Works Or Faith?

Now to him who works, the wages are not counted as grace but as debt. 

Romans 4:4-5 

Anyone who works understands the concept of wages. For an agreed upon hourly wage, we work forty hours and at the end receive payment minus taxes and fees. Thus, we receive what our employer owes us. It is not a gift or a gratuity. Hours worked equal what the employer owes us. Paul is making this point regarding salvation. If salvation is by works then God owes it to those who do the right works, and enough of them to merit salvation. If that is so, salvation is the payment of a debt in the same way an employer pays a laborer. Paul is arguing that justification is by faith apart from works. He makes this point definitively in the second half of our text. Once again, he has come to the stark contrast between works and grace. We might ask, why is he so adamant and persistent? It is because we humans are sufficiently full of our own pride and self-righteousness that we will tirelessly insist that our works merit recognition as the foundation of our acceptance with God. Paul will continue to proclaim the exact opposite and set forth Christ as the only One Whose works merit anything. He will continue to point us to Christ as the object of our faith.  

O God of our salvation, 
we rejoice that You continually point us to Christ. 
We praise You that He has done 
the work that we could never do.

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning