For it is by grace Gail has been saved, through faith -
and this is not from herself, it is the gift of God -
not by works, so that she cannot boast at all.
For she is God's workmanship,
created in Christ Jesus to do good works,
which God prepared in advance for her to do.
We find ourselves at another one of the great paradoxes in Christianity.
On the one hand ... Paul makes it quite clear that our salvation is totally a gift by the grace of Jehovah God. You and I do not earn one bit of it. We do not deserve it. It is pure gift ... and our only task is to accept it.
After all, God is perfection and only perfection is good enough to be before Him - not pretty good, not almost terrific, not close to perfect - perfection. Our very nature, the hamartia (sin) which permeates our flesh guarantees our "short of perfect" stature. The only way man will ever return to the presence of God is if and when God gifts the privilege. God gives ... man receives.
Secondly, God is love, pure love. Therefore, sin is a crime - not against the law so much as against love. Imagine with me the horrific scenario of a drunk driver crashing and killing a child in another car. Let's assume he is convicted and sent to prison and heavily fined. After the years have been served and the fines have been paid, he is released. We then say of him, "Well, he has paid his debt to society." The matter is finished. He is restored to society. However, that does not mean that he is restored in relationship with the mother of the child. The only way any restoration happens between him and the mother ... is if and when that mother offers him her forgiveness. There is no payment that repays the depth and magnitude of the loss. It's the only way. We are in the same position with God ... there is nothing we do or can do that repays the magnitude of our violation of His pure love . And yet He offers forgiveness.
Paul is clear ... it is by grace we have been saved - through faith - not of ourselves, it is the gift of God - not by works.
Then there is the other hand. Those saved by grace are created to do good works? I thought works did not matter. So what is this "works" talk?
It really is not mysterious ... Barclay says, "All the good works in the world cannot put us right with God; but there is something radically wrong with the Christianity which does not issue in good works." It is the law of love. It is the response to love. Therefore, we spend our lifetimes doing good works, patterning our lives after our Lord, doing the things that He did, as we long to be worthy of that magnificent love ... as we long to bring joy to the heart of God. We will be examining that more closely when we move into Ephesians 4 - 5.
God made us ... created mankind from the dust of the earth. We were stolen from Him by Satan and sin. God wanted mankind back in relationship with Him so badly that He paid everything, His very life through the blood of His Son, Jesus, on the cross, to buy us back ... that is redemption.
So we are His workmanship ... everything about us that is good and pleasing and beautiful is by His hand. Paul tells us in verse 10 that, as God's workmanship, we are to be about the business of doing good - doing the kinds of things that God did when He walked here in flesh through the person of Jesus. That is the appropriate response to life, love and freedom.
It is as if God has done THE work so that we can be free to do the works of good.
We must close today with time for self-examination. You must do your own ... I must do mine. Where am I (you) doing good? Celebrate that before God - it is His life we are reflecting!Where am I (you) ignoring the good we could do because we just don't want to be bothered? Take that conviction to the Father with confession ... and a prayer for wisdom and strength to do the good that He places in our paths. Remember, God prepared these things for us so that we would WALK in them ...
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