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Christ Port

Thursday, November 24, 2005

No actions not followed by faith, then the faith is dead

I found some Christians claimed that as long as they say they believe in Christ then they will be saved. However, they may continuous on engaging serious flaws in their personal life in terms of relationship with people, which some of them may not be even acceptable to anyone with conscience, and do not care of putting any effort of correcting. They say that the Bible said we are saved by grace, not by works; therefore, they can pay no attention to their actions.

For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast. (Ephesians 2:8-9)
你們得救是本乎恩,也因著信,這並不是出於自己,乃是上帝所賜的,也不是出於行為,免得有人自誇。(弗 2:8-9)

I guess they have been quoting out of context (斷章取義), one should read on:

For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. (Ephesians 2:10)
我們原是祂的工作,在基督耶穌裏造成的,為要叫我們行善,就是上帝所預備叫我們行的。(弗 2:10)。

Therefore, actions resembling Jesus Christ should be followed by faith; otherwise the faith is questionable, or even dead.

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