Faith needs godly deeds

By  Scott Mair, Youth Speak News
  • April 1, 2010

A popular saying among Christians is “faith without deeds is dead.”

This saying (James 2:14-26) tells the reader that it is not enough to simply believe in God; one must also do His will by striving for righteousness and doing good deeds.

There’s much truth to this as it is clear that anyone who claims they have faith but does not accompany their faith with good works is not sincere. If a person said they believed in God but ignored the less fortunate or were abusive to their family, one would consider this person a fraud. However, the converse also applies. Christian works without faith are inert.

To me, works without faith are deeds we perform without sincere and godly intentions. They are godly deeds performed or looked at in an ungodly manner. Consider people who give to charity only to receive praise. These people tend to give money only to receive acclaim from others. But when a homeless person asks for money, they suddenly become tight-fisted.

Jesus warns Christians against such a mindset. In Matthew’s Gospel, He urges people not to “call attention to their acts of charity,” but to give in secret where only God sees what they are doing. Jesus knows giving done to enhance one’s social status is not godly because it’s done for selfish gain, not to help others or do the will of God. Indeed, Jesus was reminding His followers that deeds by themselves are not enough to please God: one needs to have a sincere faith as well.

This teaching against works without faith is as true today as it was in the time of Jesus. I’ll give you a personal example. I practise the Christian virtue of sexual abstinence and will remain a virgin until I marry. I know casual sex is harmful to others and offensive to God. Initially, however, I did not regard my abstinence in a godly and faithful way.

Privately, I was envious towards sexually active people. I became malicious, vilifying those who bragged about their relationships and sexual experiences. I thought myself morally superior. I now realize that attitude was selfish and un-Christian. I had turned abstinence into self-aggrandizement. While my deed was good, my faith was terrible.

In addition to good deeds we need a personal faith as well. This “personal faith” involves a fulfilling and prayerful relationship with God and thoughts that are as good as their deeds. It involves guarding their mind from the poisons of envy, arrogance, laziness, selfishness and anything else that might pervert the deeds they do in the name of God.

This is not to say one should only do deeds that give them pleasure. Sometimes doing the work of God means undertaking a struggle or doing things we find unpleasant. However, if we don’t perform these works with a respect for God, then our relationship with Him will suffer as a result.

While faith without deeds is dead, deeds without faith do not have much life either. They simply become things done for our own gain or to fulfill a rule. Without faith, they are not fully alive in the image of God.

Indeed, we need both aspects to make our Christian deeds fully holy like God wants them to be.

(Mair, 19, is a first-year journalism student at Carleton University.)

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