Are we saved by works or faith?

CARM

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Exegete James two, well, it's turning in verse 14 is where we gotta go and I'll do it quickly. So faith that works is dead is true.

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Faith that works is dead, but what does it mean? Does it mean that such works keep you saved or get you saved?

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Of course not. So looking at verse 14, what use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith, but he has no works, can that faith save him?

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That faith, what faith? The faith that is dead, the faith that doesn't have any works, because you gotta remember something.

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In Philippians 1 .29, God grants that we have faith. And in John 6 .29,

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Jesus says this is the work of God that you believe on him who he has sent. So we are granted faith by God and that faith is in Christ.

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That faith that comes from God is true faith. And true faith will have good works because it's accompanied with regeneration.

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A regeneration is being born again of John 3, 3 -8 and 2

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Corinthians 5 .17. We're made new creatures, right? We are born again, we're changed, we're in well.

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And so out of the change of our nature, the good works come forth. What James is doing here is he's saying, look, if someone says he has faith, but there's no works that back it up, can that faith save him?

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It's not real faith. It didn't come from God, obviously. It's just a mental assertion that someone says.

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That's all that's going on. If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food and one of you says to them, go in peace, be warm to be filled and that you're not give them what's necessary for their body, what use is that?

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Even so faith if it has no works is dead, being by itself. Totally agree. If you say something and you don't back it up by your actions, then you're a hypocrite.

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You don't believe what you really believe. See, I believe in the Trinity. I defend the Trinity. So people defend the

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Trinity because they believe in it. You can see what they believe in by their actions and their statements or statements under the category of actions in their defense of the

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Christian faith. That's what's going on. So what James is saying is saying, look, if you believe, if you're really a

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Christian, let's see it. That's all that's going on here. And faith without works, it's dead faith.

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And how do we know? Because someone may well say, in verse 18, may say you have faith and I have works.

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Show me your faith without the works. I will show you my faith by my works. What James is saying is, look,

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I'm gonna show you what I believe by what I do. He's demonstrating on the horizontal between people, not vertical between God and man.

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On the horizontal, he's demonstrating what real faith is. Real faith is in God is manifested in works to people, in goodness, in not lying, in being honest, in helping others.

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That's what it is. He's just talking about this issue of proclamation of faith. Well, I'm a Christian.

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You proclaim it, let's see it. That's what's going on there. And he says that in verse 18, that's a very critical verse in that whole pericope is the horizontal.

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He goes on to verse 19. You believe that God is one, you do well. The demons also believe and shudder.

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Now the word believe there is from the Greek word pastuo, to have faith or to believe. And we have it in English as faith and belief, but in Greek, it's really one word and variations of the one word.

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So he says the demons, they believe also. This is the kind of faith dead faith is. It's an intellectual faith.

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It's just essential up in here. Yeah, God exists. Yeah, whatever. And they don't have any works that follow the belief of the truth of that.

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Now the demonic forces are insanely evil because they're wicked and fallen. And they know for a fact that God exists, but they don't believe and trust in him the way we do.

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But what James is doing is relating this issue to demonic belief. If you say you have faith, but you don't have any actions that demonstrate it, your faith is like the demons.

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They have an intellectual awareness, but no change has occurred in them. Nothing is going on. That's the level and kind of faith that you have there.

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But are you willing to recognize verse 19, verse 20? Are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith that works is useless?

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Was not our father Abraham justified by works when he offered up Isaac, his son, on the altar?

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Yeah, he was. Before God? No, not before God. Because in Romans 4 .1,

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I'll quote it to you. What then shall we say that our forefather Abraham had or found according to the flesh?

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For Abraham was justified by works. He has something to boast about, but not before God. So he's talking about the vertical there.

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The justification is not before God by any works. Justification here is before people by our works.

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That's how he's justified, that we know he has true faith because of what he did. We know that Abraham had true faith because he went and offered up his son.

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We know that he really did believe. And that's how we see that. And so, in verse 22, you see that faith was working with his works, and as a result of the works, his faith was perfected.

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Well, how is faith perfected by that? Well, when you live according to what you profess, you believe in the

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Lord Jesus Christ, you trust in the Lord Jesus Christ, something bad happens, and through it, you praise him.

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Through it, you trust him. Through it, you acknowledge his greatness. Then in this, as he brings us through, our faith is perfected.

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Our faith is improved. Our faith is clarified and purified through the trials and tribulations that God allows for us.

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And this is why it says, and the scripture was fulfilled, saying, Abraham believed God and was credited with righteousness.

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The crediting of righteousness, ultimately, this is what's really interesting, is in this particular verse, what's going on here, the belief of Abraham to God justified him, but it's not the works that justified

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Abraham. It was the faith, because the faith is perfected through the works, and it was his faith that justified him, and that's what's going on there.

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And that's why it says, you see, a man is justified by works, not by faith alone, and not before God, but before people. That's what

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James is talking about. You go to verse 18, you show me your works, your faith by your works,

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I'll show you mine by my works, et cetera. That's the horizontal. That's what's going on there. You know, it's like saying, you know,

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God, I know that you died on the cross for my sins and shed your blood and bore my sin in your body, but I have to do good things to make it all complete and effective.

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I have to go out and be nice and be honest and not lie, not commit adultery, not steal, not murder.

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I have to do the good things too. I gotta worship properly, I gotta read the word, I gotta be honest. And through all of this, with what

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Jesus did, the combination, the combination will get me saved.

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That is arrogance and it's foolishness. That's not what James is talking about. We're justified before God by faith alone.

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And the one who does not work, to the one who believes and does not work, his faith is credited as righteousness.

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That's what Romans 4 or 5 says. Let me check this out here for you. I'm gonna read it to you slowly. But to the one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness.

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Now, when you have two things, just two, an apple and an orange, one's removed, the other one is alone.

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Simple. Faith and works. But to the one who does not work, that's taken away.

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What's left? Faith. The one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness.

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It is not your works that'll get you saved because your works are filthy rags, Isaiah 64 .6. You can do no good before God.

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And if you think that you can contribute to your salvation or get yourself saved or keep yourself saved by your goodness, you're an arrogant fool and you're risking damnation.

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You're just balancing your toes over the precipice of the abyss of damnation and balancing it on this side of life, saying,

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I can keep myself right by my goodness. You're just playing with fire.

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Nope, that means you're denying the sufficiency of the work of Christ. It means you're denying that he did everything completely and totally that was necessary.

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And in light of that, you have to understand, we are not justified by faith and our works. We're justified by faith alone in Christ alone because as I said earlier,

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Romans, excuse me, Philippians 1 .29, faith is granted to us by God. So here's the question. Is the faith that God grants to us, that he grants to us, is it enough to save us, to justify us?

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Because Romans 5 .1 says, having therefore been justified by faith, the one who does not work, but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is credited as righteousness, that's

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Romans 4 .5. Or Romans 3 .28, we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from the works of the law.

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Apart from the works of the law, love God and love your neighbor. That's Deuteronomy 6 .5 and Leviticus 19 .18,

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respectively quoted by Jesus in Matthew 22 .37 and 39. And he says, that's a summation of the law.

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And yet we're justified without the works of the law because all of that is the law, the summation of the law. We're not justified by our love before God.

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We're not justified by our love of people. We're justified by faith in Jesus Christ, what he did.

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And that faith is granted to us by God, Philippians 1 .29. And that faith is in Jesus Christ, John 6 .29.

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This is the work of God that you believe and then on him whom he has sent. So therefore, the justifying faith that God grants to us is something from him that's in Christ.

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And it alone is sufficient to justify us before God. And if you dare add any works to it and think that you're gonna keep yourself right with God through any of your efforts, your sincerity, your works, you're a fool.

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You're a fool. And nothing but the grace of God just prevents you from just tipping you over into the abyss where you fall into eternity once your heart stops to beat and your breath is no longer taken and you enter into his presence and the judgment of God falls upon you because you dare to think and entertain the idea that through your faith and your works, you can keep yourself right with God.

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Foolishness, demonic doctrine, just get rid of it and put all your faith and trust in Jesus Christ and him alone and be justified by faith.