Christian Accountability

[seajayrice]

Php 2:12 Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.
Php 2:13 For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure.

Does the Father see our works, are Christians accountable for our walk on this side of glory?

 

[Contra_Mundum]

What do you mean by "see our works"? and
How much of a Christian do you want to be?

I think God is pleased by his Son in us. I think he approves of Holy Spirit's working graciously in us, toward the Father in worship, toward our neighbor in mercy.

We are accountable for attending to God's work in our lives. We have obligations to walk by faith, to live as Spirit-filled people live. Our wills are engaged in our activities. We should keep in step with the Spirit, and so we will not fulfill the lust of the flesh, Gal.5:16. God will bring all things into judgment.

But the grace of God in Christ is: we will not loved any more or less in the future than we are now loved, perfectly, because that is the way God loves his Son.

Someone has attributed this sentiment to Luther: God doesn't need your good works; but your neighbor has need of them. Well said.

 

[seajayrice]

Positionally I understand there is but one type of Christian - justified.
In sanctification (progressive), there seems to be more than one verdict. For Believers, does the didactic function of the law have consequence on both sides of glory? In other words, does the father see our trangressions and to what ends?

Heb 12:5 And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him:
Heb 12:6 For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.
Heb 12:7 If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?
Heb 12:8 But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons.

 

[Contra_Mundum]

I guess I think that there is probably some "correlation" between sanctification now, and glory later, cf.1Cor.3:13. What exactly, that's not part of revelation.

I also think that most thinking about degree of rewards is a waste of time. Jesus' parable of the workers in the vineyard comes swiftly to mind. Those who worked longer (i.e. "better") than those hired at the day's end thought themselves ill-treated when the Master gave the late-comers as much as he gave those who had borne the heat of the day. Get in, and work, so that you may receive... something, and not be sent to that door into hell, hard by the gate of heaven (ala Pilgrim's Progress).

The other thing I don't think too many Christians think about is that the path to glory, and probably greater glory, is through suffering, cf. 1Pet.3:8ff, 4:1ff. This is the thinking that made the early church willing to suffer terrible persecution, and the reason why most of us western believers aren't worthy to loosen the lachet of their sandals--nor the sandals of the poverty-stricken, orphaned, widowed, maimed, and otherwise beset faithful of today. We read about their endurance on a computer screen while sipping our $5 lattes.

"Ye have not yet resisted to blood, striving against sin." Heb.12:4.
"Our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory." 2Cor.4:17

I hope it will be worth thinking about the comparative blessing of heaven, Rom.8:18, when the suffering is the greatest. When we've done all that we can of good, we are but unprofitable servants, having done naught but our duty.

 

[seajayrice]

Thank you, most helpful. Perhaps the best answer is "I am not sure but we should not be slack!"

WCF XVI

II. These good works, done in obedience to God's commandments, are the fruits and evidences of a true and lively faith:[3] and by them believers manifest their thankfulness,[4] strengthen their assurance,[5] edify their brethren,[6] adorn the profession of the Gospel,[7] stop the mouths of the adversaries,[8] and glorify God,[9] whose workmanship they are, created in Christ Jesus thereunto,[10] that, having their fruit unto holiness, they may have the end, eternal life.[11]

III. Their ability to do good works is not at all of themselves, but wholly from the Spirit of Christ.[12] And that they may be enabled thereunto, beside the graces they have already received, there is required an actual influence of the same Holy Spirit, to work in them to will, and to do, of His good pleasure:[13] yet are they not hereupon to grow negligent, as if they were not bound to perform any duty unless upon a special motion of the Spirit; but they ought to be diligent in stirring up the grace of God that is in them.[14]

 

[Mushroom]

Someone has attributed this sentiment to Luther: God doesn't need your good works; but your neighbor has need of them. Well said.

Well said indeed. And another take I recently heard was that God doesn't need one single thing from us, but He delights in using us for His glory.

 

[Peairtach]

Does the Father see our works, are Christians accountable for our walk on this side of glory?

The Father sees everything - as do the Son and the Spirit. But if we are believers He sees our sins and good works as our Father, rather than as our Adversary.

If you are a believer your good works cannot add anything to your justification and access to Heaven, neither can your sins take away from that, because you are no longer under the law as a covenant of works.

But, in a sense, you are under added obligation to the law as a rule of life.

 

[Contra_Mundum]

It is the office of the Spirit to "bring the law inside" instead of having it standing over us.

Either the Spirit leads us within, or the Law lashes us without; the moral standard is unchanged.

Our obligation to obey isn't any greater or less than it ever was. The law is a rule for living, it always was.

The law written on stone, however, does not come with any power to aid in accomplishment.

The addition for the born again is: we have more reason to love (i.e. obey) than ever.

 

[puritan628]

The law written on stone, however, does not come with any power to aid in accomplishment.

Now this is the most useful way I have ever heard/read of explaining the difference between begin under the law and having the law written on our hearts.

Thank you!

 

[Peairtach]

Quote from Bruce

The addition for the born again is: we have more reason to love (i.e. obey) than ever.

Thanks for that clarification. This is what I meant, not that unbelievers were under any less absolute obligation to observe the law than believers.

 

[seajayrice]

Does God use the carrot and the stick in our sanctification? Clearly the stick seems evident.

WCF XI

V. God does continue to forgive the sins of those that are justified;[14] and although they can never fall from the state of justification,[15] yet they may, by their sins, fall under God's fatherly displeasure, and not have the light of His countenance restored unto them, until they humble themselves, confess their sins, beg pardon, and renew their faith and repentance.[16]

XII

All those that are justified, God vouchsafes, in and for His only Son Jesus Christ, to make partakers of the grace of adoption,[1] by which they are taken into the number, and enjoy the liberties and privileges of the children of God,[2] have His name put upon them,[3] receive the spirit of adoption,[4] have access to the throne of grace with boldness,[5] are enabled to cry, Abba, Father,[6] are pitied,[7] protected,[8] provided for,[9] and chastened by Him as by a Father:[10] yet never cast off,[11] but sealed to the day of redemption;[12] and inherit the promises,[13] as heirs of everlasting salvation.[14]

 

[Contra_Mundum]

If I, as a father, use a "carrot" and "stick" approach with my children, when I suppose I am training them for godliness, I believe the results would be sorry, in the main.

Sanctification can be expressed in terms of the fruit of the Spirit, but obedience will never define sanctification. The "good" brother of the Prodigal Son "never disobeyed" the Father's command (Lk.15:29); and yet it took his brother's return to rip the mask off his hatred for his Father.

The beginning of the Spirit's fruitful work is love (Gal.5:22). Here, in the Spirit's work upon the heart, is the power that was lacking in the stone-writ law. It is the love that produces obedience to the reinscribed law now found in the new heart, not over and outside of the old one.

Simple obedience to command will never produce genuine love, anywhere. It won't produce it in the one obeying, and it won't produce it in the once being obeyed. I don't love my children because they obey me, nor do I want them to obey me principally for a reward they expect.

However, it seems to me the essence of the "carrot and stick" approach makes sanctification into a new legalism, by measuring it according to the quantity and quality of obedience, complete with rewards and punishments, and tit-for-tat.

My love for my children leads me to give them what they need, including corporal punishment when deserved, when it will do them good. I would not characterize this as the "stick" approach. And I don't think that the "carrot and stick" idea does much justice to the notion of the wise Father's love, or the Spirit's modus operandi for heart-transformation and renewal.

 

[seajayrice]

Joh 14:15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.

 

[Mushroom]

Joh 14:15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.

Interesting that the ESV has this as follows:

Joh 14:15 "If you love me, you will keep my commandments.

The first sounds imperative, the second declarative. Any Greek scholars that are able to clarify on the board?

 

[Peairtach]

There is some carrot and stick involved in sanctification, though.

Even the most assured believer knows that their will be e.g. loss of felt fellowship with God and chastisement if he goes in the wrong direction, and that there will be e.g. the enjoyment of more intimate fellowship, avoidance of temporal troubles because of sin, and additional heavenly rewards for those who persevere in the right direction.

 

[Steve Curtis]

The first sounds imperative, the second declarative

The TR has tērēsate, while WH has tērēsete. This is the basis for the different renderings. The former is imperative; the latter is future.