How can salvation be not of works when faith is required? isn't believing a work?

The concluding verses of the section (8-10) show that salvation is entirely by grace on God's part, pure favor at a time when we deserved wrath and judgment. "Through faith" is the means by which we receive such grace, faith being not in itself a thing of merit, but that which rightly recognizes all merit in the Lord Jesus Christ, having confidence simply in Himself. "And that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God." Even faith to believe is seen as God's gift for in our natural state faith was far from us. God alone has worked marvelously in changing matters, giving us faith and salvation by grace, and indeed every spiritual blessing.

Verse 9 firmly guards against the human natural thought to add works to grace and faith: "not of works, lest anyone should boast." All occasion for people's self exaltation is utterly taken away. We are reduced to our true place and God is exalted. Believers are seen to be "His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus" (v.10). Precious work of new creation, by power infinitely higher than all human work! Let us delight to think of what it means to be the subjects of God's miraculous work. Yet His work in us is "for good works" (v.10), for good works are the proper result after God's work has brought salvation. Yet God has before prepared even these good works for us to walk in. Therefore, if we believers do good works, we have nothing to boast of, nor do we have any excuse for not doing them.

The contemplation of it leads the Apostle to again emphasize the fact that our salvation is all of grace. He had stated this previously, in verse 5, in a parenthetical way. In verse 8 he enlarges upon this important fact, and adds that it is also through faith. The grace is God's: the faith is ours. Yet even our faith is not of ourselves. Faith is not a natural product of the human heart. The weeds that grow by nature in the heart of man are detailed for us in Romans 3:9-19. Faith is no weed at all, but rather a choice flower which once planted by the heavenly Father can never be rooted up. It is the gift of God.

Now this necessarily excludes works; that is, works done in order to obtain life and blessing. The only works of which we were capable were those detailed in verses 2 and 3, and in those works we were spiritually dead. God Himself is the Worker and we are His workmanship; a very different thing. Further, the work necessary was nothing short of creation. How obvious then that human works must be excluded.

I maintain, therefore, that the salvation spoken of in Ephesians is already complete for him that believes; so absolute indeed, that none can add anything to it, because it would be adding something to Christ, and to what Christ has done. And this may not be, cannot be, seeing that it is all the free, unmerited, unmingled mercy of God. And this is the great thing for the soul. Am I able, without question of what I am, or what I hope to be, or what I ought to do for God, to trust Him now? Can I rest all that I have been and am upon Christ, without any promises or pledges of mine — without any hope or thought of what I may do, because God might take me away in a moment? Can I rest entirely and implicitly in Him? Think of the case of the dying thief, which is a living and notable testimony of salvation by grace throughout all ages. Others may have a work to do afterwards; but there we have one who was an object of grace in the last hours of his life. And there is no other way. Had he lived for a thousand years afterwards, he would not have been a whit more secure by grace than he was then. It is of great moment to bring our souls to the touchstone from time to time — whether we are resting solely upon the grace of God toward us, not upon what people call grace in us, i.e., our faithfulness toward Him. For this is a common notion of grace. They mean a great change that has taken place in the heart in respect of God. This, however, is not what God calls grace, but what He has given gratuitously in the work that Christ has done for sin. "By grace are ye saved through faith." The Spirit shuts out all thought of man's contributing the faith or taking any credit because coming to Christ; for He says immediately after, "And that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God." This probably refers, not only to the salvation, but to the faith; it was all the gift of God, and not man's production: "Not of works, lest any man should boast." On the contrary, instead of being a question of our works, we are God's handiwork, the new creation for His own praise. "For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has before ordained that we should walk in them." There you have a most plain proof that there could be no carelessness as to the walk of the believer; but the same verse cuts off all thought that man's doing can be the ground or means of salvation.

Here, then, we have the believer the workmanship of God in Christ, and this "unto good works, which God has before ordained that we should walk in them." This is a very remarkable expression, and one that we cannot too much weigh. It is not the good works of the law — not those which might seem so in human judgment, but an offering of a new character, heavenly and of grace, which was in God's mind and all determined about us before the scene existed into which we are now brought. The same God who had a purpose of saving us and blessing us with Christ before the world was made, had a certain line of walk, a special course of action, in which He expected the recipients of such favour to walk. It is not the thought of the good we ought to do as men, as a means of showing that we are willing to obey God under the law. It is not loving God, and one's neighbour as oneself simply, but another type and display of love altogether. It flows from our new relationships, and if it be exercised in loving God and loving those around us, it is according to the rich love which God Himself has shown us in Christ. It is not merely duty, let it be the very highest form of obligation. If a man were to walk merely in this, though ever so well, he would fall short of what a Christian ought to be, and they are not the "good works which God has before ordained that we should walk in them." The law was brought in by Israel's presumption and self-conceit; it was not something that God had before ordained for His people to walk in. Therefore it is said in Romans, that law came in by the way (περεισῆλθεν). It was a thing that entered incidentally, as a sort of parenthesis brought in for a special but very momentous purpose. And it has done its work, and the believer, even if he had been under it, is brought clear out of it and made alive to God. He has a new husband, and is dead to the old one. But here the truth is put in a very beautiful form, in harmony with the character of the whole epistle. As the calling and the purpose and all that God thought about us were before the world was, so even the character of the believer's walk was ordained before ever we came into the world and is in its own nature entirely above it. It is a question of our manifesting God aright, as He is now displaying Himself. "Be ye followers of God as dear children."

Now as to the passage in Ephesians 2, it is very simple. What is said of the neuter is this: the adversaries of this truth say that τοῦτο ("that") cannot agree with "faith," because the latter is feminine; but in the same way it cannot agree with "grace" (χάρις) because it is feminine. Then they say, It is true, but it agrees with the whole thing, salvation; but this has no sense. "By grace ye are saved through faith, and that (this salvation) not of yourselves, it is the gift of God." Certainly salvation by grace is not of ourselves, otherwise it would not be grace - impossible to suppose that grace is of myself, so that in this case "and that" has no meaning. But it may well be supposed that faith is of ourselves, as you say; therefore when he has said that it is by faith he adds, "and that, not of yourselves, it is the gift of God." In short, by true faith we have life; we are children of God; but this is so because we are born of the Spirit, who works in us, and produces faith when we are begotten of God by His own will. To be begotten of God is by His operation, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit; but seeing that it is by the word, and by means of faith (the Spirit gives to the word the divine power which produces life, as the incorruptible seed of the living God enduring for ever), the word of God becomes the revelation of His Son in us, and Christ thus received is our life.

(Vv. 8, 9). All is brought to pass by the grace of God, and every blessing we enjoy is the gift of God. The very faith by which salvation is received is the gift of God. The works of man have no place in securing this blessedness; all is of God, and hence there is no room for man to boast.

(V. 10). This leads to a further truth. Not only are our works shut out — for God has done all the work — but we also are His workmanship, and, as such, we form part of a new creation in Christ Jesus. If, however, the works of the law are excluded as a means of salvation, we are not to infer that works have no place in the Christian life. There are indeed works suited to the place of blessing into which we are brought, which God has before prepared that we should walk in them. These works will come before us in the later part of the Epistle, in which we are exhorted to walk worthy of the vocation, and to walk in love, to walk as children of light, and to walk carefully (Ephesians 4:1; Ephesians 5:2, 8, 15).

Ephesians 2:8,9 is to be fully and without question recognized as absolute truth. The grace of God in Christ Jesus, grace shown in the willing sacrifice of the Son of Man at Calvary, is the one and only principle by which God saves men from the guilt of their sins, Human works have no place whatever in this marvelous transaction. Man does not and cannot deserve in the least the blessing of his soul's salvation. Therefore he has nothing whatever to boast of. On God's part, grace saves him. On his part, only faith apprehends this, faith that bows to God and takes Him at His Word. Lest anyone should think highly of himself for having faith, it is added, "and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God." Faith itself is God's gift: it is not a matter of merit on man's part. God's grace both saves and preserves every believer. This is consistent with God's election, of which we have spoken. We are chosen in Christ by God's own pure grace. Nothing is ever to dim the luster of this great fact in the eyes and heart of the child of God.

Verse 9. That salvation is "not of works," results inevitably from the doctrine already stated. Instead of being won by his own effort, salvation is received by the believer as the end of his faith (1 Peter 1:9). But the reason elsewhere given is here also added it is not of works, "lest any man should boast." God, who is seeking the glory of his Christ, will still all human boasting. He does so now with His elect by the power of His saving grace. He will do so in the coming day of judgment, when the haughtiness of man shall bow before the fearful presence of His holiness. It is evident that boasting is excluded where salvation is of grace. Believers are not boasters but worshippers, adoring with a wise and understanding heart the God whom they have learned to know and love, through His manifestation of His own rich grace in Jesus. The doctrine of this verse, and of the entire passage of which it forms a part, may be easily paralleled by the attentive reader of Scripture; for it is the fundamental doctrine of the Gospel. Happy are they who, in a clear perception of the mystery of saving grace, are kept from glorying in anything but the cross of Him through whose sore travail all this great salvation is their own.

Verse 10. "For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has before ordained (or prepared) that we should walk in them." Instead of working, we ourselves are wrought of God. Two words occur in the verse, which it is proper to distinguish. First, the saints collectively are styled "the workmanship" (poiema) of God. The force of this expression is to show the completeness, whether of the Church in its unity, or of the believer as a particular member of the body of Christ. A Christian, when considered as a vessel of saving mercy, is not in process of formation, but completely made. But we are said also to have been "created (ktisthentes) in Christ Jesus." We cannot hesitate as to the intention of the Holy Ghost in his selection of such a word. It is, beyond doubt, that the absolute originality of this work of God might be forcibly impressed on our minds. It is not an adaptation of something that previously existed, but a new creation. A believer carries nothing of himself into Christ; he is another and a new man. The old nature having been set aside judicially in the cross of Christ, we receive in Him, and from Him, another nature, a new and altogether different life. Hence the perfect propriety of describing the conversion of a soul to God by an expression which conveys nothing less than the idea of primary and absolute creation. Identity is not destroyed, fin• it is we who are thus said to be new made. On the other hand, it is no longer we, but Christ. Being naturally lost, we are found in Him. If we are really alive to God, our life is by the faith of Him who loved us, and gave Himself for us (Gal. 2:20).

But this creation of God is also described in its intended results. If God creates His people anew, it is that they may glorify Him by their obedience. For they who are truly sons obey the Father that begat them. His children must bear some resemblance to Himself in their desires and their ways. And God has perfectly provided for this end. The good works in which believers are to walk have been prepared beforehand by Himself. This is accordingly expressed with much distinctness in the verse before us. We are created "unto good works, which God has before ordained that we should walk in them." The intention of the Apostle in the previous verses is very manifest. Nothing could be more important, in the eye of the Spirit of God, than that Christians should be preserved from the danger of confounding the practical effects of grace in themselves, with the completed work of God by which He had definitively stablished them in Christ as living members of His Body. Having, however, declared thus emphatically the great doctrine of sovereign grace, he does not fail to state, with equal clearness, the moral results of God's saving power, as they exhibit themselves, in a greater or less abundance, in the conduct of His people.

Notice, it is “not of works” as the principle, but it is “unto good works” as the object. Good works accompany salvation, but they never go before it. Up to that point they are only sinful.

“But to him that worketh not, but believeth on Him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.” God is no debtor to man: He is a Giver; and any blessing from God to man can never be on the ground of man's works, but only on the ground of God's grace. Judgment is according to works; but salvation, thank God, is according to grace. And this verse 5 is marvelously plain and decisive for eyes that have been opened by the Spirit of God. “Working” is put over against “believing on Him that justifieth the ungodly.” Do I work for justification, or do I receive it freely by God's grace through faith in His Son? It is one or the other. There is no mixture: the two are distinct. But God cannot impute righteousness to my account in virtue of my works. Why?Because they are not perfect in righteousness: they savor all too strongly of unrighteousness. But the virtue of the work of Christ is a different thing: it is perfect, faultless, unadulterated; and on this ground God can freely impute righteousness to the account of “him which believeth in Jesus.”

First, "It is to him that worketh not, but believeth" (working and believing are here contrasted). And who are we to believe in? The God "that justifies the ungodly." Who but God could do that? A human judge could not do it: he might let the guilty one off, or be merciful to him; but it is not in the power of any human judge to justify a guilty criminal: for to justify him he must clear him from every charge that could be brought against him, which if he was guilty he could not do. But, blessed be His name, God can, and that in a way perfectly consistent with His own perfect righteousness. He justifies the ungodly.