Due to the simul of Christian existence (that is, Christians are “at the same time saint and sinner,” simul justus et peccator),[1] the temptation of returning to the self-incurvature of reflective faith is ever present. That is to say, because even true believers now possess a sinful nature, they are subject to the temptation trusting in their own works or the quality of their faith over what the external Word tells them. Such a temptation connects with not only the root sin of unbelief, but what Luther called “Enthusiasm.”[2] Enthusiasm means “God withinism.”[3] An enthusiast looks inward to his interior thoughts and feeling so as to discover God’s will for him, rather than the external Word of God. This tendency can undermine biblical authority, but it is also the source of human doubt in the promise of the gospel.
Because of fallen humanity’s orientation toward unbelief and enthusiasm (incurvatus in se) temptation to doubt one’s own proper reception of the word will invariably arise. When temptation arises, faith in the Word must inevitably seek a secondary support in refocusing the believer on the objectivity of grace rather than the subjectivity of their own disposition. Such a secondary support should inculcate the objectivity of grace to the individual believer in a tangible manner and break the focus of the believer on their own inner reception of the external word. This secondary support for faith can be found in the sacraments of the new testament.
Disappointingly, most forms of Protestantism have failed to maintain the focus believer on Christ and the Word because of their rejection of sacramental realism. Indeed, most (though not all) Protestants rejected sacramental realism in favor of sacramental symbolicism or spiritualism.[4] Since both sacramental symbolicism and spiritualism disconnect the res from the signum in the sacraments, much of the Protestant tradition has denied believers the tangible secondary assurance of God’s grace that sacramental realism provides. Believers who reject sacramental realism therefore have had to seek secondary assurance apart from the sacraments in moral athleticism or spiritual experience, thereby exacerbating the problem of unbelief and self-incurvature. Only if the sacraments objectively contain grace can they function as antidote to religious subjectivism. They perform this task by shifting the focus away from the interior and spiritual reception of grace, to grace’s tangible external embodiment in a physical medium.
[1] See: Wilhelm Christe, Gerechte Sünder: eine Untersuchung zu Martin Luthers “Simul iustus et peccator” (Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt 2014).
[2] SA III.8; Concordia Triglotta, 497.
[3] Steven Paulson, Luther’s Outlaw God: Hidden in the Cross, vol. 2 (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2019), 350.
[4] See discussion in: James F. White, The Sacraments in Protestant Practice and Faith (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1999).
From the draft manuscript for Jack D. Kilcrease, Justification by Word (Lexham Press, forthcoming).