salvation by works .. ?

while researching stuff on christian community life, i found an article describing one particular group living it ..
and readers posted comments

another group was mentioned in the article, the Mennonites
and several of the comments included thoughts like " they have a works-based salvation " ..

from my reading over the years, and knowing the Mennonites fall generally within the Anabaptist tradition, i immediately dissed those comments and consider them unfair
but i followed up by researching the ' what we believe ' of Mennonites and, as expected, found them to be much like the rest of evangelical christianity as far as their statement on salvation is concerned

which begs the question ..
presumably the commenters believe in ' salvation by grace through faith ' ..
so do i
   and so do the mennonites, according to their statement
yet they went to ' they believe in salvation by works ' ..
how then did the commenters get there so swiftly  ?

hmmm ..
i suspect they swallowed the same pill i did and many of  ' us ' did while sitting in the pew being coached in the faith vs. works thinkology ..
as has often been the case, in order to separate ourselves from others we drew lines in the sand
ever-narrowing lines that ' defined ' who we are and what we believe
   and who we aren't and what we don't believe
and sadly, we went too far east and ended up west ..
again

fact is
there is no dichotomy between faith and works in christianity ...  .  ... .     .

let me rephrase that ..
there is no need to stand across the trenches on this one ..
faith and works in Christianity are bedfellows
they sleep under the same covers
and they embrace gleefully

further, to divorce them is to totally misunderstand christianity
and the man that it reveres and adores as master

selah ..~
 .. .            .


we strain out gnats ..

i look at Jesus
and see him constantly doing ..
the man went about doing good as a matter of course
it was his lifestyle
his worldview
and God's answer to the awful mess of the world system he had created
   the system that enslaved the humans he had created
      in his own image and likeness
         ( look like and resemble ? )

selah ..~


the book of James in the new testament deals with this theological strawman, summarily ..
James answered the faith vs. works issue simply
' faith apart from works is dead ' ..
that's the barebones response from James
and is all you and i need

we doctrined so much and forced the pendulum to swing so far in the direction of faith
that we effectively dissed the life of the gospel
   the
   life
   of the gospel
which is, in summary, love the Lord your God with all your heart mind soul and strength
and love your neighbour as you love your self
' all the law and the prophets is contained in this statement ' said Jesus ..
and, really, how do you love without living that love
doing that love  ?
can we ' be ' without the ' living '  ?
a tree is known by it's fruit
it's in the fruit that we can safely say ' that's an orange tree ' , ' that's an apple tree ' ..
and it's natural that we associate the two
   fruit and what-it-is
      or what-it-isn't ..

as a friend once said
the faith Jesus teaches
is a verbed noun ..
it is in the doing
that we express our ' belief '
and evidence who-we-say-we-are

i'll flip that
where there is no doing
faith is a barebones skeleton without life
lying there
just lying there

A body that doesn’t breathe is dead. In the same way faith that does nothing is dead.
   ( James 2.26 ) ..

my friend, the gospel is a lived faith
a transformation that recreates me through and through ..
live it
and in living you diffuse the bomb of faith vs. works
which is not a bomb but a dudd
a distraction
a long windy rabbit trail that looks to pull us away from the living Jesus
and from living Jesus
.. ... .    .

there's this strange phenomenon in the loooooonnng debate between faith and works ..
it centres in Ephesians 2:8,9 which most evangelicals my age can quote offthebat ..

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. 
learned it in sunday school
a basic tenet of doctrine ..
and the fight ensued over the ages
faith vs. works
lines drawn guns locked and loaded

and then
we read on
just 1    ( as in one )    verse later, in v 10

10 For we are God’s handiwork [ this is the point: salvation is God's doing, not mine ], created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

God saves us in his graciousness, through the medium of faith and the person of Jesus
creating us anew for the purpose of good works

and the debate dies right there
a dead issue
just like faith without works is dead, as per James
dead


selah ..~

i'll posit that faith is not only made evident through works
   that my works are the evidence of the faith i claim
but is made stronger through works ..
as you live faith by working it out, it matures

selah ..~


faith is not what you believe about God
it's what you do about God ..

it's all mixed up in the same bowl
and you can't have the one without the other
simply can't

read Hebrews 11
those great people of faith were doing their faith
not ' believing ' it
doing
actively living what they trusted

if our faith isn't working
we might want to take Apostle Paul's advice and test ourself to see whether we are ' in the faith '
. .. .     .

faith and works are not enemies
they are married
the one filling out the other and vice versa
the two demonstrating one union of in-Christ-ness
inseparable
indivisible
perfectly balanced

life in the Son
is by God's graciousness
through the medium of faith
working the works of God
just like Jesus did

when you're done read hebrews 11

 You see that a person receives God’s approval because of what he does, not only because of what he believes.
( James 2.24 )

shalom