Works and Faith 1

Here are some short thoughts impressed me this morning that I would like to explore much more. I compared Rom 4:1-5 with James 2:21-24 and Heb 11:17-19 about Abraham and the relationship of works and faith. I know this may be a worn out argument and I am not interested in a rehash. What I do want is to understand just for myself what God is trying to teach my heart when I looked at these this morning.

One thought that came to me was this.

Faith is like the seed, or maybe the planting of the seed.

Works is like the ground work, the preparation, the cultivating, the weeding that allows the seed to take deeper root and flourish. Work does not give the seed its life and is not the same as the work of the sower. My work is what continually creates the environment that encourages and protects the plant from withering away.

In this analogy it can be seen that while works do not save you, the lack of works can destroy the ability of the seed to flourish thereby suffocating your lifeline connection the the source of salvation resulting in ultimate loss of salvation. This is not due to God's unwillingness to save but in my loss of ability to cooperate and the destruction of my desire.

There is a lot more to unpack here but I have a lot of things to “work” on today while I think more about this.