Faith Without Works Is Dead

Before I start preaching, I wanted to say one thing about the constructions that are going on here. Some of you, Eric asked this in Sunday school, but there's more of you here. How many of you noticed that the back wall is painted? Not many. Well, next week you're going to notice changes, okay? So next week, Lord willing, and this is something we'd ask you to pray for, is where our flooring should all be delivered tomorrow, our flooring crews are showing up tomorrow, the foyer and all the hallways. should have flooring on them next week. That's one thing that's happening next week, Lord willing, okay? The other thing that's happening next week is this stage is being rebuilt. So next week, I'm going to stand eight inches higher and I'm going to stand about here because we're going to have a curve up here. And there's going to be another step back there. There's a lot of work going on. So this is worship right now. For the rest of the week, this is going to be a carpenter shop.

And so one of the things that you can do, a number of you came on Labor Day when we were tearing out the carpet and were very helpful. Such a blessing. Thank you. Another thing that you could do, men, after the women have finished their meeting in here that would be incredibly helpful to us is to take all of these chairs in these three sections and stack them in the back so that we have room to work in here without getting dust and having to move all those chairs. ourselves. We would really appreciate that. So if you're hanging out, young men, if you're sticking around after church a little while, once the women are done and we're not going to rush them out of here, if you can just come in and grab a couple of chairs and we'll set them to the back, that would be a huge help. Also, if you're available, we've sort of developed this put it all back together Saturday, which basically Eric and John and James have been overseeing. If you're available on Saturdays for the next

couple of weeks anyway. Our church doesn't look like this throughout the week. Stuff's moved and scattered all over the place, and so there's guys that come in and put it all back together. If you're available on a Saturday, this coming Saturday, to help put these chairs that we're going to move back where they belong, talk to Eric and let him know if you're available or not. I just want to let you know there's that need, and there's been men who've been faithfully and humbly meeting that need, but I just want to let you know it's a continuing need, so if you're able to meet it, we'd really appreciate it.

Now, that concludes my announcements. Last week we finished the Sermon on the Mount, and we're going to be taking a few weeks before we start our next book of the Bible. And so each week we'll be doing something a little different. It's not a sermon series per se, at least I've not conceived of it that way. I've thought about our congregation and thought about our needs and where we would be helped and choosing the sermon's texts. that way each week. And so this morning, we're going to be studying the relationship between believing in Jesus and obeying the Bible. How do those things work? In other words, you may think of it in terms of what is the relationship between faith and works? Our text this morning, the one I've chosen, can actually be very confusing because of the way that the Apostle James uses the word justification. The confusion runs so deep that during the time of the Reformation, Martin Luther denied the inspiration of this epistle. He said, this is not, should not be a part of the canon. And he actually worked to get it removed from Scripture. Does anyone know what he called James' epistle? He called it an epistle of straw. He didn't like it at all. He saw it as an affront, as a danger to our souls.

In his context, he was dealing with the abuses of the Roman Catholic Church at that time. And later on in Luther's life, as he studied and as he came to a deeper and greater understanding of the Scripture's teaching on justification and sanctification, he came to repent of or recant his previous opposition to the James Epistle. He came to understand that the things James said in the text we're going to be studying today were not actually meant to confuse us or to merge together this issue of faith and works, that they were distinct and yet they were inextricably connected. And so my goal this morning is to draw out this relationship, this connection, and help us to understand that both faith and works are necessary, necessary for salvation.

And so when we're finished this morning, my hope is that God will bless us by renewing and strengthening our faith in him and motivate us to obey him more fully and more thoroughly. Would you please stand now as we read the word of the Lord from James chapter 2. This is verses 14 through 26. This is the word of the Lord and it is eternally true. What use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but he has no works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or a sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, go in peace, be warm, and be filled, and yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that? Even so, faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself. But someone may well say, you have faith and I have works. Show me your faith without the works and I will show you my faith.

You believe that God is one. You do well. The demons also believe and shudder. But are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless? Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up Isaac, his son, on the altar? You see that faith was working with his works. And as a result of the works, faith was perfected. And the scripture was fulfilled, which says, And Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. And he was called the friend of God. You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone. In the same way, was not Rahab the harlot also justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way? For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.

This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. Now just a word about justification here and sanctification. Those are not words I intend to use throughout this sermon, but typically in terms of defining them here at the beginning, justification is a monergistic work of God. Now I don't really care if you know what monergistic means. All it means is that it is single, mono, one act of God. He saves us alone by himself. If anyone is to come to Christ, he can only come if God saves him. And if in saving him, God does 100% of the saving. We don't bring anything with us. We don't add anything. We can't add anything. In fact, if God hadn't worked in the hearts of his people before they were justified to soften them, They wouldn't want to bring anything. They would not want to come to God. And so this is justification. It's a monergistic work of God where he, by his own will and according to his own desires and his own timing and everything that has to do with his prerogatives, he's chosen and then he saves. We don't have anything to do with it. The ones he saves are not better than the ones he doesn't save. They're not the A team, if you will, as opposed to the B team.

They're not ones who will do greater works than those who are not saved. It really is hidden to us how and why God chooses the ones to save as well as the ones to curse. This is what Scripture teaches us about justification. That is distinct from sanctification. Sanctification is not a one-time act that happens 100% by God. Sanctification instead is the whole rest of your life until you die as a Christian. The analogy that helps me think about this sort of thing, you have justification, sanctification, and glorification. And I think of it like a bookshelf. And you have a book end on either end. And then you have a whole row of books in the middle. The first book end is justification. It's life. It's when you become a Christian. It's very distinct. It happens at a point in time and God does it. Then you have sanctification, all the books on the shelf.

Some of us have, and different things will be written in our books because our growth will necessarily look different. And some of our shelf, our list of books will be longer than other people's. And then at the other end, there's another bookend, and that is glorification. And that's when we die, and that's when God finishes the work of sanctification, and we're perfectly holy now. We will not get to perfect holiness in this life. We can't. Our sinful nature and our flesh will not be fully and completely done away with. until the end, until we pass away. Distinct from justification in that it's a work of God all by himself, sanctification is a synergistic work. It's something where we actually cooperate with God because in giving us life, he's given us his Holy Spirit. He's changed our hearts. He's changed our desires. He's changed our inclinations. Not perfectly and not all at once, but there has been a substantive change made.

In the same way you could think if you went out and you planted a walnut. So we say, you want a walnut tree. And you'd say, okay, I'm going to get me a walnut tree. And I get a walnut and you say, I'm going to go plant a walnut in the ground. What do you have when that walnut just breaks through the soil and your walnut tree is this big? You don't have wood. There's no wood in it, right? You could take it and just mow it over with your lawnmower and you would never even know it was there. It's so small. And yet it is a walnut tree, right?

And at some point, the wood inside of it is going to be very valuable. Farmers used to plant rows of walnut trees and it was their retirement. They would buy a piece of property, they would plant walnut trees, acres and acres of them. And they'd plant them when they were 20 because they knew about how long it would take them to mature. And then as they got to retirement, they would go and they would cut down and they would sell all of the wood. And it was their retirement. Because walnut trees are really cheap when they're little and very valuable when they're big. Okay? So when is a walnut tree a walnut tree? Well, as soon as there's life in that seed. As soon as that seed germinates, there's life in it, right? But it's not, we wouldn't recognize it as a walnut tree. We wouldn't say, oh, I can go get the walnuts off of this. We wouldn't get the black, slimy, stinky stuff, you know, all over our hands or be shooting the walnuts at everything when we mow the grass underneath it. That tree has to grow. And as it grows, it's going to mature and it's going to become more and more like that thing that it's always been, which is a walnut tree.

The same is true with us as Christians. If you're in Christ, if you are a new creation, you will be growing and you will be becoming more like your Lord Jesus Christ. You will look more like him in 10 years than you do now. Now, you may not feel like it, but we'll get to how to process through our feelings as it relates to this later. A walnut tree is a walnut tree, however small or however big it is. It has life in it, and as it grows, it matures, and it becomes more and more of what it was created to be. And so that's what is true of Christians, and that process in our lives is known as the process of sanctification, where we become more like Jesus Christ. The question is how? And that is through growing in our faith, growing in our repentance. And the way that we grow through faith and we grow through repentance is by seeking to obey God.

If I were to say, you need to become more like Jesus, you need to have more faith, the question would be, how do I get more faith? Can I go buy it? No. Do I just sit and wait for it? No. How do I get more faith? By seeking to, by cultivating your faith through seeking to obey God. That's actually how we grow our faith. In this passage, we're just going to kind of move around in it a number of places. But I want to point out to you at the end when he's talking about Abraham, he says, you see that faith was working with his works and as a result of the works, his faith was perfected. And so one of the ways that your faith grows, probably the primary way or maybe even the only way your faith grows is through your obedience growing. And this is one of the reasons Martin Luther didn't like this passage because he thought that it was conflating our justification and how we are acceptable to God with

what we do in this life. And so we have to be careful not to get confused in the same way. Our works do not save us, and yet God does use them to grow us into better and more mature Christians. And so the beginning of our text, James asks this question, what use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but has no works? Can that faith save him? Now, if you just had to answer the question by yourself and in your head, you might say simply, no. Because you can read the rest of the text and you can see that the answer is no. But if you had to answer that question to other people or to other Christians, no is not as easy of an answer to offer. You feel pressure. There's a cost to saying no. It makes us uncomfortable because it's so final. It's such a complete answer. And it's a scary answer, actually, that faith alone is not enough to save us or to evidence our salvation.

So why does this answer of no make us so uncomfortable? Well, there's a couple of reasons I want to go through. The first is that it draws attention to our behavior in the context of our salvation. This is something that we have learned very good growing up in our context in American Christianity and evangelicalism. We've learned really good to separate those two things. How we live our lives and whether or not we're Christians. If you were to walk down the street or you were to go ask people, are you a Christian? I think many times the answer would be, yes, yes, I'm a Christian. Yes, I believe in God. And yet you'd immediately have this thing in your head where you'd be like, but you don't go to church. But you don't live like a Christian. But there'd be all of these behavior patterns in their life, right? And you'd be like, I think there's a conflict here. You say you believe in Jesus and that you're a Christian, but when it comes to how you live, there's just a disconnect.

And James says here simply that there can't be a disconnect. That the way that we live shows whether we have faith, whether we're saved. That makes us uncomfortable because we've been taught not to do that. We've been taught not to think those ways. But how can we submit to that sort of thinking when we read this passage where James says, are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow? Which is one other way of saying, you simpleton or you idiot. And that's not me being insulting. That's sort of what these words mean. It's meant to be a humbling thing. Hey, knucklehead, we might say. But are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless? Useless. What do you do with useless things? I know we do with useless things at my house. We get rid of them. Because we don't assign any value to them. If they're useless, they're worthless. If there's no joy even in a...

Looking at the thing, we say this thing is useless. It's worthless. It's a waste of space. We get rid of it. It's unnecessary. And so James here says that faith without works is useless. And he's highlighting for us the connection between the two of these. And so however uncomfortable we get with that connection, we have to deal with what Scripture says and trust it more than what we feel ourselves. However uncomfortable we get. I mean, we could read Scripture and find all kinds of things that make us uncomfortable. I mentioned, Eric was talking in Sunday school, and I mentioned a thing that makes, the whole idea makes me uncomfortable. Paul had Timothy circumcised. In fact, it doesn't say he had him circumcised. It says he circumcised him. Now, I get to baptize people. But the priests in the Old Testament weren't baptizing people. They were circumcising all the men. Like, that's uncomfortable. Fairy, grown man, not a baby.

Grown man. Hey, man, we're going to go on this missionary journey, and we don't want to have trouble with the Jews while we go on our missionary journey, so here's what we need to do. And I'm going to do it. So, I mean, are you uncomfortable? And that's just one example in Scripture. And it wasn't because Paul misunderstood circumcision and thought, this is the thing. In other places, he said, circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing. It wasn't the act that was substantive. And so there's plenty of things, if we're a student of Scripture and if we think when we're reading, that will make us uncomfortable. And it should be our habit as Christians that when we get to those places that make us uncomfortable, that we slow down and not speed up. Slow down and figure out, what is it that makes me uncomfortable here? Why am I uncomfortable? Am I uncomfortable because I didn't understand what I read? Maybe.

Am I uncomfortable because of the pressure that it puts on me? Am I uncomfortable because it's convicting to me? Am I uncomfortable because it makes me scared of the cost of doing the thing that it says? There's lots of reasons or sources for our discomfort, and it's our job to figure out what they are and then sort through them and figure out if we should submit to our discomfort or whether we should submit to Scripture. And so it is absolutely appropriate that we would be considering our lives. and our behavior in the context of whether or not we have saving faith. We should not have those things separated from one another. Why else does it make us uncomfortable? Well, here's another reason, and this may be more specific to Reformed folks. It makes us uncomfortable because it compels us to examine our behavior rather than our intellectual commitments. Being able to explain in detail the differences or the nuances of the ordo salutis.

How many know what the order of salutis is, right? Yes, okay. We've got three nerds in here. I actually don't mind that the rest of you don't know it. It's just a fancy Latin word to make you feel stupid. But you're not stupid. It just means, it's just the Latin phrase of order of salvation. How does God, like how do things happen when someone's saved? That's all it is. Or maybe you would like to talk about soteriology. Another big fancy word, right? Same thing. Just means, how do we get saved? How does God work? How is he sovereign in our salvation? Or for those of you who are not only scripture buffs, but history buffs as well, the Filioque Clause. Noah's like, yes, right? All the Filioque Clause, which is hard to even say, it's not even an English word, none of these are, is that when the Nicene Creed was written, and it was opposing the Arians who denied the deity of Christ, there's a place where it says that,

that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son. And they got in a big fight about whether the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Son as well. Now, is there any value in talking about that or learning about that? Sure. Does that knowledge save you? Does it get you closer to salvation? Well, here's the thing. If it does, then a lot of you are in trouble, aren't you? If it was like top tier, really important, you need to know this to be saved, you would not be ignorant if you had been at this church long because we would have taught you about it. Right? Part of the reason this passage makes us uncomfortable is because in many ways it's easier to learn a bunch of stuff and facts and fancy words and complex theology to the neglect of, have you repented lately of anything? Have you been sad about sin at all lately? Like your own sin? Which one makes you more comfortable? Wouldn't you rather read about Greek and Latin and Hebrew?

So far away, so distant. It's not personal. But James doesn't give us that out. He says that we're to examine our works, our behavior. How have we lived? And that that's connected to whether we're Christians, much more so than the breadth of our knowledge of theology. This knowledge of deep theological things is worthless in comparison to how you actually live your life. Knowledge does not save us. In fact, if you have a great knowledge and your ability to obey God is very low, then that knowledge stands as a testimony against you before the judgment seat of God. You should have known better because you studied so much and you knew so much, but you didn't do what any of it said. It's a condemning knowledge. And it is the knowledge in this passage that James calls the demon's knowledge. He says, you believe in that God is one. You do well. The demons also believe.

and shudder. And so the demons in this passage, the unbelievers, the fallen angels, the corruptors of mankind, they have a sort of faith, a sort of knowledge about God that has nothing to do with them being saved. They shudder at the fact that they know who God is and that they're not one of his chosen ones. This answer of to can that faith save him and the answer being no, it also makes us uncomfortable because it compels us to examine our behavior not only in light of our, as opposed to our intellectual commitments, but also in comparison to our feelings. I like to hunt. You guys know that. Deer season's coming up. The beans are starting to turn. And it'll be a good time. One of the things that I know about hunters is they're good God-fearing Christians that spend every Sunday in the deer woods. Why?

Well, they're not ashamed of telling you that's where they feel the presence of God. That's where they connect with the Lord. And I say, bunk. You don't like hunting any more than I do. The problem and the difference between you and me is that you love it more than you love Jesus, if you love him at all. I can read a weather report. I can know that when the Sunday would be the best day of the week to be out in the deer woods. What are our commitments? Now, many of you, I don't know that any of you are actually deer hunters. But, Levi raises his hand, yes. But that doesn't mean you don't have feelings. And that doesn't mean that you don't trust your feelings more than your behavior. I feel close to God when I, or I don't feel bad at all when I sin in some way. Does it matter if you, is sin any less sinful if you don't feel bad about it? Are you sure? Are you sure?

Do you never lie to yourself and tell you, like, take your own, like, how bad do I feel about it as a gauge of how bad it actually is? I know you do. I do. Like, why don't feel bad about it? And the interesting thing is what never enters our mind is that the reason we don't feel bad about it is not because it's not sinful, but rather because we've hardened our hearts or seared our consciences. That's never what enters into our mind to scare us and go, how is it that God can say this is going to send me to hell and I have no Fear about it. Something's wrong with me. That's not often our response. Our response is, well, I did it, but I didn't want to do it. I didn't mean to do it. Or I had no other choice but to do it. The simple question is, when you stand before God, are those feelings, those justifications going to stand up to his scrutiny? Will he let you enter those as a defense in his judgment?

And if you know that he won't allow your excuse to enter into your defense and his judgment, then don't lie to yourself with it now. Your feelings, again, whether they're feelings of comfort or feelings of apathy or feelings of indifference or feelings of strong convictions that what you're doing is not wrong, if those feelings, whatever they are, are in contradiction with what God has said, your feelings are wrong. And there's not anything more to say about it. Your feelings at that point, not feelings altogether or in general, but your feelings at that point are something that need to be repented of and cut down and thrown into the fire, not cultivated. The final reason I'll give you for why this makes us uncomfortable and maybe the most uncomfortable is that if the answer to the question, can that faith save him, if the answer to that is no, then in effect what has happened is we've taken God off of his chain. Not that he's on a chain, but that we often live our lives as though he's in a box and he stays over there and he can't get beyond where we allow him. If the answer is no, your behavior actually matters, then all of a sudden he's not contained anymore. All of a sudden he might get into some place of your life that you don't want him in. He might require something of you that you don't want to do, that you're scared to do, that you're opposed to do.

Consider the three examples that James gives us in here of God being off the chain, so to speak, and requiring things of people that were very costly. The first, he says, if a brother or a sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, go in peace, be warm and be filled, and yet do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that? He says it's worthless. It's of no use. And we should note carefully that in this passage, James, through the inspiration of the Spirit, didn't say food once, but daily food. That someone came to you with a need that's not easily met one time, but an ongoing need. They need daily food. They're not going to just need you to have them for one meal. They're going to need you to make them a line item on your budget, so to speak. And what does he say the temptation will be? The temptation will be to say, go in peace, brother.

be warm and well-filled without giving him any food or clothing to fill him or keep him warm. We've all got our reasons for why we wouldn't give food or shelter or clothing. I don't have any extra. I can't afford it. I don't have time. I have to take care of my family first. You be careful whether or not that reasoning will stand up before the judgment seat of God. Because scriptures told us in other places that through their hospitality, some have entertained angels without knowing it. But for them to have entertained angels, they first had to say, come in and I'll feed you, not be warm and well-filled, go in peace, go away. I can't help you. And so when someone has a need, particularly here a brother or a sister, it says, if someone has a need, if you'll bear it, the easiest way to explain it is for me simply to say, we're obligated to help them.

if we have saving faith. Otherwise, the faith that we have is not going to get us to heaven because there's no works being born of it. So that's the first example. That's the easiest example. The second example is of Abraham offering up his son Isaac on the altar, taking the child of promise, the one through whom all the nations were going to be blessed, the one that was given to Abraham and Sarah when they were 90 and 100 years old, respectively. Well beyond the time of bearing children. They receive a child. Sarah laughs at the proposition. I'm going to come back in a year and you're going to be pregnant. And she laughs. Why are you laughing, says the angel. I wasn't laughing. And they get a child. Here comes Isaac. A year later, he's born. And they live and they have him. And then the Lord comes to Abraham. And this isn't the first time the Lord's come to Abraham with a difficult message. The first was,

Pack up all your stuff and leave all of your family and all of your comforts and everything and go out into the land that I'll show you later. Abraham did. Now, take your son, your only son, the one that you'd given up hope of getting and take him. You're going to offer him up as a sacrifice to me. That's what I require of you. Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up Isaac, his son, on the altar? I mean, if there was any example in Scripture of something where you might say, no, I am not going to do it. Come what may, I am not going to kill my son, even if God said so. You do recognize that that's not what Abraham did. He took his only son.

Packed up the mule or the donkey with the wood and the stuff for the sacrifice and took the servants and eventually stopped the servants and carried on. And as they're going up, his son says to him, Daddy, I see the wood and I see the knife, but where's the sacrifice? What's Abraham say to him? That's right, Levi. The Lord will provide. And so this idea that we would, I mean, if you have children of your own, I mean, it's something you just don't even want to read that section. Like that part in Hebrews 11 where he talks about it, you just want to skip it because that's not a happy part of the triumph of faith. And that part in Genesis, you don't want to read that part because it's just, it's so awful to consider. And so Abraham walks up the mountain with his son, with the wood and with the knife. The Lord will provide. Hebrews gives us some insight into what was going on in Abraham's mind as he was doing this.

In Hebrews 11, 19, it says this. It says he, speaking about Abraham, he considered that God is able to raise people even from the dead, from which he also received him back as a type. And so as Abraham's walking with his son up the mountain, he has faith that even if he kills his son in obedience to God, God will give him his son back through resurrection. That was the depth and the weight of Abraham's faith. In fact, if you pay attention to what it says here, it says, It's a funny construction. He also received him back. It means he'd already lost him. It means that as he was walking up to sacrifice his son, as far as Abraham was concerned, his son was already dead. And that when the Lord provided a ram in the thicket, he received him back as though he had been raised from the dead. Because what God said to Abraham was to be done. And so Abraham had already made his peace, believing that God would give him his son back because God had promised to bless the nations through him. And he says, well, the only way I can see for you to do all of what you said through this son that you're having me sacrifice is that you're going to raise him from the dead. That's faith and works.

And a good picture, a biblical picture, one that James gives to us of the relationship between the two. By this act, it says, it says, you see that faith was working with his works. And as a result of the works, faith was perfected and the scripture was fulfilled, which says, and Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness and he was called the friend of God. Now we might read those words, the friend of God, or we might read having your righteousness reckoned to you as small things and simple things and little things. But it was his son's life. God was faithful to him and bore him through it. And there's yet another example at the very end of the passage. It says, Now you may not remember the story of Rahab. The story of Rahab is that the Israelites are now, after a long time, going to go into the land and they're going to wipe it out in Jericho, one of the first cities of the conquest of Canaan. They're going to go to Jericho and they're just going to raze the city, which means level it, because God told them to. So Rahab somehow, and we're not told how, somehow Rahab, you know, she sees the spies and she sees what's coming and knows what's coming and has faith and believes God. And as a result of her faith,

takes her own life into her hands and the lives of her family into her hands and says, come here, I'll hide you. Provided that you don't kill us and my family when you guys come and raze the city. And there's this back and forth between Rahab and the spies about how it's all going to work. And they said, this is what you have to do. You have to hang this red rope out your window. And we'll make sure that all the armies of Israel know that that one house with the red rope, Don't kill those people. That's pretty scary, if you think about it. The spies tell her, make sure you gather your father and your family, basically everyone you're related to and care about, get them in that house, because we're telling you, everything else is gone. Because that's what the Lord's told us to do. But the children would be spared, and the women would be spared, right? Not in the conquest of Canaan. They were to kill everything. Even the animals. Even the wealth they were to destroy. None of it was for them. And so Rahab,

believed God. And so Rahab took her own life and the lives of her loved ones into her own hands and trusted that God would be faithful to preserve her life and her family's life by hanging a red rope out the window. That's faith. And that's obedience. That's faith producing obedience. And so our passage ends with James saying, For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead. I think when we think about faith and what we've been taught about faith in our lives, we think of it as a small thing or an insignificant thing or an attainable thing. But all of the examples that James gives us here of faith, saving faith, a really basic Christian faith, it's quite incredible. The things that their faith allowed them to do or led them to do or compelled them to do, it's the sort of thing we marvel at. All the while thinking of it as going, man, I don't think I could do that.

Maybe we'd say, I don't think I, I wouldn't do that. So how do you get over that? How do you get out of that place where you're just not sure that you have faith to obey God? The first thing I tell you to do is look in the small areas of your life. No one's asking you to sacrifice your son or to risk your life today to express, to demonstrate your faith. But there are many, many things in your life today and tomorrow and for the rest of your life that are going to require faith to lead you to obedience. So look at your life now and say, take inventory and say, what do I do because I have faith? Or maybe another way to ask the question or a secondary or follow-up question is to say, what have I repented of and stopped doing or started doing, depending on what the thing is, because I have faith? How has your life changed? Am I saying that there are going to be these enormous things, these big things, these sacrifice your son things? Probably not.

In fact, most of Abraham's life was not spent sacrificing his son, but being very godly in his dealings. Do you remember when he dealt with Lot, his nephew? And they were out and they were going through the land. And eventually they both got so wealthy that it was starting to cause some problems between their shepherds and those sorts of things. And so Abraham poses the question. He says, well, we need to part ways. And I'm really painting with a broad brush here. But it comes to him that we need to part ways. Like, this isn't working anymore, right? And so Abraham's the older one, probably the more wealthy one, and the leader. And what does he do? He poses a question to his nephew and says, which land do you want? Do you want the land in the valley or do you want the land on the hills? And what you may not know about that question is that the land in the valley is the lush, fertile,

valuable land. Okay? And life is easier down there because all the water comes to you and it's much easier to grow things and so there's trees down there and you can build and it's just a better place. Or you can live in the hill country, which is rougher. Everything is up and down. Everything is arid. Everything is spread out. It's a harder life. And so Abraham asks Lot, Lot, which do you want? Do you want the hill country or do you want the valleys? And Lot says, I want the valleys. And Abram says, they're yours. And he takes the hill country. Was that a big thing? I mean, not compared to sacrificing your son, right? I think that's just the sort of thing that Christians should be doing every day of their life. That you would show preference to other people, right? Philippians 2 tells us that.

That you would consider the needs of other people, the desires of other people, that you would not look out only for your own interests, but those, the interests of other people. Why? Because that's what Jesus did. And Abraham here is just another example of doing that sort of thing. Why would Abraham do that? Was it because he had to? No. I think Lot was probably a bit surprised when Abraham asked him the question. He was not entitled to it. They could have gone to war over this. And instead of going to war, Abraham gives him, the rich land. You should have that kind of testimony about your life, that you've given the rich land to those around you, that you've sacrificed, that you've fed, that you've covered, that you've cared for those who are in need. That is faith working. I'll also tell you that your faith will not, your works will not be perfect. If you're like me, as you're listening to this or thinking about this, you're not thinking about all the stuff you did do by faith, you're thinking about all the stuff you haven't done by faith.

There was all these opportunities, all these missed chances. You squandered things. That will not always be the case. And if the goal is, if the way you think is either it's perfect or it's 100% bad, then you're going to have a rough life as a Christian. Because you're living in this in-between time where you're not perfect yet. You're not even close to being perfect yet. And yet, you're that little walnut tree. that's starting to get the dark brown wood in the center. If you ever cut open a walnut tree, everyone thinks of walnut. Walnut's this, it's this dark, rich, brown wood. Not all of it is. The sapwood around the outside, it's just boring old white, yellowish wood. Sometimes it's got a green or purple streak in it. It's worthless. And so these farmers, that's why they plant the trees so early, because they knew that the tree had to get a certain size. If you had a 12-inch walnut tree, you might only have like three inches of

what we would consider walnut wood on the inside. All the rest of it's this other stuff that no one wants to make furniture out of, the sapwood. But it's growing. And by comparison, it's a small amount, but it's growing. This is our life. This is the Christian life. And so I warn you not to be overly pessimistic because if you're doing any good stuff, if there's any dark wood in the center, so to speak, it's the fruit of God's work in your life. And you shouldn't be ashamed or too proud to acknowledge that. You should be able to say with a clear conscience and with humility, I'm not what I used to be because God's been good to me. I actually have done things by faith because I love God and because he saved me from my sins. And that's a testimony to his goodness. That's not you being proud. And so we have to learn as Christians to make these sort of judgments.

Our faith is not a small thing. It's not an insignificant thing. It's not easily gotten and it's not meant to be silent or inactive. It's meant to grow and to produce obedience that glorifies God. And so our lives ought to be lives of examination. If you want to know where to start with examining, I would say start with the areas you're most comfortable in your life. Start with the areas where you're sure you're doing the right stuff. Start there. And maybe you are. Maybe by God's grace you are. You're doing well. Because it used to be uncomfortable. But now it's comfortable because you've become accustomed to it. But start with the areas where you're comfortable. Start with where you think you're the smartest, where you think you've got it all figured out, where you're just pretty sure God's just smiling and pointing and saying, there's my all-star. Start there and say, what does my faith look like in that area? And what does my repentance in that area look like? How have I grown? How has God been faithful to me? We're supposed to be the salt of the earth, the light of the world. And that is simply to say that our faith,

should be seen and be evident to the world. That they should be able to say, that is a walnut tree. They are distinct. You may not know what all the other trees around are, but walnut trees, we know what they look like. Now, you might not know what a walnut tree looks like. I used to be a certified arborist, so I know what they look like from across the field. But you should be able to see, that is maybe a weeping willow would be a better example, though I don't like them as trees. You might say, that's a willow tree. That is not an oak tree. That is not a maple tree. That is not a poplar tree. That is a willow tree. That's what people should be able to say over time about you as a Christian. That he, she, they, they're Christians. And we don't know it because they told us. We know it because we can look and see. And they have told us because they've loved us that they are Christians. That's faith and works in the relationship between them. Faith produces.

the works of god in our lives where there are no works of god there is no saving faith where there is little faith there are little works what we should desire is a growing faith which means we need to be pursuing growing works let's pray