Book Preview #4: James 2:14-26 - What Comes First: Belief or Actions?
As many of you know, I will be publishing James, a book on the letter of James, in early 2016. In anticipation of that, I will be posting snippets of the book for all of you to enjoy. Here is another sneak preview:
What Comes First: Belief or Actions?
As we have seen through James’ example of helping others, right believing leads to right actions. Good deeds are not enough on their own and right believing does not remain alive without right actions. To believe and not act on your belief would be like trying to create the color green without the color blue. Both faith and works are needed; they are not mutually exclusive in a Christian’s life. If there are no works, there is no saving faith.
While it was necessary to say, that the last statement I made may have been misleading. Neither James nor I intend to taint the glorious gospel of substitution by inferring that our salvation comes from our works. The paradox is mentally suffocating at first: We cannot do anything to earn salvation and yet if we do not do anything it is evidence that we are not saved. How can James say this and not disintegrate the very truth of salvation!
We see in other parts of scripture that our works are not the determining factor in our salvation:
“For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Ephesians 2:8-10).
In his preaching, Jesus founded salvation squarely on belief in him, even starting out this particular thought with the potent “Truly, truly, I say to you…” statement, meaning that this information was vital to those who were listening:
“Truly, truly, I say to you, whoever hears my word and believes him who sent me has eternal life. He does not come into judgment, but has passed from death to life” (John 5:24).
This is difficult, but to help provide some clarity, I’d like to present the harmony between faith and works in the following way: Have you ever gone camping? While I am not particularly fond of camping, I have gone camping a few times and have enjoyed parts of it. One of the more memorable experiences I recall was a biking trip. My father, brother Marshall and I spent almost the entire day on our mountain bikes “bonsai-ing” through all kinds of ridiculous terrain in northern New Hampshire (I’m fairly certain that my dad coined the term “bonsai-ing”). The exhausting work was richly rewarded that night when we broke out the food that we had brought and started a glorious fire to cook the food on. We were covered with mud and chilling sweat, but we didn’t mind so much. As long as the fire was burning that night, heat flowed out from it and it kept our conversations warm and our spirits high. The heat from the fire came from the flames and both occurred naturally together.
In the same way, James viewed faith and obedience as two effects of the same salvation. His view is bolstered by this statement in Gospel of John: “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” (John 3:36). You’ll notice that John says “whoever believes” in the first sentence and then substitutes “belief” with “obey” in the second sentence when he discusses what the opposite of belief looks like. In true Jewish style, John uses the pairing of two sentences to draw a direct inference between believing and action. Here is the point: When you have belief burning inside of your soul, you must act! You, like the fire, cannot help but exude enthusiasm and actions that reflect your belief.
However, works are not always the evidence of belief, just as heat doesn't necessarily mean that there is a fire. We should not be fooled into thinking that works are necessarily evidence of faith. After declaring that actions are essential to the Christian, James counters a false assumption that he sees coming: “But someone will say, ‘You have faith and I have works.’ Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works” (James 1:18). Nice actions are possible without faith, though they are useless in the eyes of God. However, when belief comes first, then good actions will start to be automatic and become holy before God.
For more information on James, click here.