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Erring on the Side of Grace

October 22, 2026 at 10:06 AM Leave a comment

I find it absolutely fascinating that many Christians today are often too focused on their works, as though their works are the things that save them. We can all agree that works are a necessary part of our sanctification, but our works themselves have absolutely nothing to do with our salvation or justification. While many Christians give lip service to this reality, I cannot help but wonder if that specific truth has specifically sunk into their hearts and minds?

One of the oft-repeated sayings today within Reformed Christian circles started with John Calvin and goes something like this, It is “…faith alone which justifies, and yet the faith which justifies is not alone.” I cannot help but wonder if it is simply nonsensical? Kind of reminds me of the movie Mystery Men in which one character – the Sphinx – would make these statements intended to be so intelligent that it caused people to stop and wonder. In reality, they were simply nonsense, such as the following.

Learn to hide your strikes from your opponent and you’ll more easily strike his hide.

He who questions training only trains himself at asking questions.

When you can balance a tack hammer on your head, you will head off your foes with a balanced attack.

The implication of the statement regarding faith is that while faith alone is what helps the sinner see who Jesus is and what He has accomplished for us, allowing us to receive salvation (and becoming justified), many argue that it requires more than that same faith to live out our sanctification until the day we are taken home to be with our Lord. If we fail to persevere in that, maybe we were not truly saved, is the sentiment. Yet, Galatians 2:20 clearly negates this belief.

I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me. (emphasis added)

John Piper is quoted by Fred Lybrand (then executive director of the Free Grace Alliance), as saying that “faith ‘produces the works’ (p. 224), and that ‘unless faith has works, then it is not faith at all…'”[1] In other words, Piper would argue that any faith that does not produce good works is a “spurious” faith at best; non-existent. Does the Bible teach this? Not that I can see. In the end, Lybrand refers to Piper’s statement as completely illogical. Those within the Reformed camp couple good works that should follow salvation with perseverance. So if the believer ceases good works and seems to end his/her perseverance, then that individual is labeled a fake believer. They were never really saved, according to them.

I’d much prefer to err on the side of grace than on the side of the Law or the judgment of others whom I may see as not living up to the godly standard clarified in Scripture. It’s impossible for us to truly understand what another person who claims Christ is going through. We don’t know what weighs them down or preoccupies their mind. We cannot tell what heaviness they carry or why they are having a difficult time overcoming. We are unaware of what troubles their minds or hearts unless they tell us. Unfortunately, most Christians often put on a smile on with a carefree attitude when around other Christians. They don’t want to be seen as suffering or under a heavy burden. They may be exhausted with what they carry and for them, it has become easier to pretend than to reveal their heart’s condition.

Erring on the side of grace allows me to stop looking at them from the outside and simply trust that God is at work in them, regardless of how small (or seemingly non-existent) their steps are in life. It’s way too easy to see the outside and offer a snap judgment, isn’t it? Instead, we should become prayer warriors for that individual, asking the Lord to graciously, consistently bring them back to a reality about their faith so that good works will naturally come to the fore, not for salvation (if they already have that), but so that they themselves will not be ashamed when they see the Lord.

In referring to the cliché stated above regarding faith, Lybrand makes this statement.

The cliché is wrong, and works do not prove salvation since salvation is accomplished apart from works.[2]

Ideally, works should flow from the life of the authentic Christian. This is urged throughout the New Testament by Jesus, Paul and others. However, there is no guarantee that works that glorify God will occur in the life of the believer. It’s a cooperative effort on the part of the believer with the Holy Spirit working in and through. But we all have a choice, every day. We can follow Paul’s advice about presenting ourselves as a sacrifice to God in Christ Jesus daily (Romans 12:1ff), or follow the dictates of our Self, even though we have died to that life in Jesus (Galatians 2:22-24).

In the opening pages of his book, Enough in Christ, Jon Moffitt makes this statement.

There is a kind of exhaustion that sleep cannot fix. Many believers know it well. They wake up already behind —not behind on tasks but spiritually behind. There is always something more they should be doing. Something more to fix. Something more to prove. The Christian life often reflects a moving walkway that never ceases. If you slow down, you will fall behind. If you stop, you feel guilty.

This exhaustion is rarely loud. It rarely manifests as rebellion or bitterness. Instead, it comes dressed as  responsibility, faithfulness, and maturity. It sounds like wisdom. It feels serious. And it quietly builds a prison in the mind.[3]

Have you ever been there? I have, all too often. What is the problem here? It is because I have spent too much time looking inward in an attempt to judge myself as to whether or not I am “on the mark.” But being focused on my inward status is not only wrong because I cannot offer a truly independent judgment, but it is actually debilitating to me as a believer, because my focus is on me, not Jesus. It is absolutely impossible for me to discern the true state of my inner life. This is why we are told that we must “lose ourselves” in Christ. But the enemy comes along and, just like he did with Eve and Adam, offers something that sounds so remarkably righteous that we cannot avoid being taken in by it.

This is the problem with Lordship Salvation in a nutshell because it prompts a believer to spend their time inordinately critiquing themselves as to whether or not they rise to what they believe pleases God. How is this then measured by the believer? By cataloging all the things that the believer does, says and is. This constant cacophony of noise within our hearts and minds makes us actually numb to the very Presence of Jesus within us. Moffitt states it this way.

The tension many Christians live with is not between sin and holiness, but between what Christ has declared complete and what they feel responsible to continue. The mind accepts the gospel in theory, but the heart lives as if the work is ongoing. The result is constant pressure without rest. (emphasis added)[4]

That paragraph above describes me. I have spent too many years mulling over my life; what I’ve done, what I feel called to do, my activities, my seeming lack of desire to do many things that seemed to me to be things that He would have me do, yet I did them in my own strength because I believed I needed to do them, period, whether I felt like it or not. What Moffitt breaks down for us is that there is a far better way and that way stems from a place of rest in Him.

Years ago, I recall reading books that talked about the Faith-Rest life and I wanted that.[5] It made sense to me, yet it has been largely beyond my grasp. Satan has such a sinister way of derailing us from understanding our true identity in Christ and all that comes with it. He wants us using our own energy to do what God calls us to do instead of coming to our Father with the admission that in order to do what He has called us to do, we need His strength, not our own.

But too often I have simply used my own strength. I have pulled myself up by my own bootstraps and just got it done because that’s what mature adults do, right? Let me give a current example of what I mean here.

I am in my Phase 3 to complete my certification in biblical counseling. During this phase, I will need to log 50 hours of actual counseling sessions for my supervisor. I have to record sessions (with counselee’s permission), write up things about each session and where I’m going with counseling. My supervisor will need to follow along and approve things for me. In the end, my supervisor will be the one to recommend me for certification or not.

My issue is the actual counselees. Where do I get them? I cannot simply put an ad in the local paper advertising that I need counselees who need counseling. What I have done is to talk to a few local pastors and ask them to send me anyone they come across in their congregations that may need biblical counseling (if the pastor is not able to meet with them). Apart from that, what else can I do? Well, there’s only one thing and that is to simply, by faith, pray about my situation and start trusting that if the Lord wants me to complete my Phase 3, He will send people my way who need biblical counseling. It’s then in His capable hands and I don’t have to run all over trying to make things happen.

If I try to round up people using my own energy, I will put my mind in gear and start worrying about who to talk to and how to go about obtaining people to counsel. I can already see that I would expend a great deal of energy trying to make this happen and in the end, I may have little to nothing to show for it and wind up exhausted because I know the way my mind works.

What is the better way? Obviously, the better/best way is through the use of faith. How does that work in this situation? I go to the Lord and He obviously already knows the need for me to counsel 50 hours worth to fulfill my requirements. Knowing that He already knows this, when I go to Him about this, and leave it in His hands, will He work? I believe He will absolutely work and things will happen without me having to make them happen. What is the end result? The end result is what occurs on the outside and on the inside of me. For me, I am more relaxed on the inside knowing that I am giving it to Him for Him to work the details out. On the outside? I believe things will fall into place and He will provide people who need biblical counseling because they are out there.

Will God provide counselees? I believe so, but what if He does not? Then what? Well, I have a year or so to complete this Phase 3 and if, by some chance, I do not get my full 50 hours of counseling in, that means that I will not pass Phase 3, which also means I will not become fully certified. That’s in God’s hands, not mine. It also means I can still act as an encourager or coach in discipling other believers who are having difficult times.

In going to Him in faith believing that He will bring to pass what He wants to bring to pass vs me trying to make things happen on my own and in my own strength, I am using the same faith when I received salvation now in the process of my sanctification. I can clearly see the difference.

For whoever enters God’s rest also rests from his own work, just as God did from His. Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following the same pattern of disobedience.  (Hebrews 4:10-11 NKJV)

In the letter to the Hebrews (Jewish believers), the writer encourages readers to enter into the rest God has provided. Notice the words, “Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest…” Too many believers read that and think “I’ve got to work hard to create that rest within myself!” That work then is often seen as actual “works“.

What the writer is actually saying there though is that God created a rest for the believer and our efforts should be utilized in exercising faith to bring ourselves into the reality of the rest that God has created for us. We don’t partake in physical works to gain that rest. We enter through faith and good works stem from that. So, this rest can be experienced in spite of the situations we find ourselves in and that rest becomes the motivational factor in living the way He wants us to live.

If you talk to many believers today who are in the reformed camp and who have adopted Lordship Salvation as a mantle, if they are honest, they will likely tell you they never or rarely experience a sense of peace or spiritual well-being about themselves. In fact, many might even admit that they are not terribly happy or even unhappy with their lives. They don’t believe they have come up to a standard they have sought. Instead, they constantly deal with anxiety about their standing before the Lord. They never feel good enough and as Moffitt says, there is always more to do. It never ends.

But while we can see that yes, there is always more to do, if done from the vantage point of truly resting in the actual rest He created for believers, then that work becomes almost effortless and not at all physically taxing. Why? Because it is our faith that places us in the desired position of our head resting on the bosom of our Lord even though we are involved in doing things for Him and His Kingdom.

Be honest and ask yourself what happens when you stop working and simply take time to rest. I’m not talking about sleeping at night. I’m talking about not actually doing anything at that moment. Does that make you feel guilty? Do you feel chagrined because you believe you should be out there doing something?

 

[1] https://www.backtofaith.com/tag/zane-hodges/

[2] Ibid

[3] Jon Moffitt, Enough in Christ, Freedom from a Performance Driven Life, pg vii

[4] Ibid, pg viii

[5] https://cdn.thiemeministries.com/pdf/books/the-faith-rest-life-2026-01-16T14-34-17.pdf

 

 

Entry filed under: christianity, eternity, Religious - Christian - Prophecy, Religious - Christian - Theology, salvation, sanctification. Tags: classical grace, faith rest, lordship salvation.