“What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and filled,” without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.”
– James 2:14-17 (ESV)
One of my heroes in the faith is Charles Haden Spurgeon. Last week I came across a sermon that he preached at his home church on February 21st, 1861. The sermon looked specifically at James 2:17, and it was entitled “Fruitless Faith.” Toward the end of this sermon, Spurgeon gives a powerful analogy.
A tree has been planted out into the ground. Now the source of life to that tree is at the root, whether it has apples on it or not; the apples would not give it life, but the whole of the life of the tree will come from its root.
But if that tree stands in the orchard, and when the springtime comes there is no bud, and when the summer comes there is no leafing, and no fruit-bearing, but the next year, and the next, it stands there without bud or blossom, or leaf or fruit, you would say it is dead, and you are correct; it is dead. It is not that the leaves could have made it live, but that the absence of the leaves is a proof that it is dead.
So, too, is it with the professor (of the faith). If he has life, that life must give fruits; if not fruits, works; if his faith has a root, but if there be no works, then it would be correct to depend upon the inference that he is spiritually dead.
For the tree, the source of life is the root not the fruit, and the proof of the life in the root is then seen in the fruit. In the same way, for the believer, the source of life and salvation is Christ not our works, and the proof of life in Christ is then seen in our works.
True faith does!