Michael Tolosa

… Jesus said to them, “It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick; I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
- Mark 2:17

“I tell you that in the same way, there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous persons who need no repentance.”
- Luke 15:7

“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”
- Romans 3:23

The only ones who will receive the benefit of Jesus’ payment on the cross are those who are humble enough to admit they need a savior. If you refuse to believe you need a savior, or believe you can earn your way to Heaven by being a good person, then Jesus is not for you. You will be judged on your “good works” rather than Jesus’ good works. And how can you possibly compare to Christ? Humble yourself and cling to Christ. Become a loser for Jesus and live forever.

[Note: The title of this blog post was inspired/stolen from the song "Jesus is for Losers" by Steve Taylor.]

Have you ever done something blatantly wrong, and then performed some good deed to make up for it? Maybe you talked badly about someone behind her back, then in an effort to make up for it, you treated her extra nicely the next time you crossed paths. Or maybe you disrespected your parents, and a religious leader told you to recite a prayer twenty times or make a difficult journey to someplace in order to “pay” for your sin.

As humans, we desire to be self-reliant and autonomous. But when we hurt someone else, we have feelings of guilt that don’t coincide with our autonomous lifestyle. Why do we care whether or not we’ve harmed someone? It’s survival of the fittest, right? We just need to look out for ourselves. Right?

The fact is, we all feel a sense of guilt when we harm other people. This is not a product of our environment and upbringing. We have guilt, because each one of us is imprinted with a moral code and a conscience that notifies us when we’ve broken that code. The moral code is written in our hearts. And it was written by God.

No one can claim that murder, rape, and hatred are neutral actions. We all know they are wrong. We are all aware of the difference between good and evil.

When we break the moral law written in our hearts, we rightly feel guilty. If we continue to ignore our conscience, eventually it will wear out and cease to notify us of our transgression. The Bible calls this the hardening of the heart. Sociopaths and serial killers fall into this category. Hitler would fall into this category. These are people whose hearts are so hardened that they no longer view their obvious sins as wrong. In fact, anyone who lives unrepentantly contrary to God’s moral law would fall into this category. You probably know someone who does this. You may even be one.

So, what do we do with our guilt? We’ve all broken the moral code within us, as well as the expressly written code of conduct in the Bible. No one is guiltless in the matter of sin. Anyone who claims to be without sin only needs to examine the 10 Commandments to find himself guilty of breaking God’s laws.

Ultimately, the question we have to ask ourselves is how can a sinner like me enter Heaven? How good do you have to be to enter Heaven?

Well, here’s the bad news… You have to be perfect.

“Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.”
– Matthew 5:48

“For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven.”
- Matthew 5:20

“There is none righteous, not even one; there is none who understands, there is none who seeks for God.”
- Romans 3:10-11

God is holy, and we are not. God demands holiness, and we can never be holy on our own. No amount of prayers, penance, or praise-worthy actions will ever make up for the fact that you are not perfect. Just one sin keeps us from ever living up to the perfect standard of God.

So, if you have to be perfect to get to Heaven, who could possibly get there?

Well, here’s the good news… Jesus was perfect.

“And having been made perfect, He [Jesus] became to all those who obey Him the source of eternal salvation.”
- Hebrews 5:9

“For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are sanctified.”
- Hebrews 10:14

You see, we will never be perfect on our own. But Jesus lived a perfect life for our benefit, and it’s only with Him as our representative that we can be seen as perfect in God’s eyes. We don’t deserve to go to Heaven, but because Jesus was perfect and paid for our sins, God no longer sees our sins as ours, but as Jesus’. God punished Jesus on the cross for all of our sins – past, present, and future – so that we could escape punishment. That is why we are now seen by God as perfect.

It’s through Jesus’ perfect life, punishment, death, and resurrection that we have attained perfection. It’s not our own perfection, but Jesus’ that will get us into Heaven.

So, if you’re looking to make up for your sins by doing good deeds, stop it. You can never make up for your sins. Instead, trust in Jesus’ payment for your sins to remove your guilt and provide you with the necessary perfect status before God.

This was a free gift from God – not something you earn. If you try to earn it, you lose it. The only way you can get to Heaven is through Jesus Christ’s perfection.

“But to the one who does not work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness.”
- Romans 4:5

CAUSE of Salvation = Faith Alone
“For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.”
- Ephesians 2:8-9

EFFECT of Salvation = Works
“Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself. But someone may well say, “You have faith and I have works; show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works.”
- James 2:17-18

Works are only necessary as an evidence of faith. But the only requirement for salvation is faith. Once you put Works into the CAUSE category, you have a false gospel, of which Paul says…

“… even if we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel contrary to what we have preached to you, he is to be accursed!”
- Galatians 1:8

The difference between CAUSE and EFFECT in the matter of salvation is of eternal significance.

The word deceit is interesting. It is like a fish hook, in that what a fish gets is not what it expects. What you see is not what you get in that circumstance. … The word guile is dolos in the Greek, it’s the word used for fish hook which is very deceptive if you’re a fish, obviously.

– John MacArthur

All of the “sola’s” so far discussed have led to one inevitable conclusion: Soli Deo Gloria (or To God Alone be the Glory). When the reformers declared Sola Scriptura, they declared that all doctrine must align with what is taught in Scripture, alone—than no teaching of Rome or any other church is to be considered mandatory or “God-breathed.” Since it was God who inspired the Bible’s writers, through the Holy Spirit, the doctrine of Sola Scriptura pointed directly to God, giving Him the honor.

When the reformers declared Solus Christus, they said there is only one Way to Heaven, and that’s through Jesus Christ alone. There is no other mediator than Christ—not Mary and not the so-called saints. Because Christ is the only way to be reconciled to God, and since God was the One who sent Christ, God alone gets the glory in this doctrine as well.

The doctrine of Grace Alone established God’s initiative in redeeming man. Since man was corrupt by nature (every desire of his heart was to reject God), he already warranted eternal damnation. There is no righteousness in man, in and of himself. It was strictly out of grace alone that God thought of redeeming man. It was out of grace—not obligation—that God sent His Son to die for the sins of His elect. The doctrine of Sola Gratia clearly gave glory to God alone.

The reformers’ flag ship doctrine, Sola Fide (or Faith Alone) declared that man in no way warranted salvation due to his “good works.” There, in fact, is nothing a man can do to even contribute to his salvation. Justification is gained by faith in Christ’s death alone. And as Paul states in Ephesians 2:8-9, even the faith is something God gives us—not something we come up with on our own: “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that [faith] not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.” All the glory is clearly given to God in this doctrine.

So, the culmination of Reformed Theology is the honoring of God alone in the process of redemption. It is He who reveals Himself to His elect, and it is He who provides His elect the necessary qualifications to bring them to Heaven.

Though the believer, with his limited point-of-view, sees faith in Christ as a decision he makes on his own, the reformers of the 16th Century searched the Scriptures and found redemption to be a sovereign plan initiated by God before the foundation of the world. They realized that even their apparent choosing of God was really God choosing them. It was to this revelation that they declared so boldly, “Soli Deo Gloria!”