My critique is that often "faith" gets defined as something we look for within ourselves; rather than that which is outside of ourselves that evokes our response of trust. It becomes MY faith in Jesus Christ; without fully recognizing that whatever faith or trust we have comes because it has been called out or evoked in us by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Then there are those who will have basically a checkoff list of things one has to agree to in order to have the correct "faith". These might include:
- 6-day creation
- a real ark and flood
- the virgin Mary (sometimes eternally a virgin)
- the resurrection (which has to be in physical, bodily resurrection)
- a specific way of talking/believing about the Real Presence in the bread and wine
- agreeing with everything in the Book of Concord for some Lutherans
- and so on.
All this means looking into one's own brain for what one might agree with or not. Since sin has been defined as "being turned in on oneself," this understanding of faith - looking inwards - becomes sinful.
It seems to me both theologically and from the Greek terms, that "faith" should mean, looking to Jesus. It is relying on his trustworthiness; his faithfulness; rather than looking inward at my faith.
If we have any faith, Luther states that the Holy Spirit gets all the credit. Luther does not address the question of those who don't appear to have faith. Didn't the Holy Spirit call them? Could they refuse to answer? Is that like imagining a fetus deciding, "I'm not going to be born," if salvation is seen as a new birth?
Can one trust the faithfulness of Jesus to us sinners even if one questions some of the doctrines I listed above?
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GJ - The author is not important because this generic nonsense is so common among the Objective Justification donkeys and Leftist Mainline apostates.
The herd of jackasses braying these solemn - and unsupported - pronouncements can only repeat each other's noise. They have no idea what faith is and only mock what they imagine.
Thus the OJ heroes warn people away from faith, which they see as dangerous, something to avoid.
Claiming Luther for this eructation is as absurd as Jay Webber wasting 50 pages on Luther teaching a dogma that entered Lutherdom chiefly through Halle's rationalistic Pietism, almost 200 years later. And yet he recognized and supported Rambach's OJ interpretation of 1 Timothy 3:16 - "the world was absolved when Jesus rose from the dead." But - the verse says nothing of the sort. Nor does Romans 4:25.
Full Name: Luther, Martin, 1483-1546
Birth Year: 1483
Death Year: 1546
Full Name: Rambach, J. J. (Johann Jacob), 1693-1735
Birth Year: 1693
Death Year: 1735
"On Oct. 27, 1712, he matriculated at the University of Halle as a student of medicine, but soon turned his attention to theology. He became specially interested in the study of the Old Testament under J. Michaelis."
1911 Encyclopedia Britannica - Rationalism
"The first great rationalist leader was [Halle's] J. S. Semler (q.v.), who held that true religion springs from the individual soul, and attacked the authority of the Bible in a comprehensive spirit of criticism. He ultimately reached a point at which the Bible became for him simply one of many ancient documents. At the same time he did not impugn the authority of the Church, which he regarded as useful in maintaining external unity. Among those who followed in Semler's path were Gruner Ernesti, J. Michaelis, Griesbach, J. G. Eichhorn."
