Thursday, August 22, 2019
What good is it, dear brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but don’t show it by your actions? Can that kind of faith save anyone?
Don’t you remember that our ancestor Abraham was shown to be right with God by his actions when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? You see, his faith and his actions worked together. His actions made his faith complete. And so it happened just as the Scriptures say: “Abraham believed God, and God counted him as righteous because of his faith.” He was even called the friend of God. So you see, we are shown to be right with God by what we do, not by faith alone. Rahab the prostitute is another example. She was shown to be right with God by her actions when she hid those messengers and sent them safely away by a different road. Just as the body is dead without breath, so also faith is dead without good works. James 2:14, 21-26
How can I know I
have a genuine faith, and not a mirage?
How can I be sure? Look at the
examples James gives:
Abraham was
justified... (that means God accepted him) based on his faithfulness. God asked Abraham to burn the bridge behind
him, leave his home and follow God out to the wilderness. Abraham said, Alright, I'll go. That was faith. But it was the loading of the camels, the
endless ridicule he endured that was works.
I can picture
the scene: Abraham and Sarah packing up the family stuff, and the neighborhood
wag leaning over the fence;
Hey, Abe...Don't you know there's snakes out there in that sand? I know another fool that went out there without a map. He never came back. Abe, maybe you'd better reconsider this.
But he
went. Faith came alive in deeds.
The other example
James gives was Rahab the harlot who burned her bridges behind her. When the children of Israel were marching towards
her city, Jericho, she made the decision to throw in with God's people, and she
helped by hiding the reconnaissance team Joshua had sent.
Think of the
scene inside the walls of Jericho that night.
Sister Rahab, are you nuts, girl? Here we are inside the most fortified city in Canaan. Those silly Jews don't know how to fight; all they can do is walk around the outside. You'd better reconsider this; the city fathers aren't going to like it when they hear you've been helping those spies.
But Rahab hung
in there, and those silly Jews kept on marching seven days around the walls of
Jericho. And then 7 times on the 7th
day....and the walls came down. The
faith of Rahab, a common streetwalker, is chronicled in Matthew's gospel (Ch
1). Rahab's grandson was named
Jesse who had a son named David, King David. And out of the lineage of David was born a
king in a manger... Jesus.
Rahab had
faith. She put it all on the line in
deeds.
For You Today
How can you know
for sure that your faith is alive? You
can begin to take your spiritual pulse by throwing yourself wholeheartedly into
deeds of loving service to others. I
guarantee you will know inside of a month what is genuine and what is
mirage.
Where do you
start? Begin with forgiving your
neighbors, and fellow church members.
Ø Start to give OF
yourself, instead of concentrating ON your own needs. That is the model Jesus gave us.
Ø Start to depend
on the Father to supply what needs to be given.... Don’t concentrate on what
you don't have to give.
Ø But, most of
all...Do Start!
Occasionally a
person will get involved in a church, and there’s no change. There’s no joyful satisfaction to being
involved in the things of God. The
problem there was the “cart before the horse.”
You cannot work yourself
into having faith.
Faith is a gift
from God. I invite you today to make a
commitment in your heart to the Author of faith, Jesus Christ. Then the works – the good deeds you do – will
be a matter of joy, not a matter of trying to work your way into heaven. It can’t be done!
Go to VIDEO
[1]
Title Image: Courtesy of Wikimedia
Commons
Unless otherwise noted, Scripture used from The
New Living Translation©
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