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Boasting has no place in Christian faith and salvation. This was problem for Saul of Tarsus (Paul) before he became a Christian. Saul the Pharisee was full of religious fervour and practicing his Jewish faith to the dot by observing the Torah (Laws). He was proud of himself in every way – nationality, tribe, morality, knowledge and godliness. He even boasted of his tutelage under Gamaliel, a notable scholar and religious teacher. He was self-satisfied and self-assured. After his miraculous conversion on the road to Damascus, boasting was irrelevant. He called it as “dung and loss”; it is vile, it is wrong!

We are Christians solely because of God’s grace – unmerited and undeserved favour. It comes to us entirely from God’s initiative and action; in spite of ourselves. It is not God’s response to anything good in us or any work we have done. The point is that we have no right whatsoever to salvation. We are dead in sins and trespasses and deserve nothing but “He hath quickened us together with Christ” (Eph. 2:5 KJV). The word “quicken” means “made alive” – there is a “new” life. Before this quickening, we were “spiritually” dead, without any ability to serve God. Saul (Paul) clearly was an obvious and unmistakable example of someone who was “quickened”. He was a blasphemer who hated Jesus and wanted to kill Christians in the early Church and did not deserve God’s grace. However, grace was given liberally in abundance to him. If not for God’s grace and “quickening” he could not, in his deadness, find reconciliation with God.

There is the constant danger of boasting about our good works. Good works do not make the Christian; it is the other way around. We are created in Christ Jesus to do good works because God crafted Christians to do them. Good works does not lead to Christianity but Christianity leads to good works. Any boasting would not point to God’s glory. Dr Martyn Lloyd Jones, a great Bible teacher, said, “If we are in any way conscious of our goodness, or if we are relying upon anything we have done, we are denying the grace of God.” Know this – God “quickened us” and made us alive for a purpose: to do good works for His glory.

Question to reflect on: “If there are no good works in our lives, are we Christians?”