you in this online community and I want to welcome you to Intermediate Biblical Counseling. This is week number 14 and we're looking at theology exam number 14 tonight, the exam on trusting in Christ alone or the great doctrine of sola fide and I look forward to a wonderful time studying God's Word with you tonight.

I hope that you're doing well and that you're enjoying the blessings of Christ and his amazing grace in each of our lives and thank you for your faithfulness to this class and for your faithfulness in the study of God's Word. It's just a joy to continue in these essay topics with you and to be a part of what God is doing in each of your lives.

In theology exam number 14, we are moving on from the section of exams which deal with the doctrine of Christology, the person and work of Jesus Christ. We had a wonderful time studying a number of topics related to Christology and the person of our Savior and we are moving on tonight to the section of exams which deal with the topic of soteriology or the doctrine of salvation.

And as you know, the study of soteriology is really closely tied together with Christology. You cannot study the doctrine of salvation without understanding the person and work of Jesus Christ and yet this is a wonderful segue, I think, for our class to think about the doctrine of salvation of God's amazing grace in each of our lives and how he has saved us from our sins and given to us an eternal inheritance in Christ.

I think this is going to be a wonderful study. So, welcome everyone tonight and we hope that you'll be blessed by our hour together. Just as a word of devotion, what I'd like to begin with is a reading from Romans 1, verses 16 and 17 as we introduce the subject of sola fide, salvation through faith alone.

We are looking at the core cardinal doctrine which launched the Protestant Reformation and just a precious truth for each of us in our own walk with Christ to know that we are justified not by any works of the law, not by any works of human merit, but we are justified by grace alone and that justification is received through faith alone on the basis of Christ's work alone, all to the glory of God alone.

These are the fundamental truths which we build our lives upon and I think we have a clear statement of the doctrine of sola fide or salvation through faith alone from Romans 1, verses 16 and 17. So, I'd like to go ahead and read this for us. The Apostle Paul says, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.

For in it, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, the righteous shall live by faith." My friend, Dr. Keith Palmer, who is on the board of ACBC and who serves as an ACBC fellow, made this observation in his message at the 2017 ACBC National Conference.

He said this, "The Protestant Reformation began as a counseling problem. The Protestant Reformation began as a counseling problem. It began as an overwhelming life struggle in the heart of one man and that man you and I know is Martin Luther. It was Luther's overwhelming heart struggle to deal with unresolved guilt in his life that led him to discover the truths of scripture, which in turn launched the Protestant Reformation.

And Luther, in his account, many of you have already read this, but I'll just bring this to our attention for tonight. He recounted his pre-conversion experience in the following way. He said, "Though I lived as a monk without reproach, I felt that I was a sinner before God with an extremely disturbed conscience.

I could not believe that he was placated by my satisfaction. I did not love, yes, I hated the righteous God who punishes sinners. And secretly, if not blasphemously, certainly murmuring greatly, I was angry with God and said as if indeed it is not enough that miserable sinners eternally lost through original sin are crushed by every kind of calamity by the law of the Decalogue without having God add pain to pain by the gospel and also by the gospel threatening us with his righteous wrath.

Thus, I raged with a fierce and troubled conscience." Now, let me just pause at this point and ask you as biblical counselors in training, if the pre-conversion Martin Luther were to enter into a time machine and make an appointment with you for counseling, and he told you in the first number of sessions of how his conscience was extremely disturbed, if he told you about his anger toward God, if he told you about the murmuring and the grumbling that was in his heart, if this counselee were to come to you for counseling and speak to you of his overwhelming sense of guilt, his unrelenting struggle with this tormented conscience, how would you respond to this counselee?

What answers would you have for this person's troubled soul? Would you tell him, "Well, Martin, the problem is that you lack self-esteem. The issue is you need to think more highly of yourself. You should start repeating yourself on a daily basis. I am valuable. I am worthwhile. I am a good person.

I am a beautiful butterfly who is waiting to soar. The problem, Martin, is that you just have a deficit of self-esteem, and so we need to build you up in your self-esteem. Don't be so hard on yourself. You struggle with so much guilt because you need to think more highly of yourself." Or maybe you would take the Freudian approach and say, "Well, Martin, the problem is that your id and your superego are at war with each other.

Martin, the id is raw desire and the superego is the judicial branch that tells you if you're doing right and wrong. Martin, your problem is that your superego has been basically strengthened by all of these external forces that are in your life. You've had a difficult, demanding dad, and he's been really hard on you, and you've just been weighed down by all these societal influences.

So, Martin, your guilt is really false guilt. You are experiencing guilty feelings that are not rooted in any truth. So, the answer is, Martin, we need to engage in psychotherapy and have hours of sessions of free association that dig into your past so that we can try to make these guilty feelings go away." That would be another approach.

Would you give him that approach? Or how about this approach? Would you tell your counselee, Martin, that, "Martin, the problem really is that you have an empty love tank. Your heart is really empty and neutral. You're just a needy person who needs to be filled. It's really your father's fault and your mother's fault because they never really learned to fill up your love tank and speak your love language, and that's why you have such a troubled soul today.

It's not your fault, Martin. It's your family's fault. It's your loved one's fault. It's society's fault." If the pre-conversion Martin Luther were to come into your counseling room and make an appointment with you, how would you help counselee Martin with his troubled soul? And can I just encourage you in this way that this is a great advertisement for biblical counseling because, as we know the story, Martin Luther's great internal struggle, his battle with this fierce and troubled conscience, was not addressed through endless sessions of psychoanalysis and free association.

It was not addressed by an attempt to build up Luther's self-esteem. It was not addressed by teaching his family members to speak his love language so that he would fill up his empty love tank. Luther's troubled soul, and here it is, here's the argument for biblical counseling, was addressed through a rigorous understanding of the text of Scripture, and more specifically, it was addressed by Luther coming to understand the doctrine of sola fide, justification by grace alone, received through faith alone, apart from the works of the law.

Luther's heart struggle was addressed through an understanding of Romans 1, verses 16 and 17, and he writes this of his understanding of that text. He says, "Nevertheless, I beat importunately upon Paul at that place, most ardently desiring to know what Saint Paul wanted. At last, by the mercy of God, meditating day and night, I gave heed to the context of the words, namely, 'In it, the righteousness of God is revealed, as it is written, 'He who through faith is righteous shall live.' There I began to understand that the righteousness of God is that by which the righteous lives by gift of God, namely, by faith." And here was the effect of this understanding on Luther's soul.

He says, and this is the meaning, "The righteousness of God is revealed by the gospel, namely, the passive righteousness with which the merciful God justifies us by faith, as it is written, 'He who through faith is righteous shall live.' Here I felt that I was altogether born again and had entered paradise itself through open gates.

Here a totally other face of the entire scripture showed itself to me. Thereupon I ran through the scriptures from memory and I extolled my sweetest word with a love as great as the hatred with which I had before hated the word righteousness of God. Thus that place in Paul was for me truly the gate to paradise." What began as a counseling issue, the experience of a man facing great internal struggle became the launching point of the Protestant Reformation and the discovery that Luther made as he rigorously meditated on the words of Paul in the epistle to the Romans was that man is justified by grace alone through faith alone on the basis of Christ's work alone as revealed in the scriptures alone to the glory of God alone and that salvation is received by faith alone apart from human merit, apart from the works of the law, but solely on the basis of Christ's all-sufficient work through his life, death, and resurrection from the grave.

And Luther said, "This was for me truly the gate to paradise." Don't underestimate the power of these glorious doctrines to cure troubled souls. That was the effect of the doctrine of Sola Fide on Martin Luther's soul and I believe it can be the effect upon our souls as well and the souls of those whom we minister to and serve.

And so just as I conclude this devotion, I want to read from Romans 3 verses 21 to 26 and just note the many times the term faith and the term believe are used in reference to Paul's explanation of salvation and this is going to be a segue into our essay topic tonight because theology exam theology exam number 14 is an exam dealing with the doctrine of salvation through faith alone.

And so listen to Paul as he explains and amplifies what he introduced in Romans chapter 1. Romans 3 verse 21 Paul says, "But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.

For there is no distinction for all of sin and fall short of the glory of God and are justified by his grace as a gift through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith. This was to show God's righteousness because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.

It was to show his righteousness at the present time so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. And so theology exam number 14 is an exam which asks you to explain what it means to trust in Jesus Christ alone for salvation.

And I hope you see how important this essay is in the training of biblical counselors. I hope that writing this essay will be an opportunity for you to clarify what you believe about these doctrines of justification by faith alone. And I hope this will be a training exercise for you so that when a Martin Luther-like person comes and sits with you for counseling that you will be able to use this doctrine to minister to that troubled soul.

So let me pray and we'll devote this time to the Lord. Let's pray. Father, thank you for this precious truth that we are justified by grace alone through faith alone that we are justified on the basis of Christ and his perfect work alone that there is no work that could add to or supplement the work that Christ has already done on our behalf.

We thank you that these truths are revealed in the scriptures alone and all of this rebounds to your glory and your glory alone. And we pray that you would help us, Lord, as we study these truths, not only to find joy in them ourselves, but Father, I pray that you would train us and equip us that we may be skilled practitioners of your truth, that we would be able to make the application of these precious doctrines to the troubles of life, that you would help us to use these truths in such a way that we would bring healing and hope to those who have troubled souls and a troubled conscience.

Father, I pray that as you would bring to us those who, like Luther, are afflicted with great torment of spirit and conscience, that you would help us to wield the great truths of the gospel and that we would be able to witness the healing, transforming power of your word in people's lives.

I just thank you for each of my brothers and sisters tonight. Thank you for their faithfulness and tuning in week after week and studying and writing their essays and laboring to be precise with doctrine. I pray that you would bless each one and allow the fruit of this time to abound to your glory.

And we pray all this in Christ's precious name. Amen. Amen. Okay, so we're looking at page one of your handout there, and I just put some good works for you to look at. The standard works from Wayne Grudem and Paul Enns and Charles Ryrie all have very solid sections that will help you walk through this topic of what it means to trust in Christ and him alone.

And I would also recommend to you John MacArthur's "The Gospel According to the Apostles," especially chapter six of that book, which is entitled "Just by Faith." That's an excellent read that is clarifying for this issue. And then for supplemental reading, I'd recommend R.C. Sproul's "Faith Alone, the Evangelical Doctrine of Justification." That will be a helpful work for you just to enrich your understanding of this doctrine.

So I do encourage you to acquaint yourself with those resources. As you move to the next page of your handout, what we're really looking for in this essay is a clear understanding of sola fide, the doctrine of justification by faith alone, the idea here of trusting in Jesus Christ alone for salvation.

The words "trust," "believe," and "faith" are used interchangeably in the Scripture. And so we're asking you to write an essay giving a clear understanding of what it means to trust in Jesus Christ alone. I have in your handout there the idea of sola fide is the biblical conviction that salvation by grace alone, salvation is by grace alone through faith alone, apart from any works of man.

So just at the starting point, we want you to be absolutely clear on this topic that we are saved by grace alone, not by works, that we receive that salvation through faith alone, not through any meritorious effort, and that we are saved solely on the basis of Christ's work alone.

We just want you to be absolutely clear that you believe the salvation is received by faith alone. So we are not eager to affirm any Catholics as part of ACBC certification training. We want you to make sure that you have a correct understanding of salvation and that you're able to articulate those basic truths.

By the way, some of you are going to be given a ministry to, an evangelistic ministry, to those coming out of a Catholic background. And if you're trained to be certified as an ACBC biblical counselor, you may have opportunities to sit with Catholics and to be able to lead them to an understanding of salvation by grace alone through faith alone.

And so this is part of your training for that ministry is to write this essay. Just be aware that that is an opportunity that we do see in our counseling ministry. So we just want you to be absolutely clear on this topic, Ephesians 2 verses 8 and 9, "For by grace you have been saved through faith.

This is not your own doing. It is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast." Or as the hymn writer put it, "Nothing in my hand I bring. Simply to the cross I cling." Just a brief overview on your slides here of the five solas of the Reformation.

I would encourage you, if you haven't already, to listen to Heath Lambert's message from the 2017 ACBC National Conference. The conference theme was "Faithfully Protestant," and Heath Lambert was introducing that theme by relating the five solas of the Reformation to counseling ministry. And his argument was that biblical counseling, which holds to the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture, best represents the theme of the five solas of the Reformation because we are founded upon the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture.

Just an excellent message. It's available for free on Vimeo. I'll send out a link if you haven't gotten that already. But he walks through the five solas of the Reformation with a specific application to counseling ministry. "Sola gratia," salvation is by grace alone and cannot be earned through human merit.

"Sola fide," the instrument of receiving God's grace is faith, not faith plus works. It is received by faith alone. "Solus Christus," faith has an object, and that object is the person of Jesus Christ. Salvation is accomplished through the perfect life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. "Sola scriptura," the Bible alone is the only authoritative source for understanding the gospel and salvation.

And "Soli Deo Gloria," salvation is to the glory of God alone. And as R.C. Sproul has well observed, the distinction between Protestants and the Catholic Church is not in the words "gratia," "fide," "Christus," "scriptura," and "gloria." It is in the word "sola." It is the concept of grace alone, faith alone, Christ alone.

A Catholic will say that he or she believes in grace, faith, Christ, and the Scriptures. But a Catholic, at least if it's in accordance with the official documents of the Catholic Church, Catholic will not be able to say that he or she believes in "sola gratia," "sola fide," "solus Christus," grace alone, faith alone, Christ alone.

That's really the dividing mark and the dividing line between Protestants and Catholics. So those five "sola" stand and fall together. I hope you all see that. If you lose "sola scriptura," if you lose the Bible alone as your authority, then you lose "solus Christus." You lose the doctrine of Christ because Christ is revealed through the written Scriptures.

If you lose the person and work of Jesus Christ in your understanding of salvation, you lose an understanding of grace alone and faith alone. And all of that has implications on "soli deo gloria," salvation to the glory of God alone. So those five "solas" stand and fall together, and this is what was articulated by Heath Lambert in that message where he says those are the five "solas" of the Reformation arranged around this text of Scripture itself.

Each element of Paul's theological framework fits together. Each element of Paul's theological foundation depends on the other elements. His biblical and theological commitments are a web, not a list. You cannot take anyone away without damaging the entire system. If you take away "sola scriptura," there is no way to know the others.

If you take away Christ, there is no object of faith. If you take away faith, there is no way to lay hold of Christ's work. And his message there was simply that a biblical counselor who holds to the sufficiency of Scripture ought to be the most Christ-centered counselor, because Christ is the focus of the Scripture, and ought to be the most grace-centered counselor upholding the grace of God in salvation.

But if you take the integrationist approach to counseling, and you remove the doctrine of Scripture alone in your counseling methodology, you will inevitably diminish the person and work of Jesus Christ in your counseling practice. That Christ may be an add-on, or he may be a reference in your counseling, but he will not be the center of your counseling if you do not hold to the doctrine of Scripture alone as the authority.

Again, an excellent work, and I commend that to you. So, let me move to your notes on, and I believe this is the same page as "Trusting in Christ Alone for Salvation." I have a quote there from the Westminster Catechism, which says that, "Justification is an act of God's free grace, wherein he pardoneth all our sins, and accepteth us as righteous in his sight, only for the righteousness of God imputed to us, and received by faith alone." I love that language of being received by faith alone.

It's not that faith is a meritorious work, that you become a person of great faith, and somehow that earns God's favor. It is simply that the grace of God, his unmerited favor, is received by faith. This is why even a weak faith in a strong Savior can bring salvation to the sinner.

It is the object of faith who shows himself to be strong, and even those who are weak in faith, as Scripture describes, there are some who are stronger in faith and weaker in faith, but even those who are weak in faith have full salvation because the object of their faith is Christ and him alone.

This, of course, is in contrast to what the Catholic Church teaches. The following is a quote from the Council of Trent, which says this, "If anyone says that the sinner is justified by faith alone, meaning thereby that no other cooperation is required for him to obtain the grace of justification, and that in no sense is it necessary for him to make preparation and be disposed by a movement of his own will, let him be anathema." So, the Council of Trent says, if you say that man is saved by faith alone, then let that person be anathema.

So, the battle lines here are very clear. Do you believe that salvation is by faith alone, or do you believe that it is by faith plus works? On your handout, you have an article from Table Talk magazine, which is produced by the ministry of R.C. Sproul, and it says this, "Among the many points Rome offered, chief among them were several key claims.

Number one, the sinners are justified by their baptism. Number two, the justification is by faith in Christ and a person's good works. Number three, that sinners are not justified solely by the imputed righteousness of Jesus Christ. And number four, that a person can lose his justified status." So, for five years here at the church, I've taught the baptism class at Kindred, and we do make the point very clearly and emphatically that baptism is not a requirement for salvation.

The thief on the cross went to be with Jesus in paradise, and he was not baptized. We're saved by grace alone through faith alone, not faith plus baptism. And at the same time, we make the point that baptism is one of the first acts of obedience for a Christian, and that it is a command of God, and we should not neglect to be baptized.

It's that tension that we want to make very clear that baptism is not a requirement for salvation, but that does not make it optional in the Christian life. But there are many who are teaching that a person is saved as they enter into the waters of baptism, the doctrine of baptismal regeneration, which is an aberrant understanding of salvation and an assault against the doctrine of sola fide.

I believe that R.C. Sproul's explanation is helpful. I like math equations, and so this is a helpful equation. The Roman Catholic view is that faith plus works equals justification. The Protestant view is that faith results in justification plus works. In the first equation, works are presented as the root of salvation, a requirement for salvation.

In the second equation, works are presented as the fruit of salvation, but not the root or requirement for salvation. So we do believe that faith in Christ produces good works, but those works are never the requirement for a person being justified. As Sproul writes, neither view eliminates works. The Protestant view eliminates human merit.

It recognizes that the works are the evidence or fruit of true faith. They add or contribute nothing to the meritorious basis of our redemption. So this is the glorious work of salvation. God opens the sinner's eyes to see the true condition of his or her soul. The Holy Spirit brings to the sinner a conviction of sin.

Before the holy law of God, the sinner confesses that he or she is a sinner, that there is nothing that can be done to earn or to merit salvation. In Luke chapter 18 verse 9, Jesus told the story of two men who went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.

The Pharisee standing by himself prayed thus, "God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week. I give tithes of all that I get, but the tax collector standing far off would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, "God, be merciful to me, a sinner.

I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other, for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted." Jesus said that the tax collector who simply cried out for grace was a picture of true salvation. This is what happens when a person becomes saved.

The sinner sees himself with nothing to offer in terms of merit. The sinner sees all of his or her work's righteousness as filthy rags. The sinner sees that the only contribution that he or she can make to salvation is the sin that needs to be forgiven. The sinner comes with what's been called by John MacArthur a beatitude attitude in Matthew 5 verse 3.

"Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted. Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied." The sinner who formerly flattered himself or herself like the Pharisee in Luke chapter 18 is convicted of sin and comes with poverty of spirit, mourning over sin, hungering and thirsting for righteousness that is not possessed, and then the Holy Spirit in the wonderful and glorious work of salvation opens the sinner's eyes to see the all-sufficient work of Jesus Christ on our behalf and to lead the sinner to embrace the perfect substitute, the perfect work of Jesus on the cross that pays for all of our sins and earns all of our righteousness, and then to receive that righteousness as a gift of grace, not as the result of the works of the law.

That is the glorious work of salvation that leads the sinner to embrace the truth of grace alone through faith alone. So if you'll move with me to the next page, what I want to do is to break down the three components of saving faith, and you'd do well in your essay to articulate a view of this, of the three components of saving faith.

You'll find in Paul Enz's work, as well as Wayne Grudem's work and Charles Ryrie's work, they all have some kind of explanation of these three components, and you would do well to read those sections of those systematic theologies and then to, in your own words, articulate your own understanding of the components of saving faith.

But for our time tonight, let me walk through these components together. Number one, there is an intellectual aspect to saving faith. Romans 10 verse 17 says, "So faith comes from hearing and hearing through the word of Christ." So there are biblical truths that must be intellectually understood and known in order for the sinner to be saved.

So man, a sinner must understand that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, the truth of Christ's work on the cross, salvation by grace and not works of the law. There are certain biblical truths that simply must be understood in order for the sinner to come to salvation.

This would argue against the Roman Catholic idea of implicit faith. I don't think I have that term on your handout, but it's this idea in the Catholic Church that a person can be saved by simply having a general acceptance of whatever the church believes without a specific understanding of the contents of that faith.

So this is the idea, implicit faith, that you don't actually need to know certain truths about the gospel to be saved. You just need to generally affirm that, "I believe whatever the church teaches." But that is not what the Bible teaches us about saving faith. Listen to Paul's language in 1 Corinthians 15 verse 1.

He says, "Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you, unless you believed in vain." And here are the elements of the gospel.

Verse 3, "For I delivered to you as a first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures." Paul says these are the central tenets of the gospel that must be intellectually understood for salvation.

There is an intellectual aspect to saving faith, that the sinner must understand certain truths in order to be saved. Now let me just pause at this point in our discussion and make some application to counseling ministry. I think if you've been with me for any length of time, I've explained the whole idea that counseling ministry is sort of the emergency room of the church, that you've got primary care, which is maybe small groups or other ministries, and you've got kind of the general flow of ministry in the church.

But counseling is really the emergency room. It's urgent care. It's the place where people go when things are falling apart. And so this is not the pediatrics section of the medical center where you see babies who need to be immunized. This is the emergency room. People come in, their lives are falling apart.

And in the counseling ministry, you are going to hear all sorts of things in terms of a person's understanding of Christ, a person's understanding of the gospel. Oftentimes you may hear a heavily psychologized understanding of the gospel and of Christ's idea that Jesus came in order that I may turn over a new leaf, or Jesus came in order that I may reach my full potential, or Jesus came in order to give me excitement in life because I needed to be rescued from my boring life.

You'll hear all sorts of understandings of Christ and the gospel. And under this first component, knowledge, just the intellectual aspect of saving faith. What we want to work with our counselees on is a clear understanding of sin and salvation. We want to help our counselees come to the place where they can articulate a clear understanding of their sin before a holy God.

The wages of sin is death. The holiness of God's law and their need for salvation. We want them to be able to articulate a clear understanding of Jesus and his saving work on the cross that Jesus came to save me from my sin. He died in my place for my sin.

The full righteousness of Christ has been given to me as a gift of grace. Those are just very clear teachings about the gospel. And you might say that, "Well, you know, I'm going to assume that my counselee understands all that because my counselee has been in the church for over 10 years." And we would just encourage you that that is an assumption you would be wise not to make.

You will find all sorts of understandings of who Jesus is and why Jesus came and why he came to die for us. You will find all sorts of understandings of the gospel of Jesus. And you want to make sure that your counselee, at the very least, has an accurate intellectual understanding of the basic truths of the gospel.

We're not talking here about high-level theology. We're not talking here about some upper level of theological knowledge. We're just talking about basic truths of sin and salvation. Who God is. Who man is. What Jesus has done. How do I come to saving faith in Jesus Christ. And I've been, this is my pastoral lament, that a very clear and straightforward articulation of sin and salvation, which really can be articulated in two or three minutes, but that clear, straightforward confession of, "I am a sinner who needs salvation.

Jesus died for my sins. He took the wrath of God. I'm justified by grace alone." That clear understanding of salvation is increasingly becoming more rare in our church today. And so you just want to make sure and labor with your counselee to understand. Don't assume that they have a clear understanding of sin and salvation.

Work with your counselees under this intellectual aspect of knowledge. Now we know that knowledge is not enough. On your handout you have there, James 2 verse 19, "You believe that God is one. You do well. Even the demons believe and shudder." A person can know the basic truths of the gospel and not be saved.

Sad to say, but we do see this happen all the time. We often get the question in church ministry and in counseling ministry, "What about the person who said that they believed in Christ when they were eight years old and now they're 30 years old and they're living in unrepentant sin?

Did that person lose their salvation?" And the scripture would say, "They didn't lose their salvation. They demonstrated the reality that they were never saved to begin with. They went out from us because they were not of us." We want to continue to pray for such people, but we don't want to give assurance of salvation to someone who's living in disobedience to Christ.

So, that's the intellectual aspect of saving faith. You have, secondly, the emotional aspect of saving faith. Paul Enns writes that conviction involves the emotions. This element emphasizes that the person has not only an intellectual awareness of the truths, but that there is an inner conviction of their truthfulness. This conviction is the work of the Holy Spirit.

John 16 verse 8 says, "When he that is the Holy Spirit comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment." Concerning sin, because they do not believe in me. Concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father and you will see me no longer. Concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.

And then I love Acts chapter 2 verse 37. Now, when they heard this, when they heard the preaching of Christ, they were cut to the heart. That's a very vivid and memorable phrase there. They were convicted of their sin and need for repentance and need to place their faith in Jesus Christ and said to Peter and the rest of the apostles, "Brothers, what shall we do?" That's good preaching.

Good preaching does not elevate man's pride, but good preaching smashes man's pride to the dust and exalts Christ as the perfect substitute. So there you have emotional conviction over what was heard. And then the third aspect would be the volitional aspect, which is trust. It's one thing to say that Jesus died to save sinners.

It's another thing to say that Jesus died to save me. It's one thing to say, "I understand that men need to trust in Jesus for salvation." It's another to say, "I will trust in Jesus Christ for salvation." As the illustration, I'm borrowing this illustration from someone, but it's one thing to analyze the parachute on the plane.

It's another to put the parachute on and trust that the shoot is going to work. The "I will trust Jesus Christ for salvation" is very important. That's Paul's language in Galatians 2, verse 20. "I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.

And the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me." It's just beautiful language. It's one thing to say that Christ loves the world. It's another to say that I know he loves me and he gave himself for me.

Saving faith means to trust in Jesus Christ as a living person for forgiveness of sins and for eternal life with God. So says Wayne Grudem, "Saving faith is not just a belief in facts, but a personal trust in Jesus to save me." Just an application to counseling ministry. In counseling ministry, we make personal application of the truth of Scripture.

We use the words "you," the second person, "you," not just "them" or "the church." We make things personal. It's powerful. It's powerful to be on the receiving end of that ministry. It's powerful to to be on the ministry side of that conversation. It's one thing to teach that Jesus died for sinners.

It's another thing to sit with John or Jack and say, "I want you to know that Jesus died to save you." It's the great opportunity for counseling ministry. When I came to faith in Christ, back in February of 1992, I always tell people I was the nightmare new visitor.

I was a sophomore at UCLA. I was able to articulate my thoughts fairly well, and I was hostile toward the faith. I came out to a little church in Sylmar, California, and I scribbled down tons of notes from the sermons of why the preacher was wrong, the pastor was wrong.

I intellectually assaulted the truth. I argued with anyone who would talk to me about why Christianity is wrong and the Bible is wrong, and the pastor, being very long-suffering, Pastor John, instead of writing me off and kicking me out of the church, invited me to lunch, and we went to Chili's, because Chili's is where all good things happen.

Over lunch at Chili's, Pastor John listened to, I believe, this must have gone on for a couple hours, just all of my arguments and all of my disagreements with Christianity and the Bible. I remember at the end of that conversation, Pastor John saying to me, "Really, these arguments are not the issue," and he said to me, "Dan, the issue is that Christ is calling you to submit to His lordship.

Christ wants you to obey His word. Christ is calling you to come to Him, and the issue is that you are not willing," and I can't say that I gave my life to Christ there at the Chili's. Chili's was not the place of my salvation. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing, but I can't say that the Holy Spirit used that conversation in my life, and it wasn't long afterwards that I gave my life to Jesus Christ and truly repented of my sins, and it was the power of that conversation of the personal application of the gospel to my life, of a man of God who had the Bible and who opened the Bible and ministered Christ and then used the second person pronoun, not just, "Dan, Jesus died to save the world.

Jesus is calling everyone to come to Him, but Dan, Christ is calling you to come and to submit to Him, to submit to His lordship," and God used that conversation in my life to bring me to Christ. There's such power in that conversation. That's the volitional aspect. Once you understand the knowledge, "Here's the gospel," and then there is conviction because the Holy Spirit brings those truths to bear upon a person's heart, then there is the question, "Will you come to Christ?

Will you believe in Him? Will you trust in Him?" And that element of saving faith must be there in order for the faith to bring salvation. So, on the next page of your handout, I don't have time to go into all of this, but just note the number of passages there that speak of belief in Christ being the requirement for salvation.

I believe we're going to get into this in one of the next sessions of how faith and repentance are really two sides of one coin, and it's not that there's two requirements for salvation, faith and repentance. It's really that faith and repentance are two sides of one calling, and that's why the Bible sometimes just says, "Repent." The Bible sometimes just says, "Believe." The Bible says sometimes, "Repent and believe." It's really two sides of one calling for the sinner to turn from his sin and to embrace Christ for salvation.

So, you have the solas. You have "Sola gratia," "Sola fide," "Sola Christis," "Sola Scriptura," and we end with "Soli Deo Gloria." And what that means is, in the middle of your handout there, no boasting. If you understand these truths, you end up in saying that man has no reason to boast in his salvation, as if he's earned it in any way, but he has every reason to glory in the greatness of God's grace.

Romans 3, verse 27, "Then what becomes of our boasting? It is excluded by what kind of law? By law of works, no, but by the law of faith. Behold, that one is justified by faith apart from the works of the law." One final application, and then I'll close. I've got two minutes here, so I'm going to make it good.

I believe that biblical counselors ought to sing. You might think that worship ministry and biblical counseling ministry are really two separate ministries in the church, and they never intersect or come together, but I believe that biblical counselors ought to sing, and biblical counselors should teach our counselees to sing, because an understanding of grace alone, faith alone, Christ alone, scriptures alone, leads you to the glory of God alone.

And if you understand these truths, you end up by affirming solely Deo gloria, that my gracious God, who has saved me through the work of his son, deserves all my praise and all of my adoration. Proud people don't sing. Prideful people don't sing, because they're filled with themselves. They're like the Pharisee, who was moral and simply rehearsed his own righteousness and looked down upon others.

Who did not have that perceived righteousness. Proud people don't sing, because they have nothing to sing about, but if you understand these truths, what it does is it produces a song in your heart. You sing to the glory of God. Your heart is filled with praise to God for the greatness of his salvation.

You understand that nothing shall separate you from the love of Christ, and what you do is you bring that heart that is filled with song into the counseling room, and you teach your counselees to sing. That is the intangibles of biblical counseling ministry. That's the flavor, if you will, or the culture, or the atmosphere, the environment of the counseling ministry.

We desire that counselors go deep into their understanding of the doctrine of salvation, so that we will be amazed at the greatness of God's amazing grace, and from that experience in the truths of scripture, that we would come alongside other sinners who are in need of grace. Just one beggar telling another beggar where to find bread, and because we have received such grace in the gospel, that we would flavor our ministry with a gracious and a kind spirit that would reflect the gospel that we believe and we love.

And so, I just commend to you the study of sola fide, trusting in Christ alone for salvation. I pray that this will be a rich and a wonderful time of study for you, and that as you put your understanding of this doctrine, definitely make sure to contrast sola gratia, sola fide, grace alone through faith alone from the works righteousness system of salvation.

That would be a good place to start in this essay of just the many scriptures which contrast salvation through grace alone and faith alone with a works righteousness system, and make sure that you highlight the components of saving faith and show how each one are, which one of those components are essential for salvation, and I trust that God will give you a wonderful time of study.

So, God bless you all. Thanks for being here tonight. I am going to go ahead and sign off tonight, and I wish you a wonderful time of study this week, and just again, super thankful for your faithfulness and for your commitment to being trained in biblical counseling ministry. If I can be of any help in the writing of these essays, you can feel free to email me during the week, and also Joan Shim.

I believe many of you have her contact. She's also available to help you with any editing work at all, and we're just thankful for your continued progress in these essays. So, stay encouraged, keep studying, keep digging deep, and I trust that God will bless your labors. Let me close this in prayer.

Father, thank you so much for this time around your word, and we just marvel at your grace, the grace of salvation, and pray that these truths would so cause our hearts to rejoice in you that, Lord, when we come alongside troubled souls like those represented in Martin Luther's case, that we would be equipped to bring healing and help to those who are struggling.

Thank you for each of my brothers and sisters in training for counseling ministry. Pray that you bless each one and give us a great week of study. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. God bless you all. We will see you next Sunday at 5 p.m., and we'll go through theology exam number 15.