Feeding on Christ

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With respect to your #1, the Lutheran-RB squabble isn't at all interesting to me. But this is: you said, "Lutherans are the ones who invest so much of their spiritual stock in the efficacy of the sacraments, not me." May I just suppose for a moment that you are an RB? If you were, then this statement makes absolutely perfect sense because you have not only not invested much stock in the efficacy of the sacraments, you've rejected anything whatsoever "sacramental" about baptism and the Lord's Supper. Now, back to the Reformed Steve. If you subscribe to any one of the Reformed standards, do you have the option to divest yourself of the efficacy of the sacraments? I think even the Reformed with the very weakest view of sacramental efficacy (Zwingli?) would say "NO WAY!" More on this at #3...

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1.If I were RB, I’d subscribe to the LBCF, which is one of the historic Reformed standards.

2.I’ve not rejected what’s sacramental about baptism and communion. I simply take my theology of the sacraments from my understanding of Scripture.

3.As to whether I have the option of parting company with the Reformed standards on sacramentology, I’d say the following:

i) For reasons that JD and I have already given, I think the position I take is quite consistent with what’s distinctive in the Reformed tradition.

ii) I call myself a Calvinist because that’s what I think I am, and that’s what I think most folks would take me to be. Labels are useful shortcuts.

iii) But to be perfectly frank, I really don’t care. This is the wrong question to ask. The first question I ask myself about what I believe is not: “Is this Reformed?” but, “Is this Biblical”?

When I’m on my deathbed, staring into eternity, it will be quite irrelevant to me and to my Maker whether I have my Reformed passport stamped with all the right names of all the approved luminaries.

As to someone like Alastair, who defines himself by his ecclesiastical party and institutional affiliation and historical identity, this is nothing but the idolatry of tradition.

BTW, “Biblical Sacra,” on the same thread, has had some very sensible things to say.

http://www.haloscan.com/comments/fishstik45/113375228687870850/

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Assurance of salvation. Again, now that I've moved into the Reformed fold from my earlier years as a tulipy baptist, the examples you offer regarding "I know I'm saved because..." present starkly the difference between what you've written here about unmediated faith (although I thought the subject was grace) and what I understand to be the typical Reformed view of assurance.

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Salvation is by grace, assurance is by faith. Of course, faith is also a condition of our justification, while grace is the engine driving our faith.

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Of course, this remembered baptism is a remembering that you were baptized, even if it occurred when you were an infant. I suppose you could say again that Calvin isn't the best representative of calvinism or the Reformed faith in general, but it sure gets curiouser and curiouser the more qualifications that have to be added.

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1.No one denies that Calvin is a leading representative of Calvinism. But Calvinism is larger than Calvin.

2.However, where uninspired writers are concerned, my acceptance or rejection is based, not on who said it, but the quality of the reasoning.

Calvin’s statement on this particular point is flawed, obviously flawed, for the simple and irrefutable reason that not everyone who is baptized is saved. Baptism is not a ticket to heaven. There are many baptized churchmen in hell.

Hence, to vest one’s assurance of salvation in baptism is a classic and hazardous example of false assurance.

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My assurance rests on my unmediated faith in Christ? Yikes, what a responsibility! If this is true, I'm done for because I'm only too aware of the noetic effects of sin. If my faith is not assured by God keeping His faithful covenant promises through whatever means He ordains, then I would never be able to get off the justification hamster wheel. I can't give you an ontology of the sacraments or a metaphysics of the "seals," but it sure seems to me as if Jesus intended to apply His grace to us as His disciples through physical means. That doesn't bother me at all. I don't understand fully how He does that, but that's where the trust comes in. I don't trust the physical means, I trust Him to keep His word because of that cross up on the hill and that empty tomb over there. If He says "Eat my flesh and drink my blood," then after we get our literalism out of the way, I'm going to take His word for it.

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1.You are saved by the grace, but you know you are saved by faith. You are not saved by your assurance of salvation, but you can’t have the assurance of salvation apart from faith. That’s how you know you’re a Christian. That’s what makes you a believer.

Of course, faith is a gift of God, so it doesn’t rely on your own fortitude. But there’s no way around faith in Christ. There’s no substitute for faith in Christ.

How do you know God’s faithful covenant promises apply to you? By faith. His promises are promises to believers.

Why do you trust him to keep his word? By faith in his word.

Again, you can take the Presbyterian view that sacraments are means of grace for the elect, but even on the Presbyterian view, the grace of God is not channeled through the sacraments alone. Baptism doesn’t regenerate. At most, the sacraments would be means of sanctifying grace, not regenerating grace.

2.This is not an ontological question of how God does what he does. Rather, this is exegetical question of how to interpret Scripture.

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If the sacraments just resemble, represent, signify...something only nominally, then you do indeed seem to embrace the RB position (which is fine with me, just confusing given your earlier profession).

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RBs deny infant baptism. I’m non-committal on that. So, in that respect, I differ from the RBs. I think there are plausible arguments on either side.

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Am I not Reformed because I do think God grants grace to us mediately through His appointed instruments?

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If you want to take the Presbyterian position, that is clearly a Reformed position to take. The point is not that there is only one Reformed position, but more than one.

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Am I in epistemic disarray even though I am trusting Christ to keep His promises through those appointed instruments?

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The answer turns on the question of what Christ appointed them for. What is their appointed function? That’s an exegetical question. God is always true to his purposes; the question is the true interpretation of his purposes.