July 15, 2006
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When we speak of salvation without works, it leaves a question in the minds of many. They wonder if we mean that a person can live any way they please and still be saved. We don’t mean that at all. Salvation is such a life changing experience that it not only changes a person’s eternal destiny, it changes their present life.
This doesn’t mean that we have to change our life to get salvation nor to keep salvation. Really, it is like a person getting a gift of a million dollars and being told that they do not have to change anything. Their life would change anyway.
So it is with the Christian life. Good works follow salvation automatically. And a person who claims to be a Christian and his life does not change has likely never been saved at all.
A simple four line poem puts it this way:
I could not work, my soul to save;
For that, the Lord has done.
But I would work like any slave
Out of love for God’s dear Son.
Salvation is a free gift. The Lord Jesus has purchased it for us by His suffering on the cross. Anyone who depends on Christ receives the gift of eternal life. And though it may take time to manifest itself, eternal life will change that person.
The change is not the salvation, but it is the manifestation of it. As the apostle Paul put it in Romans 6:14, “….sin shall not have dominion over you…” Hence salvation is like a person joining the armed forces. And good works are like putting on the uniform. It lets everyone know who you belong to.

Russ Nesbit