Basics: Assurance, Faith & works
Thursday
Evening Bible Study
February
11, 2021
The struggle with doubt
Everyone
struggles with doubt.
You may from time to time encounter a person who says they have never
doubted their salvation, and I applaud that person if indeed they are being
honest.
Yet for most of
us, after we took that step of choosing to believe in Jesus, would often face
that nagging question – “Was that real?”
Sometimes the question comes like this, “If I’m really a Christian, then how come I’m
struggling with sin?” (we’ll deal with this in a
couple of weeks).
As you know,
being a Christian is all about having a personal relationship with Jesus
Christ.
Can you imagine
a man and woman getting married and then every day after that they wonder, “Did
I really do that? Are we really married?”
I’m not saying that a marriage might not have
difficulties.
But how horrible
would it be if your spouse was wondering every day whether or
not they were actually married to you.
There is a turning
point that God wants each believer to come to, where they stop the daily questioning
of whether or not they are saved.
The person who is paralyzed by the fear of not knowing for sure they are
saved, is usually the person who is afraid to step out and serve God like He
wants.
God wants you
to know that you are saved. He wants you
to know you are heading towards heaven.
Let’s start with
a quick review of how we are saved.
The Gospel
The word
“gospel” means “good news”, and in understanding the good news it’s important
to first realize
what the “bad news” is.
The bad news is
that we are all sinners.
Except for Jesus, there is not a single person on planet Earth who has
never sinned.
We all fall short of what God wants for us and expects from us.
It is sin that
will keep us from God, from eternal life.
There is no way that a human being can meet God’s requirements for eternal
life on their own.
The good news
is that God has done the very thing that rescues us from the consequences of
our sins.
God sent His
Son Jesus to take on human flesh, live a perfect life, and die as a sacrifice
for the sins of the world.
When Jesus died, He didn’t die to cover one person’s sin. As God-in-flesh, He laid down an eternal life
to pay for the sins of the whole world.
Our part in the
salvation process is to simply choose to believe. We trust what God has done. We have faith.
We make the choice to receive God’s free gift of
eternal life.
The Bible says,
(John 3:16 NKJV) For God so loved the world that He
gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have
everlasting life.
And
(John 1:12 NKJV) But as many as received Him, to them He
gave the right to become children of God, to those who believe in His name:
Belief is not a
“feeling”. The question isn’t whether or not I “feel” like I’m saved. The question is whether or
not I’ve made a choice
to trust in Jesus.
What is faith? Faith is putting your trust in someone or something that you
don’t fully see or understand.
We do that every day.
You walk into a room and sit in a chair.
Did you do stress analysis on that chair before sitting? No.
You trusted it would hold you up.
So let me ask you, have you made that choice to trust God?
If you haven’t, maybe we could stop right now and
you tell God that you need him.
Say to Him, “God, I recognize that I am a sinner. God I need You. Jesus would you come
into my life and be my Savior?”
Assurance
If you have made that choice, then this next verse for you.
(1 John 5:13 NKJV) These things
I have written to you who believe
in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may continue
to believe in the name of the Son of God.
If you struggle with knowing whether or not you
are saved, I find it helpful to write in the front of your Bible – “On this
date, I chose to believe in Jesus”. Write down the date that you opened your
heart to Jesus.
Faith or works?
You will find that there is some controversy over whether a person is saved by faith alone,
or whether they are saved by doing good works.
When you look
at the Bible, you realize that there’s a little bit of truth to each side.
The Bible
clearly says that salvation comes when we simply believe.
We’ve just read several verses that say that.
Paul wrote,
(Ephesians 2:8–10 NKJV) —8 For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is
the gift of God, 9 not of works, lest anyone should
boast.
We aren’t saved by our own “works”, or “good deeds”. We are saved by our choice to believe in
Jesus.
But pay attention, because Paul doesn’t end there. He goes on to write in the very next verse.
10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ
Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in
them.
When you are
“saved”, you find out that God has a plan for you. He has things for us to do.
God saves us with the intention that we would live lives
characterized by good works.
James writes about the relationship between faith and works.
(James 2:14–18 NKJV) —14 What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has
faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? 15 If a brother or sister is naked and
destitute of daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and
filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body,
what does it profit? 17 Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead. 18 But someone will say, “You have
faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without your works,
and I will show you my faith by my works.
When a person says they have faith, but there has never been any change in
their life, something is suspicious.
Real faith will
change your life.
Real faith will change the way you treat others.
Real faith is obvious to those around us because they see
how we live.
(Matthew 5:16 NKJV) Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good
works and glorify your Father in heaven.
The
question isn’t “Faith or works”, but “Faith that works”.
We receive
eternal life when we choose to put our faith in Jesus.
We have
assurance of our salvation because of our faith in Jesus, not because of our
works.
But … the proof
that our faith is real is that our lives change, we help others, we do good
works.
We don’t do these things to “keep” our salvation. We do them simply because we love Jesus.
Jesus said,
(John 14:15 NKJV) “If you love
Me, keep My commandments.