What is Saving Faith? A Reformation View

By Dennis Prutow

This short booklet briefly summarizes the good news about Jesus Christ to which saving faith is the required biblical response. Four parts follow. First, the text presents the classic Reformed view of the Three Elements of Saving Faith. Then, the next three parts of this booklet compare and contrast aberrations of and deviations from true saving faith: Saving Faith vs. Blind Leaps, Saving Faith vs. Dead Orthodoxy, and Saving Faith vs. Decisionalism. In each part, the analysis keeps the basic definition of saving faith in the forefront as the required biblical response to Christ and His gospel.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dennis Prutow
• Release date: Jul 18, 2016
• ISBN: 9781945305047

Dennis Prutow

Denny Prutow was born in 1939 in Cleveland, Ohio. He attended the US Military Academy at West Point (1959-1963), Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California (1965-1968), and Reformed Theological Seminary, Orlando, Florida (1995-1998). Denny was an Army Chaplain, a pastor in both the Orthodox Presbyterian Church and the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America, and the Professor of Homiletics and Pastoral Theology at Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary in Pittsburgh, PA. He developed Westminster Evangelistic Ministries and remains its administratior. Denny retired in 2013 after forty-five years of active ministry and is now RPTS Professor Emeritus of Homiletics. His books include So Pastor, What's Your Point?, Joyful Voices, Public Worship 101, The Visions of Revelation, You Cannot Escape from God, Biblical Baptism, and What is Saving Faith? He and his wife, Erma, live in Indianapolis, IN. They have three grown daughters and eleven grandchildren.

Book preview

WHAT IS SAVING FAITH?

A Reformation View

Dennis J. Prutow

Copyright © 1993, 2016 by Dennis J. Prutow

All Rights Reserved.

Distributed by Smashwords

Unless otherwise noted the Scripture quotations are from the New American Standard Bible, Copyright by The Lockman Foundation, 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the author.

ISBN 9781945305030 (paperback)

ISBN 9781945305047 (ePub)

ISBN 9781945305054 (Kindle)

Westminster Evangelistic Ministries

Indianapolis, Indiana

Ebook formatting by www.ebooklaunch.com

Contents

Introduction: The Gospel We Must Believe

Part One: Three Elements of Saving Faith

Part Two: Saving Faith vs. Blind Leaps

Part Three: Saving Faith vs. Dead Orthodoxy

Part Four: Saving Faith vs. Decisionalism

Introduction

The Gospel We Must Believe

The ground for understanding saving faith is the good news about the Savior. The apostle Paul briefly outlines this good news, this gospel, in 1 Corinthians 15:1-4.

Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.

This gospel, says Paul, was received and believed by the Corinthians. He does not think they believed this gospel in vain, emptily, or without cause or reason. In other words, those to whom Paul writes