What  are  the  five  solas  

•  By  Pastor  David  Kim  

Difference  between  Theology  and  theology  

•  Ancient  Truth.  Be  careful  not  to  be  doctrinal  innovators.  

ChrisAans?  Evangelical  catholics?  

•  We believe and teach nothing more and nothing less than what the Scriptures themselves teach and what Christians through the ages have always believed. We therefore consider ourselves to be catholic (small "c"), which means "universal." At the same time, we have always thought of ourselves as evangelical, since the evangel–the Gospel, the good news of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ for the sins of the world–is at the heart and core of everything we believe and teach. Christians, therefore, can rightly be regarded as evangelical catholics.

What  we  believe?  •  Standing firmly in the tradition of the trinitarian and

Christological formulations of the 4th and 5th centuries, we believe that

•  sinners are justified (declared right) with the Creator God by grace alone (sola gratia), through faith alone (sola fide), on the account of Christ’s merit alone (Solo Christus) on the basis of Scripture alone (sola scriptura), and for the Glory of God alone (Soli Deo Gloria). These five great "Reformation solas" form a handy outline of what we (LINC/GLOCAL) believe, teach, and confess.

Five  Solas  

•  The five solas are five Latin phrases popularized during the Protestant Reformation that emphasized the distinctions between the early Reformers and the Roman Catholic Church. The word sola is the Latin word for “only” and was used in relation to five key teachings that defined the biblical pleas of Protestants.

5  Solas=5  Solae  

•  The Five solae are five Latin phrases that emerged during the Protestant Reformation and summarize the early Reformers' basic theological beliefs in contradistinction to the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church of the day. The Latin word sola means "alone" or "only" in English. The five solae articulated five fundamental beliefs of the Protestant Reformation, pillars which the early Reformers believed to be essentials of the Christian life and practice."

5  solas  are:  

•  ���1. Sola scriptura: “Scripture alone”���2. Sola gratia: “grace alone”

•  3. Sola fide: “faith alone”��� 4. Solo Christo: “Christ alone”���5. Soli Deo gloria: “to the glory of God alone”

5  solas  

•  Each of these solas can be seen both as a corrective to the excesses of the Roman Catholic Church at the start of the Reformation and as a positive biblical declaration.

Sola  Scriptura  •  Sola scriptura emphasizes the Bible

alone as the source of authority for Christians. By saying, “Scripture alone,” we reject with all our hearts whatsoever does not agree with the infallible teaching of the Word of God." We believe that Scripture alone–not Scripture and tradition, Scripture and the church, Scripture and human reason, or Scripture and experience, or Scripture and emotions, or Scripture and science–stands as the final standard of what the Gospel is.

Formal  Principle  &  Material  Principle  

•  But we also believe that confidence in the reliability of the Bible is not possible apart from faith in Jesus Christ. Christians believe what the Scriptures teach because they first believe in Jesus Christ. Christ is the object of faith, not the Bible. We believe that the inversion of this order compromises "scripture alone" and results in rationalistic fundamentalism, as if an accepted demonstration of the Bible's truthfulness and reliability–perhaps a piece of Noah's ark, for example–could provide a foundation for faith in the Gospel. The Bible remains a dark book apart from faith in Christ, for He is its true content. But when sinners are brought to faith in Him, Christ points them back to the writings of the prophets and apostles as the sole authoritative source for all the church believes, teaches and confesses.

Law  and  Gospel  

•  The key to understanding Scripture properly, we believe, is the careful distinction between the Law and the Gospel. The Proper Distinction Between Law and Gospel is C. F. W. Walther's best known book. The Law tells what God demands of sinners if they are to be saved. The Gospel reveals what God has already done for our salvation. The chief purpose of the Law is to show us our sin and our need for a Savior. The Gospel offers  the  free  giN  of  God's  salvaAon  in  Christ.  The  whole  Bible  can  be  divided  into  these  two  chief  teachings.  

Scripture  alone...  •  As the Scripture says,

Open my eyes, that I may behold Wonderful things from Thy law....I will bow down toward Thy holy temple, And give thanks to Thy name for Thy lovingkindness and Thy truth; For Thou hast magnified Thy word according to all Thy name....You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them; and that from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work. (Psalm 119:18; Psalm 138:2; II Tim. 3:14-17)

Sola Scriptura: The Scripture Alone is the Standard

•  The doctrine that the Bible alone is the ultimate authority was the "Formal Principle" of the Reformation. In 1521 at the historic interrogation of Luther at the Diet of Worms, he declared his conscience to be captive to the Word of God saying, "Unless I am overcome with testimonies from Scripture or with evident reasons -- for I believe neither the Pope nor the Councils, since they have often erred and contradicted one another -- I am overcome by the Scripture texts which I have adduced, and my conscience is bound by God's Word."

•  Sola Scriptura!

•  Sola scriptura is the teaching that the Bible is the only inspired and authoritative word of God, is the only source for Christian doctrine, and is accessible to all—that is, it is perspicuous and self-interpreting. "Scripture interprets scripture" is a governing principle of many Protestant denominations."

•  Sola scriptura!

•  Sola scriptura is sometimes called the formal principle of the Reformation, since it is the source and norm of the material principle, the gospel of Jesus Christ that is received sola fide ("through faith alone") sola gratia (by God's favor or "grace alone"). The adjective (sola) and the noun (scriptura) are in the ablative case rather than the nominative case to indicate that the Bible does not stand alone apart from God, but rather that it is the instrument of God by which he reveals himself for salvation through faith in Christ (solus Christus or solo Christo)."

Sola  GraAa=  Salvation by Grace Alone

•  Sola gratia emphasizes grace as the reason for our salvation. In other words, salvation comes from what God has done rather than what we do. Ephesians 2:8-9 teaches, “For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”

By  grace  alone  •  It means "only grace" and it excludes the

merit done by a person to achieve salvation. Sola gratia is the teaching that salvation comes by divine grace or "unmerited favor" only, not as something merited by the sinner. This means that salvation is an unearned gift from God for Jesus' sake."

•  Two wrong views: "•  no synergism: cooperation"•  no universalism: everyone will be saved"

Grace  Alone  

•  At the heart of what we believe is the conviction that salvation is the free gift of God's grace (undeserved mercy) for Christ's sake alone. "Since the fall of Adam all men who are born according to the course of nature  are  conceived  and  born  in  sin"  (Augsburg  Confession  II,  1),  the  Lutherans  confessed  before  Emperor  Charles  V  in  Augsburg,  Germany,  in  1530.  This  "inborn  sickness  and  hereditary  sin"  makes  it  uZerly  impossible  for  people  to  earn  forgiveness.  If  salvaAon  were  dependent  on  human  iniAaAve,  there  would  be  no  hope  for  anyone.  But  God  forgives  our  sins,  says  Luther  in  his  Large  Catechism  (1529),  "altogether  freely,  out  of  pure  grace"  (LC  III,  96).  

Grace  Alone  

•  The basis for the grace of God that alone gives hope to sinners is the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. We believe, as Luther put it in his explanation to the second article of the Apostles' Creed, "that Jesus Christ, true God, begotten of the Father from eternity, and also true man, born of the virgin Mary, is my Lord, who has redeemed me, a lost and condemned person . . . not with gold or silver, but with his holy, precious blood and with his innocent suffering and death. . . ." (Luther's Small Catechism with ExplanaAons,  p.14).  

Grace  Alone  

•  We believe that the Scriptures teach that God's grace in Christ Jesus is universal, embracing all people of all times and all places. There is no sin for which Christ has not died. Says the Formula of Concord (1577), "We must by all means cling rigidly and firmly to the fact that as the proclamation of repentance extends over all men (Luke 24:47), so also does the promise of the Gospel . . . . Christ has taken away the sin of the world (John 1:29)" (FC SD XI, 28). Therefore, there need be no question in any sinner's mind whether Christ has died for each and every one of his or her personal sins.

As the Scripture says, Sola Gratia

•  In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace, which He lavished upon us. (Ephesians 1:8)

Sola  Fide=Sola Fide: Justification by Faith Alone

•  Sola fide emphasizes salvation as a free gift. The Roman Catholic Church of the time emphasized the use of indulgences (donating money) to buy status with God. Good works, including baptism, were seen as required for salvation. Sola fide stated that salvation is a free gift to all who accept it by faith (John 3:16). Salvation is not based on human effort or good deeds (Ephesians 2:9).

Sola  Fide  (by  Faith  alone)  •  It means "only faith" and it excludes the good works as necessary for

salvation. Sola fide is the teaching that justification (interpreted in Protestant theology as "being declared just by God") is received by faith only, without any mixture of or need for good works, though in classical Protestant theology, saving faith is always evidenced, but not determined, by good works. Some Protestants see this doctrine as being summarized with the formula "Faith yields justification and good works" and as contrasted with the Roman Catholic formula "Faith and good works yield justification." The Catholic side of the argument is based on James 2:14-17. "What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead." (James 2:14-17, NKJV)"

Faith  Alone  •  A thousand years before the Reformation, St. Augustine (A.D.

354-430) had fought strongly against the errors of a monk named Pelagius. Pelagius taught that sinners could contribute to their salvation by their own efforts, apart from God's grace in Christ. Relying on St. Paul's letter to the Romans, Augustine held that Adam's fall into sin had so corrupted human nature that the human will was completely depraved and enslaved to the flesh. But Augustine believed that sinners, following their conversion and infused with renewing grace by means of baptism, begin to be healed, and are actually empowered by God's grace to perform inherently good works. Christians, according to Augustine, do continue to commit some sins, but they also begin to do more good things and fewer bad things as they are gradually justified by God.

Faith  Alone  

•  Luther had learned from Augustine that only the grace of God could save him. But Luther's rediscovery of the Gospel in all its clarity took place when he came to see that he did not first have to do something to merit God's saving grace. Philip Melanchthon, Luther's colleague at the University of Wittenberg, writes in the Augsburg Confession: "Our churches also teach that men cannot be justified before God by their own strength, merits, or works, but are freely justified for Christ's sake through faith when they believe that they are received into favor and that their sins are forgiven on account of Christ, who by his death made satisfaction for our sins. This faith God imputes for righteousness in his sight (Rom. 3,4)" (AC IV, 1-3).

Faith  Alone  •  We believe that the conversion of sinners is a gift of God and not the

result of any human effort or decision. Lutherans therefore confess in the words of Luther's explanation to the third article of the Apostle's Creed: "I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to him; but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel." (Luther's Small Catechism with ExplanaAon,  p.  15).  

Faith  Alone  

•  Lutherans are by no means anti-intellectual, and we thank God for our reasoning ability. We use it to seek to understand, to present and to defend what we believe, but we do reject all suggestions that scientific evidence or rational arguments can prove Christian truth claims. By the same token, we uphold the importance of emotion and feeling in the life of the Christian, but we steadfastly repudiate any reliance on conversion experiences or "charismatic gifts" for the certainty of salvation. We believe that the Scriptures teach that the sole object of saving faith is Jesus Christ and his resurrection, and that it is only by the miraculous power of God the Holy Spirit that the Christian can say, "I believe." Faith is not a human work but a gift from God.

Faith  Alone  •  "Through faith alone" also implies that it is only through the

proclamation of the Gospel–in Word and Sacrament–that the Holy Spirit gives the gift of faith. The proclamation of the Gospel Word in public preaching therefore occupies a central position in our Christian theology. Christian churches are preaching churches. But we are also sacramental churches, for the sacraments–Baptism and the Lord's Supper–are the Gospel made visible (cf. Circumcision and Passover in the OT).

Faith  Alone  •  Finally, to say "through faith alone" means that we

believe that, to use a phrase Luther made famous, Christians are at the same time sinners and saints (simul justus et peccator). Justification is an act, a declaraAon.  It  is  not  a  process.  Through  faith  in  Christ,  and  only  through  faith,  sinners  are  declared  to  be  forgiven  and  to  be  perfectly  right  with  God.  This  declaraAon  is  whole  and  complete,  totally  independent  of  any  inherent  goodness  in  us  sinners.  In  short,  because  of  God's  act  on  the  cross  received  through  faith,  we  sinners  are  declared  to  be  perfect  saints  in  God's  sight.  But  this  does  not  mean  that  forgiven  sinners,  when  judged  by  God's  law,  do  not  conAnue  to  be  sinners.  We  are  not  "perfecAonists"  in  the  sense  of  teaching  that  following  conversion,  ChrisAans  stop  sinning.  "Forgiveness  is  needed  constantly,"  says  Luther.  "Because  we  are  encumbered  with  our  flesh,  we  are  never  without  sin"  (Large  Catechism  II,  54).  

Faith  Alone  

•  Yet we also disagree with those who answer the question "why some and not others" on the basis of something which human beings do or possess, as if the ultimate cause for salvation is our striving or cooperating or "deciding" for Christ. The Scriptures teach that all people by nature are "dead in ...transgressions and sins" (Eph. 2:1), utterly incapable of contributing anything to their conversion or salvation. If sinners, therefore, come to believe in Christ, this is the result of God's power at work in them. If they continue to reject the Gospel, this is their own fault. We do not regard this response as a "cop-out" but simply as faithfulness to what the Scriptures themselves teach about the doctrine of election.

Faith  Alone  •  Because of our emphasis on justification through faith alone, we

Lutherans have sometimes been understood to advocate, or at least to condone, what the German Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer condemned as "cheap grace," that is, taking sin for granted and ignoring concern for a life of holy living. But such notions are a perversion of what we believe. "Love and good works must also follow faith," writes Melanchthon, because "God has commanded them and in order to exercise our faith" (Apology of the Augsburg  Confession  IV,  74  and  189).  In  other  words,  we  believe  that  good  works  are  necessary—but  they  are  not  necessary  for  salvaAon.  Because  we  believe  that  salvaAon  is  both  "by  grace  alone"  and  "through  faith  alone,"  we  Lutherans  refuse  to  give  a  logically  saAsfying  answer  to  the  age-­‐old  quesAon  of  why  some  people  are  saved  and  others  are  not.  We  disagree  with  those,  like  Calvin,  who  teach  that  since  salvaAon  is  God's  free  giN,  hell  for  those  who  do  not  believe  must  be  proof  that  God  does  not  want  everyone  to  be  saved.  In  opposiAon  to  this  view,  we  maintain  that  the  Scriptures  clearly  teach  that  God  desires  all  "to  be  saved  and  to  come  to  a  knowledge  of  the  truth"  (1  Tim.  2:4).  

Faith  Alone  •  We believe that Baptism has God's command and promise. Baptism

is "the Word of God in water," Luther said (Smalcald Articles, Part III, V, 1). We believe that it is precisely in the baptism of infants, who are included in Christ's Great Commission (Matt. 28:19-20), that we can see the full meaning of "through faith alone." We believe that those who deny that God gives faith to infants through Baptism, nevertheless in actuality deny salvation by grace alone (perhaps without intending to do so). God's action in Baptism,apart from any human initiative, creates and bestows the gift of faith through which the Christian lays hold of God's grace. We also believe that the Scriptures teach that the bread and the wine in the Lord's Supper are the true body and blood of Christ. Although we do not presume to understand how this takes place, we confess that in, with and under the earthly elements God gives the true body and blood of Christ for the forgiveness of sins. Missouri Synod Lutherans therefore seek a balance in public worship between the proclamation of the Gospel in the Word and in sacrament. It is only through these "means of grace" that sinners are brought to faith in Jesus Christ and preserved in it.

Failth  Alone  

•  While God's grace is universal and embraces all people, we believe that the Scriptures teach that this grace can be appropriated by sinful human beings only through faith.

Solus  Christus=By Christ's Work Alone are We Saved

•  Solo Christo (sometimes listed as Solus Christus, “through Christ alone”) emphasizes the role of Jesus in salvation.

•  Hebrews 4:15 teaches, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.” Jesus is the One who offers access to God, not a human spiritual leader.

•  The Reformation called the church back to faith in Christ as the sole mediator between God and man. While the Roman church held that "there is a purgatory and that the souls there detained are helped by the intercessions of the faithful" and that "Saints are to be venerated and invoked;" "that their relics are to be venerated" -- the reformers taught that salvation was by Christ's work alone.

Solus Christus or Solo Christo ("Christ alone" or "through Christ alone")

•  Solus Christus is the teaching that Christ is the only mediator between God and man, and that there is salvation through no other (hence, the phrase is sometimes rendered in the ablative case, solo Christo, meaning that salvation is "by Christ alone")."

•  This is laid out in the Lutheran formula of holy absolution: the "called and ordained servant of the Word" forgives penitents' sins (speaks Christ's words of forgiveness: "I forgive you all your sins") without any addition of penances or satisfactions and not as an interceding or mediating "priest," but "by virtue of [his] office as a called and ordained servant of the Word" and "in the stead and by the command of [his] Lord Jesus Christ" [The Lutheran Hymnal, (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1941), p. 16]. In this tradition absolution reconciles the penitent with God directly through faith in Christ's forgiveness rather than with the priest and the church as mediating entities between the penitent and God."

Soli  Deo  Gloria=  For the Glory of God Alone

•  All of life is to be lived to the glory of God. As the Westminster Shorter Catechism asks, "What is the chief end of man? Man's chief end is to glorify God and to enjoy him forever." This great and all consuming purpose was emphasized by those in the 16th and 17th Centuries who sought to reform the church according to the Word of God. In contrast to the monastic division of life into sacred versus secular perpetuated by Roman Church, the reformers saw all of life to be lived under the Lordship of Christ. Every activity of the Christian is to be sanctified unto the glory of God.

Soli  Deo  Gloria  •  As the Scripture says,

Whether, then, you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God; Whoever speaks, let him speak, as it were, the utterances of God; whoever serves, let him do so as by the strength which God supplies; so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever. He has made us to be a kingdom, priests to His God and Father; to Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory, both now and to the day of eternity. To Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Blessing and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might, be to our God forever and ever. For from Him and through Him and to Him are all things. To Him be the glory forever. Amen. (1CO 10:31; 1PE 4:11; REV 1:6; 2PE 3:1; EPH 3:21; REV 7:12; ROM 11:36)

•  Soli Deo gloria

•  Soli Deo gloria emphasizes the glory of God as the goal of life. Rather than striving to please church leaders, keep a list of rules, or guard our own interests, our goal is to glorify the Lord. The idea of soli Deo gloria is found in 1 Corinthians 10:31: “So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”

Soli  Deo  Gloria=  Coram  Deo  

•  Coram Deo: Living our entire life in the presence of God, under the authority of God, to the pleasure and glory of God alone. Therefore, whatever we are doing, wherever we are doing it, and however doing it, we are acting under the gaze of God (Col. 3:22-23; Gn. 39:8-10; Eph. 6:6; Ps. 51:9-12; Dt. 31:16-18; Ps. 27:9-10; Lk. 22:61-62; 2 Cor. 4:14)

Soli Deo gloria ("glory to God alone") •  It means "glory to God only" and it

excludes veneration or cult given to the Virgin Mary, the saints, or angels. Soli Deo gloria is the teaching that all glory is to be due to God alone, since salvation is accomplished solely through His will and action — not only the gift of the all-sufficient atonement of Jesus on the cross but also the gift of faith in that atonement, created in the heart of the believer by the Holy Spirit. one should not exalt such humans for their good works, but rather praise and give glory to God who is the author and sanctifier of these people and their good works."

•  We are called to focus on Scripture, accept salvation by grace through faith, magnify Christ, and live for God’s glory.���

• The primary mission of the church is...

•  The primary mission of the church, according to our Christian belief, is the preaching of the Gospel and the administration of the sacraments.