cross-posted from: https://exploding-heads.com/post/185114
Some protestants seem to believe you only need to have faith to be saved, so the criticism of this view is that it justifies sinning as much as people want as long as they simply have faith (or in essence, justifies “moral anarchy”)
Now according to some polls, a good majority of protestants seem to believe works are important for salvation (a view more traditionally associated with Catholics; I don’t know what the orthodox view is, if some orthodox can chime in or people knowledgeable about the issue) - so this does not reflect the belief of all protestants. In fact, in practice, there are even a lot of protestants it seems with this view, who believe that since they have faith that they want to do good “on the honor system” (and so they may do some good works anyway, even if they don’t believe them to be necessary to salvation).
But of those who do believe they can sin and it doesn’t matter… does anyone have any thought on the implications of this (heretical) view or how to encourage people away from this viewpoint?
Not protestant… closer to a non-denominational Christian with smatterings of Catholic and Lutheran… but if I’m on the fence about a few things, I Believe in God pretty solidly.
I might be missing a lot of nuance etc. But my take based on nothing but my own opinion is that if I were someone’s boss or creator, I would be happy with any honest effort (whether you’re setting specific goals or just doing the best you can). Some of us work better with well defined structure and others do better with more freedom. I sure hope any creator will grade me with this in mind anyway.
But one thing I absolutely would not be too thrilled with is people trying to cheat the system (e.g. “as long as I have faith” + then setting out from day 1 fully intending to commit sins with the expectation that you will get away with it).