For by grace have you been saved through faith, and not that of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9)
Works and faith, what an unending issue. Conservative Protestants will look at Catholics and say, “They believe in works; they aren’t saved.” Baptists will look at the Church of Christ and say, “They believe in baptismal regeneration[1], which is a work; they aren’t saved.” Reformed will look at the entire free will crowd of Christians and say, “They believe in works and deny the sovereignty of God. They may be saved, but it’s hard to tell.”
The various conservative Baptist denominations are very forceful in using the cry of the Reformation, sola fide.[2] Anything that smacks of a human work is decried and denounced if it is associated in any way with salvation. This would include Roman Catholics, Lutherans, Episcopals, Church of Christ, and others. In ironic contrast, the Church of Christ questions if Baptists are saved because of their distance from baptism. The theological squabblings would be the stuff of a Master Mad Hatter’s party.
I was so intrigued by this insistence by the Baptists that associating baptism with salvation was a works theology that I went to the home page of the Southern Baptists, General Association of Regular Baptists, Freewill Baptists, Conservative Baptists, and, a non-Baptist but with very similar doctrines, the Independent Fundamental Churches of America. On each page I visited the doctrinal or positional beliefs. Except for “works” being included in Ephesians 2:8-9, the word was not mentioned except for one site, which did say that one purpose of salvation was for “good works.” That was it. Not a hint of works was stated under any of the doctrinal sections.[3]
The observation that “baptismal regeneration” was omitted by all groups was not as glaring as another omission, much, much greater. What was that? “Works” is never defined! This might seem a gross, exaggerated reaction on my part, but let’s think about it for a moment.
One Christian group will call baptism a work, and another Christian group will not. I have learned a long time ago that when nomes[4] are used, they must be defined. Since a nome cannot be perceived by our senses or instruments that magnify our senses, then all that can be done is to define the word and illustrate what it is like.
Before illustrating Christian works as contrasted with faith, I wish to start with a common, non-religious issue. Let’s assume a person, W´, is dying of thirst. Two people (A´ and B´) give the person a drink of water. Is it possible for A´ to have done a good deed and B´ to have done a selfish deed? I believe so, if you count attitude and motive. A´ gives the water merely to relieve C´’s suffering. It will be difficult to find critics of A´.[5] However, B´ could have given water for a number of selfish reasons: 1) he wanted to know where C´’s wallet was so he could steal it later; 2) he wanted an attractive woman who expressed sympathy for W´ to notice him; 3) he saw A´ going to get water, and B´wanted to do it first because he disliked A´so much and is disgusted at how much attention A´ receives. (You use your imagination and continue your own illustrations.)
W´ did receive water and was relieved of suffering. A good result occurred regardless of the motives, but did B´ actually do a good work? Perhaps a die-hard pragmatist will merely point to W´’s relief and say, “Leave well enough alone. If everyone helped others, even for mixed motives, people are still helped.” Certain W´ was helped, but what about the wallet that might be stolen later, or the woman misled by B´, etc.? As long as there are bad attitudes and bad motives, there will eventually be bad deeds.
With the previous paragraph I wanted to establish that motive and attitude affected the giver doing a selfish work though the receiver gets a good result. All of us recognize that good works, as far as a personal commendation, requires a good motive and/or a good attitude. We also see this dual nature of good works when a person, with good motives, does a work that produces a bad result for the receiver. For instance, a young child wants to make a special birthday cake for his mother and nearly sets the kitchen on fire. Though the parents will show anxiety about the near fire, the anger toward the child will be mitigated. If the child had meant to start a fire, the whole situation changes again. Means, opportunity, and motive are required for a criminal conviction, at least in the popular mind. The mindset is what defines the quality of an act; though it may be undiscoverable in any particular incident, we still recognize this principle.
Before continuing to the religious question, let’s settle what a work is, any work. I would be baffled if a work were more than energy expended to do something. “Wait, that would include recreation, and recreation is not work.” Really? I know people who love to work in their lawn, planting flowers (seemingly unendingly), attacking each weed as if it were a pervert seeking to molest the innocent. They love it. In reference now to moi, simply mowing grass is a curse from Adam. Why not let the goats take care of it? There is NOTHING relaxing or recreational about working (see the word—WORKING) in the yard! The difference between work and play is in the mind, not in the exertion and energy of the body. The exertion of energy is precisely what work is. That definition will cover all examples and usages of the word.
Simply because some activities are less strenuous does not mean energy is not needed. The energy needed to think of my next sentence is less than the energy needed to type it, which is less than the energy needed to carry the keyboard, which is much less than the energy needed to carry a board, and on and on. Because thinking does not seem to take energy does not mean that it doesn’t require energy. (Besides, haven’t you ever heard writers discuss how hard it is to write, how tiring?)
With all these ideas, definitions, and thoughts in place, let’s consider how a person can be saved WITHOUT some work. Can you think of a single example? I can’t, and I’ve been puzzling over this for 20 years or so. To even think, “Jesus, I trust You and want You to be my savior” takes energy and is a work of the person thinking it. Raising the hand to receive Jesus is a work. Repeating the sinner’s prayer is a work. Crying for joy is a work. Being baptized is a work. It’s not possible to have faith without thinking, and thinking requires work. Any physical activity or any religious activity is a work.
If we are saved without works and work is needed for anything that we do, what is going on? How is this reconciled? We need to move from the physical to the mental. What makes a work a good one or a bad one is again the attitude or the motive. A good work or good works or a bad work or bad works may appear to be the same by observers. Only the faith differs.
Can two people stand before a church, confess some statement of faith concerning Jesus, and one is saved whereas the other is not? The answer is yes. Reciting words does not require faith. Any atheist reading this article may now read, “I believe Jesus died on the cross for my sins, and I accept Him as my Savior,” and he will not be saved … if he doesn’t believe it.
Neither words nor works are the issue; it is faith. Works are the expression of faith, but they are not faith. A work may be done by anyone, but only faith can make it a work of faith. As long as the work is not a sin, then all other works may or may not be a work of faith.
The accusation, “That person cannot be saved because he believes in works,” may be true if a person truly believes what he is doing is saving him and not Jesus, but even that can be iffy. For instance, consider a person who has taken chemotherapy and the cancer has remitted. What saved the person: the doctor who discovered the cancer, the technicians who tested the biopsy, the equipment used to determine the biopsy, the people who created the equipment, the chemo, the people who administered the chemo, etc, etc, etc? Ultimately there are two factors: 1) the patient had to believe the doctor(s) and 2) the patient had to follow the regimen.
The question now is “How much did the patient have to believe the doctor? What did they need to know about the doctor or the regimen?” The answer is that they only needed to believe enough to do what was prescribed. Perhaps more details might be needed by some who want to know more about the doctor or the procedure, but that would not be needed for everyone. What is needed to be believed about the doctor is that he knows what he is talking about.[6]
Also, if the person believed whatever was needed to follow the procedure, does it make any difference if the motives or attitudes were not “pure.” Let’s say a person is thinking, “What choice do I have” or “The drug companies just want to make a fortune” or “If I don’t do this my family will nag me without end.” The analogy between medicine and religion break down at this point. A patient can believe the doctor is totally incompetent, but he goes through the motion because his wife wants him to. In a medical procedure the result would statistically be the same (allowing for the fact that the patient’s negative attitude would not affect the result). In Christianity the belief and commitment to Christ is necessary.
Why does the medical analogy beak down, and why is belief in Christ necessary? The difference is that the doctor, for any medicine or procedure, is pointing to something else, something other than himself. All of us have heard a doctor say, “I haven’t healed anyone.” Other religions point to something else: do these works. Christ points to Himself as the healer! He does say, “I heal people. I do it.”
With medicine as long as the medicine or the regimen is followed, then results follow. In Christianity Jesus Himself IS the medicine. Instead of saying “Take two of these pills after a meal,” Jesus says, “Choose to become like me.” He says, “Follow me.” He says, “Leave your old way of life and choose this new way.”
Many times I have read or heard atheists ask, “Why is belief necessary to be saved?” My counter-question is, “Is it possible to follow someone, truly follow him, without believing him and believing in him?” I agree a person can follow a crowd without realizing there is a leader in front, but a time will come when he will realize that the leader is asking for commitment to him.[7] Jesus requires a commitment to Him, not to a medicine or a procedure. When Jesus is asking people to believe Him is the same thing that all leaders ask of those who wish to follow. Even the atheists who are asking, “Why believe in Jesus,” are saying, by a subtle implication, “Believe me that you don’t have to believe Him” or “Believe me when I say you don’t have to believe in belief.”
To summarize, to say that someone believes in works and is not saved only makes sense if the person does not believe in Jesus at all. It is impossible to believe in Jesus without some works, impossible. Everyone has to do SOMETHING to indicate he believes in Jesus. As long as the person is responding to Jesus in some way, even with faith the size of a mustard seed, then “by grace has he been saved through faith.”
So the criticism of some conservative Christians that others believe in works because they think they have to be baptized to be saved does not make sense if Jesus commands baptism. Jesus was baptized, his disciples baptized, the Great Commission commands baptism (Matthew 28:19-20), and there are commands to be baptized throughout the book of Acts.
If a person was baptized and then said, “Now Jesus will save me because I’ve been baptized,” he is still lost if he does not believe in Jesus, but, if he believed in Jesus prior to the baptism, then he is saved. Faith in Jesus is the key, and works are an expression of that faith. When James wrote, “Faith without works is dead,” he could just as easily have written, “Faith without works is impossible.”
[1] This is the belief that baptism actually causes salvation.
[2] This Latin phrase translate to the equivalency of “faith alone” or “only faith.”
[3] Perhaps the reason is to avoid negative statements, i.e., the doctrinal position is what a group believes, as opposed to what they do not believe.
[4] A nome is an acrostic for Non-material entity. Essentially, a nome is anything that is not matter or energy. A ready response might be, “Is that simply an abstract idea? Is so, why not use abstract?” It has to do with reality. Typically the position is taken that abstract ideas have a true reality (Plato’s forms, Platonic realism) or abstract ideas are simply names for a category of material objects or a designator for material objects (nominalism). These abstract ideas include spiritual terms: God, angels, heaven, soul, etc. I am merely asserting here that some abstracts truly have reality, the spiritual ones. Other abstracts, e.g., truth, good, love, mathematics, are nominalistic. In order to avoid the dualism of existence that is created by concrete/abstract or realism/nominalism, I am introducing a hybrid term, nomes, a non-material entity.
[5] There is always a critic somewhere. Perhaps C´ had broken into a bank, killed a person or two and then attempted suicide. He is near death and is begging for water. A´ could be criticized for giving help to a worthless person who deserved to die, particularly after killing people. As I said, there is always a critic somewhere.
[6] Obviously a quack could be believed. His procedure would not help anyone. Faith per se does not save, but faith in someone, and this someone has to have the credentials to save him. A child who has a brain tumor might believer his daddy can save him because daddy can do anything. That faith is misplaced.
[7] A recent historical example would be the personal pledge that German soldiers and civil servants gave to Hitler. They pledged to follow him personally. Obviously a person could still lie when he gave pledge, but he could later be prosecuted if his behavior did not conform.
