Works: Faith and Repentance Exemplified

Rev 22:12
And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be.

Among the final words of the Revealed-Will of God appears a statement that has been the cause for much division in the Christian religion. The debate within the root of the belief of this religion appears as an unmixed and very clear two sided coin. Either salvation is by merit or not by works which man can do. The question actually, is not as ‘black and white’ as it appears as it requires defining of terms.

If the patron asked his waiter for one hard boiled egg, no doubt in about 10 minutes he would receive one cooked egg without its shell. Is this in fact an egg or not?  Most of the original egg is there on his plate but there is something missing, the shell. Both waiter and patron may agree he has before him what he asked for; an egg, but technically speaking, what he actually has is most of the egg for he is lacking the shell which is truly part of what fully identified that egg as a complete egg.

Faith is not just belief, it is an active belief. It is not merely an ascent to a fact, it is an active ascent. It is a belief that causes change in the person who acquires it.  It is an action-word, not stale. It is dynamic, not static. It does not merely accept data as truth vocally or even experientially but more, it exemplifies and incarnates, or manifests an evidential outpouring of works which demonstrate and typify the identity for which it represents or epitomizes.

When Jesus makes his declaration; that all that manifests good works will be taken-in as His own people, he defines His statement repeated times in this prophetic book.

Revelations 20:12, 13
And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.

And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.

Similarly, in the next chapter

Revelations 21:27
And there shall in no wise enter into it any thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh abomination, or maketh a lie: but they which are written in the Lamb’s book of life.

As an illustration, a body in a coffin is truly a body but actually incomplete. It is not fully a human body if it has no spirit which evidences the body a complete “fully-human” body. Faith, likewise, is only a partial description that one may claim  he possesses for himself but if his faith does not accompany works, then it is only that; a claim. Faith without works is false, it is bankrupt. Faith without works is a dead body in a coffin, it is useless and worse, it is deceptive.

James 2:19 and 20 are a solemn call for us to examine whether our faith is genuine or merely nomenclature. Do we manifest what God calls acceptable works which are rooted in the faith and repentance which He by His grace supplies?

¹⁹Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.
²⁰But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead?