by Terry Wane Benton<\/p>\n
The discussion of faith versus works could end if each side took the time to define the proper ingredients of saving faith. Let me illustrate. A Muslim has faith, even in Jesus as a prophet of God. Is he saved? No! He does not have the proper ingredients of faith. He must work to acquire them, and God will not do this work for him.<\/p>\n
No one will consistently argue that faith does not take some effort or work to have the proper ingredients before pardon is actually received. Peter, by the Spirit, included repentance and baptism in the name of Jesus as essential ingredients (Acts 2:36-41) of saving faith. Others try a different recipe with fewer ingredients and tell people they get the same results without all the right ingredients. Jesus said such people are headed for a real surprise (Matthew 7:21ff). What are the proper ingredients of saving faith? You cannot afford to be mistaken by a different recipe (Galatians 1:6-10).<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
by Terry Wane Benton The discussion of faith versus works could end if each side took the time to define the proper ingredients of saving faith. Let me illustrate. A Muslim has faith, even in Jesus as a prophet of God. Is he saved? No! He does not have the proper ingredients of faith. He…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[27],"tags":[49,55],"class_list":["post-85407","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-faith","tag-works"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":86998,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/faith-plus-works\/","url_meta":{"origin":85407,"position":0},"title":"Faith Plus Works?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"May 6, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"by Terry Wane Benton Faith-only advocates have actually worked hard to convince themselves that if you include any activity in faith, such as obedience, you have added \"you\" and your effort to Jesus' perfect and complete work. Yet, who is doing the believing? You are! How does faith come? It\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":68764,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/the-umbrella-nature-of-the-term-faith\/","url_meta":{"origin":85407,"position":1},"title":"The Umbrella Nature of the Term \u201cFaith\u201d","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"July 7, 2024","format":false,"excerpt":"by Terry Wane Benton One preacher (Stephen Whitsett) argued the following: \"In the same way, it would be possible that Acts 2:38 is indeed communicating the fact that they were to be baptized \"as the result of\" or \"because\" they already had believed and in doing so had already received\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":88181,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/faith\/","url_meta":{"origin":85407,"position":2},"title":"Faith","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 27, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"by Terry Wane Benton Biblical faith is believing in God, believing what His word (the Bible) says, trusting Him enough to be refreshed and reassured by His promises, yielding and submissive to His Sovereignty, and active in obeying His commands. When any of these ingredients are fading or missing, then\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":84508,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-many-facts-in-faith-only\/","url_meta":{"origin":85407,"position":3},"title":"How Many Facts in \u201cFaith Only\u201d?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"February 13, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"by Terry Wane Benton Those brethren who now teach that salvation is at the moment of faith before repentance and baptism in the name of Jesus for the remission of sins (they say that is \"faith plus works\") never seem to get around to telling us what all is included\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":92566,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/the-proper-explanation-of-john-316\/","url_meta":{"origin":85407,"position":4},"title":"The Proper Explanation of John 3:16","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 13, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"by Carl O. Cooper The fact is, John 3:16, when taken in its proper context, teaches that salvation is by works of obedience when accompanied by proper faith. It's true! This verse, read in its proper context, does not teach \"saved by faith alone.\" In reality, the context of this\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":87257,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-martin-luther-taught-about-baptism\/","url_meta":{"origin":85407,"position":5},"title":"What Martin Luther Taught About Baptism","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"May 27, 2025","format":false,"excerpt":"by Terry Wane Benton While Martin Luther may have taught the idea of salvation by \"faith alone,\" you might be surprised to learn that he did not think faith alone excluded baptism. It was an umbrella term that included repentance and baptism. So, he didn't place baptism in the category\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=85407"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/85407\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=85407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=85407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=85407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}