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Gleanings From The Word

Tag: Faith

  • # Right Belief Must Become Right Living

    Recently, I slammed my hand in a door. I’m ashamed to admit that a stream of pre-Christian expletives came out of my lips. By and large, I’ve done a good job of removing those words, but I can still slip. There are times when what I do or say doesn’t align with what I believe or who I profess to be.

    Theologians have two words for this, and you do not need a seminary degree to understand them. Orthodoxy means right belief. Orthopraxy means right living. For most of church history these two words have walked together, because they were never meant to be separated. You cannot claim one and discard the other and still call it biblical Christianity.

    Scripture is not gentle about this. What use is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but has no works? Can that faith save him? Faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself (James 2:14, 17). That is not a suggestion tucked in a side verse. James is asking us to look honestly at whether our lives back up what we say we believe.

    Before this goes somewhere it should not, let me be clear about what this is not saying. We are not saved by our good works. It is by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, so that no one may boast (Ephesians 2:8-9). Nothing about right living earns you a place at the table. But the very next verse will not let us stop there either. We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them (Ephesians 2:10). The works do not save us. They are what saved people were made for.

    This is where orthopraxy actually shows up, not in grand gestures but in the ordinary texture of a life. It is patience with the person who tests you twice in one day. It is honesty on the tax form nobody is checking. It is showing up for the friend whose crisis is inconvenient for your schedule. James puts it plainly: prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves (James 1:22). A faith that only ever lives in your head has not yet become the faith Scripture is describing.

    There is a warning built into this too, and it cuts the other direction from where we might expect. Jesus said not everyone who says to Me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father. Many will say to Me on that day, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles? And then I will declare to them, I never knew you (Matthew 7:21-23). Right belief without right living is not a small inconsistency. Jesus treats it as evidence that something never took root at all.

    So orthodoxy and orthopraxy are not in competition, and they are not optional extras for the especially devoted. They are the two halves of one whole life. Sound doctrine without a changed life is a faith that talks and never walks. A changed life without sound doctrine is a house built on whatever feels right that year. We need both, and Scripture never offers us the choice to pick only one.

    If you have spent more time defending what you believe than living it out this week, that is worth sitting with honestly before God. And if you have been busy doing good without rooting it in the truth of who Christ is and what He has done, that is worth examining too. The way we live matters, not because it earns us anything, but because it is supposed to be the visible proof of what grace has already done.

    I still catch myself in moments like that door slam, where what comes out does not match what I claim to believe. That is not proof grace has failed. It is proof I am still being made new, and that the gap between profession and practice is meant to keep shrinking, not stay the same size forever.

    Hallelu Yah (Praise God)

    Be blessed,

    Kevin

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  • Is Christianity Too Narrow? What critics miss about the gospel.

    Is Christianity Too Narrow? What critics miss about the gospel.

    A narrow uphill trail in the woods - Is Christianity Too Narrow? What critics miss about the gospel.

    We hiked up the mountain through the forest. The trail wasn’t very wide, at places almost non-existent.  We had two choices: use the path or scramble up where there was no path. We chose the narrow path.

    Now, if you have been a Christian for any length of time, that phrase narrow way reminded you of a Bible passage (perhaps in whole, or maybe just the idea).

    Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. Matthew 7:13

    In other places, Jesus makes it abundantly clear that the only way is through faith in Him. There is no other plan.

    Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but through Me. John 14:3

    That has led to charges that Christianity itself is very narrow. Those charges have merit; there is only one way, and it doesn’t get any narrower than that. That’s God’s plan. He created everything, and He gets to make the rules. There is a narrow path.

    There are some things that the complainers don’t recognize.

    Firstly, without Jesus, there is no way to be forgiven and reconciled to God at all. He would have been perfectly righteous and just to allow everyone to perish in their sins. That’s fair punishment for rebellion against the king.

    Jesus didn’t have to come to redeem us. He chose to, and that is incredible love and unmerited grace.

    Secondly. While some may claim that the way of Christ is exclusive by its one-way nature, it’s also the least exclusive club in the world.

    The way of Christ is open to people of any age, from any culture, of either gender, from all socio-economic backgrounds, and at any level of sin. You don’t have to be religious enough, righteous enough or good enough. You don’t need lots of money or education to enter through the narrow path.

    You can’t earn your way in by good works. You can’t buy your way in. You can’t be born in. It has one requirement, faith in Christ, and even the worst among us have an opportunity to choose that.

    Christians are not people who have their act together. They are flawed people who are being transformed into the image of Christ. They will let you down. They may be hypocritical. They might look very much like Jesus. Then again, neither do you.

    The difference is that they responded to Christ by faith and were redeemed.

    Churches are messy places, but God will clean them up. The world outside the church is equally flawed, but without Christ, it will never get better.

    Narrow? Absolutely!

    Exclusive? Hardly!

    God calls, and we have a choice to make. Will we respond, take the narrow path, and follow Him ,or will we reject Him?

    Hallelu Yah (Praise God) 

    Be blessed 

    Kevin 

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    SUMMARY

    A narrow mountain trail becomes a vivid illustration of Jesus’ teaching about the narrow way to salvation — one path, one requirement, one Savior. Though Christianity is rightly called narrow, it is paradoxically the most inclusive invitation in the world.

    TAKEAWAY

    • The narrow way is real and intentional: Jesus is unambiguous that faith in Him is the only path to the Father, and God, as Creator, has the right to set that condition.
    • Narrow doesn’t mean exclusive: The way of Christ is open to every person regardless of age, background, culture, wealth, or depth of sin — the only requirement is faith.
    • Grace, not fairness, is the starting point: God owed humanity no rescue; that Jesus came to redeem us at all is an act of extraordinary love and unmerited grace.

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