The Scrolls is a weekly Bible study written by pastors and other leaders at Central Bible Church, based on that week’s sermon topic. Use The Scrolls as a personal Bible study tool, for family devotions, and for small group discussions. You can read part of it below. The downloadable PDF also includes discussion questions, more in-depth commentary, end notes, and a kids’ page designed for families to study the topic together. This lesson goes with the sermon "Proof of Life."
The Thessalonians’ faith is proven genuine by their response to the gospel that Paul preached to them. About them, he writes: “For we know, brothers and sisters loved by God, that he has chosen you for salvation because our gospel came to you not simply with words but also with power, with the Holy Spirit and deep conviction” (1Th 1:4-5a). His words raise a thorny question regarding the relationship of faith and works—a question over which much ink has been spilt by commentators over the centuries. It’s a question that the apostle James asks in various ways in chapter two of his letter. First he writes: “What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them? And then after issuing the challenge, “Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds” (v. 18), he declares, “You see that a person is considered righteous by what they do and not by faith alone” (v. 24). Apparently, Paul and James agree that faith is made evident by works. The first is confident that the Thessalonians are “chosen” given their response to the gospel (1Th 1:3), and the second confident that one’s righteous deeds are proof of a genuine profession of faith (Jas 2:18). Since justification is by faith alone and not by works at all, good deeds in and of themselves apart from a profession of faith in Jesus Christ are not evidence of justification.
Consider this comment on James’ meaning: “James is not saying that a person is saved by works and not by genuine faith. Rather, he is saying, to use Martin Luther’s words, that people are justified (declared righteous before God) by faith alone, but not by a faith that is alone. Genuine faith will produce good deeds, but only faith in Christ saves” (The NIV Study Bible, note on Jas 2:14-16). Put differently, one theologian writes: “Every Christian will bear spiritual fruit. Somewhere, sometime, somehow. Otherwise that person is not a believer. Every born-again individual will be fruitful. Not to be fruitful is to be faithless, without faith, and therefore without salvation” (Charles C. Ryrie, So Great Salvation, 41). However, the same author adds three caveats making it clear that concluding a person’s profession of faith is not genuine, and hence that they are unsaved, based on their works is a risky business and to be avoided. Inferring from someone’s deeds that their profession of faith in Christ is genuine is one thing, but inferring from a person’s deeds that their profession of faith in Christ is not genuine is quite another.
Once you read Ryrie’s three caveats, you will understand why. Having said that faith results in “spiritual fruit,” he notes that some caveats, or cautions, are in order. He writes: “First, this does not mean that a believer will always be fruitful. Certainly we can admit that if there can be hours and days when a believer can be unfruitful, then why may there not also be months and even years when he can be in that same condition [cf. Tit 3:14; 2Pe 1:8] . . . Second, this does not mean that a certain person’s fruit will necessarily be outwardly evident. Even if I know the person and have some regular contact with him, I still may not see his fruit. Indeed, I might even have legitimate grounds for wondering if he is a believer because I have not seen fruit. His fruit may be very private or erratic, but the fact that I do not see it does not mean it is not there . . . Third, my understanding of what fruit is and therefore what I expect others to bear may be faulty and/or incomplete. It is all too easy to have a mental list of spiritual fruit and to conclude that if someone does not produce what is on my list that he or she is not a believer. But the reality is that most lists that we humans devise are too short, too selective, too prejudiced, and often extrabiblical” (41-42). After all, saved people are not perfect people; neither are they fully sanctified people.
Central Message of the Text:
A person’s profession of faith is confirmed to be genuine by their faith, love, and hope.
Another Bible Study on this passage: Commendable Christians