Faith Without Works Is Dead But ... Works Without Faith Are Also Dead

My Utmost For His Highest

We are God’s fellow workers… —1 Corinthians 3:9

{CHAMBERS} “Beware of any work for God that causes or allows you to avoid concentrating on Him. A great number of Christian workers worship their work. The only concern of Christian workers should be their concentration on God. This will mean that all the other boundaries of life, whether they are mental, moral, or spiritual limits, are completely free with the freedom God gives His child; that is, a worshiping child, not a wayward one. […] The only responsibility you have is to stay in living constant touch with God, and to see that you allow nothing to hinder your cooperation with Him. The freedom that comes after sanctification is the freedom of a child, and the things that used to hold your life down are gone. […] We have no right to decide where we should be placed, or to have preconceived ideas as to what God is preparing us to do. God engineers everything; and wherever He places us, our one supreme goal should be to pour out our lives in wholehearted devotion to Him in that particular work. “Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might…” (Ecclesiastes 9:10).”

{ELGIN} (James 2:14-26)  “….. faith without works is dead.”  That is a pretty common Bible reference.  Good works are a natural product of our faith.  (Ephesians 2:10) “we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”  For God’s glory not ours.  The problem so many of us have is that works can supplant our devotion to the One who called us to the work.  So faith has nothing to do with the work we do.  Two people can be passing water to thirsty people.  One is a Christian and one is not.  The thirsty person’s thirst is quenched by both.  You see you can do “good things” and not have the power of God behind what you do.  That is what makes it so easy to abandon God and make what you are doing all your own.  You might still wear a T-shirt or hat or bracelet that makes reference to your faith or to Jesus, but your heart is far from God.  There is no eternal power in what you do.  Like the Pharisees, you have become a “whitewashed tomb filled with dead men’s bones.” I must constantly remind myself that what I do, I do because I am a child of God and I am about my Father’s business.  If I don’t nurture my spiritual life, then my natural life will soon take over.

We are working on a home right now.  It’s really a cool house .. in a rustic sense … we had occasion to pour a cement landing outside the back door.  I was doing some shovel work preparing the area when I felt something solid under the point of my shovel.  I scraped the dirt away to find pavers – a brick path.  As I followed the bricks I uncovered a patio.  Time and neglect had taken over what was once a beautiful garden patio.  It took a great deal of effort, but eventually the patio was restored.  It’s the same with our spiritual lives.  If we neglect the disciplines of our faith, soon God’s handiwork will be covered over.  You might still “do” what you were doing before but you have become like those Paul wrote about in 2 Timothy 3:5, “having a form of godliness but denying its power”.  You see – work, no matter how well intentioned or how good or helpful - without faith is dead.  Each of us must examine what we do and why we do it.  Just as with our salvation – saved by grace through faith and not works – we bring glory to God by faith in our work.