What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can his faith save him?
If a brother or sister is without clothes and lacks daily food and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, keep warm, and eat well,” but you don’t give them what the body needs, what good is it? In the same way faith, if it doesn’t have works is dead by itself. James 2:14-17 HCSB
This morning, I typed a pretty long blog to go with this and then felt that God wanted me to simplify it. So here we go. We all know that we are saved by faith. We are told this in Galatians 2:16. We are also told that our work is like filthy rags in Isaiah 64:6. So you can be a really good person and you can do all kinds of nice things and live to help others. But that’s not enough. If you don’t have a good solid relationship with Jesus Christ then you are not headed to heaven. Ephesians 2:8 tells us that we are saved by God’s grace through our faith in Him. So now you know how to be saved, let’s talk about this works thing.
Thom Rainer wrote a book called, I Am A Church Member. He talked about being a biblical church member. Let me explain. You see, we can go to church every time the doors are open and become a great pew warmer. We can read our bible and pray every day for those in need. These are all good things to do. We can believe in God. But when we love God with all we have, we want to help others. We want to do good things. Ephesians 5:1-2 tells us that we should imitate Christ and walk in love. You see you can talk a good game all day long and tell everyone how you love the Lord, but if you don’t walk it out by showing that love then you are dead in the water.
In Mr. Rainer’s book he talked about becoming inwardly focused. What often stops us from helping others is our focus on ourselves. We are just so busy getting everything we need that we don’t have time to help others. Some churches will spend a fortune on updating their facility and making it beautiful, but won’t spend a dime on missions or community outreach. What’s the use of having this beautiful facility if you don’t use it to lead others to Christ?
Our pastor used to say that we are not to judge others, but we are to inspect their fruit. The Bible tells us that we are to avoid evil (1 Thessalonians 5:22). So, we must be careful to inspect the fruit of so-called Christians. So look at where their time and money goes. Does it go to take care of their own selfish desires or does it go to help others?
True salvation brings about this desire to do good. It makes us want to work for the Lord. It makes us want to get out there and help others and do good things. It makes us want to help others to find the peace and joy that we have in our lives.
I am so grateful to be connected to a group of believers that want to do community outreach and want to support missions. The other day a friend remarked on how “busy” our church is. We are always working to reach out to our community and help others and it feels great! It’s so good to be with others that love the Lord and want to show His love to others. I hope for your sake that you are having that same kind of experience. If not, I am sure that there is a church in your community that would love to have you join them. Look for a good bible teaching church that reaches out through their community and missions to help others. You will be so glad you did. There is no greater joy than sharing God’s love with others!
Have a great day!