Work (41)
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Every good work in us is performed only by grace.Epist. 105 ad Bonifac.
Faith alone justifies, but justifying faith is not alone. Good works though they are not the causes of salvation, yet they are the evidences. Faith must not be built upon works, but works must be built upon faithGleanings, 24
For a work to be considered good it must not only conform outwardly to the law of God, but it must be motivated inwardly by a sincere love for GodChosen by God, 107
Good works are required as the means and way for possessing salvation. Even though they don't contribute anything to the acquisition of our salvation, they are necessary to the obtainment of it. No one can be saved without them.
But where contentment of heart springs from grace, the heart is very quick and lively in the service of God. Yea, the more any gracious heart can bring itself to be in a contented disposition, the more fit it is for any service of God. And just as a contented heart is very active and busy in the work of God, so he is very active and busy in sanctifying God's name in the affliction that befalls himThe Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment
We do not have the ability in ourselves to accomplish the least of God's tasks. This is the law of grace.
Our projects may seem to work and to succeed for some time. However, if the work is not for the purpose of glorifying God, and is instead about making a name or a kingdom for ourselves, in the end the work will fail, or as the apostle Paul states, burn (1 Cor 3:13)Deep Discipleship, 136
If you live gladly to make others glad in God, your life will be hard, your risks will be high, and your joy will be full.
The first part of a good work is the will, the second is vigorous effort in the doing of it. God is the author of both. It is, therefore, robbery from God to arrogate anything to ourselves, either in the will or the act.Institutes, Book 2, Chapter 3
If we can no more bear fruit of ourselves than a vine can bud when rooted up and deprived of moisture, there is no longer any room to ask what the aptitude of our nature is for good.Institutes, Book 2, Chapter 3
Works are an evidence of true faith. Graces are not dead, useless habits; they will have some effects and operations when they are weakest and in their infancy. It is said of Paul as soon as he was regenerate, "Behold, he prayeth" (Acts 9:11). Newborn children will cry, at least before they are able to go. This is the evidence by which we must judge, and this is the evidence by which Christ will judge. Riches
Faith justifies the person, and works justify his faith.
We shall not be saved without working, yet not for our working.
Diligence, as it relates to trade, is a habitual employment of our bodily and mental powers about our proper callings in a just and happy medium between idleness, supineness, and trifling curiosity on the one hand and slavish drudging and immoderate care on the other.
Industry doth beget ease by procuring good habits and facility of acting things expedient for us to do. By taking pains today, we shall need less pains tomorrow; and by continuing the exercise, within awhile we shall need no pains at all, but perform the most difficult tasks of duty or of benefit to us with perfect ease—yea, commonly with great pleasure. What sluggish people account hard and irksome (as to rise early, to hold close to study or business, to bear some hardship) will be natural and sweet, as proceeding from another nature raised in us by use. Industry doth breed assurance and courage, needful for the undertaking and prosecution of all necessary business or for the performance of all duties incumbent on us.Of Industry in General
One asking what was the best compost to manure land, it was answered, the dust of the master's feet.
You will say, "Who are now under the covenant of works?" There is a vulgar prejudice abroad which supposes that the first covenant was repealed and disannulled upon the fall and that God now deals with us upon new terms, as if the covenant of grace wholly shut out the former contract, wherein they think Adam only was concerned. But this is a gross mistake because it was made not only with Adam but with all his seed. And every natural man, whilst natural, whilst merely a son of Adam, is obliged to the tenor of it. The form of the law runs universally: "Cursed is every one that"…(Gal. 3:10), which rule allows no exception but that of free grace and interest in Christ.
To preach the law, in order to Christ; to labor to make men that lie in their spiritual lethargies to know and feel their disease, that they may see the need of and embrace the blessed Physician— is not this rational? I think all men naturally stand under a covenant of works, and to make men know what that state is, I think, is very requisite if ever we would make them feel the necessity and know the worth of a covenant of grace; yet I know not how it comes about. Of late years this kind of preaching is laid by. When I consider the people, then I can see their reasons why they love it not; but when I think of the ministry, I know not why ministers should so gratify the corruptions of people. So the law were rightly preached, I never knew it offend any godly and judicious Christian. Real Christian
why do you let your souls from their work, make them idle and rest from their burdens, by telling them of long life while death chops in upon you unawares?Christian in Complete Armour, 179
Life is not merely a gift, it is a task, an achievement. We are not simply passive recipients of the Good, but free and determinative agents who react upon what is given, taking it up into our life and working it into the texture of our character. Christianity and Ethics A Handbook of Christian Ethics
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Divine knowledge makes us understand the gospel, but it is divine grace which makes us live according to the gospel. Therefore, what you want in great learning supply with good living. I love preaching, and I love practicing; and I had rather hear one sermon in a day and do three good works than hear three sermons in a day and do never a good work else.
The end must be as noble as the means, or else a man may be undone for all his doings. A man's most glorious actions will at last be found to be but glorious sins if he hath made himself, and not the glory of God, the end of those actions.
The heart that is fullest of good works has in it the least room for Satan's temptations. Riches
A wrong sum can be put right, but only by going back till you find the error and working it afresh from that point, never by simply going on.
Love is like new wine, which will have vent; it vents itself in good works.
There is no inconsistency in saying that God rewards good works, provided we understand that nevertheless men obtain eternal life gratuitously.
A man can accept what Christ has done without knowing how it works; indeed, he certainly won't know how it works until he's accepted it.
Man is to properly magnify God's image by living in consonance with the patterns that God has installed in His creation from the beginning, including the pattern of work and rest.There Remains a Sabbath Rest, 52
No storms, assaults, sieges, or pestilences, can hurt us, till we have filled up his appointed measure of service; and when our work is done, and he has ripened us for glory, it is no great matter by what means he is pleased to call us home to himself.
Conversion is not the smooth, easy-going process some men seem to think.... It is wounding work, of course, this breaking of the hearts, but without wounding there is no saving.... Where there is grafting there is a cutting, the scion must be let in with a wound; to stick it on to the outside or to tie it on with a string would be of no use. Heart must be set to heart and back to back, or there will be no sap from root to branch, and this I say, must be done by a wound.
When faith be not exercised upon Christ,
it nods and ceases to produce good works. When hope languishes
and becomes inactive, the heart is no longer lifted above the things of
time and sense by a desirous expectation of good things to come.
Then love declines and is no longer engaged in pleasing and
glorifying God. Zeal slumbers and instead of fervour there is
heartless formality in the use of means and performance of duties
As ever you would enjoy the gracious presence of the Lord, take heed of a lazy, slothful, sluggish spirit in the things of God, in the concernment of your souls.
Hereafter thy servants may be above thee in glory. It is taken notice of, that a contemptible grasshopper, the silliest almost of all creatures, is advanced into the chief city of England, ( London, ) and a principal part of that city, the Royal Exchange, when far more noble creatures are less regarded. He that took upon him the form of a servant, and was vilified and scorned as a worm on earth, is certainly the highest in heaven. A poor servant, like Lazarus, may be comforted and highly exalted, when a rich master, as Dives, may be disgraced and tormented. He that hath not a foot of land, may have a title to the inheritance of the saints in light.
It is true that faith alone justifies, without works; but I am speaking about genuine faith, which after it has justified, will not go to sleep but is active through love.
works are done on the basis of faith through love, not that a man is justified through love.Commentary on Galatians
He who is lazy in temporal matters will be lazy in spiritual matters, and he who is diligent in spiritual matters will be diligent in temporal matters.
During the difficult years of the Great Depression, LeTourneau's manufacturing business was blessed by God. In 1932, his yearly net profit was $52,000; in 1934 it ballooned to $340,000, and by 1938 it was a staggering $1.4 million, which amounts to almost $30 million today. What was R.G.'s secret? The Lord gifted him with an engineer's mind, an adventurous streak, and an incredible work ethic. But it was his commitment to the Lord as his business partner that he emphasized whenever he had the opportunity to speak on the subject.Deep Discipleship, 138
So go marry someone, provided you're equally yoked and you actually like being with each other. Go get a job, provided it's not wicked. Go live somewhere in something with somebody or nobody. But put aside the passivity and the quest for complete fulfillment and the perfectionism and the preoccupation with the future, and for God's sake start making some decisions in your life. Don't wait for the liver-shiver. If you are seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, you will be in God's will, so just go out and do something.
Every one should strive to be like to them in grace whom they desire to be equal with in glory. He that shoots at the sun, though he be far short, will shoot higher than he who aims at a shrub. It is best, and it speaks out much of Christ within, to eye the highest and the worthiest examples.Smooth Stones Taken From Ancient Brooks
But to show our utter destitution, he argues that we merit nothing, because we are created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has prepared; again intimating by these words, that all the fruits of good works are originally and immediately from God.Institutes, Book 2, Chapter 3
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