Not by works

Back in the days, God’s people had shifted focus from God’s abounding grace to their own righteousness by their works; our works do not appeal to God Eph 2:8, only the works of Jesus does, His works are works of perfection, that is why we were admonished to put on Christ, Ro 13:14.

Our salvation is not by our works, it does not come because of what we can or cannot do, it is about what Christ has done for us already ‘But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us’ Rom 5:8. When we rely on works, it leads to boasting, we see ourselves instead of seeing the Lord.

Some folks ask about that scripture where James said that faith without works is dead, Ja 1:20, and propound from there that faith is apart from works, that despite faith, work would also be necessary for salvation. The full quotation of that scripture reads ‘Jas 2:18 Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works. Jas 2:20 But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead? Jas 2:26 For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also. I noticed a few things here, firstly, faith and works go together, but the works that he is talking about are things that we do in obedience to the word of God, things that we do because of the word of the Lord, and acts that are in obedience to His will.