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I grew up in a devout Roman Catholic family and attended private Catholic schools for both my primary (St John’s Riverstone) and secondary education (Oakhill College, Castle Hill) both in the Western Suburbs of Sydney, NSW. While nothing is perfect, I really enjoyed my upbringing and even aspired to becoming a De La Salle brother, which is kind of like a ‘teaching monk’.

All that changed though when I received a sporting scholarship to the United States to play tennis on the college circuit. In the providence of God, I ended up in a Missouri Synod Lutheran University in Southern California, formerly called ‘Christ College Irvine’ but is now Concordia University. My world was about to be turned upside down.

My tennis partner said to me soon after I arrived: ‘It’s great that you’re here and all but, how do I say this…you’re clearly a committed Roman Catholic and well, this is a Lutheran university! Are you going to be ok with that?’

I immediately said, ‘Yeah, of course I will.’

My teammate though, knew I had answered too quickly and so he respectfully said. ‘You do realise who Martin Luther is, don’t you?’

‘Of course I do,’ I responded, ‘he’s that black guy you shot!’ (think: Martin Luther King Jnr).

After he realised that no, I wasn’t joking, he said in shocked disbelief, ‘Haven’t you ever heard of the Reformation?’

At which point even I could see that I was missing something of considerable historical and ecclesiastical significance, so I innocently asked: ‘Wasn’t it all that civil strife you had in the ‘60’s?’

Even though I had attended mass nearly every week of my life, I sadly knew very little about the Bible or church history. I still vividly recall one Saturday morning when my mum was driving me to soccer. There was a guy in my team from England who was pretty outspoken about not being a Catholic. As I looked out the car window, I’d noticed many different church buildings: Catholic, Anglican, Presbyterian, Uniting (a combination of Methodist, Congregational and Presbyterian Churches which was formed in Australia in 1977) and Baptist.

‘Mum, what’s the go with all of these other churches?’ I asked, ‘Do they all believe the same thing as us?’

‘O, don’t worry about them,’ my mum dismissively replied, ‘they’re just people who wanted to get a divorce!’

‘Well, that’s a pretty poor reason to leave!’ I thought. I knew Catholicism held to a pretty robust morality. My mum was very outspoken in her views regarding contraception—and that it should never be used—as well as the practice of pre-marital sex and especially the sin of homosexuality. And to be honest, I deeply respected her convictions and the courageous stance she often took in the face of opposition.

For the remainder of my high school years, that’s all I really knew about other churches. Indeed, even though I had regularly religious instruction at school, I ended up learning more about the tenants of Islam than I did about the Catholic faith. Vatican II really has a lot to answer for in the regard, as Pope Francis’ recent endorsement of other religions likewise affirms.

The homilies which the priest gave each week at mass weren’t much better. And in all my years of attending I can’t really remember hearing anything of theological substance at all, and I was really trying to listen! All I can remember is them being a brief moral comment on something which happened in the news that week.

I really wanted to learn about God. From ever since I can remember, I believed in Jesus and wanted to do what was right. My mum and dad belonged to a Rosary group and even had the priest come over to our house sometimes for dinner and to answer questions. He seemed somewhat bemused by my interest in spiritual things, and I quickly worked out that he wasn’t really interested in engaging in any deeper discussion.

Not that I was bitter or anything. I came to see that Catholicism is all about the externals of what you can see, hear, taste and touch. And so I threw myself into a life of semi-religious piety. From my brief and disastrous attempt at serving as an altar boy—more on that sorry episode another time—to engaging in sacrificial acts of self-denial such as walking slowly in the rain as a form of penance, to spending extended times of private prayer in our school chapel. But none of it brought me lasting joy or peace.

The Snake in the Jungle

Attending a Protestant tertiary institution in America, I quickly saw that there was a massive difference in being ‘religious’ and what the Bible defines as being a ‘Christian’. Like Nicodemus in John 3, I learnt that a person has to be ‘born-again’. Being born into a Christian family and being baptised didn’t automatically guarantee one’s spiritual regeneration. Being justified or made right with God, is not about what an individual does, but is instead about trusting in what Jesus has done.

The turning point came when my university planned a short-term mission trip to Honduras. My major was in Anthropology, which is essentially the study of comparative culture, and this was to fulfil an internship component to my particular course. The plan was to work with a tribe of ‘Indians’ in the jungle for a couple of months.

Wycliffe missionaries had already been there for about twenty years, and they had translated a large proportion of the Bible into the indigenous language. Most of the people in the tribe had converted from animism to Christianity, but there was still much work to be done in establishing a church.

Part of our role was to map out their water sources, provide basic health care and distribute Gospel tracts. As I read through the material myself though, I was struck by the profound truth of the Gospel. In Latin America, Catholicism is particularly strong. One sees people climbing the stone steps outside the Cathedrals on their knees as a form of penance.

The Gospel literature we were distributing focused on the finished work of Christ, that by faith in Jesus one could be forgiven and assured of eternal life. But surely it couldn’t be that simple? I mean, all these people had was a relationship to God through His Son by faith. There were no ornate buildings, complex liturgies or even an ordained priest!

The turning point for me came though, when one night I was standing at a bonfire with a huge American man who was responsible for facilitating the entire mission. He was an assistant gridiron coach and probably weighed around 120 kgs. After chatting with him for a bit, I said I was going to bed and started back to the mud hut where we were staying.

As I walked across the small open field, he noticed what might have been a green pit viper (similar to the deadly Australian King Brown) slithering towards me. In an instant, he discerned that we were going to intersect and that I would be an unfortunate target. He immediately ran across the field, tackled me from behind and fell on top of the snake. It bit him twice across the inside of his forearm.

I picked myself off the ground and I said: ‘What did you do that for?’ I hadn’t seen the snake, and he hadn’t said anything before I was suddenly pushed to the ground. He said: ‘Mark, there’s a snake in the grass, and I’ve been bitten!’

I frantically looked about me to see not only where snake now was, but also to discern whether or not I too had been bitten. With the adrenaline running through my body I felt numb. But by the grace of God I had escaped and the snake was nowhere to be seen. The man quickly ripped out the laces from his hiking boots and put on a torniquet. We then raced inside the hut where the other members of our team were told what had just happened.

The man who had selflessly pushed me out of the way started to go pale, sweat profusely and to dry wretch and vomit. We all prayed fervently, but to be honest, I was full of fear. What if it was me who had been bitten by the snake that night? What would be my verdict from the LORD?

I didn’t hear a voice from heaven or anything—I sincerely wish I had—but it was like God had got me by the scruff of the neck and said, ‘Eternity. Where will you spend ETERNITY?’ And for the first time in my life I realised that I would go to hell. I hadn’t been good enough to get into heaven, and I completely deserved to be judged forever by God. The guilt of my sin was overwhelming…

I walked outside and looked up at the stars in the clear night sky. And I made a promise to God that night as well as a request. ‘Lord,’ I said, ‘Please show me the way to be saved. I will follow you wherever you want me to go, even if I have to leave the Catholic church. But please just show me how to be made right with you?’

A Pastor’s Wise Advice

At this point I will cut an already long story short and simply say that the man who saved my life survived. Years later I asked some of the people who were there that night why, and they said it was because he was so large. He was  very ill for a number of days, but the poison was able to dissipate through his body adequately enough that he was OK.

That said, none of it takes away from the gracious answer to prayer from our loving heavenly Father. Many years later I did sadly learn that the man had since fallen away from the faith and no longer claimed to be a Christian. For myself though, the journey of saving faith had only just begun. And what this man did was integral in my own understanding of God’s saving grace.

After returning to the United States, I went to see a Lutheran Pastor whom I had come to deeply respect. Ps Norbert Oesch was one of the most gifted preachers I have, even to this day, ever heard. The Lutheran Church which he pastored drew enormous crowds of people every Sunday, and even during the week many came to hear his extended expositions of Scripture. And so, with the encouragement and exhortation of one of my friends, I sought this man’s advice regarding my spiritual turmoil.

After I told Ps Oesch what had happened in the jungle of Honduras and my close encounter with death, he was quiet for an uncomfortable period of time. He then asked me to open to Numbers chapter 21. And we read together the following passage:

They travelled from Mount Hor along the route to the Red Sea, to go around Edom. But the people grew impatient on the way; they spoke against God and against Moses, and said, ‘Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the desert? There is no bread! There is no water! And we detest this miserable food!’

Then the Lord sent venomous snakes among them; they bit the people and many Israelites died. The people came to Moses and said, ‘We sinned when we spoke against the Lord and against you. Pray that the Lord will take the snakes away from us.’ So Moses prayed for the people.

The Lord said to Moses, ‘Make a snake and put it up on a pole; anyone who is bitten can look at it and live.’ So Moses made a bronze snake and put it up on a pole. Then when anyone was bitten by a snake and looked at the bronze snake, he live.’ (Numbers 21:4-9)

I immediately saw the spiritual significance of the Old Testament passage. The people of God had badly sinned by speaking directly against the LORD and referring to Him as being evil, even though He had been nothing but good and gracious to them. And so, He rightly judged them by sending serpents to strike and kill them.

But here was the thing. In response to Moses’ intercession, the LORD also provided them with a way of escape. To be saved from their sin, they simply had to look to the bronze serpent which Moses had placed on a pole. The poison was still in their bodies, but they wouldn’t die because God had chosen to save them simply by believing in the sign he had provided.

That was truly amazing, but I still couldn’t quite understand how that had any relevance to us today. But then Ps Oesch followed up with this. He said, ‘Mark, have you ever heard of John 3:16?’ I quickly affirmed that I did, even Catholics know what John 3:16 says thanks to people like the famous ‘Rainbow Man’ who would hold up a John 3:16 sign at major sporting events.[1] But then Ps Oesch said: ‘That’s great! But do you know what John 3:14-15 says?’

I had to admit that I didn’t, but I was definitely intrigued. ‘What a great question to ask,’ I thought. ‘I wonder what it is?’ I didn’t have to wait long for the answer because he immediately opened his Bible and read:

‘Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, that everyone who believes in him may have eternal life.’ (John 3:14-15)

Have you ever seen one of those old cartoons where a character has a sudden revelation which is symbolised with a light bulb igniting over his head? Well, that is what happened to me. In my first flash of genuine biblical insight I said: ‘That’s all you have to do to be saved? Just like with the bronze serpent in the wilderness, all you have to do is to look to Jesus on the cross!’

‘That’s all you have to do,’ he said. All I could say in response was, ‘Mate, that’s the best news I’ve ever heard. You should tell that to everyone!’

I don’t think he was completely sure if I was being genuine or not, and so he cautiously said: ‘Well, that’s my job…’ I had often wrestled with what I would do with my life after tennis, because as anyone who plays sport competitively knows, it’s only for a limited time. I’ve always known that I wasn’t the smartest guy in the room, and so if I could understand that simple truth, then so too could anyone. But why hadn’t I been told about this before?

But does James Contradict Paul?

One of the issues which I genuinely struggled with the most in leaving Catholicism was the biblical teaching that a person is justified by faith apart from works (what Protestants referred to in shorthand as, Sola Fide, or ‘Faith Alone’). On the one hand, the apostle Paul clearly teaches, ‘For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law’ (Romans 3:28) and yet, James writes, “You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.’ (James 2:24). So, how do you reconcile the two passages, and were the Protestant Reformers wrong?

This is where I found the teaching of John Calvin in particular, incredibly helpful. First of all, Calvin explained that it is “quite absurd to restrict them (works of the law) to ceremonial observances” or to “the works of the letter which are done without the Spirit of Christ”.[2] This is because the word ‘law’ is precisely what makes our works good or meritorious. i.e. they are the reward promised for keeping the law. But in relation to what James teaches, Calvin gives an especially helpful explanation:

When James says that man is not justified by faith aloe but also by works, this is in no way opposed to the preceding view. The best way of reconciling the two views is to consider the nature of the argument used by James. The question is not how men may attain righteousness for themselves in the presence of God, but how they may prove to others that they are justified. James is refuting the hypocrites who make the empty boast that they have faith. It is, therefore, grossly illogical not to admit that the word justify is taken by James in a different sense from Paul, since they are dealing with different subjects. The word faith is also no doubt capable of various meanings, and this ambiguity must be taken into account for a correct judgment to be formed on the question. James, as we may learn from the context, meant no more than that man is not rendered or proved righteous by a feigned or dead faith, unless he proves his righteousness by his works.[3]

Put simply, Paul and James are talking about two different issues. Paul is rebuking religious people who think they can be saved by their good works, whereas James is rebuking those who claim to have faith, but their lack of works demonstrates that they don’t really believe in Jesus at all. As the Reformers were well-known was saying, “We’re saved by faith alone, but saving faith is never alone!”

The Article upon which the Church Stands or Falls

I caught up with Ps Oesch a few times after that, and continued to benefit enormously from his peaching. I felt like my relationship with God though, had completely changed. Martin Luther described his own conversion, in response to understanding the biblical gospel, in these words:

Thereupon I felt myself to be reborn and to have gone through open doors into paradise. The whole of Scripture took on a new meaning, and whereas before the “justice of God” had filled me with hate, now it became to me inexpressibly sweet in greater love. This passage became to me a gate to heaven.[4]

I soon realised for myself what Martin Luther had felt and experienced. The Word of God came alive to me, and I suddenly had a thirst to pray and meet with God’s people. Even giving generously at church became a joy! I realised that the God who made the universe had himself done something for us to make us right with himself.

This is why Luther called the doctrine of justification the article upon which the church stands or falls. The Catholic Church actually agrees. Not with Luther’s understanding of the issue obviously, but with the ramifications for believing that justification is a gift to be received by faith, or whether it is a wage to be earned by a person’s faith and works (i.e. Rom. 4:4-5). As the Council of Trent decreed:

Canon 9.  If anyone says that the sinner is justified by faith alone, meaning that nothing else is required to cooperate in order to obtain the grace of justification, and that it is not in any way necessary that he be prepared and disposed by the action of his own will, let him be anathema.[5]

By the way, to be ‘anathema’ is to be eternally condemned to hell, so these are not light or insignificant issues upon which we can simply agree to disagree. Compare what the Council of Trent resolved though, with that of Holy Scripture. In particular, this parable by the Lord Jesus Christ:

He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt: ‘Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get. But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, God, be merciful to me, a sinner! I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted. (Luke 18:9-14)

Notice that both men had faith in God, as demonstrated by the fact that they both went to the temple to pray. The difference between them or underlying problem though, was that of pride. The Pharisee was trusting in his own works and so it made him presume that he was better than everyone else. In contrast, the tax collector couldn’t even look up to heaven. Instead, he simply beat his chest and pleaded for God’s mercy and forgiveness. But in the end, Jesus says the person who was justified—declared to be in the right with God—was not the Pharisee, but the tax collector!

The same truth is true today for all everyone who simply believes. We’ve all be bitten by sin, but as soon as we look to the sign of his sacrificed Son then we are saved. As the Lord Jesus Christ himself promises, we pass from death to life and will not come into judgment (John 5:24).

Is Faith in Christ Enough?

My wife Angie is the daughter of Spanish migrants who came to Australia in the 1960’s and one of our favourite films is The Way starring Martin Sheen. It’s a fictional story involving the El Camino, a walk which traditionally goes across the entire country of Spain and finishes in Santiago. Historically, the El Camino was a religious pilgrimage which ended with this special Mass at a church called the de Compostela.

The El Camino is over 800 kilometres long, and about 400,000 people walk it each year. It is set it up so that you stay at various monasteries along the route for very little cost. What’s more, at each town you go through you receive a special stamp in an official passport to show what you’ve completed.

This is something which I would love to do. Not for religious reasons, but simply because it’s such a beautiful part of the world, and we think it would be a great way of unwinding. Plus, I’d love to be able to do it with my wife Angie because she speaks fluent Spanish and so we’d obviously be able to communicate with fellow travellers.

Many people who walk the El Camino carry with them a small stone. It’s officially referred to as the “Stone of Burden”, and it’s supposed to be a symbol of the burden of your guilt, sin or shame. That’s because many people who walk the El Camino do so as a form of Catholic penance, a way of atoning for your sins.

Significantly, towards the end of the El Camino there is a huge iron cross at a place called Crus de Ferro, and it now has an enormous pile of stones at its base. The idea is that pilgrims cast their stones at the foot of the cross and then pray the following prayer, which Martin Sheen’s character dutifully recites in The Way:

Dear Lord, may this stone—a symbol of my efforts on the pilgrimage—that I lay at the feet of the cross of the Saviour, weigh the balance in the scales of my good deeds on that day, when the deeds of all my life are judged. Let it be so, Amen.

This is a classic example of the Roman Catholic doctrine of justification by faith and works. Rather than having faith alone in what Christ has done on the cross, the individual is encouraged to rely on their own good works as well. But this completely undermines the finished work of Christ. As the apostle Peter writes, “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.” (1 Peter 2:24)

Likewise, the apostle Paul writes, “He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification. Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into this grace in which we now stand.” (Romans 4:25-5:2)

What I came to see through the Scriptures is that we can be certain of our standing before God because the atonement Christ Jesus made on the cross has reconciled us to the Father once and for all (Hebrews 10:10, 14). And this gift of salvation is received by faith apart from any works we might do. One of my favourite passages in this regard is written by the apostle Paul in the book of Ephesians.

“For it is by grace we have been saved through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” (Ephesians 2:8-10)

The amazing thing about God’s grace is that even the faith to believe in his Son Jesus is a gift. We’re not saved by our good works but for them – works which God Himself has prepared in advance for us to do.

Look to Jesus Christ!

Sola Fide was one of the great catch-cries of the Reformation. Rather than being a novel invention, it was the recovery of the good news as to how an individual can be made right with a holy God. Not by what we ourselves can do, but through faith alone in what Christ has done. And that is the only thing which can bring us lasting joy and peace. Whoever you are, I hope and pray that in reading this you will come to know and personally experience the amazing grace of his justification as well.

– Mark Powell

[1] https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/500515/unbelievable-life-john-316-sports-guy

[2] John Calvin, Calvin’s Commentaries: The Epistles of Paul the Apostle to the Romans and to the Thessalonians, Translated Ross MacKenzie, Editors, David W. Torrance and Thomas F. Torrance (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1960), 79.

[3] Calvin, The Epistles of Paul the Apostle to the Romans and to the Thessalonians, 79. Calvin discusses this issue in a little more depth in his Institutes of Christian Religion, Book 3, Chapter 17, especially paragraphs 10 and 11.

[4] Roland Bainton, Here I Stand: A Life of Martin Luther, p. 65.

[5] https://www.k-state.edu/english/baker/english233/Council_of_Trent6.htm