Faith Energized Through Love

“The only thing that matters,” says St. Paul, “is faith working through love” (Galatians 5:6). This is faith expressing itself through love, energized by love — and that can only be the energy of God at work, for God is Love. Love is not an optional add-on to faith but is essential to it. Faith without love lacks value and gains nothing. Without love, faith is useless.

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing. (1 Corinthians 13:1-3)

Faith without works is an abstraction, a concept with no incarnate reality. Faith reaches out in love. Love is the very form of faith. Whatever works we do, though they may otherwise be very good, yet if they are not energized by love, accomplish nothing, for there is nothing of God in them.

See how St. James and St. John, in their letters, agree with St. Paul concerning the dynamic of faith energized through love. 

What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them? Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. (James 2:14-17)

Was not our father Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. And the scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness,” and he was called God’s friend. You see that  a person is considered righteous by what they do and not by faith alone ... As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead. (James 2:21-24, 26)

Dear friends, I am not writing you a new command but an old one, which you have had since the beginning. This old command is the message you have heard. Yet I am writing you a new command; its truth is seen in him and in you, because the darkness is passing and the true light is already shining. Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates a brother or sister is still in the darkness. Anyone who loves their brother and sister lives in the light, and there is nothing in them to make them stumble. But anyone who hates a brother or sister is in the darkness and walks around in the darkness. They do not know where they are going, because the darkness has blinded them. (1 John 2:7-11)

We know that we have passed from death to life, because we love each other. Anyone who does not love remains in death. Anyone who hates a brother or sister is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life residing in him. This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth. (1 John 3:14-18) 

See also how the early Church stands in agreement: 

St. Ignatius of Antioch: “None of these things is hid from you, if you perfectly possess that faith and love towards Christ Jesus which are the beginning and the end of life. For the beginning is faith, and the end is love. Now these two, being inseparably connected together, are of God, while all other things which are requisite for a holy life follow after them.” (Epistle to the Ephesians 14:1) 

St. Basil of Caesarea: “Faith and works must be joined: so shall the man of God be perfect, and his life not halt through any imperfection. For the faith which saves us, as says the Apostle, is that which works by love.” (Letter 295, to Monks)

St. Augustine: “The faith that saves is the faith that the apostle Paul adequately describes when he says, ‘For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision avails anything, nor uncircumcision, but the faith which works through love.’” (Handbook on Faith, Hope and Love) 

St. Leo the Great: “While faith provides the basis for works, the strength of faith comes out only in works.” (Sermons 10.3)

St. Hilary of Arles: “Works give life to faith, faith gives life to the soul, and the soul gives life to the body.” (Introductory Tractate on the Letter of James) 

Faith without works is nothing but 
abstraction and is quite worthless. 
Faith without love gains nothing. 
Nothing of God is in it, 
for God is Love.