Men At Work

There is so much confusion today over the alleged conflict between faith and works. Too many Christians see them as mutually exclusive concepts and divide into schools of adherence: those that believe in works as a means to salvation, and those who believe it's all in God alone without any effort on the part of man (or woman, of course).

The fallacy is in trying to separate faith and works. They work together, in stride, in unity.

The Bible says we are saved through faith (Eph 2:8), and without faith, we can't please God (Heb 11:6). So one may jump to a conclusion and say, "Aha, faith is all we need since salvation is a God thing anyway."

But not so fast, in the same Bible we're told to save ourselves (Acts 2:40) and work out our own salvation (Phil 2:12). And just in case the "works crowd" gets too excited, please reread the previous paragraph.

Jesus and John the Baptist both advocated works. Jesus said, "If ye love me, keep my commandments" (Jn 14:15) and John said to "Prove by the way you live that you have repented" (Mt 3:8 NLT). This is how we prove ourselves to God, how we show God our love, through our actions, deeds, WORKS...After all, didn't God so love the world that he GAVE (as in action or works) according to John 3:16?

So we see that in salvation, both faith and works are present. We repent of our sins (works/man) and God forgives us (faith/God), we get baptized in Jesus name (works/man) and God washes us in His wonderful blood, cleansing us from our sin (faith/God), finally we seek after the Holy Ghost and speak in tongues when filled (works/man) while it's God who actually fills us with His Spirit and gives us the utterance to speak in tongues (faith/God).

Three times in James chapter two we're told that faith without works is dead (see Jas 2:17, 20, 26). So put your money where your mouth is, step up to the plate and show God your faith through the works that you do. Faith and works must operate in unison to have the affect that God intended in our lives!!!