One of the great misconceptions about the Western church before the Reformation and therefore about the Reformation reaction to it is that the medieval church taught “salvation by works” or, more precisely, “justification by works” whereas the Reformation taught “salvation by grace” or, more precisely, “justification by grace.” There are a couple of reasons why this way of speaking is misleading or problematic.

First, the claim that the medieval and the Tridentine (and post-Tridentine) Roman Church (even today) teaches justification by works is a true conclusion and a powerful but misleading slogan because one will not find many medieval or counter-Reformation or post-Reformation Roman theologians or Councils or Papal decrees saying “justified by works.” Because the debate was (and is) rather more nuanced, sometimes Protestants are surprised to read the medieval and Roman theologians speaking so often and so effusively about grace.
Indeed, the Roman system of salvation (and justification) is positively infused (pun intended) with grace. Remember through the course of medieval history the Western church developed an elaborate sacramental system designed to impart grace to the sinner at every turn. So, a medieval or Roman theologian, when accused baldly of teaching justification by works could quite rightly reply, “What do you mean? There has never been such a gracious system of salvation!”

Here is the problem, and it is a very important problem touching the New Perspective(s) on Paul, the Federal Vision, and other sorts of covenantal moralists. It is too often assumed that the only categories by which these problems, e.g., Paul and Second Temple Judaism, the Reformation reaction to the medieval church, may be analyzed are the categories “Pelagian” or “Anti-Pelagian.” This is a mistake. Though the Reformation often used the adjective “Pelagian” to describe the Roman soteriology, and there were some late medieval theologians who advocated a doctrine of salvation that came perilously close to genuine Pelagianism, in the main, the medieval and Roman soteriology was not actually Pelagian any more than most Second Temple rabbis were baldly Pelagian (i.e. teaching that we are not sinners until we sin and therefore do not necessarily need grace). The Rabbis recognized that we are sinful, but they held we are not so sinful that we cannot keep the law. They had at least some of them a doctrine of sin and grace and so did most medieval theologians and so did Trent and so does Vatican II and the Roman catechism.

Failure to recognize that, in each of these cases, the opponents of either Paul or Luther, had a doctrine of depravity and grace, has led too many to think that so long as they acknowledge sin and grace and especially in Calvinist circles, so long as they say “sovereign grace” that everything else they say is “covered” as it were. As a matter of fact, just as there were late medieval theologians who verged on Pelagianism, so too there were late medieval theologians who had a high view of divine sovereignty. Those late medieval, neo-Augustinian theologians who taught a high doctrine of sin and a high doctrine of grace also taught that we are justified because we are sanctified. They taught that God sovereignly works sanctity within us. To be sure a recovery of the doctrines of depravity and sovereign grace were essential to the Reformation but they alone were not sufficient. . . .

Augustine not only rejected Pelagianism but also semi-Pelagianism (grace and cooperation with grace). The Reformation rejected both Pelagianism and semi-Pelagianism. For the Protestant Reformers, to say “and cooperation with grace” is to deny the material doctrine of the Reformation, justification by unmerited divine favor alone, through faith resting on and receiving Christ’s finished work alone. The doctrine of justification by grace and cooperation with grace attempts to synthesize two contrary principles: grace and works. When it comes to justification there is no synthesizing grace and works. Either we stand before the perfectly holy God on the basis of the perfect righteousness of Christ imputed to us sinners and received by unmerited divine favor alone through faith (defined as a certain knowledge and a hearty trust or leaning and resting on the sole obedience of Christ crucified alone) or we do not. It is not possible for a Reformed Christian to speak of justification “by grace and works.” If it is by grace, then it is not by works and if it is in the tiniest bit by our works, even if that work is described as Spirit-wrought sanctity by which we are empowered to cooperate with grace, then justification is no longer by grace. This is what Paul says in Romans 11:6, “But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace” or in 2 Timothy 1:9, “not because of our works but because of his own purpose and grace, which he gave us in Christ Jesus before the ages began….”

The medieval church taught (and the Roman church today teaches) that God the Spirit sovereignly works grace within the sinner creating sanctity (holiness). They called this Spirit-wrought sanctity “condign merit.” It is condign or worthy of divine acceptance because it is perfect and it is said to be perfect because it is Spirit-wrought. Nevertheless, the sinner is obligated to cooperate with grace or there can be no merit.

Remarkably, the covenantal moralists of our day are arguing a very similar program. There are two outstanding cases that come to mind. A few years ago, in our own federation (the United Reformed Churches in North America), a minister preached a notorious sermon in which it was argued that, at the judgment, we shall stand before God not on the basis of the imputed righteousness of Christ but on the basis of Spirit-wrought sanctity by virtue of our union with Christ. This sermon caused a complaint to the minister’s consistory and the matter eventually came to Synod where our churches responded by affirming our belief in the imputation of the active obedience of Christ as the sole ground of our justification.

There is no doubt that the Reformed churches confess the necessity of Spirit-wrought sanctity and even grace and cooperation with grace but not for justification. The fundamental distinction that Paul made, and that the Reformation recovered, is the distinction between justification as the divine declaration of righteousness and the sanctification as the progressive out working of that righteousness in our lives as a consequence of justification. This is why our catechism is in three parts: guilt, grace, and gratitude. The last section flows from the second. It is the result, the consequence of it, not the basis or even the instrument by which we stand before God now or ever. (“Examining the Nine Points,” The Outlook, Dec. 2008)