I call it my gospel.
Read what Paul says:
Acts 26:20 First to those in Damascus, then to those in Jerusalem and in all Judea, and to the Gentiles also, I preached that they should repent and turn to God and prove their repentance by their deeds.
Now read what John the baptizer says:
Matthew 3:8 Produce fruit in keeping with repentance.
Luke 3:8 Therefore produce fruit worthy of repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' For I tell you that out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham.
Acts 3:19 Repent, then, and turn back, so that your sins may be wiped away,
Look at that, John the baptizer, Peter, and Paul himself, they all taught the exact same thing.
Are you really that dense!? What they say is NOT THE SAME. What Peter and John say are the EXACT OPPOSITE of what Paul says.
This is what Paul says:
Prove you have repented by your deeds after you turn to God. Good deeds are the result of repentance and faith.
This is what Peter and John the Baptist say:
Work for repentance, produce fruit so that you become worthy of repentance, work for your salvation AND Repent so God will wipe away your sins.
He (Paul) says that good works are the result of faith, which is what grants us salvation. Faith, no works, for salvation.
John and Peter say works will result in being saved, but belief is also required on top of that.
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GT, there's a true story that I've heard about recently (I won't say where from) where a pastor (no, not Pastor Enyart) needed his roof redone, so one of the members of his congregation offered to redo it for free, and so worked on it until it was finished. The next Sunday, the pastor mentioned how the man did the work for free and thanked him... And then said, intended as a joke, something along the lines of, "well, I guess it wasn't really free, because I took him out to lunch and paid for his food, so I guess you could say it was valued at a few cents per hour. Now, everyone laughed, but it was a joke in poor taste. The man did all the work for free, and then was insulted by the pastor saying his work was worth very little.
Another story (not entirely sure if it's true or not, but still has a valuable lesson) is one where a man's son loved to dive into the oceans surrounding the islands they lived on, and he would collect the oysters for their pearls. One day the boy saw one that was really deep, too deep to safely dive for, but seemed extremely valuable, so he dove for it, and managed to obtain it, and tried to swim back to the surface, but the damage had already been done, and the boy died a few days later. Now there was a missionary who came, and the man told him about his son, and the missionary told the man about Jesus, but the man wanted to pay for this salvation he heard about, but couldn't understand why the missionary said it couldn't be paid for with any amount of money. So the months went by, and it came time for the missionary to leave, and as he was about to leave, the man offered the beautiful pearl his son had died for to the missionary, who thought for a moment, and then pulled out his wallet and handed the man a twenty dollar bill (or whatever currency was used). The man, insulted, went into a fit about how the missionary was dishonoring his son by offering to pay for the gift, and the missionary said to him, "so to you yourself insult God by trying to pay Him for your salvation.
GT, the parallel you need to draw in your mind from these stories to the Bible is that working for the gift of salvation is an insult to God, who sent His only Son to die on the cross for us, a gift beyond value, and when you try to work for it, you're offering your measly pieces of wood and hay and stubble as a payment for his priceless gift to us.
GT, the only way to obtain salvation CANNOT be through works, because you cannot pay for the gift of Christ's blood on the cross. It is by grace through faith alone that we obtain salvation. No works required. You insult God when you say "one must work to be saved."
