Sunday, September 10, 2006

Grace Everywhere = Grace Nowhere

I can certainly appreciate the irony displayed by a Calvinist (who is supposed to be all about grace) making such a fuss about the covenant of works. But what many don't understand is that, divine grace notwithstanding, the only way any person can be saved is by works.

You see, if it is wrong to insist that pre-fallen Adam's obedience would have entitled him to eternal life, then the same must be true of the second Adam, Jesus Christ. But if our Lord's obedience to his Father did not earn eternal life for his people, then this means that God's Law has yet to be satisfied, and at the end of the day, It is not "finished" after all.

Kline writes:
"The irony of all this is that a position that asserts a continuum of 'grace' everywhere ends up with no genuine gospel grace anywhere. An approach that starts out by claiming that a works principle operates nowhere ends up with a kind of works principle everywhere. What this amounts to is a retreat from the Reformation and a return to Rome."
The reason for so adamant a stance is due to the fact that if the works principle ("Do this and live") that summed up both the Edenic and Sinaitic covenants is still hanging over the heads of God's New Covenant people, then the "works" that confessional Reformed theology has insisted were meritoriously accomplished by our Mediator are now our resonsibility to perform.

So Kline is right: We are saved by works after all. But whose?