debate will be from a biblical standpoint and we’ll start that with 10 minute opening statements. It’ll be five minute rebuttals, then it’d a 15 minute cross section. Both opponents will be get a chance to ask each other’s questions and then audience keep this in mind as well. There will be a 15 minute q and a right after that. So you guys got to get your questions in. Now we’re going to use that same format for the second part of this debate, which is what did the early church believe about justification and where we approach the debate from a church historical standpoint. And once again the format would be 10 minute openings, five minute rebuttals, and then 15 minute cross-examination where both parties get to ask questions. And once again after that, that will introduce another 15 minute q and a from our audience. And then after all of that we’ll have a seven minute closing statement from each team and then that will conclude the debate for tonight. Are we all on the same page with that?
Alright, with that said, Samuel, you’ll be presenting a biblical argument. And Samuel, I believe that you will be presenting first here. And so I will bring the screen up here so that you will have the floor and I will start your time. Give me a second, Samuel, before you go for it. Let me get your audio and everything situated. And so Samuel, you have 10 minutes and I’ll start your time and you begin to speak
Nesan:
Thank Jimmy and Trent for being open and having this discussion on an important topic that is the topic of justification. Specifically I’ll be dealing with the question, what justifies a person before? And perhaps it’s good to deal with the definitions before we get started. Thanks Jimmy for doing the slides for me. So let’s move to definitions. Let’s begin by defining justification because one of the key texts for this debate is Romans 3 28. That is we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law. So these things need to be justified to be defined. And so let’s begin with the word justification. It comes from the Greek word, the cayo, and it means to render right or just to hold as guiltless or to accept as righteous. I’m using Jimmy’s favorite lexicon here that is mount as lexicon. The word fate on the other hand.
Number two comes from the Greek with and can refer to faith, belief firm, persuasion of firm conviction. Now I look forward to having a discussion between what kind of faith we’re talking about here. Is it fiduciary faith? Is it fi for matter formed faith? That’s an important discussion to have, but we’ll get into that in just a minute. The third one that we need to define, and this is perhaps important, very important especially when discussing what works is works can refer to according to mounds are gone, can refer to anything done or to be done. That is a duty we have before God be the 10 commandments, be it the sacraments, whatever we need to do before God counts as works now that’s it. Let’s discuss this point. When we say that we are justified by faith alone, do we mean that it is a ascent which is delo from any commitment to charity?
Well, no. In fact Luther in his definition of faith, the next slide says Faith is God’s work in us. That is that it gives us new birth from God and is working of John one 13. It changes our heart. There is regeneration and he goes on to say faith cannot help doing good works constantly. It doesn’t stop to ask if good works ought to be done, but before anyone asks, it already has done them and continue to do them without seizing anyone who does not do good works based on Luther’s definition in this manner is an unbeliever. Now Kelvin says something similar as well, which I think we may find a little bit of common ground, especially when we discuss Fe is for mother and that is Kelvin says indeed we confess that with Paul that no other faith justifies but faith working through love here is interacting with Galatians five, six. So I’m going to be making three contention. The first contention I’m making would be that saving faith is a gift of God which is attained through the merits of Christ. Apart from works now this is the two most light star. Thanks Jimmy.
The next one. Yeah, thank you. Alright, so saving fate is a gift of God which is attained through the merits of Christ. Apart from works we see in Ephesians two was eight to nine, maybe we could just flash all the verse up. I won’t be covering all of them due to time, but Ephesians two was eight to nine says four, by grace you have been saved through faith. This is not of your own doing, it is the gift of God, not of works as anyone should boast in Acts 1348, as many as were appointed unto eternal life believed. So God’s appointment precedes them. Believing Acts 16 tells us that the Lord opened up her heart referring to Lydia that she would pay attention to what was being said by Paul. And so we see even in one John five, four, everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world.
And what is that victory? Well, John tells us that this is the victory that has overcome the world, our faith. And so through these passages we see that faith is a gift of God. That is something we attain based on the merits of Christ and not based on anything we do. Number two, this faith and I call it saving faith to be distinguished from just a mere intellectual ascent Dewars from the good works that we see described in James chapter two. This faith is accompanied by the good works and I’ll define that in just a minute. But it stems from the new birth of regeneration and it includes among good works, genuine repentance, godly living, a genuine hunger and thirst for righteousness, a demonstration of the fruits of the spirit and participation in the sacraments and so on. So now Peter the Apostle Peter deals with this in two Peter chapter one, he begins in verse one by saying Simeon Peter servant an apostle of Jesus Christ to those who have obtained a faith of equal standing widows by the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
So notice it is a faith that is equal standing with Peter. Yes, you and I believers have the faith of equal standing with the Apostle Peter himself, but it is not based on what we’ve done. It is based on the merits or the works or the righteousness of our God and Savior Jesus Christ. And in fact, Peter urges the church was five to say for this very reason, make every effort to supplement your faith with virtue, virtue with knowledge, and goes on to add brotherly love dealing with affection and among other things that we need to supplement the faith with. He goes on to say in verse nine, for whoever lacks these qualities is so nearsighted that he is blind having forgotten he was cleansed from his former sins. And so Peter sums us up by telling us that we ought to be diligent in verse 10 that confirm our calling an election.
So based on this one sees that the faith we received is a fate from God. But this is no intellectual, mere intellectual ascent. It is a faith that is accompanied by repentance, by godly living. It is demonstrating the fruits of the spirit. It is supplementing that faith with the fruits of that fate, namely virtue, steadfastness godliness and brotherly affection among other things. And so when we look at this particular view of this that leads to the third and final part of this, that is that the saving fate we receive from God is both eternal, that it brings about eternal life and as the sole basis for our justification before God. Philippians one, six gives us the promise that he who began a good work in you will complete it until the day of Jesus Christ. Again, this is not just someone saying, well I believe but does not demonstrate it.
The demonstration of that fate is fruits of the genuine fate working itself out through love. First Peter three, five says, blessed be the God and father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who according to his abundant mercy has begotten us again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead to an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled that does not fade away, reserved in heaven for you. That’s the promise. And look at verse five, who are kept by the power of God, true faith for salvation to be revealed in the last time. So we are kept by the power of God, not based on our own doing, but we’re kept true faith and it demonstrates, it reveals the good works that God is working within us. Now in my closing few minutes, just what I want do is to just demonstrate this saving faith, all that I’ve discussed here.
That is number one, that this saving faith is a gift of God attained through the merits of Christ by faith, this faith, sorry, is attained by the merits of Christ. And number two, this faith is demonstrated or evidence by good words, it stems from a regenerated heart. And number three, it results in godly living. And when we look through the patriarchs of the Old Testament, we see of course that Adam sinned before God and we find a beautiful promise of Genesis three 15 where God says to him, O says to the serpent rather that he would cause this enmity to come between the serpent and the woman and that the seed of the woman will crush the head of the serpent. That’s a foreshadow of the blessed mother Mary who gives birth to the seed of that woman that is the Lord Jesus Christ himself who crushes the head of the serpent.
And when Adam ceased this in Genesis three 20, he declares by faith that this woman he now calls Eve is the mother of all the living. And so what makes Adam look at Eve after what she’s just done together with him and say she’s the mother of the living well, he sees her in view in the lens of God’s promises. That is true her the seed will come that provides victory to the world. And instantly after that, verse 21, Adam is coward. His shame is by the kid. And so we see this. It’s my time up already.
Speaker 6:
No, you got one minute left.
Nesan:
One minute left. Oh gotcha. Thank you. Yeah, and when we look through the life of Noah, we see in the context of an evil world, Noah found favor in God’s eyes. You look at the words of Abraham, he was justified by faith in Genesis 15 verse six. And then in Genesis chapter 22 was 10 to 12. We see that the angel says to him, now I know that you fear God. So which came first? Was it the faith, the justified him or was it the works? We see that the order is the other way around. That is the faith leading to works. But it’s like I said, no intellectual asset. Now I’m going to stop here due to time, but I look forward to hearing and learning from my Catholic friends here on the topic of justification. Thank you very much.
Host:
Alright, thank you Sam for that opening. All right, so Jimmy, you’re up for your 10 minute opening statement and oh yeah, I forgot to tell you guys about that little chime. That is a one minute indication. You have one minute left in your presentation. So sorry about that. I forgot to let you guys know that. But
Akin:
So I wanted to start by noting a principle that St. Paul mentions in second Timothy. He says, Timothy needs to warn folks not to quarrel about words, not to dispute about ’em because it’s not beneficial and it only leads to the ruin of the hearers. So what we can learn from that is that if we agree on the substance of doctrine, even if we use different language to express it, we shouldn’t quarrel about that. Now of course, in order to resolve disputes about words, you frequently need to talk about their meaning. So talking about words is not the same thing as quarrel and about ’em. I recently debated someone who seemed deeply confused on that point. A keyword we should talk about is faith. This term is used in different senses and it’s used in at least three ways in the New Testament. The first kind which is mentioned in James two 19 is intellectual faith.
It’s just agreement with the teachings of the Christian faith. But that’s not saving faith because James says even the demons believe have faith in that sense and yet they shudder. A step up from that is what’s called fiducial faith. And this involves not only intellectual belief but also trust in God, but that also is not saving faith. As Paul says in one Corinthians 13, if I have faith so that I could move mountains, so he’s really trusting God but don’t have love, I’m nothing and it doesn’t benefit him anything, then there’s what’s known as formed faith or faith formed by charity. So it incorporates intellectual belief, it incorporates trust and it incorporates love. And this is what the Catholic church understands sa faith to be. As Paul says in Galatians five, six, in Christ, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything but faith working through love well.
So how to Protestants understand justification? We heard a presentation from Samuel and he touched on points that are commonly made by many in the Protestant community. I would note that the Westminster confession of faith, which is used by many Calvinists, says that faith is the alone instrument of justification. So it’s faith only yet it is not alone in the person justified but is ever accompanied with all other saving graces and is no dead faith but worketh by love. So the Westminster confession acknowledges that saving faith works by love, it needs to incorporate love. It’s formed faith. Many Protestant formulations use the expression we are justified by grace alone through faith alone. So does the Catholic church agree with that? Well, we’ve got Ephesians two eight and our Bibles too, which says, for by grace you are saved through faith. So we believe in justification by grace.
The Council of Trent in its decree on justification said this. This is from chapter eight. It said, we are therefore said to be justified gratuitously meaning by grace because none of those things that precede justification, whether faith or works merit the grace of justification for if it is by grace it is not now by works otherwise, as the apostle says, grace is no more grace. So the Council of Trent agrees nothing preceding justification merits it and consequently we’re justified by grace in the joint declaration on the doctrine of justification that the Catholic church signed a number of years ago with the Lutheran World Federation and later several other groups, it says We together, we meaning Catholics and Lutherans confess by grace alone in faith in Christ’s save and work and not because of any merit on our part, we are accepted by God and receive the Holy Spirit who renews our hearts while equipping us and calling us to do good works.
So the Catholic church agrees that we’re justified by grace alone. Well what about faith alone? Well, here I have to make a little bit of a terminology note. Scripture never says that we’re justified by faith alone. It says a lot about being justified by faith, but it doesn’t use the language faith alone. That phrase only appears once in scripture where James says that you see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. So faith alone is not the language of scripture. But I’m not here to quarrel about words, though I am here to talk about their meaning to end quarrels and understood correctly. Catholics can affirm faith alone according to the annex, to the joint declaration which the Catholic church signed justification takes place by grace alone, by faith alone the person is justified apart from works. And it’s not just the joint declaration that says that Pope Benedict six said this a few years ago, he said Luther’s phrase, faith alone is true if it is not opposed to faith in charity in love.
So it is that in the letter to the Galatians in which he primarily developed his teaching on justification that St. Paul speaks of faith that works through love. So the Catholic church agrees that we are justified through faith alone understood correctly. Now that may surprise some of our listeners who come from the Protestant community because they’re often told that the Council of Trent condemned faith alone, but it actually didn’t. If you read the decree on justification from Trent, this is Canon nine, what it says is this. If anyone shall say that by faith alone, the emus is justified so that he would understand. So it’s specifying a meaning for this phrase. If he understands that nothing else is required to cooperate in order unto the obtaining of the grace of justification and that it is not in any respect necessary that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will, then that’s what they reject.
So they’re not objecting to the formula of faith alone own. They’re objecting to a particular understanding of it. And since it mentioned that the kind of faith alone they’re rejecting is a kind that says you don’t need to do anything with your will, they’re not even condemning fiducial faith because you use your will to trust God. So what they’re condemning is the idea that we are saved by intellectual faith alone merely believe in Christian doctrine. And there are multiple Orthodox Catholic authors including doctors of the church who used the faith alone formula prior to the reformation like St. Augustine who lived in the fifth century. And St. Thomas Aquinas who lived in the 13th century. Both of them among others, used the formula faith alone. They just clarified that it’s faith which works through love or formed faith. So formed faith is, as I said, it involves love as well as trust and intellectual belief.
And we see multiple passages in the New Testament that underscore this. I mentioned Galatians five, six where Paul says what counts is faith working through love? Also, in one Corinthians 13 he said, if I have faith to remove mountains but don’t have love, I’m nothing, it benefits me nothing. And in one John three 14, John says, we know that we have passed over from death to life because we love the brothers. And then he says, the one who does not love remains in death. So love is an essential component of saving faith. And you know who agreed with that? Well John Calvin. Calvin viewed unformed faith that is faith without love as unworthy of the name faith. And in his institutes of the Christian religion, he criticizes those who would use the word faith to mean intellectual faith because he says by this, they would deform faith by depriving it of love.
And as I noted, the Westminster confession agreed with that. It said that faith that justifies is faith that works by love. And a lot of people today have agreed with that. That’s what the joint declaration on the doctrine of justification says. It was signed by the Catholic church in 1999 and the Lutheran World Federation in 1999, the World Methodist Council joined in 2006. The Anglican Consultative Council approved it in 2016 and the world communion of Reformed churches approved it in 2017. So consequently we can agree that man is justified by grace alone through faith alone, provided you understand that correctly and that’s something we can all celebrate.
Host:
Alright, thank you Jimmy for that opening and Samuel as well. So now we’re going to drop it to the first part is debate rebuttal. And Samuel, you’re back in the seat for your five minute rebuttal and so lemme bring you back up and I’ll start your time when you begin to speak.
Nesan:
Well thank you. Thanks very much Jimmy for that opening. I really appreciate the clarity and charity in which Jimmy can tell. And so let’s go back to my own statement. In my opening statement I highlighted three say This is a gift of God which is the merit of Christ apart from works. And as I heard the, I don’t think there was anything in there that challenged that first premise at all. And so the words of Jimmy himself, yeah, I celebrate the fact that that first premise is granted. Plus of course we are having a disagreement on concept, which that is, we can maybe explore that towards the cross-examination. I wouldn’t celebrate the fact that there’s no disagreement... Read more on Catholic.com