Grace, Faith and Works

I’ve been pondering lately the subject of grace and it’s relationship to faith and works.  I have always felt that if I have faith in the Savior, I would need to show that by keeping His commandments and serving Him.  If I didn’t do those things, I would think that it was a pretty clear indication that I didn’t love and appreciate Him and all He has done for me.  

It seems a little bit to me like the relationship I have with my husband.  I have the good fortune to be married to a really good man.  He loves me.  A lot.  He does everything he can to make my life good and to ensure my happiness. I appreciate him for that.  I love him, too.  Because of the love I have for him, and the appreciation I have for him and the things he does for me, I  try to do things that please him. To care for him and do everything I can to make him feel loved.  

There is a little part of my mind that realizes that if I didn’t keep doing the things I do for my husband, he might love me less.  Our relationship would suffer.  Realizing that, I could be doing the things I do, serving him, because I am afraid if I don’t he will love me less.  And if that were my motivation, I would always be worried that I’m not doing enough, that he might love me less anyway.  To all outward appearances, nothing would have changed; I’m still serving him, he’s still serving me.  Outwardly, it still looks like a great marriage.  But there is a very different feeling in our marriage.  I no longer would feel safe and loved, even though he is still treating me in exactly the same manner.  And he would no longer feel trusted, even though he has done nothing to deserve losing my trust.  Eventually, I would probably come to resent him for his unreasonable demands.  And he would wonder why I don’t trust and appreciate him.  

When I think of how I feel about the Savior, I am so grateful for all He has done for me.  He came to earth and lived and died for me.  Because of Him, I am and can be forgiven of my sins, my weaknesses and human failings.  I know there are things He wants of me, things that would make Him feel like I love Him and appreciate all He has done for me.  He wants me to be a better person, to be like Him.  He wants me to love other people and serve them to show my love for Him.

My loving obedience and acts of service cannot ever completely repay Him for all He has done for me.  In fact, a lot of the obedience and service I can’t even manage on my own.  He has to help me or I wouldn’t even be able to do it.  I could spend my life worrying that my works would not be enough to repay Him and that He would be displeased with me because I didn’t do enough.  Eventually, though His love for me had not changed, my desire to love and serve Him would diminish because I feared His judgement instead of appreciating His grace.  

I often hear people say, “I don’t know if I can make it.”  “I don’t know if I can be good enough.”  I just want to take them by the shoulders and look them in the eye and say,”you can’t!  Get over it.”  Jesus died for us for precisely that reason.  Because we can’t be good enough, because we can’t make it on our own.    

We are commanded in the scriptures to “Be ye therefore perfect, even as Our Father in Heaven is perfect.”   (Matthew 5:48)   We can’t achieve this without God’s grace.  Two things happen.  First, God forgives us every time we mess up and second, he changes our hearts so that we are capable of becoming like him.  It’s  not something that happens overnight.  Choosing to accept the Savior is our initial conversion.  Changing our hearts to become perfect is a lifetime work.  It is also conversion: converting our hearts to become capable of perfect Godlike love.  Giving up the natural man is a life-time process, but it’s one that we take on because of our love for God and gratitude to our Savior, not because we fear failure. For with God, nothing shall be impossible (Luke 1:37)