DAILY DEVOTIONAL – October 8, 2020
“Actifaith”
Prayer: God as we read in the Bible in the book of Hebrews, Your word is living and active. Your love and grace is not a passive disposition, but it is an active love that took on flesh in Jesus Christ to die our death and rise again to give us new life. Lord, in Your mercy help us to live the life of faith and good works You died to give us. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
Scripture – James 2:18-26
18 But 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. 19 You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder! 20 Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless? 21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar? 22 You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works; 23 and the Scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”—and he was called a friend of God. 24 You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. 25 And in the same way was not also Rahab the prostitute justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way? 26 For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead.
Devotional – “Actifaith”
You know, a lot of things in life are get better the more you use them.
Learning a new language is only possible when you use it regularly
A cast iron skillet cooks better and better the more you use it
A good firearm needs to be used and conditioned regularly to prevent jamming
String instruments like a violin – the best and most expensive ones are the most used
A new deck of cards is tough to manage, but a well-used deck shuffles nice and easy
What’s true of a new deck of cards and string instruments, is exponentially more true for our faith in Jesus. The more faith is exercises and put to work, the stronger it gets and the more joy and fulfillment we find in our walk with Jesus. When our faith is ignored or exercised sporadically, our faith stiffens up, which means we become increasingly blind and deaf to the leadings and workings of God’s Spirit and presence in our life.
A genuine and sincere faith in Christ will inevitably be an active faith. True faith in Christ inevitably is a faith of action. For the heart that truly believes and understands the true depravity of our human condition and the indescribable love of God in Christ who gave His own life on the cross so that we could truly live by faith in Him both now and for eternity. A heart of faith that truly understands the amazing grace we have received cannot help but be an active faith.
This is exactly what James is saying in our text for today when he says that faith is active and seen to be alive through good works, and that faith is completed by good works. And what are good works? The only good works are the works that God does in and through us by His will and His power and His mercy. As Jesus says in Luke 18 to the rich young ruler who was convinced he had done enough good works to earn salvation, “There is no one good except God.”
This passage from James 2 for our devotional today is often grossly misunderstood. James is not saying that we are saved by works. He is saying that a faith found to be left alone and without the good works of God that God has promised to work through a genuine faith, is a dead faith…an ineffective faith. In other words, what James is saying, is that a saving faith is evidenced by the works that God does through the life of a true believer in Jesus Christ. Someone who claims to have faith in Christ but shows no evidence of God working in and through their life, only claims to have faith, or as James says, he has a faith that is dead.
Friends, God did not send His only Son to die on the cross to be a model or a religious idea that we like to think about but never actually use. Christ died for your sins and my sins in order to give us LIFE. Yes, eternal life and salvation, but He died and rose again from the dead to give us new life TODAY; a new life that is full of true value and true purpose and true joy because it is a life lived in every way in faithfulness to God and in love toward one another with the good works God has promised to accomplish in and through we who love and trust in Him.
We could never do enough good works to prove to be perfect and earn God’s love and mercy. We know that and God knows that. The Good News of the Gospel is that Christ has done all the work of salvation for us on the cross, and now you and I have the incredible opportunity of serving the living God in a life of service and good works.
As we close today I invite you to listen carefully to Peter’s words in 2 Peter 1:3-9. Peter is making the same exact point that James is making in our text for today, but in a different way. Peter says:
3 His divine power has given us everything we need for a godly life through our knowledge of him who called us by his own glory and goodness. 4 Through these he has given us his very great and precious promises, so that through them you may participate in the divine nature, having escaped the corruption in the world caused by evil desires. 5 For this very reason, make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; 6 and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; 7 and to godliness, mutual affection; and to mutual affection, love. 8 For if you possess these qualities in increasing measure, they will keep you from being ineffective and unproductive in your knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. 9 But whoever does not have them is nearsighted and blind, forgetting that they have been cleansed from their past sins.
Believe in Jesus my friends and live actively in His grace, and remember that God has forgiven yesterday, is with you today and has already taken care of tomorrow. Amen.
