Faith, works, and justification or Does James really contradict Paul?

When I was a young Christian, this was a hot topic. A lot of this may have been because we were doing a lot of evangelism and often encountering people who openly believed in salvation by faith and works. I remember having the opportunity once many years ago to preach in my brother-in-law’s (Methodist+) church on a Sunday night. My text for the night was Ephesians 2:8-9, For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast. Afterwards one of the members complained to him, “What about good works?” This agreed with what I had often heard from Methodists who, when asked, Have you been saved? would reply, “I’m working on it.” I don’t mean to pick on them, we heard it from many other groups as well. Many times James 2 would be quoted as proof that we are justified by works and not faith alone.

In my early days in the faith justification was a common topic, along with propitiation and other five dollar words (I am thinking about doing a series on those five dollar words!). The Bible college I attended laid great stress on justification, naturally so did I in my ministry. When justification is a common topic James is going to be in the picture.

I said all that to say this, For a while I’ve been thinking about doing a series on James 2:14-26, asking the question, Does James contradict Paul? Justification is not mentioned very often these days, but I do hear people saying we are saved by faith and not by works. Yet James says, Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only. Paul wrote, Therefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith without the works of the law. Which is it? Is this one of the contradictions people claim the Bible is full of?

Martin Luther is famous for igniting the Reformation with its emphasis on justification by faith alone. It is also well known that Martin Luther was not a fan of the epistle of James. He wrote:

“But to state my own opinion about it . . . I consider that it is not the writing of any apostle. My reasons are as follows. First: Flatly against St. Paul and all the rest of Scripture, it ascribes righteousness to works. . . St. James’ epistle is really an epistle of straw, compared to the others, for it has nothing of the nature of the gospel about it.”*

Was Luther right? My plan is to go through James 2:14-26 and see what it is James actually says. This will not be a detailed study, but it will take several posts (five counting this one) over the next couple of weeks. Spoiler alert: the answer to the question, Does James contradict Paul? is, No.


Tomorrow: James 2:14 What doth it profit, my brethren, though a man say he hath faith, and have not works? can faith save him?


+ Methodists have a great heritage. You can read about John Wesley and his ministry to the poor here

* You can read more of Luther’s views on James here