James 2:20-26

Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless?  Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar?  You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works; 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.  You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone.  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?  For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead.

Genuine faith that produces works is illustrated in the lives of two people that represent extremely different ends of a spectrum.  Abraham is a man who was chosen by God to be the father of the nation of Israel. Rahab is a woman from a Gentile nation that was a prostitute.  Both were saved because they demonstrated genuine faith by their actions.

THE JUSTIFICATION OF ABRAHAM: Abraham was saved by faith just as every person is.  James quotes Genesis where it states that His belief in God was counted to him as righteousness.  However, it was his words that demonstrated his belief.  Faith and works are not the same thing, but they do go hand in hand when faith is Genuine.  God asked Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac.  This was an unthinkable request had it come from anyone besides God.  Abraham clearly understood what God told him to do.  Even though he did not understand why God would ask him to do such a thing; he had learned to trust and obey the Lord.  In essence lack of obedience is tantamount to a lack of trust.  So when Abraham takes steps of obedience or “works” he is demonstrating the true condition of his heart.  He believes God.  Disobedience would have demonstrated a lack of faith.  This is why James uses his work of obedience as proof that Abraham’s faith was real.

THE JUSTIFICATION OF RAHAB: Rahab had little to know revelation from God Himself.  However, she had heard of the supernatural protection and provision of God for the children of Israel.  She believed in the power of God and that He was with Israel.  She demonstrated that belief by hiding the spies from Israel that had come to her for help.  She did this at great personal risk, but she believed it was better to help the people of God than to die with her own people.  The only way her faith could be evidenced was by her work of siding with God’s people.  If she had refused to help the spies, she would have proven that she trusted in the strength of her own people more than the God of Israel.  Her outward actions demonstrated the inward condition of her heart.  A body with no spirit is dead just as a faith with no works is dead.  Works without faith can never save and faith without works is no faith at all.

APPLICATION: Obey God even when it does not make sense in our own minds or makes us feel uncomfortable.  Assurance of God’s will should always lead to action.  Place your trust in the Lord and his power as opposed to your own strength or the world system in which we live.  Be assured of the Lord’s final victory.

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