Faith and Works: Reconciling Paul and James

The following is a paper I wrote as part of my work toward a Master of Arts in Leadership, Theology, and Society at Regent College.

A central message of the Christian faith is that God is saving humanity from the deadly effects of sin, and this salvation is accomplished through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. There has always existed tension among Christians regarding humanity’s involvement in the process of salvation. In this paper, I will explore this tension by first reviewing Paul’s perspective of salvation in his epistles and then that of James in his epistle. In light of these two perspectives, I will then address the role of works in the Christian faith. We will find that faith and works are inseparable and that Paul and James do not disagree about their relationship. Thus, there is no need for a faith/works dichotomy.

We read in Paul’s epistles a recurring concern related to the matter of a person’s salvation being dependent on obedience to the law. Paul ensures that the recipients of his letters are well aware that salvation comes through the work of Jesus Christ. This is to contrast an apparently common view in the early church that obedience to the Jewish laws is still required, even if someone has faith in Jesus. Paul corrects this view by emphasizing throughout his letters that all people who put their faith in Jesus for salvation are made righteous; thus, obedience to the law is not required.

To the Galatian church, Paul wrote, “We know that a person is justified not by the works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ. And we have come to believe in Christ Jesus so that we might be justified by faith in Christ, and not by doing the works of the law, because no one will be justified by the works of the law.” (Gal. 2:16) The context of this verse is the Antioch incident in which Paul was addressing the matter of eating with Gentiles. The issue was a collision between Christians who believed it was still important to obey Jewish law to maintain righteousness and Christians for whom the law was not a concern for matters of righteousness. Timothy George comments on this concern regarding eating with Gentiles:

If Gentiles were to be accepted into the Christian fellowship at all, it could only be on the basis of their strict adherence to the Mosaic law. For the strictest Jewish Christians this meant that all Gentile Christian males must be circumcised else they would lack the divinely ordained seal of the covenant; apparently for an even larger number of Jewish Christians, it meant that there could be no table fellowship with Gentile believers who disregarded the scrupulous observance of the dietary laws.¹

For Paul, it is a problem that there is division among the believers over who can sit with whom. In Christ, there should be no division among them, even between Jewish or non-Jewish people, for “There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus.”² This concern of Paul’s that Christians not be required to be circumcised opens the gates for the broader matter of works-based salvation. If righteousness is not based on obedience to the law, then on what basis is righteousness acquired?

Paul wrote to the church in Ephesus, “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God—not the result of works, so that no one may boast.”³ Paul’s meaning in this passage is that justification by faith is not about the greatness of faith or the worthiness of the person who has faith but about the worthiness of the person in whom the faith is placed.⁴ Salvation is indeed dependent upon merit; holiness is required for surviving an encounter with God. It is, however, the merit and holiness of Christ by which we enter God’s presence. Thus, any attempt to earn righteousness through good works is not only fruitless but minimizes the value of Jesus’ sacrifice.

While there is no doubt Paul insisted that salvation is offered without merit, he did not suggest that behaviour was inconsequential. Romans contains a warning similar to that found in James. In Romans 2, we read about Paul’s warning that faith not be without evidence for both the Jew and the Gentile: 

For he will repay according to each one’s deeds: to those who by patiently doing good seek for glory and honor and immortality, he will give eternal life; while for those who are self-seeking and who obey not the truth but wickedness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be anguish and distress for everyone who does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek, but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek.⁵

Lawrence Richards comments, “Here his purpose is not to describe a way of salvation, but the fruit of salvation. When God judges our works, those who possess eternal life will persist in doing good, not to win salvation, but because they care about ‘glory, honor, and immortality,’ and not the things of this world.”⁶

This understanding of Paul’s concern for faith being demonstrated through the way one lives is where we find common ground with James, yet there is still the problematic statement made by James that seems to be a direct contradiction to Paul’s claim that justification is by faith alone, “faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead….You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone.”⁷ Even within these two verses, and the context of Abraham’s obedience being credited as righteousness, it seems James wants to agree with Paul by saying faith by itself is dead. But he takes it further by explicitly stating that justification comes by works and not by faith alone. It almost seems as though James intentionally disagrees with Romans 3:28, “For we hold that a person is justified by faith apart from works prescribed by the law.” 

When two different authors use similar language to make contradictory statements, it is difficult to see that they agree with one another. What is helpful is James’ use of Abraham as an example of someone who was considered righteous before the arrival of Jesus. A careful reading shows that the righteousness of Abraham was not actually credited to him based on his obedience. Genesis 15:6 reads, “And [Abraham] believed the Lord; and the Lord reckoned it to him as righteousness.” The righteousness given to Abraham was based on faith, but the faith was demonstrated by obedience. Had Abraham not obeyed, there would have been no faith to begin with. As is observed by J. Ronald Blue, “Great claims may be made about a corpse that is supposed to have come to life, but if it does not move, if there are no vital signs, no heartbeat, no perceptible pulse, it is still dead. The false claims are silenced by the evidence.”⁸

The skeptic might question this as a semantics issue. What difference does it really make if we are considered righteous before or after we obey? If someone proclaims they have faith in Jesus yet does not demonstrate that faith and then dies suddenly, is that person saved based on their claim to faith? Roger Ellsworth comments on this dilemma from James 2:17 and its relationship with Paul’s view of faith and works:

James believed firmly in salvation by faith, but he believed just as firmly that saving faith inevitably shows up in good works. Kent Hughes helpfully explains, ‘Paul’s teaching about faith and works focuses on the time before conversion, and James’s focus is after conversion.’ We do not have a works faith, but we believe that faith works. We might say that good works cannot produce salvation, but salvation most certainly produces good works. John Calvin says, ‘It is faith alone that justifies, but faith that justifies can never be alone.⁹

The question of the role of works in Christian faith is answered by both Paul and James. In short, it is to prove one’s faith. But, if not to earn salvation or merit, then to what end? We can go back to Abraham, but this time in Romans 4. Paul is walking the recipients of his letter through the timing of Abraham’s faith and circumcision:

How then was [righteousness] reckoned to him? Was it before or after he had been circumcised? It was not after, but before he was circumcised. He received the sign of circumcision as a seal of the righteousness that he had by faith while he was still uncircumcised. The purpose was to make him the ancestor of all who believe without being circumcised and who thus have righteousness reckoned to them, and likewise the ancestor of the circumcised who are not only circumcised but who also follow the example of the faith that our ancestor Abraham had before he was circumcised.

As is the case with James, obedience came after faith. Paul explains that the function of Abraham’s obedience was not to earn salvation but to bring about the purposes of God, namely the establishment of a nation set apart to be God’s people. Abraham is then declared to be the forefather of all who believe. And, if he is our forefather, then we will follow in his ways by doing God’s will to accomplish God’s purposes. Just as through Abraham, God established a nation for himself; through our obedience, God will expand his kingdom and claim more people as his own. Warren Wiersbe comments on this passage from Romans:

As a sign, [circumcision] was evidence that he belonged to God and believed His promise. As a seal, it was a reminder to him that God had given the promise and would keep it. Believers today are sealed by the Holy Spirit of God (Eph. 1:13–14). They have also experienced a spiritual circumcision in the heart (Col. 2:10–12), not just a minor physical operation, but the putting off of the old nature through the death and resurrection of Christ. Circumcision did not add to Abraham’s salvation; it merely attested to it.¹⁰

Returning to James, we see another example from the Old Testament in the person of Rehab. James writes, “Likewise, was not Rahab the prostitute also justified by works when she welcomed the messengers and sent them out by another road? For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is also dead.”¹¹ James uses this example not to prove that Rahab’s obedience produced righteousness but that her obedience was a fruit of faith. If we look at the context of the story in Joshua 2, we see that Rahab’s faith existed before the encounter with the messengers. In verses 8-11, it shows that her faith in God came upon hearing about the power of God to rescue the Israelites from their enemies. Because of that faith, the messengers escaped, and the Israelites were able to accomplish God’s purposes.

In conclusion, Paul and James agree on the relationship between faith and works. Paul needed to help the churches, particularly the Jewish Christians, understand that anyone who believes in Jesus is considered righteous. Obedience to the law is not a prerequisite. Yet, he urged believers to demonstrate their faith. James needed to remind people not to be stagnant in their faith but to demonstrate it for the benefit of others and to show the blessings of God for those who not only hear the Good News of Jesus but respond to it by the way they live.

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