Not By Works

Have you bought into the lie that says because you are religious you are fine in God’s eyes?  Being religious, keeping rules and regulations is not what pleases the Lord.  There are people that teach that if you do this and that you will be right with God, in other words works is behind it all.  There were men in the Bible that thought by keeping the law they would be right with God, in fact, they thought up about 300 of their own laws and expected those they taught to keep them also.  But shamefully they couldn’t keep the laws either but expected everyone else to.  What it came down to is, these men were what we would call hypocrites, people that pretend to be something they were not.

Jesus had much to say about these men, He said this and more about them in Matthew 16:11-12, “‘How is it you do not understand that I did not speak to you concerning bread?—but to beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.’ Then they understood that He did not tell them to beware of the leaven of bread, but of the doctrine of the Pharisees and Sadducees.”

These people were teaching people and leading many astray.  Remember a small amount of false teaching can lead many people astray into falsehood.  Jesus had many things to say about the religious teachers in His day, He warned about them in most of the chapter of Matthew 23:1-36, “Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, saying: “The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. Therefore whatever they tell you to observe, that observe and do, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do. For they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers. But all their works they do to be seen by men. They make their phylacteries broad and enlarge the borders of their garments. They love the best places at feasts, the best seats in the synagogues, greetings in the marketplaces, and to be called by men, ‘Rabbi, Rabbi.’ But you, do not be called ‘Rabbi’; for One is your Teacher, the Christ, and you are all brethren. Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven. And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ. But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant. And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.

“But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you shut up the kingdom of heaven against men; for you neither go in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in. Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows’ houses, and for a pretense make long prayers. Therefore you will receive greater condemnation.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you travel land and sea to win one proselyte, and when he is won, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.

“Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘Whoever swears by the temple, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple, he is obliged to perform it.’ Fools and blind! For which is greater, the gold or the temple that sanctifies the gold? And, ‘Whoever swears by the altar, it is nothing; but whoever swears by the gift that is on it, he is obliged to perform it.’ Fools and blind! For which is greater, the gift or the altar that sanctifies the gift? Therefore he who swears by the altar, swears by it and by all things on it. He who swears by the temple, swears by it and by Him who dwells in it. And he who swears by heaven, swears by the throne of God and by Him who sits on it.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cummin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone. Blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you cleanse the outside of the cup and dish, but inside they are full of extortion and self-indulgence. Blind Pharisee, first cleanse the inside of the cup and dish, that the outside of them may be clean also.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but inside are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. Even so you also outwardly appear righteous to men, but inside you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! Because you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, ‘If we had lived in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the prophets.’

“Therefore you are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of your fathers’ guilt. Serpents, brood of vipers! How can you escape the condemnation of hell? Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes: some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.”

There is not anything you can do to be right with God outside of coming to Him with a broken and contrite heart and repenting of your sins and you can’t even do that without the help of God!!  Without the conviction of the Holy Spirit you will never truly repent, you can do absolutely nothing on you own to be right with God and He knew that so He made a way where there was no way.  We have one way to be saved and it is this; read very slowly and prayerfully Ephesians 2:8-9, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.”

This is hard for many to accept, even believers have a struggle with this.  I guess people are not used to getting things free and especially not this kind of gift.  God made it possible and we can receive it or reject it, but we can do nothing to bring it about, no works of our own.  After we receive this gift of grace then there are good works for us to do, but we don’t do them to keep us saved, we do them because of our appreciation for what the Lord had done for us.

Think of this, when one of the thief’s was on the cross next to Jesus he said, “Remember me when you come into your kingdom.”  Jesus said this, “Today you will be with me in paradise.”  This man died and could do nothing outside of believing that Jesus was the Son of God and he is with Jesus today, praise the Lord!!  If you are reading this, you have the same choice and I hope you make the one to repent and receive Jesus as your Lord and Savior and ask Him to come and take over your life and guide and lead and direct you into paths of righteousness.  I have given you something to think about, may the good Lord bless you and yours and may you have a super day!!  And don’t forget to thank and praise the Lord!!