In any discussion of faith there is the eternal struggle between Paul’s, “You are saved by Grace through faith,” and James’s, “Faith without works is dead.” All to frequently I appeal to James for anything related to real faith and to Paul for the more theoretical ideas about what faith is for. I have come to realize that this idea puts faith to my test rather than to God’s.
I may be the only one, but whenever I used to reference this passage in James it was for talking about my faith or someone else’s. Behind the safety of James I sat comfortably spouting pleasantries about being “good little Christian workers.” I was such a fool. Assuming that Paul’s statement about grace and faith was well known among the gathered, I focused on “Faith without works is dead.” Seeking to encourage people in their works I have done many things.
But it was all dead already. There cannot be “good little Christian workers” without Christ. Moreover, any task that begins with “Faith without works is dead” was never alive.
What is faith? Why do we have it? What does it do for me?
“You are saved by Grace through faith.” Paul is not describing something in parallel with James’s rebuke of the lazy. They are not talking about even remotely similar things. Paul is talking about God relating to humanity while James is talking about the life of a Christian. There is no life of a Christian without the relation of God to humanity.
I cannot begin to think about “Faith without works is dead” without first thinking about the death and resurrection of Christ. If I skip this pause of meditation upon the meaning of Jesus death and just jump in to talking about faith in any capacity, then I am not talking about faith. Faith is not something to be memorized and reiterated at every confrontation. Faith is supposed to be a living part of life. Any talk that is just about faith, or about God, without having first planted oneself before the throne of God is just talk. Accurate or inaccurate, the words are hollow. To talk about God as the Lord of my life, I must first make Him the Lord of my life – anything else is empty.
To merely jump into speaking about faith and works without focusing on God and letting Him dictate the actions of a Godly life, is to be wrong. It is one thing to merely talk about what faith is for, it is another entirely to let that faith sculpt my life; this is the point I think James was getting at. We are not to go around talking about works as though they say anything about faith, to even try is nonsense.

~JCPunk