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James 2:14–26
“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” (v. 18).
As we have seen in our brief look at Matthew 5:17–20, Jesus taught that we will inherit eternal life only if our righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees. This points to our need for the perfect righteousness of Christ imputed to our accounts and received by faith alone as the only basis for our right standing before God (see also 2 Cor. 5:21; Eph. 2:8–9). Yet Jesus commended some aspects of Pharisaic practice (Matt. 23:23), so we know that the kind of righteousness that should characterize God’s people is the sincere attempt to obey the Lord in all of life. This righteousness, which is associated with our sanctification—our growth in holiness—is insufficient to grant us eternal life because it will never be perfect in this life (1 John 1:8–10). Nevertheless, our sincere but imperfect obedience is the necessary and inevitable consequence of saving faith, which procures for us the perfect righteousness of Christ on our record before our holy Creator.
Scripture makes this point about what Martin Luther called “two kinds of righteousness” in a couple of ways. With regard to the perfect righteousness of Christ imputed to us and received by faith alone, we see it clearly in Paul’s epistles as well as in texts that talk about our believing “in” Jesus. For instance, Jesus in John 14:1 says that we are to believe “in” Him, with the English word “in” translating the Greek preposition eis, or “into.” Saving faith in Christ so closely connects us to Jesus that we are put into Him and He into us. Everything that belongs to Him, including His perfect record of obedience, consequently belongs to us. The righteousness that we practice as a fruit of faith, on the other hand, is plain in James 2:14–26, where the Apostle writes that good works reveal to others that we have trusted in Jesus Christ for salvation. It is vital to profess our faith before others, but merely claiming faith does not mean that we have it. A changed life confirms that we possess the faith we profess.
What does this changed life full of good works entail? Galatians 5:16–26 provides important guidance here in contrasting the works of sinful flesh with the fruit of the Spirit. We will look at the fruit of the Spirit in more detail in the days ahead, but for now let us understand that unlike the gifts of the Spirit, all the fruits of the Spirit are for every believer. God the Holy Spirit does not give all of us the same spiritual gifts, but He works in every Christian all the fruits of holiness.
Coram Deo Living before the face of God
Over the past century, many Christians have focused their attention on the gifts of the Holy Spirit and whether all of them continue today. This is an important issue, but questions about the gifts of the Spirit have often drowned out attention on the fruit of the Holy Spirit. If we do not pay attention to the fruit of the Spirit, however, we will not be able to see our growth in grace or search our lives to see whether we possess the faith we profess.
for further study
- Isaiah 32:9–20
- Matthew 7:15–20
the bible in a year
- Job 35–37
- Acts 14
- Job 38–Psalm 1
- Acts 15