Foretaste: Salvation and Good Works

This coming week we will be hearing about salt, light, the law and the prophets (Matthew 5:13-20).   For most of the sermon we will be looking into good works, or the call to action which we receive from Jesus Christ.  While there are many important conversations to have around "good works," we also need to sit with and hear the claim that has often been made since the period of the Reformation: "we are saved by grace through faith" and (some folks will add) therefore anything I do is really OK because I am not saved by good works, but by grace.  Right?

Wrong, at least in part.  SAVED PEOPLE DO GOOD.  Let's hear what Paul says fully in Ephesians 2:8-10: "For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God - not the result of works, so that no one may boast.  For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life" (NRSV).

Let me summarize this: We are saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ - since we are saved, we are made new, and in being made new we are created for good deeds.  It is imperative that we understand that salvation is a gift, but our response and our life is then Jesus'.  Once our lives are Jesus' we do good things as a way of being obedient in following Jesus. 

Not only that, but these good deeds, this living out of the Kingdom of Heaven is in fact "prepared beforehand to be our way of life."  It is not just a onetime occurrence, a two time occurrence.  It is literally who we are, our "way of life."  We must regain the clarion call to obedience to Jesus ("good works") while holding onto the saving grace that we receive through faith. 

The way of life doing good deeds begins with submitting ourselves to Jesus, even if it means picking up the cross to follow him through counter-cultural practices, giving up vain things we think are important and that occupy our time, and through the muck of being labeled misleading names because we follow Jesus in a real way. 

"You are the salt of the earth...the light of the world...let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven."