Week #2: Good Works, Good News

Blog Series Intention Recap

City on a Hill: Living Out Your Faith

Yeshua (Jesus) told His followers, "You are the light of the world. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden" (Matthew 5:14, ESV). Our faith was never meant to stay hidden.

City on a Hill is a four-week Theology Thursday series about what it means to live faithfully in the world while we wait for Yeshua to return. The Church has a unique place in God's plan in this present age. We are not here to build the promised kingdom, replace Israel, or retreat from a world that desperately needs the gospel. We are here to follow Yeshua, make disciples, love our neighbors, do good, and make the truth of the gospel visible through the way we live.

The world should not only hear what Christians believe. It should be able to see the difference our faith makes.

This page is a post in the series “City on a Hill: Living out Your Faith.” Click here to see the rest of the posts.

Let’s jump into Week #2:

"Good Works, Good News"...

If good works don't save us, why does the New Testament care so much about whether unbelievers see them?

Most Christians who have sat under good Bible teaching can answer the first half quickly. We are saved by grace through faith, and nothing we do adds to what Yeshua has done. The second half is harder. Paul and Peter spend a surprising amount of ink on ordinary conduct: how older men carry themselves, how young wives treat their husbands, how workers treat their employers, how believers respond when they're slandered. Again and again, they attach a reason, and the reason has to do with people-watching.

Our good works don't save us, but they can point people toward the God who does.

Why it Matters:

• Good works don't save us. Salvation is God's gift, received by faith.

• Titus 2 keeps tying ordinary Christian conduct to how outsiders view God's Word.

• Paul says believers' conduct can "adorn the doctrine of God our Savior" (Titus 2:10, ESV).

• Peter teaches that honorable conduct matters even when believers are misunderstood or slandered (1 Peter 2:12).

• A good life can raise a question, but the gospel still has to be spoken to answer it.

• God still has purposes for Israel, and Gentile believers' lives have a part in them.

Go Deeper:

It's easy to push good works to the edge of the Christian life. After all, if works don't save us, how important can they really be? They can begin to feel like optional extras or simply a private matter between God and us.

There's another danger too. We can become so focused on being good examples that Christianity starts sounding like a self-improvement plan. People may meet nice Christians without ever hearing about a Savior.

Scripture won't let us choose between the two. Works can't save anyone. But God intends the lives of those He has saved to say something about the gospel they believe.

Settled Before We Start

Before looking at what good works do, it helps to be clear about what they can't do. Paul put it plainly to Titus:

"he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit" (Titus 3:5, ESV)

(The relationship between grace and works was the focus of the series "GRACE," if you'd like to dig into it further.) For this post, that truth is settled, and nothing here changes it. We're asking a different question. Once God has saved someone by grace, what do that person's works have to do with anyone else?

Paul answers in the same letter, one chapter earlier.

A Chapter Full of Reasons

Titus 2 reads at first like a list of instructions for different groups in the church. Older men are to be "sober-minded, dignified, self-controlled" (Titus 2:2, ESV). Older women are to be reverent and teach what is good. Younger women, younger men, Titus himself, and bondservants each get instructions of their own.

What stands out is how often Paul explains why. Young women are to live well "that the word of God may not be reviled" (Titus 2:5, ESV). Titus is to be "a model of good works," with sound speech, "so that an opponent may be put to shame, having nothing evil to say about us" (Titus 2:7–8, ESV). Bondservants are to show good faith "so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior" (Titus 2:10, ESV).

Three groups, three reasons, and every reason points outward. Paul expects people outside the church to be watching Christian homes, Christian teachers, and Christian workers, and he expects what they see to shape how they think about God's Word.

It's a sobering thought. Our conduct can hand people a reason to dismiss the gospel, or it can take that reason away.

Adorning the Doctrine

The last of those reasons is the most striking. The Greek word behind "adorn" (kosmeō) is the root of our word "cosmetic." It was used for putting something in order or decorating it so its beauty could be seen.

Paul isn't saying good behavior makes the gospel true. The doctrine of God our Savior is true regardless of how faithfully Christians live. But our lives can display that truth beautifully, or make it harder for others to see.

Think, too, about who Paul is addressing. Bondservants had very little social power in the Roman world. Paul isn't endorsing that system here. He is speaking to believers living within circumstances they had little power to change. He doesn't tell them to wait for better circumstances before their lives can matter. He tells them that honesty, reliability, and a refusal to pilfer could make the gospel look beautiful. If people with that little standing could adorn the doctrine of God, none of us are too ordinary to do the same.

Verse 11 then opens with the word "For." The grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation. Christian conduct can adorn the gospel because the gospel is about grace that has already appeared and is already at work in people. Paul says Yeshua gave Himself "to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works" (Titus 2:14, ESV). Good works are what God's grace produces in His people. When outsiders see those works, they are seeing some of the fruit that grace produces.

Seen by People Who Disagree

Peter makes a similar point to believers under pressure. He writes to "elect exiles of the Dispersion" (1 Peter 1:1, ESV), people living as outsiders in a world that often misunderstood them:

"Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation." (1 Peter 2:12, ESV)

Peter doesn't promise that honorable conduct will immediately silence their critics. He does expect those deeds to matter when God visits. Interpreters differ over whether Peter has God's visitation in mercy or judgment primarily in view, but his central point is clear: the conduct of believers is being watched, and God will ultimately be glorified.

The echo of Yeshua's words is hard to miss. He told His disciples to let their light shine "so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 5:16, ESV). What Yeshua said in Galilee, Peter now applies to scattered believers facing hostility.

And sometimes the life people notice is remarkably ordinary. Paul tells the Thessalonians to live quietly, mind their own affairs, and work with their hands, "so that you may walk properly before outsiders" (1 Thessalonians 4:12, ESV). Some of the most persuasive good works aren't dramatic at all. Paying your bills, doing your job well, keeping your word, and staying out of other people's business all say something to the people around you.

Works Point, Words Explain

A good life can raise a question, but it can't answer it. Neighbors may notice that a Christian family is kind, patient, or generous. They won't work out from that alone that Yeshua died for their sins and rose again.

Paul is clear that faith comes through hearing:

"How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching?" (Romans 10:14, ESV)

A few verses later he sums it up: "So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ" (Romans 10:17, ESV).

So the title of this post has two halves, and they need each other. Works without words leave people admiring Christians without knowing why we live the way we do. Words without works leave people hearing a message the messengers don't seem to believe.

Peter puts the two side by side. Believers should be "prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect" (1 Peter 3:15, ESV). Good conduct often prompts the question, and our words answer it. Paul adds that our speech should be "gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person" (Colossians 4:6, ESV). Salt shows up again, this time in the way we talk.

How Does This Help Me Understand "Good Works, Good News"?

Our good works don't save us, but they can point people toward the God who does. Titus 2 shows ordinary Christian conduct adorning the gospel. First Peter 2 shows it turning hostile observers toward God. Romans 10 reminds us that the gospel still has to be put into words.

The recurring truth of this series already holds both sides together: The world should not only hear what Christians believe. It should be able to see the difference our faith makes. The world hears, and the world sees.

Good works also clarify where we stand in God's plan. We live between the appearing of God's grace at Yeshua's first coming and His return. The promised kingdom still lies ahead, but God's people have work to do now. In this age, God is calling out from the nations a people for His name (Acts 15:14), and the way His people live is one of the means He uses to draw attention to the truth of the gospel.

Good Works With Good News

Start where you already are. Titus 2 is about homes, jobs, and ordinary relationships. Pick one of those, maybe the one you'd least like to think about, and ask what it would look like to adorn the gospel there this week.

Take away the easy objections. Paul wanted opponents to have "nothing evil to say about us." Is there anything in your life that gives people an easy reason to wave off your faith? A broken promise, a harsh post online, careless work, an unpaid debt? Deal with it, and make it right where you can.

Be ready with words. If someone asked you today why you have hope, could you answer in a few plain sentences? Practice saying the gospel out loud: who Yeshua is, what He did, and why it matters to you. Then pray for the conversation where you'll need it.

Remember who else is watching. Writing to Gentile believers, Paul said salvation had come to the Gentiles "so as to make Israel jealous" (Romans 11:11, ESV), and he hoped to "make my fellow Jews jealous, and thus save some of them" (Romans 11:14, ESV). God has not finished with Israel, and the lives of Gentile believers are part of His purposes for her. Much of Church history has provoked Jewish people to anger instead. Ask God to make your life, including the way you speak about and treat Jewish people, something that points toward Israel's Messiah.

Good works can't save anyone. In the hands of the God who saves, they can still open a door. Let people see the difference, and when they ask, tell them the good news.