faith and work

Tonight I was reading James chapter 2 and it was all about faith and works. This is something that I feel is really hard to share with people because it is something that really convicts people, myself included. Almost everyone knows that salvation can be found by faith alone-but there is a depth to this I think. Yeah, we just need to have faith in order to be saved, but we need to have a true faith. True faith, in my opinion, is genuine belief in who God is, what Jesus did for us, and what the bible says. God calls us to be Christ-like. We have been given a life on earth in order to glorify God. Even though we will fall short, we can still do everything in our power to please the Lord and give back what he deserves.

"You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that-and shudder." James 2:19

This verse makes a good point. We can believe in God all day. We can believe in what he can do and how amazing he is, but what good is believing if we don't do anything about it? It's honestly no good. It's a dead faith. Here is an excerpt from a book called Crazy Love by Francis Chan...

Lukewarm people don ot live by faith; their lives are structured so they never have to. They don't have to trust God if something unexpected happens-they have their savings accoun. They don't need God to help them out-they have their retirement plan in place. They don't genuinely seek out what life God would have them live-they have life figured out and mapped out. They don't depend on God on a daily basis-their refrigerators are full, and for the most part, they are in good health. The truth is, their lives wouldn't look much different if they suddenly stopped believing in God...
Jesus asks for everything. But we try to give Him less. Jesus said, "Salt is good, but if it loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is fit neither for the soil nor for hte manure pile; it is thrown out." Luke 14:34-35
Jesus isn't making a cute little analogy here. He is addressing those who aren't willing to give everything, who won't follow hHim all the way. He is saying that lukewarm, halfhearted following is USELESS, that it sickens our souls.

Wow. This is so powerful! It's so blatanly obvious that it is pointless to have a faith and not do anything about it. Our Lord not only deserves our best, but he demands it. It sounds weird to say, but I don't think he wants a faith unless it is genuine. Genuine is the operative word here. From true faith, works flow. We don't have to do things for God to love us; Jesus came and died so that we didn't have to, but if we have true faith and if we truly desire to be Christ-like, we will do things that God would want from us. We will live out our faiths and not just sit in one place simply believing in God. The demons believe in God too, they just don't obey him. I know I'm better than that, and I will do something about it.