Are We Saved By Faith Alone?

“The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of heaven is at hand; REPENT and BELIEVE the gospel!” Mark 1:15

We are commanded to repent, to turn from the wickedness of our ways. It is not optional! It is non-negotiable! As Matthew Henry has said, “By repentance we must lament and forsake our sins, and by faith we must receive forgiveness of them. By repentance we must give glory to our Creator whom we have offended; by faith we must give glory to our Redeemer who came to save us from our sins. Both these must go together; we must not think either that reforming our lives will save us without trusting in the righteousness and grace of Christ, or that trusting in Christ will save us without the reformation of our hearts and lives. Christ has joined these two together, and let no man think to put them asunder. ... Thus the preaching of the gospel began, and thus it continues; still the call is ‘Repent and believe, and live a life of repentance and a life of faith.’” (Emphasis mine.)

Read James 2:14-26.

There is no faith without repentance, and there is no repentance without faith. They are two sides of the same coin. John the Baptist, Christ Jesus, and the Apostles all taught repentance and faith. With the above passage, people often want to argue that it is about doing good deeds. Verses 15 and 16 might be about good deeds, but what about when you get to verse 21? What “works” was Abraham performing when he offered Isaac as a sacrifice? It was not works of the Law, because the Law would not exist for another 400 years. It was not a good deed, even though we were created to perform them. So what kind of “works” did he perform? As John Owen has said, “Obedient faith is that which saves.”

When Peter had faith that he could walk on the water, what did he do? He had to step out of the boat. When the woman with the issue of blood had faith that touching Jesus’ clothes would heal her, what did she do? She had to reach out to touch them. Faith in action (or living faith) cannot be separated from faith. The two go hand-in-hand. Faith in action (or living faith) perfects and completes faith. Without it, faith is useless, empty, dead, and in vain, as James tells us.

If you look at every instance of faith in Scripture, whether saving faith or otherwise, it is always seen with the corresponding action. If I believe sitting in a chair will support my weight and not collapse beneath me, I actually have to sit in it in order to complete that faith. If I am hanging from the edge of something and you tell me to let go because you will catch me, it does not matter how much I believe you will catch me if I never let go. My faith in your catching me is proven the second I let go. My letting go corresponds to my faith in you catching me.

Every day we exercise faith. The brakes on your car are made to work a certain way, but sometimes they do not work as they are supposed to. Whenever we use them, we are trusting (having faith) that they will work as they are supposed to and not fail. The same trust we put in a parachute to save our lives if we jump out of an airplane about to crash, we need to place in Christ Jesus. But guess what? Having faith in that parachute does nothing if we do not put it on before jumping out of the plane. It does not matter how much faith I have in the parachute to save my life if it is still on the plane and I am hurtling toward the earth.

The very first words out of Christ’s mouth when He began His ministry were, “Repent and believe the gospel” (Mark 1:15). Repentance is having a change of mind. It is doing a 180. It means to STOP what you are doing, where you are going; TURN AROUND; and START doing the opposite thing, going in the opposite direction. It is turning FROM your sin and turning TO God. If there is not a change of relation to my sin, then there is not a change of relation to Christ. If there is a change of relation to Christ, there will also be a change of relation to my sin. See Romans 6, 8, 1 John, et al.

We are not saved by our repentance, but by the same token “faith alone” does not save either (James 2:14). “Faith alone” is imperfect and incomplete (v. 22). Faith always, without fail, requires the corresponding actions for it to be genuine. We are saved by grace alone (Eph. 2:5, 8)! Both repentance and faith are gifts granted to us by God.

Once again, there is no faith without repentance, and there is no repentance without faith. As Paul Washer has said, “The evidence that you have repented in the past is that you are continuing to repent today; the evidence that you have believed in the past is that you are continuing to believe today.”

“REPENT and BELIEVE the gospel!” Mark 1:15