Bible Study Does James 2 Teach Works for Salvation?

[Hopeful]

Obviously, a strong person doesn't cave in to the enticement and temptation of sin. Only weak people do. So, obviously, James is talking about weakness. Weakness that is, perhaps, the result of ignorance of the difference between right and wrong, or about the power of God over sin that is within us.

Only those not "in Christ" do.

Paul talks about the weakness of the believer here:
17But thanks be to God that, though you once were slaves to sin, you wholeheartedly obeyed the form of teaching to which you were committed. 18You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.
19I am speaking in human terms because of the weakness of your flesh. Just as you used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity and to escalating wickedness, so now offer them in slavery to righteousness leading to holiness. Romans 6:17-19

In other words..."obey and live".

He's talking to people who "once were slaves to sin", and "set free from sin", and "have become slaves to righteousness", and who "used to offer the parts of your body in slavery to impurity", and yet he is addressing them because of the "weakness of (their) flesh". Weakness is indeed a reason why people "set free from sin" and who are "slaves to righteousness" sin.

"USED TO".
Not since rebirth from God's seed however.

Sometimes we are weak and don't always walk in the freedom we have from the slavery of sin. But we have the continual intercession of the blood of Christ in heaven forgiving us as God heals us and strengthens and trains us up to live out the righteousness we have within us by the Holy Spirit which we received through faith in Him.

That is one of the accommodations for continued sins that God's pastors and prophets abhor.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

You contend part of you is still unrighteous.
How can that be?
Either you are righteous, or you are not.

Your teachers do not know the difference between being 100% righteous in God's sight because your sins are forgiven and the actual doing of those sins that are then forgiven maintaining your righteous status before God. You don't get it because you are in a works gospel religion where your works earn God's justification, instead of being justified by having your sins forgiven.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

God's ears are not open to sinners, so your POV is baseless. (John 9:31, 1 Peter 3:12)
Repent of sin, and you will be heard.
But more sin shows the repentance was a lie to God, and that is not the way to build a relationship with God.
"If we say that we have fellowship with him, and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth:" (1 John 1:6)

You live in a horrible religion.
Your relationship with God depends on you being 100% sinless. No forgiveness, no mercy. No thanks. You can have it.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

"USED TO".
Not since rebirth from God's seed however.

And yet he calls them out in the "weakness of your flesh."

You missed it.
It went right over your head.
...or did it? :wink

 

[Jethro Bodine]

That is one of the accommodations for continued sins that God's pastors and prophets abhor.

YOUR pastors and 'prophets' abhor it.

Ours understand the "weakness of (our) flesh" despite the fact that we "have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness."

Must be a joy to be around a pastor and elders and a congregation where you have to 100% sinless, no errors, no weaknesses allowed. That's the life of the Pharisee. It fosters hypocrisy and deceit. You can have it.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

If you were still sinning, you weren't righteous.

I'm righteous because my sins are forgiven, not because I supposedly don't sin anymore.
This is the truth that escapes you.
You are caught in the deceit of a works gospel where righteousness is determined by if you sin or not.

You think it necessary that you have absolutely no sin in order to be righteous in God's sight. The truth you don't know about is it is necessary to have your sin forgiven in order to be righteous in God's sight. This is the teaching in the Bible you are ignoring, or don't know about, and which makes it so you can't interpret your un-rightly divided scriptures the way you do.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

Partial rebirth.
Sounds ugly...and not of God.

The inner man is what has been born anew. Not my flesh.

Why do you want to retain part of that which will eventually damn you?

I don't, but I have to wait until the resurrection to be forever rid of my fallen flesh and blood. Until then I contend with it by the power of the Holy Spirit in the inner man as I learn to "distinguish good from evil" more and more as I grow up on the meat of the word of righteousness and leave the baby milk knowledge of baptisms and things like that behind.

"...ALL THINGS ARE MADE NEW...except for the vessel of the Holy Ghost".
Where is that scripture?

21that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.

22We know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until the present time. 23Not only that, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. 24For in this hope we were saved; but hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he can already see? 25But if we hope for what we do not yet see, we wait for it patiently. Romans 8:21-25

So get rid of this notion that somehow your flesh is made anew, lol. That doesn't happen until the redemption of our bodies at the resurrection.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

Verse 8 starts with..."For if you possess these qualities...".
Rebirth from God's seed furnishes us with "these qualities".
If you don't have them, you can't grow in them.
But having them, we can grow in them.

If you have to grow into the qualities of love, and self-control, for example, then that means you have not been perfect in those things. You're sinning.

A stalk of corn needs to grow to bring forth fruit, but it will always be "corn".

And until you bring forth that fruit you are sinning. You are fruitless. You can't deny this.

So too we, being reborn of God's seed need to grow in order to bring forth MORE fruit, but we will always be the sons of God.
If your fruit is un-Godly, you were not reborn of God.

If you have to have more fruit that means you've sinned somewhere along the line by not having the fruit you should have had. You're sinning. It means you're not the perfect and complete person you claim you are from the beginning.

 

[jaybo]

If you have to grow into the qualities of love, and self-control, for example, then that means you have not been perfect in those things. You're sinning.



And until you bring forth that fruit you are sinning. You are fruitless. You can't deny this.


If you have to have more fruit that means you've sinned somewhere along the line by not having the fruit you should have had. You're sinning. It means you're not the perfect and complete person you claim you are from the beginning.

Are you? Only one person was sinless, according to the Bible.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

OK, but those made righteous will remain righteous.

As long as they keep believing in the blood of Christ that forgives their sin they will indeed remain righteous in God's sight.

If they start doing unrighteousness, they really aren't righteous anymore.

You think that because you don't know that a person becomes righteous and remains righteous by having their sin forgiven, not by ceasing to act unrighteously.

But it is certainly true that the person who goes backward to an unrepentant, willful life of purposeful sin show that they no longer believe in the blood of Christ and lose the righteousness of God they had when they did believe in the blood of Christ for the forgiveness of sin.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

Are you? Only one person was sinless, according to the Bible.

Am I 100% sinless, perfect and complete in behavior?
No, I'm growing up into that.

But I am 100% sinless and perfect and complete, legally speaking, because every time I sin the blood of Christ I believe and trust in, and which is interceding for me on the altar in heaven, cleanses it away leaving and so no sin guilt remains upon which a charge of unrighteousness can be made. Romans 8:33-34

33Who will bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 34Who is there to condemn us? For Christ Jesus, who died, and more than that was raised to life, is at the right hand of God—and He is interceding for us.

Hopeful needs to get this truth down inside of him so he can stop kidding himself that he's 100% sinless out of fear of being declared unrighteous and not born again. As long as he believes in the blood of Christ for the forgiveness of his sin when he commits it he remains righteous in God's sight, not because he didn't sin, but because God forgives his sin wiping away the record of that unrighteousness. When God forgives there is no sin remaining upon which to be declared unrighteous.

 

[JLB]

Are you in Jesus?

My spirit is.

But he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit with Him.
1 Corinthians 6:17

 

[Jethro Bodine]

No, you do.

Dude, come on, just read Galatians 5:17 with honesty.
People with the Spirit sin because of the opposition of the flesh.
You can't honestly deny it says that.

 

[Jethro Bodine]

Can there be sin in Jesus?
No?
Then how can your admittedly sinful self be in Jesus?

Because the flesh is opposed to the Spirit so that you don't do what you want! Galatians 5:17

 

[Jethro Bodine]

Does God want us to commit sin?

No.

Don't His apostles, pastors, and prophets supply what we need to remain faithfully obedient to God?

Yes.
And, as children, we spend a lifetime learning to use it as we grow up into the stature of Christ.

 

[Hopeful]

You live in a horrible religion.
Your relationship with God depends on you being 100% sinless. No forgiveness, no mercy. No thanks. You can have it.

my relationship with God exists because of Hs mercy, grace, and grace.
But His mercy included the ways and means of continuing on in the light.
How come your religion didn't give you that side of the "story"?

 

[Hopeful]

And yet he calls them out in the "weakness of your flesh."

You missed it.
It went right over your head.
...or did it? :wink

If they have been freed from sin, they are not slaves to sin.

 

[Hopeful]

YOUR pastors and 'prophets' abhor it.

Ours understand the "weakness of (our) flesh" despite the fact that we "have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness."

If you were a "slave to righteousness" you would no longer be a servant of sin.

Must be a joy to be around a pastor and elders and a congregation where you have to 100% sinless, no errors, no weaknesses allowed. That's the life of the Pharisee. It fosters hypocrisy and deceit. You can have it.

It is a joy to be around folks I can trust.
And it isn't a "has to" situation, it is a "get's to" situation.
You make it sound like sin is fun !
Had the Pharisees practiced what they preached, things would have been a whole lot better in Israel.
But they didn't...kind of like the wayward preachers of today.

 

[Hopeful]

I'm righteous because my sins are forgiven, not because I supposedly don't sin anymore.

Don't they go hand-in-hand?
If you are righteous, you aren't committing sin.

This is the truth that escapes you.
You are caught in the deceit of a works gospel where righteousness is determined by if you sin or not.

Made righteous, and continuing on in righteousness.
Why do you advocate a split personality doctrine?

You think it necessary that you have absolutely no sin in order to be righteous in God's sight.

That is God's commandment...yes?

The truth you don't know about is it is necessary to have your sin forgiven in order to be righteous in God's sight.

I agree, it is necessary.
So why not stay righteous?

This is the teaching in the Bible you are ignoring, or don't know about, and which makes it so you can't interpret your un-rightly divided scriptures the way you do.

If continuing on in darkness is your thing, go on committing sin.
I was desperate to flee such a world, and God showed me the way.
Thanks and glory be to God !

 

[Hopeful]

The inner man is what has been born anew. Not my flesh.

Too bad you don't have the faith to believe what is written in 2 Cor 5:17.
Or Gal 5:24.

I don't, but I have to wait until the resurrection to be forever rid of my fallen flesh and blood. Until then I contend with it by the power of the Holy Spirit in the inner man as I learn to "distinguish good from evil" more and more as I grow up on the meat of the word of righteousness and leave the baby milk knowledge of baptisms and things like that behind.

No man can serve two masters.
Why try?

21that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.
22We know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until the present time. 23Not only that, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. 24For in this hope we were saved; but hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he can already see? 25But if we hope for what we do not yet see, we wait for it patiently. Romans 8:21-25

So get rid of this notion that somehow your flesh is made anew, lol. That doesn't happen until the redemption of our bodies at the resurrection.

It is written..."But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of his." (Rom 8:9)
I like this verse form Paul..."For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ." (Gal 3:27)
It isn't "my" skin and bones anymore.