"Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless? Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar? You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works; and the Scripture was fulfilled that says, "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness" - and he was called a friend of God. You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone."
James 2:20-24
The fear in the past was that people thought they'd "earn" salvation through works. And what we have today is a people who use their tongues to proclaim faith, yet hands do otherwise. Have we stopped fearing the Lord? Have we sugarcoated our God, packaging Him to ourselves and others as loving, forgiving, gentle, kind... Why do we leave out that He is just, holy, righteous. It's so easy to say, "I am a Christian". It is so difficult to live a Christ-like life. "Be holy, for I am holy." It's so easy to read the bible, so easy to pray, so easy to sing songs of worship. So difficult to obey. Difficult to listen. Difficult to see the sinners that we are. Do we desire to be called "a friend of God"? Or are we just content to know that we've said the sinners' prayer and are saved? Believing is not enough. Even the devil believes in God, and he trembles. The devil who has so much influence on our world today fears the Lord. What about us? As works without faith is useless, so is faith without works. How different are we living our lives now that we call upon Jesus Christ as our Lord?
It's been an exhausting Saturday morning.
With explosions again.
Where a soul is broken into pieces
and peace is forsaken.
A soul without Christ will keep breaking.