Come Follow Me LDS- Romans 1-6 Part 1

'Faith, Works & Grace'
- 3 Principles of the Spiritual Economy
- How will Paul use them?
- Is there relative truth?
- Protestants, Catholics and Latter-Day-Saints

Though the 'law' is the Law of Moses, there is always a Law of God.
Though 'works' can be rituals, there is always obedience.
Though 'grace' can be 'favor', there is always the Love of God.

References:

NT Wright- www.ntwrightpage.com

Matthew Bates- Salvation by Allegiance Alone

Ben Spackman wrote the excellent blog post that I referred to. Here it is- https://www.patheos.com/blogs/benjaminthescribe/2019/07/covenant-and-law-grace-works-and-faith/

 

Come Follow Me

LDS Mormon New Testament Romans Bible

 

in this episode we cover Paul's letters

and like a juggling act we work with

three of the major parts of the

spiritual economy faith works and grace

here we go all right so what I thought

we'd do in this episode is take a a

whole parts whole approach to the

letters of Paul that's where we are now

we've gone through the four Gospels we

have gone through Luke's additional

volume of the book of Acts and now we

enter a whole new part of the New

Testament and I'd like to just take this

episode and kind of give an overview of

the territory that we're about to enter

into because it's very different from

what we've experienced up till now the

journey that we're about to take takes

us very heavily into the spiritual

economy primarily in three different

areas and that's faith works and mercy

or grace these are three major issues

where we get really some of our

strongest doctrine and our strongest

doctrinal disputes among different sects

of Christianity Catholicism

Protestantism and the Latter day Saints

and even within our church there is a

lot of dispute there is a lot of

misunderstanding about these three major

principles in the spiritual economy and

Paul beats these three things like a

dead horse over and over again causing

us to take some deep self-reflection on

our approach to the gospel and our

understanding of the plan of salvation

that doesn't mean that by the time were

done with Paul's letters

that you're gonna have a clear

understanding of everything but you will

have greater context I promise and

hopefully you will have thought about

these three things and many other things

as well in a greater light and with a

greater understanding than you have

previously but before we delve into that

let's just talk about these letters here

the rest of the New Testament gives us

Paul's letters then some additional

letters or epistles from some other

individuals James Peter and John and

then we finish up with the book of

Revelation our focus right now is on the

13 letters of Paul which does not

necessarily include Hebrews and the

reason is the makeup of the Pauline

letters here the epistles most of them

fall in order based on the size of the

Epistle so for example we start off with

Romans well Romans was actually written

much later in Paul's ministry but it's

the largest epistle and so it comes

first and so we work our way down mostly

until we get to the last four of

Paul's letters not counting Hebrews

which are letters written to individuals

and not to the church in an area and

then finally Hebrews is placed in there

at the end why well starting in about

the third or fourth century they started

placing Hebrews toward the end of Paul's

epistles and the reason is there has

always been a large dispute and not a

lot of confidence that Paul is the

actual author of the book of Hebrews

which really isn't an epistle it's

written differently it has different

language that doesn't mean it couldn't

have been him the ideas and the concepts

behind them certainly could be from Paul

and of course in the header that we see

in the King James Version of the Bible

it says the book of Hebrews written by

Paul or something to that effect

but we don't know that but that's why

it's placed at the very end you have the

grouping err of the 13 epistles then

you've got the book of Hebrews and then

you go on with the other epistles and

the book of Revelation that also doesn't

mean that some of the other epistles may

not have been written by Paul it's

possible that a few of the letters were

written by somebody else in the name of

Paul as well but this grouping of

letters where Paul is writing out to the

members of the church in all of these

different areas is full of thunder and

lightning and what I mean by that is

just strong doctrine trying to make sure

that everybody stays on the right path

and this is where the majority of

Christian doctrine comes from worldwide

it's from the Pauline letters and it's

kind of interesting because as

latter-day saints for example we don't

delve quite as deeply into the letters

of Paul as a lot of the other especially

Protestant religions do and that has to

do with those three major principles in

the spiritual economy we don't use a lot

of the phrases that are used a lot of

the phrases you'll hear from

evangelicals especially but Protestants

broadly come from the letters of Paul

and certain phrases and words such as

Christ Jesus and little phrases and

words that are used around the term

grace are something that they're not

found always in our vernacular because

Paul is a bigger hero so to speak in the

Protestant tradition because of grace

and we're going to get to that in a

minute

another thing about Paul is I've talked

about thunder and lightning because

we're not really getting a history here

a biography or a chronology of events

more like what we would see in the

Gospels or the book of Acts what we're

getting is Paul speaking a lot of

talking about a lot of doctrine a lot of

don't do this

or

of behavioral issues and so for some

people it's a little hard to read and so

as modern Western people Paul can be

very foreign to us right away here for

example in Romans one we have the topic

of homosexuality later on in his letters

we get what seems to be to him doctrine

or at least this is how we need to act

with the roles of men and women that

just don't seem to apply to us today and

so a lot of times we can look at the

scriptures here and say well wait a

minute this is the Bible this is Paul he

was an apostle and he's saying these

things but this doesn't seem right to us

today

and so we grapple with some of the

things that are written down in these

letters and we might think to ourselves

well how does this apply in some cases

it's kind of like modesty sometimes

perhaps a hundred years ago what we

would have worn out on the beach there's

a lot different than what you're going

to see today and you might say well yeah

but the Latter day Saints are gonna be

modest well if the Latter day Saints

were wearing what they wore today at the

beach as compared to a hundred years ago

no they wouldn't be modest and so there

are some principles underlying what Paul

is talking about in a first century

world where somehow we have to lay over

that first century we have to put over

it a cut-out frame of the 21st century

and say well how does this fit how does

this mesh together

is there absolute truth is there

relative truth doesn't matter exactly

how we act or is there a principle at

play here and oftentimes throughout his

writing we're going to see this along

with those principles of the spiritual

economy were going to see the letter of

the law and the spirit of the law and

how he's trying to bring this together

remember he is writing to Jews

who have a very strong identity in their

religion and as a nation as a people and

as he continues to preach he's speaking

more and more to the Gentiles that are

pagans that have different practices a

very different sense of morality in some

places especially sexual morality

different practices of what to eat and

how to eat and what is purer and what is

not pure and he's trying to work this

together and make this magic happen

somehow remember we've talked about

covenant that's what this is this is the

very beginning of trying to roll that

stone up the mountain at the very

beginning and that's what Paul's job is

so as we read these letters don't think

of it as just well there's some members

of the church that are having some

difficult times accepting some things

you have the Jews that are trying to

hang on to the law of Moses and having a

very difficult time letting go of that

and their identity circumcision the

Covenant that they have they this is

this is how they make their covenant

with God and then on the other hand with

the pagans who know very little about

these practices with the Jews that they

have or the doctrines to begin with and

certainly have less of an understanding

and a knowledge of the scriptures going

back through the prophets all the way

back to the time of Adam so that's

Paul's world and that's the world we're

about to enter here so keep an open mind

and think about these things in the

spiritual economy faith works and grace

how do they work how do they matter in

your life because that is going to tell

you how you fit into the plan of

salvation and it's at the very core of

our doctrine and on the other hand the

higher and the lower law

where Paul is not trying to get rid of

the old the lower law he is trying to

bring together the higher and the lower

laws and make them mesh and that's as

difficult a thing as anything there are

also a few words here that you're going

to want to pay attention to throughout

these epistles the first one is

justification justification is something

very similar to righteousness it's a

word that was used or something similar

to it used in all cultures throughout

the Middle East that I know of and in

the manual they describe justification

as a remission a pardoning of sin and

being reconciled with God so we can kind

of look at justified as how is your

relationship with the Lord is it at

peace is it in the right place that

would be being justified in other words

you're going to hear a lot is the law

and typically maybe all the time but

typically throughout these letters when

Paul is talking about the law he's

talking about the law of Moses now

here's where I'm going to differ maybe

from some scholars out there and again

I'm not a scholar this is completely

editorial and based on my thoughts but

to me the law of Moses is simply an

expression of the law of the law of God

it is something that is put in place for

a specific people during a specific

amount of time was the law of Moses in

place before Moses well some kind of law

was put in place but there's always a

law there's always God's law that's

going to be in place there's always the

law of obedience that is in place and

you have to have a law to be obedient to

so I'm going to ask you to dance around

this a little bit as we go through these

letters when you hear the word law I do

want you to think of the law of Moses

and understand that what the background

is there and that he's probably speaking

about how the law of Moses applies to a

world after a resurrected Jesus

Christ but in a much broader sense I

would ask you to think about the law as

the law of God a lot of people would

disagree with me on that by the way so

keep an open mind about it but that's

the way I'm going to talk about it and

then we're going to get into our three

principles here in the spiritual economy

faith works and grace how do these work

together as latter-day saints do we

believe in works through is that more

important than grace is grace more

important than works how does faith play

in this think of the it's not in a

Pauline epistles but think about John

Wright where we learned that faith

without works is dead see we learned

these three here these three pieces are

gonna work together and they're gonna

butt heads sometimes and sometimes

they'll dance together really well and

sometimes Paul will talk about one as if

this is the way it is it's grace and

then he'll come back and he'll say no

it's works and then he'll talk

specifically about faith now in regards

to faith and thinking about the

interpretation of Paul's letters with

faith works and grace what we need to do

is go back to the time of Luther

remember Luther is the major reformer

from the Catholic Church and for Luther

at the time what he saw in the Catholic

Church was works you're coming in and

you've got all of these rituals

you've got Mass you've got all this

clothing that represents different

things all of these symbols inside of

the churches all of these paintings that

mean something for Luther the Catholic

Church was very focused on works and so

as a leader of a reform Reformation he

pulled Protestantism he launched

Protestantism away from that idea and

into

what you might think of as the opposite

which is Grace and so you have this long

history here hundreds of years where

Protestantism has been focused on the

grace of Jesus Christ that if you

believe and you'll find statements very

similar to this or even exactly like

this in these letters that if you just

believe on Jesus Christ that you will be

saved through grace and that would be a

major core principle for most

Protestants and so the works are kind of

left behind and it's more an idea of

well if I'm going to be saved by grace

if I'm the kind of person that believes

in Jesus Christ then naturally my works

are gonna be from a good person and so

it's grace that saves me and works are

just a natural expression of that of

being saved now in our church we

probably lean a little bit more toward

the opposite end of the equilibrium here

or have where we are very focused on not

necessarily rituals although that's what

we have in the temple we have very

little very few rituals in the in our

churches or symbols or big huge

paintings or anything like that it's the

exact opposite and the temple of course

and in fact a lot of times we'll say

we're not into it we're not

ritualistic which is kind of funny

because yes yes we are we're very

ritualistic when it comes to the temple

that would be more of a Protestant

tradition or thought that that we would

adopt somewhat although we might think

of but at least in scholarship in the

last several decades there has been a

little bit of a change there's something

called the new perspective on Paul I

don't know if that's a word forward but

I think that's what it is the new

perspective on Paul and what it

basically does is it says look we've

gone back we understand a little bit

more about history in the first century

we understand a little bit more about

the culture and the language

of the Romans and the Ephesians and the

Corinthians and the Jews and faith may

not have always been what we think of as

faith and grace may not have always been

what people think of as grace and works

may not be what we do but the works

might be the rituals from the law of

Moses and so that's something Luther

would have kind of naturally said look

the Jews that have law of Moses kind of

like the Catholic Church all of these

works here we need to leave those behind

and focus on grace because works are the

rituals that need to be put into the

past along with the law of Moses

something kind of to that effect but

faith and grace do have a nuanced

meaning in the first century that you

may not have heard of and that is that

they mirror a relationship that would

have been common in the first century

there are a couple of scholars that I

really like that focus on Paul one is

Matthew bates and the other is NT right

now Matthew bates kind of learned a lot

from NT right at least by reading his

books he says but they pull also from

this understanding about this

relationship and I saw a blog post

recently that compared this relationship

to the Godfather so if you think of

if you say if you think of the Godfather

and this is an odd comparison because

you're basically comparing the Lord to

Marlon Brando here but give me just a

little bit of leeway here in the first

century you would have had a lot of

relationships like what Marlon Brando

would have had with those that would

have been loyal to him right in those

relationships loyalty is everything you

are committed to those individuals

to those Godfather's and in the first

century you might need somebody like

that you're just a peasant or a farmer

or a small merchant

and you need to be able to work with

trade and you might be in a guild a

trade guild and there is a patron or

a godfather type figure that you can go

to help you trade and find the right

people and work within the city work

within the government someone who has

connections and power and you need them

and so you're going to work with them

and you're going to pledge and

allegiance so Matthew Bates uses the

word allegiance the term in Greek for

faith is pistis so he translates that

more as allegiance ante right translates

it more as faithful or faithfulness

where again you're being faithful

to the patron to the Godfather so to

speak to the Lord and in return the

Godfather is going to give you grace

that is charis C H A R I S and what does

that mean that means protection that

means a favor you are in the Lord's

favor because of what your allegiance

and your faithfulness to the Lord now I

disagree with some of this but it is a

very interesting take I think it's a

little myopic but it does add a little

bit of flavor for me it's not the main

course but it's a nice little side dish

here or at least a little bit of

seasoning a little a little bit of salt

and pepper here so faith would be

Allegiance or faithfulness to the patron

to the Lord and grace would be a favor

and so you would have this relationship

and so what that does is that changes

the idea of the spiritual economy and

adds actually works into the economy

through your allegiance if anything it

does bring Protestant scholarship a

little bit more toward a latter day

point of view of faith and were

and grace now what is the latter-day

point-of-view of faith and works in

grace well we've been very strong on the

work side we are productive we are

taught constantly in the church that we

need to improve ourselves be

self-reliant and that we need to earn

our way forward now I didn't say earn

salvation but the idea of following the

example of the Savior and becoming more

like him becoming perfect in some sense

we might look back at Dallin a chokes

talk from 15-20 years ago about becoming

that's a very core part of living an LDS

lifestyle

and following an LDS theology which is

very different from either the Catholic

world or the Protestant world now in the

last several decades there's been a

little bit more of a change where we've

brought in more the idea of grace we see

some important talks that are given on

grace that are very popular we see

something I just looked on lds.com

earlier today and I saw something about

being good enough so there's a something

in the church right now with the

Brethren that is saying look I mean it's

not all works for us

there is grace there and so there are

some things that we need to work with in

the spiritual economy here to understand

these three pieces a little bit better

and I think we'll be able to accomplish

that maybe not complete clarity on this

but I think we're gonna be able to have

a better understanding of these three

principles by the time we're done with

these letters but I will be sticking

with an underlying principle of faith is

trust of works as important to the lower

law in reaching up to God and as Grace

in the Lord's love and reaching down to

us

so maybe we'll be able to follow a

little bit in Paul's footsteps see what

he's thinking what is he saying

and how does he work all of these pieces

and pull them all together the Jews and

the Gentiles the higher and the lower

law faith works in grace I'll talk to

you next time

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