Monday, October 01, 2012

On Faith and Works

From the Catholic perspective, faith and works have to go hand in hand. You can’t have one without the other. Faith is more than just the obedience though. It’s to trust in His message so that you completely submit intellect and will to Christ. It’s the “obedience of faith.”

Moreover, Jesus explains to us “if you love me, you will keep my commandments.” The obedience of faith works through love per Galatians 5:6. As I had mentioned previously, God calls man and man responds to God. God’s call to man was Christ crucified on the cross. It’s a visible sign of love to us per John 3:16 and our response to Christ is love out of obedience to Him. So, first we love Christ (per His command) and then through faith we keep His commandments (out of love)
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The response to God is out of love for a God who loved us first. If our obedience is not out of love–perhaps we are obedient in the hope of “being saved” or we are going to mass out of “obligation” then it is not truly a perfect response. It’s not out of love and is not properly centered. It’s an imperfect faith.