Sola Gratia— Salvation By Grace Alone

Our purpose at the Omega Institute is to help the believer understand and appreciate the doctrines of Scripture in a way he or she can truly digest and apply. This series of devotionals cover the spectrum of Evangelical biblical doctrine in such a way that the Christian can meditate each week on a different truth from Scripture so as to master the essentials and better know and serve his or her Lord.

Key Verse:

“8For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: 9Not of works, lest any man should boast.” —Ephesians 2:8-9


In our last devotional, I mentioned that the rallying cry of the Reformation involved five phrases; all extracted from the Latin tongue and each beginning with the word Sola (meaning “only” or “alone’). This week, I would like to cover the second of these important phrases and consider why this is so critical to our walk with God today.

Sola Gratia means “grace alone” and refers to the important question: “what does it take to save a man or to make him right in the sight of a holy God?” This is perhaps the most important question a man or woman can ask in his or her lifetime – it deals with our eternal destiny and pertains to the most important relationship we can possibly have: the one with our Creator and Lord.

The Scriptures make clear that God is one “with whom we have to do [give an account]” (see: Hebrews 4:13). There is no dodging Him or His judgment, although unregenerate mankind will continue to either philosophically or functionally deny His existence by living in denial to what they know very well in their consciences (see: Romans 1:18-22). Because He will judge the world, that great day should be one of intense concern for all mankind. Paul preached this warning to the philosophers at Athens in Acts 17:30, 31 when he proclaimed that someday God would judge the world through one Man who He has appointed: namely, Jesus Christ, God incarnate. This judgment will involve where men will spend their eternities, which constitutes the most important decision ever made!

If we were to ask the man on the street if he thinks he will go to heaven when he dies; in other words, if he will endure the judgment of God, he will often appeal to what he has done. “I’ve been a good person,” or, “I’ve done good things,” or “I have never killed anyone.” The prevailing “wisdom” on the street goes something like this: “my good outweighs my bad, so since God will grade on a curve, I will be O.K.”

But we are not saved by what we do. Paul made this clear in his letter to Titus, when he wrote:

“He saved us, not on the basis of deeds we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing by the Holy Spirit.”

Titus 3:5

There are so many problems with believing that our works save us. How do we really know that our good works outweigh our bad? Has anyone ever successfully kept score of every action, thought, intent, etc. they have done? Secondly, what if we find that our bad outweighs our good? Third, how do we know that some of our bad will not negate some of our good?

So, man has come to a second conclusion to avoid the need for pure grace: our works assist God in saving us – in declaring us acceptable in His holy sight. During high school and college, I played hockey. There were two ways of getting credit for offensive play (I was a center): goals and assists. The first one is rather obvious: this is the credit one receives for putting the puck into the net. The second is the credit one receives for helping the person to put the puck into the net. Now, there were certain criteria for getting an assist, but you get the idea: without us, the goal would never have gone in.

The question that the Reformers debated during the sixteenth century was this: “is salvation a work of God alone or something we cooperate with Him on?” To employ the technical language of theology: “is salvation monergistic [God working alone] or synergistic [God working along with us]?”

This question applied specifically to the aspect of our overarching salvation called justification: the actual making of a man right before the sight of God. Well, Jonah said that salvation is of the Lord (Jonah 2:9). We are not mentioned there at all. But if justification is truly a matter of cooperation between God and man, then we get “the assist” and hence, merit something in God’s eyes. The Roman Catholic Church, which believes that justification is indeed synergistic, actually refers to these “assists” as meritorious works.

However, consider our verse for the week. Here, Paul says something very clear and very important: salvation is “not of ourselves” but is in fact a gift from God. Gifts are not cooperative, they are monergistic; they are the work of a single giver. We get no credit for a gift; there is no boasting that we ‘helped.” This is exactly what Paul says here in this passage: “it is not a result of works, so that no one may boast.”

This is why we proclaim Sola Gratia – because it is the grace of God alone that we stand on as believers (see: Romans 5:2) and there is no place for boasting (Romans 3:27) because of the fact that grace alone saves us. This very fact shapes our response to God in the good works He calls us to do – we do them, not to be saved or to earn our standing before God, but we do it out of love and gratitude to the One who has, apart from what we could merit, made us right with Him and granted to us an eternal home in His arms.

—Larry Carrino