Chapter 25: To which religion do you belong? Now let me ask you a question. To which religion do you belong? Christianity or Doctrinity? Unless you are an unusual person, I'm sure your answer is Christianity. I never met a person yet who acknowledged that his religion is really Doctrinity. So let me ask you a different question. Suppose you were standing at the gates of heaven and Jesus asked you, "Why should I let you in?" What would your answer be?
Perhaps you recognize my question as being the same question that Christians frequently ask non-believers when witnessing to them. And no doubt you have a ready answer. So let's talk about your answer for a moment. It reveals a lot about yourself and your religion. First of all, does your answer focus on theology or fruit? The persons who use that question in evangelism are normally looking for a theological answer.
The right answer is supposedly, "You should let me in because I believed in you alone for my salvation and put no trust in my own works." However, on Judgment Day, Jesus is going to look for fruit, not theological answers. He's already made this crystal clear. When the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the holy angels with him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory. All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate them one from another as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats.
And he will set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left. Then the king will say to those in his right hand, "Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food. I was thirsty and you gave me drink. I was a stranger and you took me in. I was naked and you clothed me. I was sick and you visited me.
I was in prison and you came to me." Then the righteous will answer him saying, "Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see you a stranger and take you in, or naked and clothe you?
Or when did we see you sick or in prison and come to you?" And the king will answer and say to them, "Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these, my brethren, you did it to me." Then he will also say to those on the left hand, "Depart from me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me no food. I was thirsty and you gave me no drink.
I was a stranger and you did not take me in, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me." Then they also will answer him saying, "Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty, or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and did not minister to you?" Then he will answer them saying, "Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me." And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.
Matthew 25:31-46. So Jesus isn't going to be looking for correct theological answers on Judgment Day. He's going to be looking for fruit. Theologians may assure us that we can enter eternal life without fruit. But Jesus says otherwise. In his opinion, is the only one that counts. Is this works salvation? Does this mean that Jesus taught a works salvation? Not if by works salvation you mean a salvation that we earn by our own efforts or merits. In his parable of the vine, Jesus explained, "Abide in me and I in you.
As a branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me and I in him bears much fruit, for without me you can do nothing." John 15:4-5. So we can never be good enough on our own strength to be saved. A person who truly maintains an obedient love-faith relationship with Jesus Christ will always be a person who realizes how utterly dependent he is on God's grace for his salvation.
As Jesus said, "Without me, you can do nothing." I know that I would be absolutely nowhere without God's amazing grace. Martin Luther was correct in teaching that we cannot earn our way into heaven. The problem is that Luther acted as though the main point of Jesus' parable of the vines was that we can do nothing without him. That is certainly one of the points of his parable and is surely a vital truth.
However, the point of the parable is that we must produce fruit if we're going to remain on the vine and inherit eternal life. Luther confused the means with the end. The end is fruit. The means is the power that comes from an abiding relationship with Jesus Christ. Knowledge is not fruit. By way of illustration, imagine John Smith, a homeowner living in the early 1950s. For years, John has struggled trying to mow his yard with an old-fashioned push-reel mower powered solely through human muscle.
However, one day John discovers that there are gasoline-powered self-propelled mowers. With such mowers, the homeowner's primary job is to guide the mower as he walks behind it. Filled with amazement, John immediately goes out and buys a power mower. John is so excited in learning that a person can mow his yard without having to depend on his own strength that he immediately tells the good news to his neighbors. They too go out and buy power mowers.
However, John and his neighbors never actually mow their yards with their newly discovered mowers. They spend lots of time showing their mowers to others and explaining that a person can mow his yard without having to depend on his own strength. That's because all the power comes from the gasoline engine. But none of these people ever mow their own yards. And soon their lawns are covered with foot-high grass and weeds. It was the same way with Luther and most of the theologians of the Reformation.
They rejoiced to discover that without Christ we can do nothing. They exulted in the knowledge that the power to live the Christian life comes through Jesus. They eagerly spread the good news about that. But they ignored what Jesus said about producing fruit. Understanding how a power mower works does not get a lawn mowed. Likewise, understanding how the vine works does not in itself produce fruit.
What matters is whether or not we actually produce fruit, not whether we can correctly explain how the whole process works. "Without me you can do nothing" does not mean there is no role you play in producing fruit. The whole point of Jesus' parable of the vine is that we must produce fruit or else be cut off the vine. If fruit comes automatically, there would be no point to Jesus' parable. So what role do we play?
Jesus explains, "As a branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me." So the role we play is to abide in Christ Jesus. At first glance, that may sound as though we play only a passive role in producing fruit. We just need to abide in Jesus. But what does it mean to abide? Other translations use more familiar terms such as "remain in me," "dwell in me," "live in me," or "remain united to me." And what is required to live in Christ or remain united to him?
He himself clarifies this at the end of his parable when he says, "If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love." John 15:10. So to abide or dwell in Christ, we must keep his commandments. Or to put it another way, to abide in Jesus, we must truly love him. And if we truly love him, we will keep his commandments. To enter heaven, we must maintain an obedient love-faith relationship with Jesus.
As William Law expressed it, the one true proof that we are living members of Christ's church on earth is nothing else but our having the inward nature and the outward behavior that Christ manifested to the world. However, theologians want to convince us that what matters most to God is our doctrines. They convince millions of professing Christians that we can't believe what God said about Judgment Day. According to them, he's not going to be looking for kingdom fruit.
Rather, he's going to be looking for the right theological answers. The theologians certainly did a good job of convincing George Sodini, the mass murderer of that. Like their predecessors, described in Pharisees, Christian theologians have consistently missed the essence of God's message to mankind. Rather than shedding light on God's word, they have more often hidden it in darkness with their theological books, study Bibles, and commentaries.
They nullify most of Christ's commandments by using language bullying, counterfeit history, and the claim that they truly know the historic faith. Throw off the shackles. It's time for those who truly love Jesus Christ to throw off the shackles of Doctrinity. By that, I don't mean that we need to throw away the theological doctrines of the historic faith. By no means.
Rather, it's time to let Jesus speak through the pages of the Gospels without filtering his teachings through the denials, mental gymnastics, and reinterpretations of the theologians. It's time for the children of the kingdom to stand up for Jesus and the Gospel he preached. And it's time for the theologians to sit down.