Few weeks go by that we do not hear about some horrible tragedy that grips us and causes us to respond in shock and disbelief—a terrorist bombing, an airplane crash, a hurricane or tornado claiming the lives of hundreds of people. Immediately upon hearing the news, we offer up prayers for victims and families, shaking our heads in genuine compassion and sympathy.
And yet, tragic as these horrible events are, there is a far greater tragedy with which we live every day. There is a far greater tragedy in terms of eternal consequences that far exceeds the boundaries of mere physical concerns. This tragedy is to believe that one’s soul is safe only to die with a false sense of spiritual security.
James warns us to examine whether our faith is genuine. He addresses the reality that many live from day to day, assuming that they are okay spiritually when they are not. He writes about faith here, genuine faith. And he contrasts living faith, authentic Christian faith, with what he terms a dead faith. We, too, should soberly consider his warning, allowing him to ask us: “Do you have genuine saving faith, or do you have a dead faith, a useless faith?”
One of the ways to better understand what something is is by taking time to consider what that something is not. Let us consider these three truths about authentic, saving faith.
Saving Faith is not Merely Confessional
Saving faith, genuine Christian faith, is not merely confessional. We are not Christians simply because we profess or confess to be. We are not Christians merely because we say that we are.
Here’s how James puts it. He asks, “What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says (emphasis added) he has faith but does not have works? Can (this) faith save him?”
Right from the start, James teaches that no one is a Christian based upon mere verbal confession. This teaching is reminiscent of the teaching of our Lord Jesus, who said in the Sermon on the Mount, in Matthew 7:21 and following:
Not everyone who says to Me, “Lord, Lord,” shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven. Many will say to Me in that day, “Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many wonders in Your name?” And then I will declare to them, “I never knew you; depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!”
Matthew 7:21-23
Merely saying we are Christians does not necessarily mean that we are Christians. Saving faith is not merely confessional.
James’ immediate concern here is that there were some in the church who said they were followers of Christ, but the way they lived suggested otherwise. Principally, James teaches that those who said they were Christians did not “live it out” and did not demonstrate that they were true Christians by showing concern for others.
He then provides an illustrative example: “If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,’ but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit?”
What does it profit? In other words, “What good is that kind of faith?” What good is there in a faith that is merely confessional? A man may say he is a Christian, but that proves nothing, especially if he is not living as a Christian.
Suppose you see a man or woman dressed in shabby clothes and hungry. You may feel very spiritual about yourself when you say, “God bless you! May you be warm and no longer hungry!” James protests: “But you do not give them what they need!” You don’t give them food and clothing. James asks, “What good is that?!”
And he concludes that this kind of faith (the meaning of the question: “Can faith save him”), this kind of faith, this useless faith, is no good because it does not lead to action. This faith does not lead to the good deeds one expects from Christians. In fact, James refers to this kind of faith as both “useless” and “dead.” This is not the kind of faith that saves a soul. It is a faith “by itself,” a faith that does not result in works.
So James concludes, “Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.” It obviously cannot grant life if it is a dead faith. It does not lead to eternal life.
Saving faith is not merely confessional. We are not Christians simply because we say we are. We demonstrate that we are true Christians by the way we live.
This surely comes as no surprise to those who are genuinely saved. We understand that the power of the gospel leads to regeneration and new life. Jesus says we are “born again.” We are, as Paul teaches, “New creations.” He says, “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; old things have passed away; behold, all things have become new (2 Corinthians 5:17).”
God gives us a new heart with new desires if we are genuinely saved. We read the Bible because we desire to read the Bible. We attend worship because we desire to attend worship. We pray because God has given us a desire to joy in talking with Him. We provide monies to the church not because we have to but because we want to. We love God, and we just naturally live out our Christian faith. Good deeds accompany our faith as evidence of new desires.
So James argues that if a person merely says he or she has faith but does not have the accompanying good deeds that follow, then that person has every reason to doubt whether or not he or she has been genuinely converted. Saving faith is not merely confessional. It is a confession that leads to expression, namely the doing of good deeds or works. “Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.”
We should pause for a moment to make clear that James is not contradicting the Bible’s teaching elsewhere that a person is saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone. If we disregard context and pull a couple of verses from different parts of the Bible, it might appear as though there were a contradiction.
Were we to read James’ statement: “Faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead” and then open Paul’s letter to the church at Ephesus and read: “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast (Ephesians 2:8-9),” we might conclude that James is teaching a “faith-plus-works” salvation and that Paul is teaching a “faith-minus-works” salvation. Is there a contradiction?
We must understand that James and Paul are speaking about two different points in the Christian life. Paul is talking about the way into the Christian life, the beginning of Christian living. James is talking about a point after one has become a Christian, the living out of the Christian faith. We have made this point extensively: James does not write this letter to teach how to become a Christian but how to behave as a Christian. Paul, in his writings, frequently stresses the way one becomes a Christian, and he does so by teaching that the way to God’s approval is not to be found in the way many of his Jewish acquaintances erroneously believed: by keeping the law.
Paul addresses the entry point into salvation when he writes: “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast (Ephesians 2:8-9).” That is, “You cannot earn your way into heaven. You cannot ‘work’ your way into favor with God. You are saved by grace, through faith, in Christ, alone.”
In that same passage, however, Paul goes on to say that once a person is saved, then he or she will live out the Christian faith by doing the good deeds and works that God has prepared. To the believer, Paul writes: “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.”
So salvation is not a “faith-plus-works,” nor a “faith-minus-works,” but a “faith that works.” In the words of a popular proverb: “Faith alone saves,” but “the faith that saves is never alone.” 1
James continues to teach that saving faith is not merely confessional. In verse 18, he suggests, “But someone will say, ‘You have faith, and I have works.’ Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.”
This verse is notoriously difficult to translate. There is no punctuation in the original Greek manuscripts, and all the letters are side-by-side, with hardly any space between them. Consequently, we cannot say for sure just who is doing the talking and when. We know that one person says something and that someone else responds. Beyond this, we cannot say for certain where the quotation marks rightly belong.
For our purposes, it seems helpful to avoid being too near-sighted and back up a bit, reading the text in its broader context. This way—however, the punctuation works out—the broader point remains: faith and works are inseparable. As wrong as it is for one person to say, “I have merely faith,” it is equally wrong for the other person to say, “I have merely works.” The two are inseparable.
Again, salvation is not a “faith-plus-works,” nor a “faith-minus-works,” but genuine living faith is a “faith that works.” Faith alone saves, but the faith that saves is never alone; it will be accompanied by works that show this faith to be genuine, saving faith.
So if one person merely has good deeds, good works only, and no faith, then this person may be good on the outside but has not been changed on the inside.
Have you ever heard the phrase “empty suit?” An empty suit is a derogatory expression, a way of referring to someone who looks good on the outside—they’re dressed nicely—but they are empty on the inside. Or we might say, “The lights are on, but there’s nobody home.” We mean that this person looks okay on the outside, but there’s a problem on the inside. They are lacking something.
Applied to James’ teaching on faith, one makes an “empty claim” when he or she boasts merely of either faith or works. Both are necessary for genuine conversion to have taken place. We are saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ alone. But once we are “born again,” new creatures with new desires, we will live out the truth of our confession by doing the good works God has ordained for us to do (Ephesians 2:10).
**Excerpt from You’re Either Walking The Walk Or Just Running Your Mouth (Preaching Truth: 2020), pages 81-87, available on Amazon.
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