Again, rock-solid leadership by Caleb Hayden. We wish this was done by a theologian, but Caleb is an accountant doing his homework. It restores confidence to see a young man doing his leg-work. As an older Churchman myself, I've known these things for a long time, but it is good to read this sample survey. This won't get press at www.virtueonline.org. His sponsors and friends would have no part of Virtue if he did. Of great note, all these things were known vividly to the English Reformers, as well as Lutheran and Reformed Churchmen. God spare the capitulators like Jim Packer and others. We need another recovery of the Reformation.
http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=155950763086
Please see Part 1: http://www.facebook.com/note.php?
Please see Part 2: http://www.facebook.com/note.php?
The following patristic quotes are copied from two sources:
W: indicates http://weedon.blogspot.com/2008/02/patristic-passages-of-interest-for.html
S: indicates http://www.shepherdsfellowship.org/pulpit/Posts.aspx?ID=4356
W: “Where Christ enters, there necessarily is also salvation. May he therefore also be in us: and He is in us when we believe; for he dwells in our hearts by faith, and we are His abode. It would have been better then for the Jews to have rejoiced because Zaccheus was wonderfully saved, for he too was counted among the sons of Abraham, to whom God promised salvation in Christ by the holy prophets, saying, There shall come a Savior from Zion, and he shall take away iniquities from Jacob, and this is my covenant with them, when I will bear their sins. Christ, therefore, arose to deliver the inhabitants of the earth from their sins, and to seek them that were lost, and to save them that had perished. For this is His office, and, so to say, the fruit of His godlike gentleness. Of this will he also count all those worthy who have believed in him.” -St. Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on Luke, Homily 127
W: “What is meant by mercy? and what by sacrifice? By mercy then is signified, Justification and grace in Christ, even that which is by faith. For we have been justified, not by the works of the law that we have done, but by His great mercy. And sacrifice means the law of Moses.” -St. Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on Luke, Homily 23
W: “Be not troubled when thou meditatest upon the greatness of thy former sins; but rather know, that still greater is the grace that justifieth the sinner and absolveth the wicked. Faith then in Christ is found to be the pledge to us of these great blessings; for it is the way that leadeth unto life, that bids us go to the mansions that are above, that raises us to the inheritance of the saints, that makes us members of the kingdom of Christ.” -St. Cyril of Alexandria, Homily 40 on St. Luke.
S: “For we are justified by faith, not by works of the law, as Scripture says (Gal. 2:16). By faith in whom, then, are we justified? Is it not in him who suffered death according to the flesh for our sake? Is it not in one Lord Jesus Christ.” -Cyril of Alexandria (412-444)
S: “For truly the compassion from beside the Father is Christ, as he takes away the sins, dismisses the charges and justifies by faith, and recovers the lost and makes [them] stronger than death. . . . For by him and in him we have known the Father, and we have become rich in the justification by faith.” -Cyril of Alexandria
S: “God justifies by faith alone.” -Jerome (347-420) on Romans 10:3
S: “He who with all his spirit has placed his faith in Christ, even if he die in sin, shall by his faith live forever.” -JeromeS: “His cross, and his death, and his resurrection, and the faith which is through him, are my unpolluted muniments [legal titles]; and in these, through your prayers, I am willing to be justified.” -Ignatius of Antioch (c. 50–115)
S: “I know that through grace you are saved, not of works, but by the will of God, through Jesus Christ.” -Polycarp (c. 69–155)
S: “No longer by the blood of goats and of sheep, or by the ashes of a heifer . . . are sins purged, but by faith, through the blood of Christ and his death, who died on this very account.” -Justin Martyr (d. 165)
S: “This does not mean that works can be put before faith, because a person is saved by grace, not by works but by faith.” -Didymus the Blind (c. 313-398)
S: “Wages cannot be considered as a gift, because they are due to work, but God has given free grace to all men by the justification of faith.” -Hilary of Poitiers (c 315-67)
S: “By surrendering to death the body which He [Jesus Christ] had taken, as an offering and sacrifice free from every stain, He immediately abolished death for His human brothers by the offering of the equivalent. For naturally, since the Logos of God was above all, when He offered His own temple and bodily instrument as a substitute for the life of all, He fulfilled by death all that was required.” -Athanasius (295–375)
S: “If Abraham was not justified by works, how was he justified? . . . Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness (Rom. 4:3; Gen. 15:6). Abraham, then, was justified by faith. Paul and James do not contradict each other: good works follow justification.” -Augustine (354-430)
S: “When someone believes in him who justifies the impious, that faith is reckoned as justice to the believer, as David too declares that person blessed whom God has accepted and endowed with righteousness, independently of any righteous actions (Rom 4:5-6). What righteousness is this? The righteousness of faith, preceded by no good works, but with good works as its consequence.” -Augustine
S: “God has decreed that a person who believes in Christ can be saved without works. By faith alone he receives the forgiveness of sins.” -Ambrosiaster (c. 366-384)
S: “They are justified freely because they have not done anything nor given anything in return, but by faith alone they have been made holy by the gift of God.” -Ambrosiaster, on Rom. 3:24S: “Paul tells those who live under the law that they have no reason to boast basing themselves on the law and claiming to be of the race of Abraham, seeing that no one is justified before God except by faith.” -Ambrosiaster, on Rom. 3:27
S: “The blessed Paul argues that we are saved by faith, which he declares to be not from us but a gift from God. Thus there cannot possibly be true salvation where there is no true faith, and, since this faith is divinely enabled, it is without doubt bestowed by his free generosity.” -Fulgentius, bishop of Ruspe (c. 467-532) commenting on Eph. 2:8
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