No. But we don’t believe in “faith alone” either.
That answer probably confuses people coming from Baptist or Bible church backgrounds here in Southeast Texas. You’ve been taught that salvation is by faith alone, and anything else is works-righteousness. Catholics down the street at St. Anne’s seem to emphasize good deeds. So where does Orthodoxy fit?
We don’t fit neatly into either camp because we think the whole debate got framed wrong.
The Problem With the Question
When St. Paul writes about “works,” he’s talking about something specific. He means the works of the Mosaic Law, circumcision, dietary restrictions, Sabbath observance. Jews in the first century believed these ritual observances made them righteous before God. Paul says no, that’s not how it works. Christ fulfilled the Law. You can’t earn your way to God through religious rule-keeping.
But Paul never says good works don’t matter. He can’t, because he also writes things like “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you.” That’s Philippians 2:12-13. And James, Jesus’s brother, is even more direct: “Faith without works is dead.”
So which is it? Both. That’s the Orthodox answer, and it’s not a cop-out.
Faith and Works Aren’t Opposites
Think of it this way. If I say I love my wife but never speak to her, never spend time with her, never do anything for her, do I actually love her? Of course not. Love produces action. Real faith works the same way. It’s alive, and living things bear fruit.
We’re not earning salvation through our prayers and fasts and almsgiving. We’re cooperating with God’s grace. There’s a word for this: synergy. God initiates everything. His grace comes first, always. But He made us with free will, and He won’t force us into heaven. We have to say yes, and keep saying yes, and that yes shows up in how we live.
This isn’t about racking up points. It’s about being healed.
Salvation as Healing, Not Transaction
Here’s where Orthodoxy really differs from what most Protestants around here have been taught. Salvation isn’t a courtroom transaction where God declares you “not guilty” because Jesus took your punishment. That’s part of it, sure, but it’s not the whole picture.
Salvation is theosis, becoming united with God, being transformed into His likeness. It’s a process, not a one-time decision. We’re being saved, present tense. The Christian life is a hospital, not a courtroom. We come sick with sin, and God heals us through His grace working in the sacraments, through prayer, through fasting, through acts of love.
When you fast during Lent, you’re not earning God’s favor. You’re training your will, learning to say no to your appetites so you can say yes to God. When you stand through a two-hour Liturgy (and yes, we stand), you’re not checking a box. You’re receiving Christ’s Body and Blood, being united with Him and with the whole Church across time and space.
Metropolitan Kallistos Ware puts it well in The Orthodox Way: we’re saved by grace, but grace requires our response. God won’t save us without us.
What About Judgment?
Jesus talks about judgment based on works all the time. The sheep and goats in Matthew 25 get separated based on whether they fed the hungry and visited prisoners. St. Paul says we’ll all appear before the judgment seat of Christ to give account for what we’ve done. If works don’t matter, why does Scripture keep bringing them up?
Because they’re the fruit that proves the faith was real. A tree is known by its fruit. You can’t have an apple tree that never produces apples and then insist it’s still an apple tree. At some point you have to admit it’s something else.
But here’s the thing: even the good works we do are empowered by grace. We can’t take credit for them. They’re return gifts, as one Orthodox writer puts it. God gives us everything, and we offer back what He’s given us, and He accepts it as if we’d done something impressive.
Living It Out
So what does this look like practically? You come to Liturgy on Sunday not because attendance earns you salvation points, but because that’s where you meet Christ in the Eucharist. You pray not to impress God with your devotion, but because prayer changes you, opens you to His grace. You fast not to prove you’re serious, but because your body and soul need the discipline.
And you mess up. A lot. We all do. That’s why we have confession, why we keep coming back, why the Church gives us a rhythm of feasts and fasts to carry us through the year. This is a long obedience in the same direction, as someone once said. It’s not about perfection. It’s about showing up, cooperating with grace, letting God do the heavy lifting while we do the small part He asks of us.
If you’re visiting St. Michael’s and this sounds different from what you grew up with, that’s okay. Come to a Vespers service on Saturday evening. Watch how we pray, how we venerate the icons, how we receive communion. You’ll see a faith that’s embodied, that involves the whole person. Not because we’re trying to earn anything, but because God became flesh, and that changes everything about how we approach Him.
