Sandlin, Clark, Jordan, Bahnsen & Federal Vision

Sorting out the truth amidst theological controversy is often near impossible. I offer the following from Sandlin at least to clarify some of the issues. For the record I do not embrace the Federal Vision theology and as a, what I would call, Post-Theonomist, I still have sympathies for those who are former theonomists or currently embrace it. Also, as for Justification, I agree wholeheartedly with Sandlin when he states, I embrace the doctrine of justification precisely as it appears in the Westminster Confession of Faith. The exclusive instrumental cause of justification is faith. That faith rests entirely on the redemptive work of Jesus on the Cross and from the empty tomb and grasps hard on Jesus as Savior and Lord. The issue is not sola fide, which Scott and I both heartily affirm, but the nature of saving faith. Scott, like his colleague Mike Horton, has made clear his position that justifying faith is exclusively passive (trusting in and resting on Jesus) and never active (submitting to Jesus as Lord and as his disciple). I affirm that it is both simultaneously (in the distinct senses I have stated), and that a faith that is merely active is moralistic while a faith that is merely passive is antinomian. On this point, I dissent from Clark and Horton and I agree with J. I. Packer ...Read the whole article here.