You were dead through the trespasses and sins in which you once lived, following the course of this world, following the ruler of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work among those who are disobedient. All of us once lived among them in the passions of our flesh, following the desires of flesh and senses, and we were by nature children of wrath, like everyone else. But God, who is rich in mercy, out of the great love with which he loved us even when we were dead through our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ—by grace you have been saved— and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, so that in the ages to come he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing; it is the gift of God— not the result of works, so that no one may boast. For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life. (Ephesians 2:1-10, NRSV)
This is the key verse for Lutherans, for you are saved by grace through faith! It is not our doing, and we can not earn it. We can not do anything to buy, bribe, acquire our place in the kingdom, it is a gift of God. And we can not boast that we did it ourselves, it was a gift of God.
You see though that is were we stop reading. That is Ephesians 2:8-9. We end there and I have had several conversations with many of my friends who are not Lutheran about that. And yes it is true, we Lutherans are good at the saved by grace through faith, not by works, so that means I don’t have to do works…
No that is not what it means, you see because 2:10 says “For we are what he has made us, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand to be our way of life” We were created for good works, good works that God prepared for us to do before we were here and that would be our way of life!
We are saved by grace through faith, yes it is a gift and there is nothing we can do to earn it, however that gift motivates us to do the good works God created us to do! We can not sit on our hands, because God loves us. The fact that God loves even a wretch like me should motivate me to show the world how much God loves them!
aSacredRebel 