Row, Row, Row Your Boat

[1life2live]

Row, row, row your boat

Faith without action? What do you think? Is it possible to have faith w/o actions or deeds?

No faith w/o actions is superficial faith. James goes into the detail of why faith w/o actions is superficial.

Open to James 2:14
“What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him?"

To answer his question, “no.”, that kind of faith cannot save him. Why not you ask?

Because this kind of faith is not real, its faith on the shell of the person and it doesn’t extend to the core of that persons being. Just because you go to church, pray the right prayers, say the right things, be baptized, and even take communion, this doesn’t mean you have the kind of faith that saves.
In Matthew Jesus warns us about this;

Matt 7:21 Jesus said, “not everyone who says to me, ‘lord, lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my father who is in heaven.”

We need to watch out that our faith isn’t just a faith of little importance. Back in bible days ppl would claim to be a Christian and they would even declare it publicly but some utterly failed to live it out. James had something to say to pal like that, he said that even if you declare your faith to everyone without active obedience to God that faith is useless.

James 2:15-16
“Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, ‘go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it?”

If you have the means of helping some1 don’t just tell them to have a good life and then walk away, help them, it might not necessarily be by feeding them or clothing them. It could be as simple as just listening to their problems, and maybe just trying to help them deal with it.

James goes on to say

James 2:17 “in the same way, faith by itself if not accompanied by action is dead.”

So any ideas of what he’s sayin there?

Is he sayin that faith that was once alive and vital can be killed by a lack of action?

No, because if that were the point then we would be saved my works and not by the grace of God though our faith in Jesus Christ.
His point is to say that faith without works shows a superficial/fake spirituality that was not alive to begin with. It only looked like it was alive. Before faith we were all spiritually dead, as it says in Ephesians.

2:1 “ and you he made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins…”

Active obedience as I mentioned before reveals whether or not our faith is alive, whether or not u have real faith, the saving faith. Real faith makes us receptive to God. In other words real faith will make us responsible.

James 2:18 “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.’”

Here he is telling us to show our faith through the things we do, in life God has a purpose for all of us and only with true faith are we able to experience that purpose. The bible says, “and without faith it is impossible to please God…”

Next verse James 2:19 “you believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that, and shudder.”

Demons believe that God exists, but they don’t have faith, like the most orthodox of Jew or Christian, they know the truth but have never been transformed by it. They cannot respond to God in obedience but only fear. The only reason I talk about this, is because now days the word faith has/is used as something small in meaning, but its not small at all, its suppose to be tough and all consuming of our lives.

In life faith is meant to find fulfillment. James gives us an example

James 2:20-22 “you foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? Was not our ancestor Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did.”

Abraham’s faith was fulfilled through his actions; it revealed that he was 100% obedient to God.

James 2:23-24 “and the scripture was fulfilled that says, ‘Abraham believed in God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,’ and he was called a ‘friend of God’. You see a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.

I want all of us here today to have our faith fulfilled by our acts of obedience. We then become what God created us to be… his friend. Faith will come first and it will ALWAYS lead to action.

Aight well to end out this lesson, ill explain the meaning of the title “row, row, row your boat.”

One day a man got out on his rowboat, with him he brought a can of spray paint. On one of his paddles he wrote faith and on the other he wrote works. He then took the paddle with faith on it and put it in the water and started paddling, well guess wat he just ended up going in a tight circle. He then put that paddle down and picked up the other one with works written on it. Once again he started paddling, only this time he went the other way in a tight little circle. He then finally tried using both of the paddles at the same time, both faith and works. This allowed him to go straight in the direction he wanted to go.

I want to now make a challenge to all of you, put both oars in the water this morning, let faith find its fulfillment in your life, and start rowing now.