September 12, 2016

A very common belief by people today is that you are saved by believing and having faith in Christ alone. Especially in the South. This is not true, that to me sounds like a belief someone made up to get more of an audience for their church. Like a business pitch, it's easy, quick, and has great results. Who wouldn't want that? Sorry to break it to you guys, but salvation ain't easy (But it is worth it). 

Their perspective is that when Jesus went through the atonement, he died for all our sins and all we have to do is accept him. And it says in the bible that through faith we are saved. So I get where they're coming from totally. But! Faith is a verb, a verb is an action word. So we must act if we have faith. 

Jesus died for our sins, yes. But he did not die so that he could take away our personal responsibility. That would be chipping away at our agency which would make God's perfect plan invalid and worthless. We can't say we have faith if we don't act, then it's just a belief (and I'll get to why that's not necessarily good later). We still have to be responsible for our actions. We are saved by grace (a lot of people will say that) but it is ONLY after we've done ALL that we can do. That's found in 2 Nephi 25:23.

The reason for this belief is because of Ephesians 2:8-9 which says:

8 For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God:

9 Not of works, lest any man should boast.

Ok, so what it's really saying is works ALONE won't save you. But I do understand where the misconception would be. However, like I said in two emails ago, people tend to take bits and pieces to bend it towards their liking and not look at the whole thing. I'm the very next verse of Ephesians in verse 10 it says:

10 For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.

It's basically saying that we are supposed to follow Jesus' example (ordained that we should walk in them) and do good works with our faith.

Why would God have made the Ten Commandments and why would Jesus have established a church and gospel if we could just be saved by believing in him? We still have to follow him and show him through following these and living the gospel that we love him. Otherwise he would've just said "Love me and you'll be saved." And he does say that the greatest commandment is to love him, but if you love him, you will want to follow him and keep the commandments and live the life he has asked us to live. If you can say that you are already saved through faith and don't need to acknowledge following him, then you don't truly love him, if you love him you will want to live in the guidelines, it won't be a half and half, you will live it fully. If you don't truly love him then you don't truly have faith. You only believe. Which brings me to this scripture, which is in the bible by the way, but people like to skip it because the truth hurts for those who aren't living it. It's in James 2:14-26. It says:

14 What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him?

15 If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food,

16 And one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?

17 Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone.

18 Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.

19 Thou believest that there is one God; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and tremble.

20 But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith without works is dead?

21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he had offered Isaac his son upon the altar?

22 Seest thou how faith wrought with his works, and by works was faith made perfect?

23 And the scripture was fulfilled which saith, Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness: and he was called the Friend of God.

24 Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.

25 Likewise also was not Rahab the harlot justified by works, when she had received the messengers, and had sent them out another way?

26 For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also.

Again, this is in the bible. Verse 14 asks if faith alone can save someone. 

Then in 17 it says faith without works is dead. There's no other way I can think of interpreting that! If you don't act on your faith it's worthless. For example, I have faith that the lights will turn on if I flip the switch, but if I don't act on that faith and flip the switch, what good will that do anyone? Nothing. Acting is key. Otherwise it is just a belief.

Verse 19 is intense. It literally says that even the devil believed. Where did that get him? Not very far. He believed, he didn't act in the Lord's will, therefore he didn't have faith. 

In 21 it says even Abraham (in whom every Christian religion believes was a prophet) that he was justified by works! The next verse says that faith is made perfect by our works. People get mad at us because they think we believe that works alone "save" us. No we don't believe that, but we believe that the works make our faith whole.

Then in 24 it again, very clearly says the by works man is justified, not by only faith. It doesn't get much clearer than that. 

25 hits a good point as well, just like we are dead without a spirit, faith is dead without works.

Again, that's in the bible. It kind of goes to show that people like to take the pieces they like and make a business out of religion and bring in a lot of people because their way (not the Lord's way) is easier.

So as we work on what we know to be true, then we will truly show that we love God and our faith will be made whole. If we don't keep the commandments and the gospel then we are quite literally saying, "You know, I love you Jesus, but I don't love you enough to do this." As you come to increase your faith and work and study, you will want to follow him. It will still be hard because you're living in the world. But hey, that's why we're here, to test our faith.

Tueseday:

Elder May sprained his ankle pretty badly today, so I'm not sure how well biking is going to go this next month. And once again, ALL our appointments fell through or we were cancelled on.

Wednesday:

Well. Today was rough. Things are slipping through our fingers like sand. That Deshawn guy who needed a job and had a warrant for his arrest, he got a job and the warrant was taken away. Then he got fired because they found out his background. And now he's probably moving to Florida. That Mike guy (the one we prayed to find) gave us an address and phone number that don't exist. And there's a few other things, but those two were such big miracle blessings and now they're slipping. 

Thursday:

Today was a lot better than yesterday. We had two planned appointments that fell through, so we knocked on two other potential investigators' doors. The first door we knocked on was the wrong door! But we started talking to the guy and he felt prompted to keep talking to us (at least that's what I think he was saying). So we stepped outside, taught him a whole lesson, got his number and have another appointment set up with him and he said he wants to come check us out. The lord works in mysterious ways. And he had biceps the size of my biking thighs. Then we went to knock on someone else's door who wasn't there. Her name is Lisette. We lost this person's contact info so we were kinda sad because we've been knocking whenever we are in the area. As we left her door and were heading out of the complex we saw her walking in! And then we taught her a lesson too and she's also coming to church and has a return appointment set up. She's really tall. She's taller than me. And taller than my companion. My companion is significantly taller than me even when I'm on my toes he can look over my head. So it's intimidating to have a girl that much taller than me.

Friday:

So Deshawn packed up and left to Florida without even letting us know. Hopefully he can get in touch with missionaries down there. We'd love to help him but he isn't answering our calls and we are really hoping he's not getting into selling drugs again. Long story short he's just been suspicious lately. But we aren't to judge. All of our lessons fell through today. But I gave my second blessing and I feel much more comfortable giving them. If anything, I've learned how to rely on and speak with the spirit while being out here. And that's useful in a blessing.

Saturday:

So Elder May gave me a haircut today and he insisted that I go shorter. I said no when I go shorter it starts getting patchy. But he insisted so I said ok. When he was done he looked at me and ran out of the room laughing. This is the shortest my hair has been in at least 7 years. When I left my hair was at a size 7. Now it's at a 1 and 4. So don't be expecting any pictures of me up close for at least a month.

Sunday: 

Nuthin' much. But Lisette came to church.