The gospel saves us
It is the 'power' of God!

Today, the gospel of 'justification by faith'
Can we really adequately explain our actions?

When Paul speaks of 'faith' and 'grace,' he focuses on God's divine will, which is our 'holiness,' and God's 'power' (of creation and resurrection) to realize that will.
Ultimately, according to him, 'faith' is awakening to God's 'power' and responding to His faithfulness, and 'grace' is God's sovereign way of bringing about that response.

This book is about the gospel of Paul.
Our question is, what is the relationship between salvation and works in Paul's gospel?
To answer this question, in this book we will carefully examine Paul's statements.
But before we meet Paul, we begin our story in Matthew and James (Chapter 1).
The intention is to sharpen the angle of discussion about Paul by identifying a viewpoint that seems quite different from his.

Next, we will ask about Paul's purpose as an apostle to the Gentiles.
After being called as an apostle, what was the ultimate goal he sought to achieve through the proclamation of the gospel? The nature of the gospel he proclaimed would be closely intertwined with the missionary goals he sought to achieve through that proclamation (Chapter 2).
These two chapters make up Part 1.
Part 2 analyzes three of Paul's representative letters.
First, the subjects are 1 and 2 Thessalonians (Chapter 3), which represent the period before the serious pastoral and theological debates in Paul's mission; Galatians (Chapter 4), which was written amidst the turbulent heat of debate; and Romans (Chapter 5), which, after the debates, deals with the traces of major questions and arguments as subjects for more calm reflection.

In Part 3, we summarize the conclusions reached through the analysis of individual letters in Part 2.
Here, we will examine the two concepts that are central to the discussion of salvation and works in Paul's gospel: faith (Chapter 6) and grace (Chapter 7).
In many cases, faith and grace are circulated as independent concepts, practically out of place in Paul's argument.
And as time goes by, it now comes across as a tired cliché, or a slogan that doesn't really inspire much.
We will place these two jewels back in their original ring, the letter of Paul, to confirm their original beauty.
Of course, it is up to the reader whether the 'setting in the text' will excite us or seem tacky to our eyes accustomed to cheap flashiness.
--- From the "Prologue"

In Part 1 (Chapters 1-2), the author examines the Gospel of Matthew and the Epistle of James to argue this point (that a believer's life influences the completion of his own salvation) and attempts to overcome Luther's exaggerated interpretation that separated the Epistle of James from the Pauline Epistles and the limitations of his time.
The conclusion of Part 1 is that “the saints’ righteous obedience is presented as an essential ‘condition’ for eschatological salvation.”
This is a clear and uncontroversial conclusion.
With this conclusion, the author effectively defends the canonical unity of the New Testament books, thus reassuring even devout Bible lovers.
In Part 2 (Chapters 3-4), the author effectively captures the groundwork of 1 and 2 Thessalonians, Galatians, and Romans, pointing out that the salvation received by New Testament believers is sometimes nourished, sometimes diminished, and sometimes completed by the life of the saved after salvation.
In particular, Galatians highlights the paradoxical tension between believers who are “already justified” and those who live in hope of the day when they will “be justified,” thereby clearly revealing the truth that God’s salvation sustains and matures the present life of saved believers within an eschatological tension.
Paul did not spend 25 years in the field of missionary work abroad just to hold a one-time evangelistic meeting.


In conclusion, the author states that Paul's goal as an apostle to the Gentiles was not to win converts by spreading secret doctrines of salvation, but to create a practical and moral community among Gentile believers.
Also, as we see in Romans 15, Paul describes himself as a priest who offers the Gentiles as a holy and blameless sacrifice to God.
That is, Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles, ultimately devoted himself to creating a practical and moral life for believers.
In the final third part, chapter 6, the falsity of the faith merit theory, which is often popularized in churches, is clearly pointed out through the overwhelming faithfulness of God, who reveals 'faith' as ​​the power of new creation that raises the dead, and the faithful life of believers who respond to that divine faithfulness (defined as 'loyalty', the fruit of the Holy Spirit).
Chapter 7 defines 'grace' as God's sovereignty to create a life that responds to His overwhelming faithfulness.


By emphasizing this dynamic, mutually reinforcing relationship between ‘faith’ and ‘grace,’ the author strives to overcome not only the works-based salvation or works-based reward doctrines of pastors who control the actual lives of the majority of their congregations, but also the superficial faith/grace doctrines that subtly aid and abet the moral failure and ethical decline of their congregations while attempting to bind them to the church.
--- From "Recommendation (Kim Hoe-kwon)"

"Is life after salvation and before heaven, as we know it, originally designed to be so awkward in our gospel? How "sensible" is our gospel, which says our future has little to do with our present? Can a gospel that fails to explain our present life truly function as gospel?"
--- p.21

“Despite the richness of the New Testament, we always consider the Pauline theological statements of ‘grace alone’ and ‘faith alone’ to be the core of the gospel.
Of course, this belief is based on the implicit conviction that Paul's soteriology based on faith and grace does not contradict the messages of other New Testament documents.
The problem is that this convenient premise is a doctrinal conclusion deductively derived from the belief that “since the Bible is all the word of God, its perspective must be consistent,” not an exegetical conclusion inductively derived from a direct examination of various biblical evidence.
--- p.35

“To put it somewhat rhetorically, in the Gospel of Matthew, the true condition for entering heaven is not whether we ‘love’ the Lord or not, but whether we ‘practice’ the ‘righteousness’ of the Lord whom we profess to love or not.
Matthew's perspective here is consistent with the teaching of John, who says, "He who has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me" (14:21; 15:10, 14), or with the teaching of 1 John, "He who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen" (4:20).
--- p.47

“Matthew’s ‘command’ theology presupposes that our lives matter.
Furthermore, it presupposes that we ourselves are precious before God.
We are not insignificant beings who can do whatever we want, and our lives are not trash that can be lived however we want.
Although our life itself is not heaven now, our life is certainly part of the journey towards heaven.
In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus invites us to a more noble pilgrimage in the form of a solemn demand and command.
Of course, God's invitation includes the right and ability to achieve that life.
“What the Gospel of Matthew teaches us is not the invitation itself, but the new life that the invitation portrays, which is the gospel.”
--- p.55

“If both James and Paul teach the same justification by faith, then this means that the faith Paul speaks of is also a faith that is made perfect by works, that is, a faith that contains the kernel of works within it.
However, the claim that we are justified by 'active faith' or 'living faith' is different from justification by faith as most believers understand it.
“When we normally say that we are justified by faith or saved by grace, we usually mean that we are justified without works, that we are saved purely by God’s grace, without any works or merits.”
--- p.67

“As the apostle to the Gentiles, Paul’s responsibility was to present the Gentiles as a holy and acceptable sacrifice to God (15:16).
As one who has been entrusted with this mission, his exhortation to the saints is, of course, to “offer your bodies a holy sacrifice to God” (12:1-2).
Paul's priestly responsibility is carried out not through the law but through the gospel, that is, by proclaiming the gospel of the Son of God.
Naturally, the gospel that Paul proclaims is one that is well suited to its purpose as a holy sacrifice, a sacrifice acceptable to God.”
--- p.99~100

“To properly understand the argument in Galatians, we must first understand what exactly the Galatians were trying to be justified by “the works of the law” or “the law,” and what faith, which is presented as the way to true justification, specifically refers to.
Why can't the law or the works of the law be the means of righteousness? And why are we justified by faith? By answering these two questions, we will be able to grasp the ethical implications of Paul's gospel of justification.
--- p.172

“The assurance of salvation that Paul shows is not that we ‘have been saved,’ but that we ‘will be saved.’
We cannot arbitrarily make this future tense present.
We often try such verbal manipulation, but it is often not a matter of faith conviction, but rather a selfish compulsion to relieve our anxiety.
However, this does not mean that the future confession that one will be saved implies a weakness of assurance.”
--- p.281

“The faith that leads us to the eschatological hope of justification is none other than the faith that “works through love.”
In other words, faith that is not combined with love is nothing more than a false faith that cannot lead us to the hope of righteousness, a faith that is “without works,” a “dead” faith, as James says.
So Paul warns the saints that those who, instead of living by the Spirit and bearing the fruit of the Spirit, pursue the lusts of the flesh and practice “the deeds of the flesh” will never inherit the kingdom of God (5:21).”
--- p.311~312

“It is a leap from the obvious statement that “God called us regardless of our works” to the conclusion that “therefore, our works will have no meaning in salvation in the future.”
So, we come to think that our actions have no value in our eschatological salvation.
And this is explained with the concept of grace.
The statement that “salvation is always by God’s grace” leads to the idea that “therefore our salvation never requires our works.”
As we have seen, this kind of self-deception contradicts not only the Gospel of Matthew and the Epistle of James, but also Paul's own idea that eternal life is given as a result of proper obedience (Rom. 6:22-23; Gal. 6:7-9).”
--- p.357~358

“Luther, in the church situation he was in, cried out for ‘faith alone’ and ‘grace alone’ and urged the church to repent.
Objectively speaking, Luther's doctrine is a kind of theological exaggeration in that it makes Paul's teaching one-sided and degrades the teaching of James.
So his theology is not a balanced theology.
But in our real world, balance is not the ultimate goal of theology.
Theology engages with historical context and has a responsibility to serve it most effectively within that context.
In that sense, Luther's 'exaggeration' has its own historical legitimacy.
In other words, it was an ‘exaggerated gesture’ that could not be avoided in order to properly serve the church at that time.”

--- p.419