"Faith without works is dead." Explain this, please.

GDL

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We can say they confirm it, yes, along with our hope, and, most relevantly, our love, since long is the prime motivator for doing good. Faith, by virtue of the union with God it establsihes, should lead to all that.

Do you think this is what James is talking about in James 2 where he discusses faith + works? Do you see his statement about justification by works to be God's declaration about Abraham's passing the test and thus this "confirm[ation]" [of faith] you mention?
 
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GDL

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Without Abraham offering his only son, the faith is dead until there

I don't think I would agree with his faith being dead until there.

One of the things that characterizes Abraham's faith is his obedience to God. I see faith spoken of in the Scripture as being at times interchangeable with obedience. Hearing and obeying God's command(s) is Faith and indicative of a living Faith. I also think that with a bit of work done to better understand the scope of good works, that such actions done in Faith in obedience to God's commands are likely part of our good works.
 
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BBAS 64

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Good Day,

We are Justified by Faith alone, but it is a faith that is never alone.

John Chrysostom:

"But after saying that 'it was excluded,' he shows also, how. How then does he say it was excluded? 'By what law? of works? Nay, but by the law of faith.' See he calls the faith also a law delighting to keep to the names, and so allay the seeming novelty. But what is the 'law of faith?' It is, being saved by grace. Here he shows God's power, in that He has not only saved, but has even justified, and led them to boasting, and this too without needing works, but looking for faith only." (Homilies on Romans, 7, v. 27)

"They said that he who kept not the Law was cursed, but he proves that he who kept it was cursed, and he who kept it not, blessed. Again, they said that he who adhered to Faith alone was cursed, but he shows that he who adhered to Faith alone is blessed." (Commentary on Galatians, 3, v. 8)

Faith that is not dead ( Justifying, Saving, Gifted by God) will always produce good works that we were prepared for us to walk in walk in.

Eph 2:10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

If the is a naked faith without evidence of works, then it is not gifted by God, and it is not Justifying, and it is dead.

In Him,

Bill
 
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fhansen

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Do you think this is what James is talking about in James 2 where he discusses faith + works? Do you see his statement about justification by works to be God's declaration about Abraham's passing the test and thus this "confirm[ation]" [of faith] you mention?
The two are to work hand in hand, faith working through love as Gal 5:6 puts it. Historically the church has taught that both faith and authentic works are gifts of grace, and yet gifts we can refuse. To believe in God and act accordingly-to hear and heed His voice- is the reverse of what Adam did. It's the right and just thing do to begin with which is why it pleases God immensely-and why He declared Abraham to be just. It's to walk the talk, not merely talk.
 
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GDL

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The two are to work hand in hand, faith working through love as Gal 5:6 puts it. Historically the church has taught that both faith and authentic works are gifts of grace, and yet gifts we can refuse. To believe in God and act accordingly-to hear and heed His voice- is the reverse of what Adam did. It's the right and just thing do to begin with which is why it pleases God immensely-and why He declared Abraham to be just. It's to walk the talk, not merely talk.

Thanks for the thoughts, as always.

Walk the talk:

NKJ 1 John 3:7 Little children, let no one deceive you. He who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous.

ESV Titus 1:16 They profess to know God, but they deny him by their works. They are detestable, disobedient, unfit for any good work.
 
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WordSword

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“So what is the big deal about works?
Good issue! After rebirth (being saved) the most important issue is "glorifying your Father which is in heaven," and this is by "letting your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works"--that others might desire to be saved (Mat 5:16).

Also, faith is ever accompanied by works, for faith is never dead, but alive. Faith is nonexistent if works are not evident, as one cannot have faith and no works. No works, no faith and conversely no faith, no works, for works derive solely from faith.

After being reborn it's all about growing in Christ's image (walk or lifestyle), so we can be used to draw the lost and strengthen the saved.
 
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Carl Emerson

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Good issue! After rebirth (being saved) the most important issue is "glorifying your Father which is in heaven," and this is by "letting your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works"--that others might desire to be saved (Mat 5:16).

Also, faith is ever accompanied by works, for faith is never dead, but alive. Faith is nonexistent if works are not evident, as one cannot have faith and no works. No works, no faith and conversely no faith, no works, for works derive solely from faith.

After being reborn it's all about growing in Christ's image (walk or lifestyle), so we can be used to draw the lost and strengthen the saved.

This is what Jesus prayed for in John 17...

The witness was meant to be visible to the world and all about how believers relate together.

"that they may be one that the world may know...."

Sadly this truth has been largely lost.
 
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WordSword

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This is what Jesus prayed for in John 17...

The witness was meant to be visible to the world and all about how believers relate together.

"that they may be one that the world may know...."

Sadly this truth has been largely lost.
Good input! Yes, this last century has resulted in many of the false doctrines of the past to rise due to lack of sufficient teachings of the growth truths within the Pauline Epistles. I believe the Body of Christ will be, in general, at its lowest maturity when the Lord Jesus comes for her. Thankfully it's not the maturity of our walk that determines the salvific position believers have in Christ, for at rebirth we are without "spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing" (Eph 5:27).

Change would require believers repetitiously reading and studying of the Epistles, which I do not think likely. Many if not most in His Church assign incorrect interpretation to this stream of doctrine; and it's because of the distractions of prevalent errant teachings.
 
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Ceallaigh

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“For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.” - James 2:26

Literally, this means you do not have faith unless you act on it.

But Jesus said nobody can go to heaven by working.

"I am the Way and the Truth and the Light. Nobody comes to the Father except through Me." - John 14:6

So what is the big deal about works?

It seems to me that the answer to that is found here:

What use is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone says he has faith, but he has no works? Can that faith save him? 15 If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and be filled,” yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that? 17 In the same way, faith also, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself. James 2:14

What I see James saying is that faith without works is of no use. It doesn't serve God and it doesn't help anyone. That faith without works is like being a couch potato spirituality. In my opinion James is inspiring Christians to be active in their faith instead of being apathetic regarding the needs of others and serving God.

If someone asks "are you a Christian?" a good answer would be "ask my neighbor".
 
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Clare73

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“For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.” - James 2:26
Literally, this means you do not have faith unless you act on it.
But Jesus said nobody can go to heaven by working.
"I am the Way and the Truth and the Light. Nobody comes to the Father except through Me." - John 14:6
So what is the big deal about works?
The big deal is the faithfulness of obedience, in which true faith results.
 
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fixn_junk

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I agree with this conclusion, but if you look at the verse in context I think James and Paul disagreed on justification. Maybe the disagreement was more verbal than substance, but we know from Paul’s letters that Paul and James actually did have some disagreements.
Neither Paul nor James spoke of works as a means, or even a part of the means, to salvation. The works are first evidence of salvation and secondly the acting out of the work of the Holy Spirit in sanctification of the believer.
 
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prodromos

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“For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.” - James 2:26

Literally, this means you do not have faith unless you act on it.

But Jesus said nobody can go to heaven by working.

"I am the Way and the Truth and the Light. Nobody comes to the Father except through Me." - John 14:6

So what is the big deal about works?
Faith requires action. You can believe a rickety old bridge can hold your weight, but you do not have faith in the bridge unless you actually walk across it.

For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.​

If we are not active in doing those good works which God prepared for us, helping whoever God puts in our path at any particular time and place, then we have no faith. If we are not willing to trust that God will provide for us, by not sacrificing our own time, money or comfort for those whom God puts before us, then we do not have faith, only belief.
 
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Soyeong

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“For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.” - James 2:26

Literally, this means you do not have faith unless you act on it.

But Jesus said nobody can go to heaven by working.

"I am the Way and the Truth and the Light. Nobody comes to the Father except through Me." - John 14:6

So what is the big deal about works?

The way that we interpret what Jesus said in John 14:6 should be in accordance with other things that he has said, such as in Matthew 19:17, where he said that the way to enter eternal life is by obeying God's commandments, and in Matthew 7:21-23, where he said that only those who do the will of the Father will enter the Kingdom of Heaven and that he would tell those who are workers of lawlessness to depart from him because he never experientially knew them, and God has made His will known through what He has commanded (Psalms 40:8), so obedience to God's law is the way to enter the Kingdom of Heaven and the way to experientially know Christ, and experientially knowing God and Jesus is eternal life (John 17:3), so I don't think it is correct to interpret John 14:6 as saying that no one can get to heaven by working, though we don't earn our way to heaven by working.

In Exodus 33:13, Moses wanted God to be gracious to him by teaching him to walk in His way that he might experientially know Him, God's way is the way in which He expresses aspects of His nature (2 Samuel 22:21-37), and God has made the way to His way known through His law (Deuteronomy 10:12-13, Isaiah 2:2-3, Joshua 22:5, Psalms 103:7, etc.), and experientially knowing God through expressing His nature through our obedience to His law is eternal life and the way of salvation.

God's nature is the way, the truth, and the life. The Bible often uses the same terms to describe the nature of God as it does to describe the nature of God's law, which again is because it is God's instructions for how to express aspects of His nature, such as with it being holy, righteous and good, so that is why God's law is the way (Psalms 119:1-3), the truth (Psalms 119:142), and the life (Deuteronomy 32:47). The Son is the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15) and is the radiance of God's glory and the exact expression of God's nature (Hebrews 1:3), so he is the physical manifestation of the way to experientially know and see the Father and the living embodiment of the way, the truth, and the life (John 14:6-7), which he expressed through his actions by living in sinless obedience to God's law, while those who continue to practice sin in transgression of God's law have neither seen nor experientially known him (1 John 3:4-6). So no one comes to the Father other than through choosing by faith to follow Christ's example of how he expressed God's nature through his obedience to God's law.
 
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Soyeong

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The two are to work hand in hand, faith working through love as Gal 5:6 puts it. Historically the church has taught that both faith and authentic works are gifts of grace, and yet gifts we can refuse. To believe in God and act accordingly-to hear and heed His voice- is the reverse of what Adam did. It's the right and just thing do to begin with which is why it pleases God immensely-and why He declared Abraham to be just. It's to walk the talk, not merely talk.

Eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and evil caused Adam and Eve to become mortal, while eating from the Tree of Life would have caused them to become immortal, so before eating from either tree, they are neither mortal nor immortal, but were are a crossroads between the two. In Deuteronomy 30:15-20, they were at the same crossroads where Moses presented before them life and death, life for obedience to God's law and death for disobedience to it, and instructed them to choose life! In other words, they were given the option to reverse what Adam did by choosing obedience and life.
 
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Soyeong

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Neither Paul nor James spoke of works as a means, or even a part of the means, to salvation. The works are first evidence of salvation and secondly the acting out of the work of the Holy Spirit in sanctification of the believer.

In Ephesians 2:8-10, we are new creations in Christ to do good works, so while we do not earn our salvation by our works lest anyone should boast, doing good works is nevertheless still an integral part of our salvation. Likewise, in Romans 2:13, Paul said that only doers of the law will be justified, while also denying in Romans 4:4-5 that we can earn our justification by our obedience as a wage, so there is a reason why choose to obey God's law is required as means of salvation other than in order to earn it, namely faith insofar as our faith upholds God's law (Romans 3:31). In Titus 2:11-4, our salvation is described as being trained by grace to do what is godly, righteous, and good, and to renounce doing what is ungodly, so God graciously teaching us to obey His law for how to do these works is itself part of the content of His gift of salvation. Our salvation is from sin (Matthew 1:21) and sin is the transgression of God's law (1 John 3:4), so the gift of doing good works in obedience to God's law is inherently part of the concept of Jesus saving us from living in transgression of God's law.
 
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fhansen

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Eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and evil caused Adam and Eve to become mortal, while eating from the Tree of Life would have caused them to become immortal, so before eating from either tree, they are neither mortal nor immortal, but were are a crossroads between the two. In Deuteronomy 30:15-20, they were at the same crossroads where Moses presented before them life and death, life for obedience to God's law and death for disobedience to it, and instructed them to choose life! In other words, they were given the option to reverse what Adam did by choosing obedience and life.
Yes, I agree that they were at a crossroads between the two, sort of in a moral neutral zone vis a vis God, not yet ready to to embrace Him as their God, let alone love Him with their whole heart, soul, mind, and strentgh.

Having lived in a world effectively alienated from Him now, with sin and injustice abounding and the specter of death always looming overhead, we're actually in an adantaged position in a fundamental way: we know what autonomy from God really means, with all the evil that entails, so that, when He comes knocking on our door we may all be all the more ready to open it and let Him in -so we can now begin to eat from the Tree of Life.
 
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Soyeong

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I agree with this conclusion, but if you look at the verse in context I think James and Paul disagreed on justification. Maybe the disagreement was more verbal than substance, but we know from Paul’s letters that Paul and James actually did have some disagreements.

The issue is that God's law can be obeyed for purposes other than trying to earn our justification, especially because it was never given as means of doing that, so verses that speak against that fundamental misunderstanding of the goal of the law should not be mistaken as speaking against our justification requiring us to choose to obey God's law for some other reason, namely faith. In Romans 3:31, our faith upholds God's law, so only those who have faith will uphold it by obeying it and will be justified by the same faith, which is why Paul could say in Romans 2:13 that only doers of the law will be justified while also using Abraham's example in Romans 4:4-5 to deny that our justification can be earned as a wage.

While it is true that Abraham believed God, so he was justified (Genesis 15:6), it is also true that he believed God, so he obeyed God's command to offer Isaac (Hebrews 11:17), so the same faith by which he was justified was also expressed as obedience to God, but he did not earn his justification by his obedience as a wage. In James 2:21-24, it quotes Genesis 15:6 to support saying that Abraham was justified by his works when he offered Isaac, that his faith was active along with his works, and his faith completed his works, so he was justified by his works insofar as they were an expression of his faith, but not insofar as they were earning a wage. James wholeheartedly agreed with what Paul said in Romans 2:13, so they were on the same page.
 
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fhansen

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The issue is that God's law can be obeyed for purposes other than trying to earn our justification, especially because it was never given as means of doing that, so verses that speak against that fundamental misunderstanding of the goal of the law should not be mistaken as speaking against our justification requiring us to choose to obey God's law for some other reason, namely faith. In Romans 3:31, our faith upholds God's law, so only those who have faith will uphold it by obeying it and will be justified by the same faith, which is why Paul could say in Romans 2:13 that only doers of the law will be justified while also using Abraham's example in Romans 4:4-5 to deny that our justification can be earned as a wage.

While it is true that Abraham believed God, so he was justified (Genesis 15:6), it is also true that he believed God, so he obeyed God's command to offer Isaac (Hebrews 11:17), so the same faith by which he was justified was also expressed as obedience to God, but he did not earn his justification by his obedience as a wage. In James 2:21-24, it quotes Genesis 15:6 to support saying that Abraham was justified by his works when he offered Isaac, that his faith was active along with his works, and his faith completed his works, so he was justified by his works insofar as they were an expression of his faith, but not insofar as they were earning a wage. James wholeheartedly agreed with what Paul said in Romans 2:13, so they were on the same page.
I'd probably agree with this except to say that love, which faith is meant to engender as it brings us into proximity to or union with God, the very Source of love, is the true motivation for obedience and fulfillment of the law, as love literally fulfills the law, Rom 13:10-and without needing to hear the law. Love is the goal, as God is the goal.
 
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GDL

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In Ephesians 2:8-10, we are new creations in Christ to do good works, so while we do not earn our salvation by our works lest anyone should boast, doing good works is nevertheless still an integral part of our salvation.

So, to be clear, and if I'm reading you correctly, if no works, then no salvation?
 
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GDL

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I'd probably agree with this except to say that love, which faith is meant to engender as it brings us into proximity to or union with God, the very Source of love, is the true motivation for obedience and fulfillment of the law, as love literally fulfills the law, Rom 13:10-and without needing to hear the law. Love is the goal, as God is the goal.

Would you please explain this? Here are my questions and points to explain why I ask this of you:

As I understand you, you seem to say:
  • faith engenders love - so faith > love
  • love motivates obedience - so love > obedience - so faith > love > obedience
  • love fulfills law
The way I read the Word:
  • faith and obedience are used interchangeably in the Word (Romans 10:16; Hebrews 3:18-19; 1 John 3:23). From these and other verses, I would thus express this as faith/obedience, which would change what you seem to say.
  • "love fulfills law" is, for me, a bit of an ambiguous phrase unless we explain what is meant by "fulfills"
    • In Romans 13:10 "love is the fulfillment of law" - "is the" is inserted in translation and not in the original. It literally & emphatically says "the love / fulfillment of law." Thus, I see love essentially being defined as fulfilling/completing/doing God's Law. This is at minimum confirmed by John saying in 1 John 5:3 "this is the love of/for God: that we keep His commandments, and His commandments are not heavy to bear/burdensome.
    • So, love is obeying God - love is obedience to God - obedience to God is love - love/obedience
If we take all of this and other important terminology, obedience to God is really at the core of it all. But it's faith/obedience/love at the end of it all.

For these reasons, "love motivates obedience" usually causes me to pause a bit. In part because I hear so many say they love God when they are living lawlessly. And there is a lot of antinomian teaching out there that is encouraging this thinking & disassociating the two.
 
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