Are we saved by simply reciting the words of some magical prayer?

I address this question in this teaser episode of a Patreon-only podcast.

If you want to listen to the fuller length version, the full version of this

podcast you can go to patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw that's

patreon.com forward slash theologian the raw and you can support the show for as

little as five bucks a month get access to this

episode and other premium content like it but for now let's see what I say about

this tough question. I'm completely agree with you. We're not saved by saying some magical prayer. We're not saved by saying some magical prayer. We're not saved by noises, certain kinds of noises coming

out of our mouth. We're not even saved by repeating the words that somebody tells us to repeat.

And this, like, this gets into the weeds of the relationship

between faith and

work and obedience and justification or justification and I think

scripture is is a lot messier on those questions than people realize.

I mean we're saved by, you know, just the classic example of Romans 3 and James 2. Paul says we're saved by faith and not by works and then James says we're saved by works and not by faith alone like

almost a direct like difference there and I think they are actually two sides of the same coin

when we confess Jesus God doesn't look at how good we've been up into that

plane and say well you're still not good enough why don't you come back in a few

weeks and you know once you've piled on a few more you know good deeds then your

faith will be valid kind of you know that's not that's that that's what

Paul's kind of combating James is combating this pseudo that this kind of confession that has no obedience following it that if you say

you have faith but no works and your faith is actually not faith it's simply a vanilla

verbal confession that wasn't actually somebody giving their allegiance to Jesus Christ.

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