"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? Suppose you see a brother or sister who has no food or clothing, and you say, “Good-bye and have a good day; stay warm and eat well”—but then you don’t give that person any food or clothing. What good does that do? So you see, faith by itself isn’t enough. Unless it produces good deeds, it is dead and useless. Now someone may argue, “Some people have faith; others have good deeds.” But I say, “How can you show me your faith if you don’t have good deeds? I will show you my faith by my good deeds.” You say you have faith, for you believe that there is one God. Good for you! Even the demons believe this, and they tremble in terror. How foolish! Can’t you see that faith without good deeds is useless? 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 2:14-26 (NLT)
Works Are the Evidence of Faith.
This passage of Scripture argues that an individual’s works or actions reveal the kind of faith that they have. A person’s so-called faith is not a saving faith if it does not inspire them to do virtuous deeds. It is something dead. If such an opinion does not result in any action, it is pointless and meaningless to believe or wish for a poor person to be well. In a similar manner, James maintains that it is not sufficient to agree on certain truths of God mentally. Faith is not saving faith if what a person believes about God does not inspire them to act accordingly. It is only a personal opinion. James never states that faith is not required to be saved. He never asserts that salvation requires one to perform works. However, he makes it abundantly clear that the evidence of one’s good deeds and true faith cannot be separated. An agreement with a set of Christian teachings is intellectual assent. It is incomplete faith. Why is that? It is a form of head knowledge and not heart knowledge. Genuine faith alters both our actions and our thoughts. We do not truly believe the truths we claim to believe if our lives are not changed.
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