How Are We Saved by Faith?

“By grace you have been saved through faith” (Ephesians 2:8).

What does this mean, and how can one be saved merely by having faith? To have faith is to trust something which you cannot see. The word in Greek is pistis meaning “faith, belief, trust, confidence; fidelity, faithfulness.” But Strong’s concordance develops this meaning further: to be persuaded that something is true.

How are we saved by being persuaded that Christ is our Savior?

Not by Works

For one thing, salvation comes from faith in knowing what we are not saved by. Paul continues by saying we are not saved by works (v.9). Why would he have needed to add this point to his explanation of salvation? Because many people then, as now, believed that salvation came from what they did. Leah MarieAnn Klett, exploring recent research about Christian beliefs in the United States, has found that a huge number of Pentecostals, Protestants, and Evangelicals in America “believe that a person can qualify for Heaven by being or doing good.”

Tim Keller explained how we can understand Paul’s message by exploring the Exodus. “Exodus 14:13, where Moses instructed the Israelites to ‘stand firm’ or stand still and ‘see the deliverance of the Lord’. This means … that the Israelites did not need to do anything in order to be saved. Likewise, there are no works for Christians to do in order to receive salvation.” At that time, Jews and members of other religions believed that - to the contrary - they had to do good works in order to avoid an unpleasant afterlife, whether that was eternity in Hell or reincarnation as a cockroach.

One of our challenges is that, if we recognize that we are sinners, we want to be our own solution to that problem. If we can do enough good things or follow the rules, we can make up for the bad things in our moral ledger. Since our sin is the problem and since we remain sinners even once we have been saved, we cannot be our own saviors. Keller likens works-based salvation to building a bridge, a familiar aspect of salvation theology in other religions where “adherents are continuously trying to build a bridge to reach the other side, whether that be enlightenment or salvation, but they never really feel they are there. But in Christianity, there is no process; salvation happens immediately when you believe.”

Not by Legalism

Legalism is another trap. Paul confirms this in Romans 3:28: “For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.” Erik Raymond further explains the dangers of trying to save ourselves by being strict rule followers. “Legalism is a relentless task master that promotes your personal performance as your continuing personal atonement.” We become self-righteous instead of being made righteous in Christ. Legalism also leads us to make our own “laws,” such as those the Pharisees made on top of what God had commanded. “They tie up heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to move them with their finger” (Matthew 23:4).

Legalists will say that if you are suffering, you might be breaking one of God’s commands and he is punishing you. They say you will have to accompany personal and private penance for sin with some kind of action: give away money, volunteer at a shelter, write to your grandmother more often. They say that your actions matter more than the reasons behind them. “To cling to personal merit through doing things (however good or biblical they may seem) is to demote Jesus from his place of supremacy” says Raymond.

Saved by Faith?

Faith in Christ restores him to the center of your life, makes him the focus, so you want to serve him and obey him. John Piper puts it this way: “whenever I am most thirsty and most desperate and most in need of help, I can encourage my soul not only with the truth that there is a merciful impulse in the heart of God but also with the truth that the source and power of that impulse is the zeal of God to act for the sake of his own name.” God is glorified through our lives, he lives through us, and he loves to nurture us. God loves us. Our impulse – when we fix our eyes on him and not on behavior modification – is to love him back by studying and imitating the example of his Son which is so captivating, beautiful, and right.

What does this really look like then, to be saved by faith? When we examine the Exodus, says Keller, we see a group of people with different levels of faith. “They are equally saved. Why? Because you are not saved by the quality of your faith," he explained. Some were jeering the Egyptians, and some were afraid, yet they all passed between those two walls of water which the Lord could have permitted to crash down upon them at any time.

When we have faith in the Lord, we say – in effect – that we trust his character. We trust him not to crush us when we are down. We trust him when he says “come” just as Jesus said to Peter on the water (Matthew 14:29). The Bible tells us who God is, and through the life of Jesus Christ we have an even better idea of that character: Jesus is loving, merciful, and trustworthy.