Faith / Works

"It is by grace you have been saved through faith, and this not of yourselves, it is a gift from God (Ephesians 2:8)"

It is clear in the Bible that works do not save us. It does not matter how many good things we do they will never make us worthy to be saved. Jesus saves us through faith, through believing in Him and what He did for us. What did He do? Before Christ, the human race was "In Adam" who brought sin into the world and all men were sinful by nature. Christ came and died AS US (Romans 6:3-4, 7:4). When we accept Jesus in our life we die to our sin, we are longer "In Adam" but instead are now "In Christ." We no longer have a sinful nature (Romans 5:19, 6:6-7, 7:1-6, 8:1-4, Galatians 5:24), but live according to the Spirit (Galatians 5:25). We have a new nature, old things have passed away and all things have become new (2 Corinthians 5:17). God has saved us through Jesus, not by anything we have done. When He saved us He did more than substitute Himself for us, He died as us, because since we died with Him we also live with Him now that He has raised from the dead. God put us in right standing with God (made righteous) not because of anything we have done, but through faith in Jesus.

"Faith without works is dead (James 2:17)"

Now it is by grace that we have been saved but then we realize that if we don't have works then we have no faith. A truth we must realize is this - "We always act out of what we believe." We can give lip service to whatever we like about believing this or that, but what we truly believe always shows in our actions. Every choice we make in life we make based on what we believe is the best choice, even if we are completely misguided we act a certain way because we believe certain things. Our actions always show what we believe. So while faith saves us, we actually don't have any faith if it isn't evident in our works.

"Faith works through Love (Galatians 5:6)"

God is love, and our faith in God works through Love. Love is an action. If we have no love our faith does not work. We can say we believe this or that about the Bible, but our faith is broken if we are not living in Love. This is the "works" God is talking about. He isn't saying that if we believe in Him we need to do a whole bunch of things for Him to prove our faith is real. He is saying that when we have faith and believe in Jesus, and receive our new nature, and live "In Christ," we will live with God's love overflowing out of us. We don't need to strive to do alot things for God, but instead rest in Him and allow Him to work through us by Love. Resting in Him means not striving to do things in our own effort or strength, but resting in His strength and allowing Him to do the work through us. We don't have to strive to do a whole bunch of things for God. We fulfill all He asks of us when we Love! (Romans 13:8)