good works on Anger

Preaching Commentary The teachings contained in this passage are, for my money, as difficult to preach as any lectionary text. Not only is each teaching difficult in its own right, but each has also...

Preaching Commentary Summary of the Text James, the brother of Jesus, the leader of the earliest Christian church in Jerusalem, writes this letter to scattered Jewish believers who are going throug...

Summary of the Text James, the brother of Jesus, the leader of the earliest Christian church in Jerusalem, writes this letter to scattered Jewish believers who are going through very difficult times....

preaching commentary The Transitive Property of Welcoming In elementary school math you learn various basic principles of working with numbers…the commutative property, the associative property, th...

A man appears before the pearly gates. “Have you ever done anything of particular merit?” St. Peter asks. “Well, I can think of one thing….” the man offers. “Once I came upon a gang of high-testoster...

I was invited to visit a friend who was very sick. He was a man about fifty-three years old who had lived a very active, useful, faithful, creative life. Actually, he was a social activist who had car...

In her memoir, Confessions of a Good Christian Girl, Tammy describes the internal turmoil she experienced trying to be a good, rule-following Christian who had unexpectedly built an entire life arou...

People are often unreasonable, illogical, and self-centered. Forgive them anyway. If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. If you are successful, you w...

At the core of every project of self-salvation is the staunch unwillingness to believe that God’s love and forgiveness can be unmerited. Those who would try and save themselves prefer work to rest, ef...

But let me point out something we almost always fail to notice. We can only be tempted to something that is good on some level, partially good, or good for some, or just good for us and not for others...

How Do We Deal With Jesus? Jesus’ own family asked the question. The Pharisees asked it as well. Both groups arrived at slightly different answers, but their aim was essentially the same⸺to shut Jesu...

How Do We Deal With Jesus? Our lectionary passage this week forces us to ask this question. Jesus’ own family asked the question. The Pharisees asked it as well. Both groups arrived at slightly diffe...

Want to snatch a day from the manacles of boredom? Do overgenerous deeds, acts beyond reimbursement. Kindness without compensation. Do a deed for which you cannot be repaid.

For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passions, and to live self-controlled, upright, and godly lives in this present ag...

Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good!     Blessed is the one who takes refuge in him! Oh, fear the Lord, you his saints,     for those who fear him have no lack! The young lions suffer want and hun...

Grace is not opposed to effort, it is opposed to earning. Earning is an attitude. Effort is an action. Grace, you know, does not just have to do with forgiveness of sins alone.

You don’t turn from sin to get saved. You get saved to turn from sin.

Of course, we do the righteous deed because of our redemption, not for our redemption.

For although faith alone justifies, love is also demanded…. A living faith is that efficacious, burning trust in the mercy of God which never fails to bring forth good fruits.

John Ortberg likens the transformative path of Christ to sailing. Sailors can't make the wind show up; the wind has a mind of its own. But that doesn't mean there is nothing for them to do. Sa...

Faith is nothing else than trust in the divine mercy promised in Christ…. This trust in the goodwill or mercy of God first calms our hearts and then inflames us to give thanks to God for his mercy so ...

When a person has lost Christ, he must fall into the confidence of his own works…. Take great care that no one goes to mass trusting in confession, or prayer, or self-preparation; but lacking confiden...

One particularly crafty, if not insidious way a “good works” righteousness can seep into our theology is by positioning faith as the pre-eminent work. We must never forget that faith itself is a...

Leader: May we go from here knowing we stand upright before the Father because of Christ’s works and not our own. Go, and serve the Lord in the power of the Holy Spirit!

Naked need is the occasion for God's giving, not a need adorned with the clean, elegant robes of respectability and good works.

Gratitude is important not only because it helps us feel good but also because it inspires us to do good. Gratitude heals, energizes, and transforms lives in myriad ways consistent with the notion tha...

Most of us want to have enough... good works to get into heaven, but enough bad works to be fun.

A living faith is that which pours itself out in works.

AIM Commentary Ageless Wisdom If you are reading this as a pastor, teacher or preacher, I want you to jot down how old you are here _________.  If you wrote a number less than 30 know this letter...

But we must add at once that the pious will not cease from good works simply because it is impossible to gain any merit by them. Rather, the greater our faith, the more and greater our works…. For sin...