The Jeff Cavins Show (Your Catholic Bible Study Podcast) - Faith Without Works, Doesn’t Work

Episode Date: September 24, 2021

It’s good to have faith, but you need to have the work to back it up. Today, Jeff explains why it’s so important to pair our faith with works, giving several examples from the Bible and the Catechism. Snippet from the Show “Entrust yourself to him.” Email us with comments or questions at [e-mail]. Text “jeffcavins” to 33-777 to subscribe and get Jeff’s shownotes delivered straight to your email! Or visit ascensionpress.com/thejeffcavinsshow for full shownotes!

You're listening to the Jeff Kaven Show, episode 238. Faith without works doesn't work. Hey, I'm Jeff Kavins. How do you simplify your life? How do you study the Bible? All the way from motorcycle trips to raising kids, we're going to talk about the faith and life in general. It's the Jeff Kaven show.

Well, thank you again, my friend, for joining me this week, I have looked forward to being with you and sharing some of the good things from the Lord with you, as I'm sure if the microphone was in front of you, you could share some very good things about the Lord to me, some things that are going on in your life. I like to take some time this week to talk about really something that is so core to being a Christian, and that is faith and works. It's like salt and pepper in a recipe. You just, there are certain things in a recipe that are just there all the time. And if that is salt in cooking and baking or whatever it might be, then faith is that salt in the recipe of life, really. And so I'd like to talk about

that a little bit with you this week. And I do hope you're having a good week. Hey, by the way, If you want the show notes, that is some of the paragraphs from the catechism that I mention, some of the scriptures that I use, and a quote here and there, all you have to do is text my name. That's Jeff Kaven's one word and text it to the number 3377, and we'll send you the show notes, and you'll be on the list to get all of the show notes. And that takes a lot of work out of your hands, especially when you're driving, and we'll give them to you. and we do give a rich ample supply of notes on the show. Hey, by the way, I have been getting people emailing me or texting me and asking, is the trip next June to the Holy Land with you and Father Mike still on? Answer, yes, affirmative.

And all you have to do is go to my website, jeffcavens.com. Under pilgrimages, you can get the information. We're going to start taking names, and people can put their down payments down for the trip, and that's going to be coming up shortly. But I wanted to let you know, yes, the answer is we are doing it, definitely, at this point. You know, there's a scripture that I mentioned in the last couple of weeks when I spoke about Don't be Doug and, Doug and Wendy Weiner, talking about complaining. And it was from Exodus chapter 32, and Exodus chapter 32 is that very famous chapter

chapter where Moses goes up on the mountain to seek God. And you and I know, because we have read the whole Bible, we know that he's going to be up there for 40 days. 40 is a number of trying, testing. Well, the people down below didn't know that it was going to be 40 days. And so they waited for Moses to come down. He didn't come down in their time, on their clock or what they expected. And so they did something. They made a golden calf. They started to complain and they made a golden calf, which you know that when you are waiting and you don't seem to get the results that you want, then that often leads to idolatry. We create our own gods. We create our own solutions. I came up. I came up with a solution to the problem. And you can ask Abraham about that. Abraham came

up with the solution several times and well it didn't turn out really that good and i wonder if god kind of chuckles when we say i got an idea i'll do this juxtaposed to uh to his his plan well in exodus 32 they didn't wait for god and they they developed their own idol their own golden calf and i can just hear them say you know what this god thing this yahway thing on mount sinai we tried that And it didn't work. We tried it and it didn't work. How many times have you heard people say that about the faith? They're struggling in life and you say to them, I'm going to pray for you. You need to trust God with all of your heart. You need to walk in his ways. And they respond, oh, I tried that. That didn't work. When they say, I tried that. I wonder if they mean, I tried believing that and it didn't work. I exerted some spiritual energy and gave God the opportunity to come through in the way I wanted and in the time I was planning on. And it didn't work. It didn't work. And so they tune into other things and try that. The idea is that if I think the result, it should happen. And that's faith. No,

that's not faith. That is presumption. Faith without works is dead. it's dead. And this is so common. Maybe you've tried it in your own life. I tried believing. It's like saying, I tried to make the Olympic team in a mile run, right? 1500 meters. I tried making the team. And what I meant by that was I bought the shoes. I bought the clothes online. I bought a book on running. And then two years later, I sat down and watched the Olympics. And by that, what you were saying is that you got all the equipment and then you didn't do anything. And you say, well, I tried making the Olympic team. No, you didn't.

You just bought some clothes in a book. You didn't try anything. And that's where some people's faith is. You had some faith that you could do it, but you didn't do it. You didn't do it. Now, in the Reformation, the two tenets, the two pillars of the Reformation were Sola Fide, which is faith alone, and Sola Scriptura, which is scripture alone. Those are the two tenets of the movement, the reformation.

The only problem is, is that both of them are unscriptural. And that's very easy to point out, Sola Fide, faith alone, isn't in the Bible. It is actually the opposite, faith with works. now when you hear that sometimes you bristle a little bit because we're conditioned to by listening to people say no it's it's faith alone well who said it was faith alone did god say it was faith alone no it was luther faith alone in fact he even tried to interject the word alone into the text and through the encouragement of his colleagues took it out so let's look at this this idea of faith because in the context of everyday life and you believing God, whatever situation it is, it's important to know what biblical faith is. In the catechism, it talks about two aspects of faith.

When we say, I believe, or faith, or amen, which they're all related, it really means two things that we want to look at. Two things that we want to look at. Let me read paragraph 150 of the Catechism. Faith is, first of all, a personal adherence of man to God. At the same time, and inseparably, it is a free assent to the whole truth that God has revealed. As personal adherence to God and assent to his truth, Christian faith differs from our faith in any human person. It is right and just to entrust oneself holy to God and to believe absolutely what he says. It would be futile and false to place such faith in a creature.

So, number one, how do we respond to God's revelation? How do we respond to God? Number two, what is biblical faith? God reveals himself in salvation history, and you've heard me talk about this before, how God reveals himself in time and space, he does it through words and deeds. He doesn't just give us words, but he matches the words with deeds. And there's a relationship between the words and the deeds, and that relationship should communicate to you the fullness of truth and the intentionality of God.

And our response is the same. Our response is the same. God reveals himself through words and deeds, and our response is the same. Our response to God is faith. Let me read this from the catechism. It's so powerful in paragraphs 142 and 143. It says, by his revelation, the invisible God from the fullness of his love, addresses men as his friends, and moves among them in order to invite and receive them into his own company.

the adequate response to this invitation is faith by faith man completely submits his intellect and his will to god with his whole being man gives his assent to god the revealer sacred scripture calls this human response to god the author of revelation the obedience of faith that is really powerful it tells us that that the response to God revealing himself in word and deed, the response is in word and deed, and this involves both the intellect and the will in what the church calls the obedience of faith. And so you have, you have two different aspects to this. Number one, the first aspect of faith is what we would call mental assent. That is, you agree you agree with with god you say yeah i hear that and i say yes amen love it i agree

the second part of this the first being mental assent is a personal entrusting of yourself to god that is that you're getting out of the boat you're walking on water you are trusting god with this revelation and you're going to respond to it by believing it intellectually and walking in it practically. So these two aspects are very, very important, your intellect and your will, mental assent and personal entrusting. That is very important. And all throughout salvation history, you will see that when God reveals himself to his people, it always called on the people to respond. That revelation of God was always matched by the people responding to God. Give you a few examples. In Genesis 6, Noah could not continue life as usual

and build an arc at the same time. He had to respond to God. Genesis 12, which we'll take a look at here in a moment, Abraham couldn't father a nation in Err. He had to move. He had to do something. Exodus 3, Moses could not stay on the backside of the desert and lead his people. He had to step out of the boat, sort of speak, and follow God. In 1 Samuel 16, David had to leave his sheep to become king of Israel. In Amos 7, had to leave his sycamore tree to deliver God's message. Jonah had to overcome a prejudice towards the Assyrians. And in Second Kings, we see that There was no oil until the vessels were gathered. We also see in 2nd Kings 5, no healing until the leper had dipped seven times.

Hosea 10, no harvest, until the fallow ground is plowed and prepared. Simple. And Joel, no reconciliation without repentance. In John 6, feeding of the 5,000, there is no feeding of the 5,000 until we have five loaves and two fish. so we have so many examples of faith without works is dead the two go hand in hand and to be honest with you i wonder why fight about this why would anybody resist this or argue with this is it just an attempt to say well i don't really have to do anything it's just believing in my head and that's good enough when the bible is clear that words are not enough in fact that's what it says in paragraph

546, words are not enough. Let me just read that to you real quickly here. I'm going to add that to the show notes for this week so that you can have that. Paragraph 546 says, Jesus' invitation to enter his kingdom comes in the form of parables, a characteristic feature of his teaching. Through his parables, he invites people to the feast of the kingdom, but he also asks for a radical choice. To gain the kingdom, get this, one must give everything. Not just intellectually agree. They have to give everything. They have to respond with the intellect and the will, the entire being.

It goes on in paragraph 546 and says, words are not enough. Deeds are required. Deeds are required. The parables are like mirrors for man. will he be hard soil or good earth for the word you must respond words are not enough deeds are necessary now when i come back from the break i want to get into this issue of james and abraham to see how abraham didn't just believe but his intellectual assent believing was accompanied by the doing the completely entrusting himself to

the plan of God by getting up and doing something. You're listening to the Jeff Kaven show. Hi, I'm Sonia Corbett, the Bible study of Angelista, and a Baptist turned Catholic. As a Baptist, I thought that Catholic beliefs were invented, that they came out of nowhere and had no connection whatsoever to the Bible. I also happened to believe that the Old Testament was about rules, rituals, and sacrifices that the New Testament gave us permission to ignore for a personal relationship with Jesus. It's a long story, but as God began connecting the Old and New Testaments for me, I was stunned by the beautiful consistency of God in the Catholic Church. I can't tell you how exciting it was when God opened my eyes to the incredible ways the Old Testament foreshadows God's

plan for the New Testament and for his Catholic Church. In my book fulfilled, uncovering the biblical roots of Catholicism, I explain these amazing connections, and I share how those connections helps change my life. If you read this book, I promise that you will come away with tools to help you share your Catholic faith easily, answer questions about how your Catholic faith fits with what's in the Bible, and most importantly, grow deeper in your relationship with Christ. If you're interested in learning more or ordering a copy of fulfilled, uncovering the biblical roots of Catholicism, you can do so at ascensionpress.com or on Amazon. on thank you for joining me again we're talking about faith without works doesn't work and so many of us

are familiar with that because we've tried it you know we just said lord i believe you check i got that i'm with you i'm on the same page and the lord's looking at us like good well how are you going to respond well i did i believe you no no i revealed myself to you jeff i revealed myself to you jeff i revealed to you, Greg, Mary, Susan, Shannon. I've revealed myself to you in words and deeds. And I want you to respond to me, not just with words, but deeds as well. Faith without works is dead. Let's look to what James says here about this idea of faith alone.

And I know that people who would argue with me about this on the Protestant side would say, ah, but what about Abraham? So we'll look into Abraham here in just a moment. Okay, here's what James says in James chapter 2, and I'll put this in the notes for you. But someone will say, you have faith and I have works. Show me your faith apart from your works, and I, by my works, will show you my faith. You believe that God is one. You do well. Even the demons believe and shudder. Do you want to be shone, you shallow man, that faith apart from works is barren? Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered his son Isaac upon the altar? Remember that one right there, my friend. You see that faith was active along with his works. And faith was completed by works. And the scripture

was fulfilled, which says Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. And he was called the friend of God. You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone. And then it goes on in paragraph or in chapter 2 in verse 26 and says, for as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so faith apart from works is dead. That is pretty clear, isn't it? James goes into this in great detail. I find it interesting that Martin Luther actually wanted James taken out of the canon. I wonder why. He called it the Epistle of Straw. He didn't want this in there. And today, people can try to explain away faith in works. Martin Luther's idea was take the entire book out of there. But we have to answer this. We have to address this issue. Is it enough to just believe

in God, or make mental assent to everything he says, or is biblical faith really in one of intellectual assent? Yes, part one, but part two, a personal entrusting of ourselves to God. It seems to be with Abraham. It seems to be with every other character in the Bible in that they didn't just believe, but they entrusted themselves, even the man on the cross next to Jesus. So I want to look at this again. The two aspects to feel. faith and believing. We are not simply stating the core beliefs of the church when we say that we believe. In other words, we're not simply saying, I still believe that tenet of the faith when we, for example, say the creed. According to the catechism, believing has these two

aspects. Intellectual assent, personal, and trusting. We've covered that. And we have to ask ourselves, what are we really standing on in life? What do we mean when we say, when some someone says, you need to trust God, we say, well, I tried that. What don't we really mean by that? Just, I tried that mean, I did believe that for a while, but it didn't work. It didn't, it didn't appear, it didn't materialize. We have to ask ourselves, what are we really standing on? What is my life based on? At what point will I take a stand? Am I taking a stand on simply my dreams, my talents, and my wisdom, or am I making a stand based on God's will? So week after week, when we repeat the creed, we're not just making mental assent,

but we are in the midst of mass actually entrusting ourselves to God. Now, let's look at this issue of Abraham in chapter 15 of Genesis. It is, it's one of my favorite all-time stories where we have Abraham and God is making promises to Abraham. He already did actually in Genesis chapter 12. He promised to Abraham land, a royal dynasty and worldwide blessing. But Abraham knew that there was a problem and that problem was he didn't have any errors. He didn't have any, any children. And so in chapter 15, he sort of goes to the Lord and says, I'm having a difficult time believing this, that all of this you're going to give me, and I don't have any children. And then the Lord takes Abram outside of the

tent and says to him, Abram, look up into the stars, look up into the heavens, and count the stars if you are able. And so we naturally conclude that this is the nighttime and that Abraham is actually counting stars. And that's how many people are going to be in his lineage. It's going to be grand, thousands and thousands of people. But what's interesting is that if you read on in chapter 15

after God says, look up into the heavens and count the stars if you're able, we see that the sun began to go down, which means that God, took Abram out in the middle of the day and said, look up into the heavens and count the stars if you are able. Well, what do you think he saw? Nothing except one son. And God said, so shall your descendants be. And then it says that Abraham believed the Lord and he reckoned it to him as righteousness. Now, here's what a Protestant view of this is, is that Abraham is not being presented as someone who already believed, but this is the point of conversion. This is the

event in Abraham's life where he believes God. He is changed at that point forever on now. But that isn't what happens. It is really quite the opposite. Abraham is already a follower of God, someone who already has faith in him. And the context stresses Abraham's good works and righteousness. For before this, we see that he defeated the evil kings. He rescued Lot and the other captives. He went to a priest of God and gave thanks for the victory. He refused any reward for the wicked king of Sodom from that wicked king. And so God himself promised to give Abraham a reward instead. The fact that God is rewarding Abraham for what he has done shows this isn't a case of a sinner coming to God and repenting so he can obtain forgiveness. It's God rewarding a follower for faithful service.

And that means Abraham isn't acquiring righteousness here for the first time. He is already righteous as his actions have shown. So this is very interesting in that this is one point on the continuum of Abraham's life where he believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness. Abraham believes the incredible promise that he will have a multitude of descendants despite his age, and God reckons that act of belief as a new act. act of righteousness on Abrams' part. And he matched that intellectual assent that he would have children with deeds. He did have children. So I want to encourage you, my friend, this week,

in that if you are, you know, it's easy to do, I know, to get caught in that trap of believism, that you're going to read the word of God and you're going to say, Lord, I believe you for that. walk away from it. Like looking into the mirror and saying, I know this needs to change. I know I should do that. And then walking away and forgetting it. Faith without works is dead. And so we need to constantly recalibrate and train ourselves to respond in word and deed to God's revelation. So let me ask you this. As a friend who's coming alongside a of you today. What in your life are you believing God about? Are you believing God for a good marriage? Then you must have faith and works. It's one thing to believe it. It's another thing to

do it. Enter into this story. Enter into the narrative. Are you believing that your children will grow up and that they will be faithful in serving God and find a faithful, you know, husband or wife, then believe by entrusting your children to God and, yes, making mental assent, but entrust your children to God, raise them, teach them. That's biblical faith. Biblical faith, the word is emunah, E-M-U-N-A-A-H. you can spell it that way, transliteration, emunah, and it speaks of long continuance, faithfulness, and that is the way we respond to God. You know, in my life, to be honest with you,

this makes my life much more clear that I can sit around and believe certain things, but if I'm not willing to respond by doing, then I am fooling myself. I'm deceiving me. I'm deceiving me. myself, actually. And it's one thing to be deceived by others. It's a completely different animal when you deceive yourself. And that's what happens. You deceive yourself when you believe, but you don't respond. So this is also something that I would encourage you to teach your children, that they are going to get into that rut of believism, that is intellectual assent only. And that can be very, very dangerous. Teach them, encourage them to respond to God completely in faith and works. The two, faith and works. And some people would say, well, naturally, biblical faith does have works. But oftentimes it's not taught that way. It's taught that all you have to do is make intellectual assent, believe, and the works are different. And that's just not true. I hope you have an amazing week this week. And I pray for you right now,

I'm going to pray that God will continually woo you and continually draw you into a complete response of faith and works, intellectual assent, and a personal entrusting. You believe that the scriptures are the word of God? good entrust yourself to him do you believe that mary has been given to you as a mother good entrust yourself to her do you believe that jesus is the savior of the world and your great physician and your counselor good entrust yourself to him you believe that the church was established by god good entrust yourself to the teachings of the church and the protection of the church let me pray for you in the name of the father and the son and the holy spirit lord i lift up my friend to you today and I ask you, Lord, to move in their life in a powerful way.

Lord, may you move them to be faithful in all that they do and respond to your revelation in the same way, in like kind, that is, by faith and works. Intellectual assent and a personal entrusting. May we not be those who say, I tried that, and it didn't work, but may we be those who say, I believe that and entrusted myself. I pray this in your mighty name, in the name of Jesus. Amen.

God bless you, my friend. I love you. Pray for me, and I will pray for you this week.