I read through Romans 9 - 12 today. Romans 9 - 11 gives a view of God's mercy in bringing us to Himself, and reminds us that we can't earn our salvation by what we do. Chapter 12 then says that in view of this, we should offer ourselves to God and allow Him to transform our lives. For some reason, I often hear people arguing two sides of this topic as if they were the only two options.
Argument 1: We are saved by faith and not by works. To say that works are necessary is against God's heart and misses the point of His mercy. (Romans 9:16, 30-32)
Argument 2: Works are necessary. If you haven't got works, then have you really allowed God to transform your life, and is He really your Lord? To say works are not necessary is against God's heart and misses the point of holiness. (Romans 12:1-2)
To be fair, each of these arguments makes a good point, and focuses on an element of God's character to back it up, but the danger of pitting one half of the truth against the other is that no matter which side wins the argument, something is missing, and in order to win the argument you have to downplay the other side. The whole truth is that God's mercy leads us to holiness. It's true that our works don't save us, and it's true that as God transforms our lives, works will and should follow, out of obedience and love for Him. That doesn't mean that our works save us, and it doesn't mean that once we're saved we can live like the devil, which I think are the extremes each argument is trying to avoid, one on one side and one on the other. Let us not argue about which half is more right, and let us seek out the whole heart of God, to know and love Him better.
Amen.
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