Good deeds for us

The good works God has prepared for us.
As we have seen: good works have never been the means by which anyone is saved or becomes righteous. The means to our salvation and justification is the works of our Lord Jesus Christ. He did everything necessary for our salvation. This in no way means that God doesn't want us to do good works, or that He is indifferent to the matter. On the contrary, He has already prepared good works for us. As we are told (Ephesians 2:10):

(Ephesians 2:10)
"For we are his workmanship, having been created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them."

God has already prepared the works He has for us, and He has done so with the intention that we should practice them. So it is not we who prepare the good works, but God who has already prepared them for us. We must, however, practice them, i.e. realize them, do them.

Another very important thing: when we have believed, in our hearts, in the Lord and His resurrection, we are born again and become new creatures. As 2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us, "if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature". Although we are not saved by good works, by being new creatures we have been created for them, made for the good works God has prepared for us.

See this "created for" (marked, with red in the above quote from Ephesians 2:10) or otherwise said "made for". These are the same words we'd use to say, for example, "a car is made (created) to travel". "A telephone is made (created) to make telephone calls". "A radio is made (created) to receive radio signals". In other words, God by telling us that we "were created for [made for] good works which He has already prepared for us." He's telling us that He made us perfectly capable, that He created us for, made us for, that it's in the DNA of our new nature to do good works that He's prepared for us to do.

Doing these good works is natural for us, because we were created for them. On the other hand, not walking in this nature would be like not doing what we were created to do. It would be like having a phone that doesn't make calls or a radio that's dead.

We'll better understand the meaning of the good works God has prepared for us by going to (1 Corinthians 12). There we read:

(1 Corinthians 12:27)
"You are the body of Christ, and you are his members, each for his own part."

And (1 Corinthians 12:18)
"Now God has placed each of the members in the body as He willed."

Each of us is a member of the body of Christ with a particular function given to us by God. God has placed us in the body with a specific role, and according to His good will. And just as in the physical body, it is the head, the brain, that is responsible for giving orders to the members. In the same way, in the spiritual body, it is the head - and there is only one: CHRIST (Ephesians 5:23) - that is responsible for giving orders to the members.

The members of the body of Christ, like the members of the natural body, have the task of doing what the head says. We don't have to decide what good works, what role we play in the body. God has already decided and prepared that for us. Our mission is to perform His works, to carry them out, to function as we were intended to function! If we ignore this, if we choose to close our eyes, we will never do our mission.

What I mean, brothers and sisters, is that although God has prepared for us the works we are to do, and although He has placed us in the body with a specific role, it's up to US to carry out these works. It's up to US to do what the Head tells us.

If we don't do it, no one will do it for us. If we don't play our part in the body, then, just as the natural body suffers when members don't function properly, the body of Christ will suffer too. You see, Christ is only the Head of the body. He gives the orders, but He depends on the members to carry them out.

Many brethren have a mistaken idea of what the church is, and they think that ministry, doing God's work, the works He has prepared for us, is something that belongs to the clergy, to those we call "professionals". For the rest, our only mission is to fill seats on Sundays. This is a huge mistake. The Word of God doesn't talk about clergy and laity. What there is is a body, and each brother or sister has been placed in the body by God with a specific role.

You, my brother or sister reading this article, have a specific function in the body. Do you know it? Are you doing what God placed you in the body to do, the good works He prepared in advance for you to do? Or are you simply spending your time in the things of this world (which choke the Word of God and make it sterile - Mark 4:19), since ministry belongs, supposedly to... Professionals?

If you, my brother, my sister, don't do what God created you for, made you for, placed you in the body, then no one else will. You are unique in the body of Christ, because every member in your own body is unique and absolutely necessary. That's why if you haven't yet found what God has prepared for you, you absolutely must.

It's time to leave your armchair and seek the Lord. It's time to say to Him, "Here I am, Lord. What do you want me to do?" He created you for this. He has prepared you, given you full capacity for the good works He has for you.

But you have to be available. You have to want to do them. If you're not available to God, nothing will happen. You'll be like the members of the body who, although in the body, don't communicate with the head. It's a sick member, a member that doesn't function well.

The opposite image - the very clear image of (1 Corinthians 12) with the body, the limbs, the head - is the image of a healthy limb that reacts immediately to the call of the head. It is the image of a man of God who looks at the head to see what it wants and reacts in relation to that and without hesitation. It's the image of a Christian who DOES. He does the works God has prepared for him, bearing fruit and not allowing the Word to fall victim to the cares of this world, the deceitfulness of the rich and the cravings for other things (Mark 4:19). God wants such Christians. Christians who bear fruit and glorify the Father in the process:

(John 15:5, 8)
"I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me and I in him bears much fruit... If you bear much fruit, that is how my Father will be glorified, and you will be my disciples."