Titus: Faith & Works

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Today I wanted to do a video discussing the relationship of faith and good works from a reformed perspective.

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The question of faith and works always comes up when discussing salvation with Roman Catholics or people in other cults like Jehovah's Witnesses or Mormons or just synergists in general, people who believe that you're not saved by faith alone but by faith plus good works.

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Now, we as Protestants hold to justification by faith alone and we usually cite

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Romans chapter 4 in explaining our argument while synergists cite

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James chapter 2, the famous verse that says faith without works is dead and that's true.

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But what I'd like to do is discuss these in a little bit more detail and get a better handle on them. So is it possible to break this tie?

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Well, Protestants hold to Romans 4, justification by faith alone, synergists hold to James chapter 2, justification by faith plus works and yes,

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I do believe that we can break the tie and that's where the book of Titus comes in. However, before we do that, let's take a look at Romans chapter 4.

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Let me read it for you and then we'll discuss it in a little bit. So Romans chapter 4 verse 1, what then should we say was gained by Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh?

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For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God.

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For what does the scripture say? Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.

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Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift, but as his due. And to the one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness.

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Just as David also speaks of the blessing of the one to whom God counts righteousness apart from works, blessed are those whose lawless deeds are forgiven and whose sins are covered.

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Blessed is the man against whom the Lord will not count his sin. So right off the bat, we see that Abraham is justified by God, by his faith, but not before God.

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In other words, Abraham can't come to God and say, look, I've accomplished everything you told me to do, therefore

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I'm good in your sight. I'm justified. I'm righteous. No, we understand and know that eternal life, righteousness, is a gift of God, and it's given to us freely.

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Again, he goes on to say, now to the one who works, his wages are not accounted as a gift.

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So again, eternal life is a gift. If we have to work for it, then it's no longer a gift, and then we are justified by faith plus our good works.

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In which case, none of us are going to be justified in God's sight, because all of our works are stained by sin.

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But let's continue reading the passage. Is this blessing then only for the circumcised, or also for the uncircumcised?

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For we say that faith was counted to Abraham as righteousness. How then was it counted to him?

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Was it before or after he had been circumcised? And this is important. It was not after, but before he was circumcised.

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In other words, Abraham was justified before he did any of the works of the law. Abraham was justified before he did any works of the law, i .e.

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circumcision. He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he already had by faith, while he still was uncircumcised.

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So you see, was it before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised.

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In other words, he received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he already had by faith, while he was still uncircumcised.

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Abraham was justified, made right in God's sight by his faith. Then he went on to become circumcised.

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There was a purpose in this. The purpose was to make him the father of all who believe without being circumcised.

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That's going to include Gentiles as well as Jews, those who believe or trust in the

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Lord Jesus Christ for their salvation, so that their righteousness would be counted to them as well.

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So just a few points before we go on. If Abraham was justified by works, he could not boast before God.

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He couldn't tell God, look, I did everything you told me to do, therefore you owe me eternal life.

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Next, faith was counted or credited to Abraham as righteousness. If you've ever received a credit card bill and you see a credit on the account, that means the credit card company gave you money back.

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In this case, it is God giving us the righteousness of Jesus Christ, which pays all of our debt that we owe to him as a gift.

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Works, good works, result in wages, not a gift. Again, if we're expecting eternal life at the end of what we do, then we're more like an employer and an employee relationship rather than a father and a son.

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Eternal life, again, is a free gift of God in Ephesians 2, verses 8 -9.

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Whoever does not work but believes or trusts in Jesus, his faith is counted, credited to him as righteousness.

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Again, we're justified by faith because right here, Paul tells us, whoever does not work but trusts in him.

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When we trust in Jesus Christ alone, we're trusting that he did everything necessary for us to enter into eternal life with God the

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Father, to be in a proper relationship with him. Now, it doesn't mean we don't do good works. We're going to desire to do good works because he has changed our heart.

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So moving on. King David also said, God counts us righteousness apart from our works.

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I don't think it could be any clearer than that. Our righteousness is not based on our works, it's apart from our works.

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Because if it depends on our works, our works are stained by sin. We need perfect righteousness.

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The only one who came, who lived a perfectly righteous life is Jesus, and we get his righteousness as a free gift of God when we place our faith and trust in him.

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That is good news. For Abraham, justification came before circumcision, a work of the law.

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So again, Abraham is justified by faith before he did anything good, before he accomplished a work of the law.

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We do the works of the law, but they're subsequent to our justification. They're subsequent to our changed heart.

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Circumcision, therefore, was a sign of the faith that he had already after being justified by faith.

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Again, this is good news. If you're thinking of it as an employer -employee relationship, we get our pay up front and then we do our work.

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We're really not employees. We're slaves to God because he saved us, but he's also our father.

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And a slave is not an heir. We are heirs of eternal life. We don't do anything to earn it.

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We do it because we love God as our father. Finally, there was a purpose in this.

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To make him, Abraham, the father of all who believe or trust without being circumcised.

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In other words, we're not basing our salvation by keeping a law. So that righteousness would be counted to them,

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Gentiles as well as Jews as well. Okay, so now let's take a look at James chapter 2, which is what a synergist would look at and say, see, we do need, we're saved by faith plus good works.

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Let me read it. James chapter 2. What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works?

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Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, go in peace, be warmed and be filled, without giving them the things needed for the body.

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What good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. But someone will say, you have faith and I have works.

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Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. You believe that God is one, you do well, even the demons believe and shudder.

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Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless? Was not our father

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Abraham justified by works when he offered up Isaac on the altar? You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works.

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And the scripture was fulfilled that says, Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness.

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And he was called a friend of God. You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone.

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And in the same way, was not also Rahab the prostitute justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out also by another way?

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For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead. Now if you read this on the face of it, it sounds like, yes, we are saved by faith plus good works.

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But let's take a moment to look at James. Let's make a few points. First, professing you have faith is different than actually possessing you have faith.

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I think James is making the point here that if you say you have faith and you won't feed the naked or clothe the hungry, well then really you don't have faith.

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You say you do, but your actions are not backing up what you say that you possess. Next, lip service is not service at all.

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A lot of people talk the talk, but they don't walk the walk. A lot of people say they have faith, but they don't.

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It's not evidenced in their lives. Next, faith without works is not actual faith.

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Saying faith without works is dead is the same thing as saying a man who's not breathing is dead.

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It's an indicative, not an imperative. In other words, we wouldn't say, well listen, we wouldn't tell the dead man, listen, you have to breathe in order to be alive.

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That's an indicative. Him not breathing is indicative of his death. Our breath or our works are an indicator that we have faith.

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It's the result of a beating heart, but it's not the cause of it. True faith is demonstrated by actions, not by inaction.

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This is important. Just knowing good doctrine, having head knowledge, is not faith. Remember, James says, you believe that God is one.

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Even the demons believe that. So even the demons have good doctrine, but they don't have faith, saving faith.

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Abraham was justified, and we remember reading Romans chapter 4, he was not justified before God.

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Abraham was justified before his fellow man by faith. So when we do good works, we glorify our

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Father in heaven. So other people, the people who we're doing the good works in front of, recognize that we're doing something out of our love for God that brings glory to him.

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We're not doing it in order to earn our way into heaven. We're doing it because of his love for us and him sending his son into the world to die on our behalf.

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Abraham was justified by works and not by faith alone. In the context of this passage,

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James is talking about a said faith. In other words, the person who said they had faith wouldn't clothe the person who needed to clothe, wouldn't give food to the hungry,

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Abraham, however, obeyed God. Faith is a matter of believing God and obeying him.

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So true faith is going to be obedient to God. It's not going to be perfect obedience, that's why we have

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Jesus, but we are going to obey God. And it's a process, it's called sanctification.

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Again, as a body without the spirit is dead, it's inanimate, so faith without works is dead.

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Our faith is inanimate, it's not real faith. There's no breath without a heartbeat, in the same way there is no real works without true faith.

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So now let's get to our tiebreaker, which is the book of Titus. So I'm going to go through a couple of verses in Titus because it's not just one paragraph,

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I think the whole book codifies what I'm trying to explain here. So let's take a look at Titus chapter 1 verses 10 and 16, which read,

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For there are many who are insubordinate, empty talkers and deceivers, especially those of the circumcision party, which is the

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Jews. They profess to know God, but they deny him, how?

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By their works. They are detestable, disobedient, unfit for any good work.

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So the Jews, who profess to know God, were trying to work their way to heaven.

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They were looking and relying upon the good deeds they did to justify themselves before God.

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That will never work because all of our good works are filthy rags before God. Let's move on.

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Titus 2 .7. Show yourself in all respects to be a model of good works, and in your teaching show integrity and dignity.

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So here, he's telling us that we're to model good works before people.

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Again, we're not supposed to rely on them, we're just supposed to model them because we are to properly reflect

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God to the people in the world around us. Titus 2 .11

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-14 says, For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self -controlled, upright and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great

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God and Savior Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify for himself a people for his own possession, who are zealous for good works.

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Once we're saved by Christ, once we place our faith and trust in Jesus and we're regenerated, the Holy Spirit takes up residence in our body, we now begin to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions.

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We recognize that those are antithetical to what God wants from us, so we turn away from them, and we become zealous for good works.

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In other words, the disposition of our heart has changed, and we want to do good things to glorify our

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Father in Heaven. They are the result of our faith, not the basis for our faith.

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In other words, they are the fruit of what God has done in our lives, not the root of it. God doesn't save us because we produced fruit first, he saves us so that we can produce good fruit.

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Titus 3 .1, remind them to be submissive to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work.

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Again, every Christian is commanded by God to do good when it is in our power to do so,

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Proverbs says. Continuing on in Titus 3 .8,

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the saying is trustworthy, and I want you to insist on these things so that those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to good works.

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These things are excellent and profitable for people. Again, once we're saved, we're to be devoted, given over to do good works for other people because God has done a tremendous work in us.

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He's forgiven us so much, and the one who's forgiven much forgives much. These things are excellent and profitable.

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We're going to receive rewards in heaven for the things we do here on earth. And that's again, another grace of God.

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Titus 3 .14, and let our people learn to devote themselves to good works so as to help causes of urgent need and not be unfruitful.

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Again, God saves us to perform good works, that we would walk in them as Ephesians chapter 2 verse 9 and 10 say, the works are the fruit of our salvation, not the cause of it.

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And here's where we're going to get to the crux of the matter. This is Titus 3 verses 4 through 7.

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Now, remember all of those verses where we're told in the book of Titus to devote ourselves to good works, to be zealous for good works, to be ready to do good works.

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Listen to what we're told here. But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us not because of works done by us in righteousness.

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Going to repeat that. He saved us not because of the works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the

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Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace, not by our works, justified by his grace, we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.

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Again, heirs being sons of God, we now receive things by inheritance.

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That's the difference between us and unbelievers. They're going to get what they deserve. We're going to get what we inherited by mercy and grace, not because of the good works we've done.

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Again, he tells us, according to God's mercy, not because of the works done by us in righteousness.

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So how should we view this? Let's move on. Make a few points and then we'll wrap this up.

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First, there are people who profess faith but don't have faith. Again, it's the possession of faith that makes a difference versus the profession of faith.

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True faith is going to result in good works and bear good fruit. Good works are a model of our faith.

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We are redeemed for good works, the same way God gave Adam Eve as a suitable helpmate to help

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Adam, as a good wife, to help Adam expand the garden. We, the bride of Christ, the church, is to be a suitable helpmate for Jesus.

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We are to help him build the kingdom. Now we don't earn anything. We don't earn our salvation for helping

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Jesus get to build the kingdom. But we receive eternal life as a gift of God so that we can help

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Jesus build the kingdom. It's a blessed benefit of salvation. We are ready, we are to be ready and devoted to do good works and bear fruit.

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Again, this is one of the purposes of Jesus saving us so that we bear good fruit. In fact, there's a parable that says a bad tree cannot bear good fruit, nor can a good tree bear bad fruit.

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So once Jesus changes our hearts, okay, and gives us a disposition to love him, to do the good works that he's commanded us to do, we will now bear good fruit.

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We're not saved by these works, but by mercy and grace. That's very, very important.

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Next, we are justified by grace as heirs. It's a gift, not as employees.

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Remember, we're sons of God, not slaves. R .C.

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Sproul, who I love, described it like this. He says, Catholics and synergists say that faith plus works equals salvation.

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And based on what Titus says, and what James says, and what Romans chapter 4 says, that's not true.

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He says it like this, faith equals works plus salvation. If you're saved truly by God, and have a changed heart with a disposition towards loving him, towards pleasing him, towards doing the things that he wants you to do, towards obeying him, it's going to result in works plus your salvation.

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So hopefully, there won't be any more growling between these two dogs that talk about who pit James chapter 2 and Romans chapter 4 against each other.

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I'm not too optimistic about that. I liken our faith to a heartbeat.

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A heart is beating like the faith that causes us to breathe. And our breath is like our works, which result from our beating heart.

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Our faith, our spiritual heartbeat, gives birth to our works. It produces them, and is the cause of them.

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But the works are in no way the cause of faith, nor separate from it. So we don't breathe in order to become alive, we breathe because we're alive.

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So we don't do good works in order to be saved, we do good works because we're saved.

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One causes the other. Our faith causes good works to flow.

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They are not independent of themselves. James is not saying that faith and works are two separate, independent, and unrelated things.

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He's saying that one is an indicative of the other. Think about it. You can hold your breath, and your heart will still beat.

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But if your heart stops beating, there's nothing you can do to continue breathing. So here's a little experiment.

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Try this. Hold your breath, and see if your heart stops beating. What do you think is going to stop first?

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Your heart beating, or you holding your breath? Your breathing is the fruit, or the result of your heartbeat, the life that you have.

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Not the cause of your heart beating. You see, the two go hand in hand. They're not independent.

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However, one is the result of the other, not vice versa. So I hope this clears up a little bit of the misunderstanding between faith and works.

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Works are a derivative of our faith, and the result of the faith heartbeat that we have that God's given us.