I have so many thoughts here and I’m going to try to keep them sort of organized and make sense of them, but sometimes things only make sense in my mind and when they come out of my mouth it’s just basically like a bowl of alpha-bits cereal. Lots of letters with no rhyme or reason.

How many times have you heard that faith without works is dead? If you’re like me it’s more than you can count. Also, if you’re like me you always hear about how works is associated with outward works. Hear me out, outward works matter! As a matter of fact in James 2: 25 Rahab’s outward works of receiving the messengers are mentioned. You can’t act as if sitting on your hands all day is ok, because it’s not. The Bible is full of verses instructing us to work and it starts in Genesis before humans were ever in the garden!

Did you see that? God placed Adam in the garden to work. Work has always been a part of the plan and work is talked about until the end of the Bible in Revelation.

Let me share a quick story with you about a conversation between two siblings. The conversation turned to the topic of forgiveness and healing. I know that has nothing to do with the topic of good works, but give me a few and you’ll see how it applies here. One sibling says that healing is your own responsibility and can only be done by you with no outside forces. The other sibling counters that God helps to heal you and the first sibling says something like that isn’t how God works. He can point the way, but at the end of the day it’s still you ending with you can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink.

I can see the point being made. Think about it for a minute. If God gives you free will, which He does,  He doesn’t force you to serve Him. What makes us think that when we get saved He somehow zaps us, taking way our free will, and forces us to serve Him from that point on only doing good and right? At the end of the day it’s our decision to do right or not, it’s our decision to put in the work to change. I want to stop here and say that God absolutely can and does change us. It is because of Him that we can do anything, but we still have to do, we have choices and we have actions based on those choices.

What if when the scripture talks about how faith without works is dead it isn’t just speaking of an outward showing of works, but works on the inside? What if it also means that we have work to do on us each day? The writer of Hebrews tells us that without faith it is impossible to please God. That makes sense in my brain on even the simplest terms because without faith we would never turn to God to begin with. Once we accept the gift of salvation we have work. Yes, this involves outward things, but it means I have to work to forgive, I have to work to heal, I have to work on my temper, I have to work on me. Great news, God is there each step of the way to lean on. He is there to support and guide us, but the sibling that said you can lead a horse to water but can’t make him drink wasn’t wrong. God can lead us all day long, but we can choose not to follow.