Today I read James 2:14-26. The title of this section in the three versions I read in are "Faith in Action", "Faith without Good Deeds is Dead", and "Faith and Deeds". These verses can often be very comfusing. Because doesn't everyone tell us that it's our faith that gets us to Heaven and it's not by anything that we do? It's true. There is nothing you can do to get into Heaven other than accept Jesus as your Lord and Savior and commit your life to him. That's just step one though.
Step two involves a little more work. How do you prove to people that you are a Christian? Just sitting there isn't going to convince anyone that you truely believe and that you're different from the rest of the world. In the Message it says that even talking about faith doesn't show that you really are faithful. The Bible goes on to talk about telling a friend who doesn't have addequite clothing or food that just telling them that you hope they stay warm and are well fed isn't going to do anything for them. You must be the hands and feel of Jesus and give them these things, by which you are proving your faith.
The most tricky thing about all this is that you must have faith. You can't just have deeds. The Book says "But someone will say, "You have faith; I have deeds." Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do. You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons delieve that-- and shudder." (James 2:18 and 19)
This illistrates that just because you believe there's only one God you obviously don't go to Heaven based on that believe because the demons are not in Heaven. Deeds show that you have faith. The Bible talks about a couple examples. One being Abraham and the other being Rahab.
The final verse in this section says "As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead."
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