I agree but people here seem to think works are a "result" of faith. Works are a choice they dont appear simply because of faith.
Faith or Law?
- Thread starter Gideon300
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So in other words, be like Jesus in all things. Emulate what is good. Live in Him daily…. This is also works, is it not?
If you believe in Him and do His will, doesn’t this show up in your daily actions (works)?
Are we not to strive to be more like Him? If we are like Him, people will notice that we are different, as we should be.
Indeed, followers of Christ should follow his example of embodying the character traits of God in obedience to His law, which involves doing works.
I am glad to see that you do not believe we are saved by works, but rather we are saved unto good works. But I till do not understand the "or else" part of your argument. Is salvation lost when the things that are required of a person who has been saved are not fulfilled (i.e., when he does not choose to break the law or does an ungodly act)?
You indicated before that forgiveness comes into play in these circumstances. But you also indicated that God does not require saved people to be perfect. You also argued that a character trait can be a flawed character trait and still be counted as good. And you have also argued that wanting to do good but not doing dood is not the character trait of saved people. But it seems like these four things are in conflict with each other because forgiveness is not necessary if a flawed character trait is counted as good or imperfect people can be counted as righteous and being a doer of the law (with the right intentions) does not align with not doing the law on occasion and feeling bad about it.
It depends on who is doing the living. In reality, God includes every believer in the death of Christ. Every human being is born dead in trespass and sin. Since we can think, choose and feel still, it is obviously not the soul of man that is dead. It is the spirit that God breathed into Him to give us life. That spirit was "good", but empty. Hence the tree of Life in Eden. Man could have, should have eaten from the tree of life. He chose to eat instead of the fruit that killed him. Again, it was spiritual death, causing separation from God.
Two objects cannot occupy the same space. In order to give us a new spirit, which is to be born again, God has to remove the old, dead spirit. This he does by means of the cross. God includes us in Christ when we accept Him as saviour and Lord. We are included in His death. We are also raised together with Christ so that we have resurrection life, life that comes out of death. Read Galatians 2:20 if you do not follow me.
The question becomes, what is the source of life for the believer now? While we have a new spirit, the body and soul are not immediately changed. We will receive a new body when we go to be with the Lord. There is no other way. However, the soul realm is where we make our choices. Some choose to be governed by the law of the Spirit of Life in Christ Jesus. Some are governed by their will power, by thoughts, opinions, concepts and the desires of self.
As it was with Adam, we have a choice in this life. We can go to the tree of knowledge of good and evil and life according to its dictates. Or we can go to the tree of Life and live according to the leading, motivation and empowering of the Holy Spirit. Most Christians vacillate from one to the other, sometimes in the Spirit but more often, ruled by the self of the soul.
Some never break out of this cycle. It is never a life of victory. It is a struggle to overcome and it is in vain. Some realise very early on that the Christian life is only available in and through Christ. Others get to that place later in life. Look it up sometime. The NT states "in Christ" at least 50 times. All we have that is of any value is found only in Christ.
Most people think that we are saved by faith. Not true. We are saved by grace. Everyone knows that verse. But we are also saved by the life of Christ (Romans 5:10). Is this a contradiction? Not at all. Grace is in reality the life of Christ working in us to do God's will.
Works simply validate faith. They are the outworking of faith. And where does that faith come from? It is Christ in us.
Since we are crucified with Christ, what does God expect of us? Nothing. If we could be reformed, if we could learn to obey, then God would have not needed to send Jesus to die and rise again for us. It's so simple that most Christians miss it. It's no longer I but Christ. Does a bird study a flight manual, go to flight school, strap on an engine and try to fly? No. it flies precisely because it is in its nature to fly. Many believers do not understand that they are truly new creations in Christ. They spend their lives trying to be what God has already made us to be. And they fail. So they try harder. And fail more. Some get mad at God at this point and quit because it's too hard. Others realise that they have been been trying to make a dead man alive, instead of enjoying the new life that they have in Christ. We get to choose. I struggled with the "trying" way for way too long. I finally quit and Jesus does the living in and through me now. My wife will testify as to which version of me she prefers!
You don’t have to be Mormon to believe in having the character traits of Jesus.
If Jesus is in us, then His traits are manifest.
This doesn’t mean we are perfect by any means, but rather we are perfected by Him. People notice that we are different, because we act and speak differently than the world.
I agree but our daily actions are choices not the result of faith. As an example if feeding the hungry is a good work, but good works are only a result of faith then atheists wouldn't be able to feed the hungry. That's silly. Good works done with faith are salvific but good works alone like faith alone are not sufficient for salvation.
Yes, works come from faith. Abraham believed God's promise that through Isaac the "Seed" would come. As a result of that, when God told him to offer Issac as a burnt offering, he was willing to go through with it because he looked back at that promise and concluded that God was going to raise Isaac from the dead after he killed Isaac (Heb 11:17-19). This is how what a person believes motivates their actions. And as observers, we can see what Abraham truly believed about God's promise because he was willing to sacrifice his son.
Even today, people's actions still reveal what they really believe. Two people say they believe Jesus' sacrifice for their sins is sufficient for their salvation. But one person is resting all his weight on Christ and the other one is working hard to maintain his salvation. Which one's actions corroborate his faith, the one resting or the one working?
For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His. (Heb 4:10)
If its true that works come from faith then atheists couldn't do good works. That's silly. Works done by atheists arent salvific but works done in faith are. That's why James says faith is completed by works and why faith alone is not sufficient for salvation. If faith was it wouldn't need completion. You have to know what sufficient means.
To use an analogy, if two people came to a bridge that they were told that it was safe to cross and the first one chooses to stand there mentally affirming that it is safe while the second one chooses to cross the bridge, then the second one would be experiencing what it means to believe that the bridge is safe in a way that the first one is not, or in other words, second one would be embodying their belief and would be showing the kind of belief that the Bible is speaking about by believing in the Son. What exactly are we believing about the Son? The Son is the radiance if God's glory and the exact likeness of His character (Hebrews 1:3), so if our goal is to be like the Son, then the way to experience the belief that the Son is righteous is by being a doer of righteous works. In Luke 6:36, it says to be compassionate even as our Father is compassionate, so someone choosing to just mentally affirming that the Father is compassionate without being compassionate is not correctly understanding what it means to believe that God is compassionate..
I agree on one level that we should follow what God has commanded simply because Jesus is Lord, but there is more to it than that. God could have conceivably commanded anything that He wanted, but His commands are not arbitrary, rather there is purpose in everything that God chose to command, which is to teach us how to know Him by embodying His character traits. The Hebrew word “yada” refers to intimate relationships/knowledge gained by experience, such as with Genesis 4:1 where Adam knew (yada) Eve, she conceived, and gave birth to Cain. God’s way is the way to know (yada) Him and Jesus the experience of embodying His character traits, which is the narrow way to eternal life (John 17:3). For example, in Genesis 18:19, God knew (yada) Abraham that he would teach his children and those of His household to walk in His way by being doers of righteousness and justice that the Lord might bring to him all that He has promised. In Exodus 33:13, Moses wanted God to be gracious to him by teaching him to walk in His way that he and Israel might know (yada) Him, and in Matthew 7:23, Jesus said that he would tell those who are workers of lawlessness to depart from him because he never knew them, so the goal of the law is to graciously teach us how to have an intimate relationship with God and Jesus by walking in His way, which is His gift of eternal life.