Make Your Calling and Election Sure

The Death of Capt. John H. Miller - Saving Private Ryan

Therefore, brethren, be even more diligent to make your call and election sure, for if you do these things you will never stumble; for so an entrance will be supplied to you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ (2 Peter 1:10-11).

It sure sounds like Peter is saying here that, in order to keep your salvation, you must do good works. In the verses immediately preceding 2 Peter 1:10, he gives us a list of things to do so we can make our calling and election sure: Add to your faith virtue… knowledge… self-control… perseverance… godliness… brotherly kindness… love.[1] Do these things and your election will be sure; stop doing them, and it won’t be. Doing this list of good works will earn you the pardon Christ has won for you. It’s like the end of the movie “Saving Private Ryan”, when Tom Hanks’ character, dying, having secured the salvation of the aforementioned Private Ryan, looks into his eyes and, with his dying breath says, “Earn this.”[2] This is the way the theologians of the Roman church in Luther’s day certainly thought about good works.

When Rome responded to the Augsburg Confession in a document called the Roman Confutation, they rejected the Lutheran insistence that the forgiveness of sins is not merited by doing good works.[3] One of the scripture texts they used to try to support their argument was 2 Peter 1:10. But, as Philip Melanchthon replied in the Apology to the Augsburg Confession: If the promise were to depend upon our works it would not be sure. If forgiveness of sins were to be given because of our works, when would we know that we had received it?[4] That’s sort of the whole idea upon which the system of indulgences that developed in the medieval church was built; You can’t be sure you’ve given enough money, or done enough good, to insure your salvation, so you’d better give and do just a little bit more. This idea of making your calling and election sure, that Peter writes about here, is often misunderstood this way by Roman Catholic and Protestant alike. Peter, however, is actually instructing us to cultivate the good works, which flow naturally out of us because of our faith in Christ, rather than doing those good works to turn us into, or insure that we remain, Christians.

James also gives this same type of exhortation. In chapter two of his letter, James says that faith without works is dead: But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. You believe that there is one God? You do well. Even the demons believe – and tremble.[5] James is not teaching contrary to Christ, or Peter, or most notably Paul, who constantly writes that it is by grace you are saved, and not by works. To the contrary, James’ words here enhance those of Paul; James is explaining the same idea as Paul and Peter, but coming from the opposite direction. What that means is this: Paul begins by telling us that we are saved by God’s grace alone through faith in Christ, and not by works. After explaining that, Paul then exhorts the Christians who have been saved by grace through faith, to then do good works. He tells us to act like the Christians God has made us into. We are to cultivate the good works, which naturally come forth from our new nature, and we are to resist and deny the impulses and desires of the flesh: And those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with it’s passions and desires. If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.[6] And later: For he who sows to the flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life. And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all, especially to those who are of the household of faith.[7] These exhortations come only after Paul expounds on how man is justified by faith, how the law brings a curse and it’s purpose is to show us our sin, and that we are all heirs to God’s promise in Christ.

Paul explains that, since we are baptized into Christ’s death and resurrection, we should not let sin reign in our mortal bodies. We should not obey sin’s lusts. We should not present our members as instruments of unrighteousness to sin.[8] This is also what the apostle John teaches when he writes: By this we know love, because He laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. But whoever has this world’s goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in truth.[9] This teaching, however, is no innovation of Peter, Paul, James, or John; it comes from Christ. This is what Christ is saying when He instructs the now forgiven woman caught in adultery to go forth and sin no more.[10] This is the meaning of the exhortation of both Christ and John the Baptist to bear fruit in keeping with repentance. We are forgiven, set free from sin, and bondservants to Christ; we should not waste our freedom, time, and energy pursuing opportunities to sin. We have been called to follow Christ.[11]

Melanchthon, responding to the Roman theologians, explains the folly of trying to make one’s calling sure by good works in the way they wrongly understood Peter’s words: Now you see, reader that our adversaries have not wasted any effort in learning logic, but have the art of concluding whatever pleases them from the Scriptures. For they conclude, “Make your calling sure by good works.” Therefore, they think that works merit the forgiveness of sins. This is a very nice way of thinking, if one would argue this way about a person who’s death sentence had been pardoned. “The judge commands that from now on you stop stealing for others. Therefore, you have earned the pardon from the punishment, because you no longer steal from others.” To argue in this way makes a cause out of no cause. Peter speaks of works following the forgiveness of sins and teaches why they should be done…Do good works in order that you may persevere in your calling, in order that you do not lose the gifts of your calling. They were given to you before, and not because of works that follow, which now are kept through faith.[12]

You can’t earn a gift. You can only be grateful for it. Christ has died as the atonement for the sins of the world; He rose from the grave as the conqueror or death. He gives us this gift through His Word because He loves us; we take hold of it by faith, created in us by the working of the Holy Spirit. He joins us to Him, to His death and resurrection, and gives us the Holy Spirit, in our baptism. He nourishes us, as sap flowing through a tree feeds all it’s branches, when we eat His body and drink His blood in the Lord’s Supper as He commanded. Because He has made us a new creature, He calls us to live according to the nature of that new creature, and not according to the impulses of the sinful flesh with which we must still contend, all the days of our lives. Our works are evidence of our faith.

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[1] 2 Peter 1:5-7

[2] Saving Private Ryan. Directed by Steven Spielberg. Performed by Tom Hanks, Edward Burns, Tom Sizemore, Jeremy Davies, and Vin Diesel. USA: DreamWorks, 1998. https://youtu.be/Lv-67DFlOsM

[3] "The Confutatio Pontificia." The Roman Confutation 1530. Accessed November 25, 2018. http://bookofconcord.org/confutatio.php. In the twentieth article, which does not contain so much the confession of the princes and cities as the defense of the preachers, there is only one thing that pertains to the princes and cities - viz. concerning good works, that they do not merit the remission of sins, which, as it has been rejected and disapproved before, is also rejected and disapproved now.

[4] Ap. XX 87

[5] James 2:17-18

[6] Galatians 5:24-26

[7] Galatians 6:8-10

[8] Romans 6:12-13

[9] 1 John 3:16-18

[10] John 8:11

[11] Engelbrecht, Edward, et. al., eds. The Lutheran Study Bible: English Standard Version. Saint Louis: Concordia Pub. House, 2009.

[12] Ap. XX 89-90