by Terry Wane Benton<\/p>\n
Faith-only advocates have actually worked<\/em> 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 <\/b>are! How does faith come? It comes by you<\/strong> hearing the word of God (Romans 10:17). If you <\/b>don’t hear, give ear and your attention to hearing the word, you won’t have proper faith in the right person, and you <\/b>won’t receive what He offers. So, there is “work plus faith,” no matter what!<\/p>\n Jesus said we <\/b>have to “labor<\/em> (work) for the food that does not perish<\/em>” (John 6:27). He goes on to say that if we do not “eat His flesh and drink His blood we have no life in us<\/em>” (John 6:53). Who does the eating and drinking? That would be us! So, there is labor (work) involved in faith-building. That is work plus faith! Work is part of the process and cannot be avoided as part of the process.<\/p>\n The only kind of work that does not save us is perfect, sinless work. If you worked everything out perfectly without sin, you earned your own way and did not need forgiveness. That <\/b>is the only work<\/em> not involved in our fellowship with God. We all sinned and therefore need justification and forgiveness. Perfect works is already off the table. We have already blown that means of right standing with God.<\/p>\n The kind of work that is indeed involved in our forgiveness is “obedience of faith<\/em>” (Romans 1:5; 6:16-18; 16:26) or “faith working through love<\/em>” (Galatians 5:6). If it is not an active, working, obedient faith, it will not save (James 2:14-24).<\/p>\n You cannot read Paul and James in these verses and attribute a false doctrine of “faith plus works” to them. It is an obedient faith, but it must be that kind of faith, or it fails to be the right kind of faith. The men in John 12:42 “believed” but would not confess Jesus. Would confessing Jesus be “faith plus works,” so they needed to stay with faith only? You know that is not a saving faith. Confessing Jesus is not “faith plus works”. It is faith working through love. Faith working is based upon the work of coming to know Jesus, eating His flesh and drinking His blood, and it never ceases to work obedience into one’s life. Otherwise, it ceases to be real faith in Jesus.<\/p>\n So, those who try to put confession and baptism into a “works” category and then proudly proclaim that Peter was teaching “faith plus works” in Acts 2:38 are revealing a fatal flaw in their perception of faith and a wrong perception of what kind of “works” it is that has no part in our fellowship with God.<\/p>\n Active, obedient faith is involved, a work of labor to have the food that does not perish is certainly involved, a faith working or working faith is involved, an obedient faith is involved, a confessing faith is involved, a baptized faith is involved, but works of perfect law-keeping are not involved. The lack of works of law puts us in need of Jesus. Thus, it is not faith plus <\/b>my works of perfectly keeping the law. The lack of perfect working of the law is why I put my faith (obedient faith) in Jesus.<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" 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 comes by you hearing the…<\/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":[1008,55],"class_list":["post-86998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-faith-only","tag-works"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":84508,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/how-many-facts-in-faith-only\/","url_meta":{"origin":86998,"position":0},"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":94420,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/faith-takes-work\/","url_meta":{"origin":86998,"position":1},"title":"Faith Takes Work","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"March 9, 2026","format":false,"excerpt":"by Terry Wane Benton The argument that baptism is a \"work\" but faith is not is not sound. There is far more work involved in faith than in passively letting someone immerse you in water. Think about it. Faith comes by hearing the word of God (Romans 10:17). Think of\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":27880,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/is-faith-a-work-that-god-does-to-a-person\/","url_meta":{"origin":86998,"position":2},"title":"Is faith a work that God does to a person?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"June 30, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Recently someone told me that they believed that the work of God in John 6:29 means that God makes a person believe. I assume they think the Holy Spirit works in a person making them believe. I know that faith comes from hearing the Word of God but would\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":28611,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-is-a-work\/","url_meta":{"origin":86998,"position":3},"title":"What is a work?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 26, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I'm a little confused by works. I understand that faith and works go hand in hand. But I'm the type of person who needs concrete examples. Is reading my Bible considered a work? Is, say, giving turkeys to the poor on Thanksgiving considered a work? Is praying a work?\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2026,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/since-teaching-is-a-work-then-it-doesnt-save-right\/","url_meta":{"origin":86998,"position":4},"title":"Since teaching is a work, then it doesn’t save. Right?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"December 29, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Telling others about Christ is a work. \"For by grace we are saved through faith, it is the gift of God, not of works lest any man should boast\u00a0\" (Ephesians 2:8-9). Answer: There was a branch of the Baptist denomination that fully accepted the idea that being saved was\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":761,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/is-water-baptism-a-work\/","url_meta":{"origin":86998,"position":5},"title":"Is water baptism a work?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"January 5, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Is water baptism a work? Answer: I have always been amazed at the dread shown by people toward the word \"work.\" You would think that it was a dreaded disease or something equivalent to sin. The word \"work\" by itself is neither good nor bad. It simply refers to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86998","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=86998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86998\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}