I do not work to be saved, I’m saved and as a byproduct I can work.
There is, however, an apparent distinction between works.
Guess what is the work that is specified? The one that matters for salvation?
John 6:29 “The work of God is this: to believe in the one He has sent.”
All others, if they are genuine, arise because of obedience to the Holy Spirt whom God gives to all the Saints.
... So here’s the thing, when someone “works” in their own strength rather than from obedience those works may seem good but they are counterfeit. Which is to say that I’m persuaded that these are the works which will be burned up when tested by fire (wood, hay and stubble).
To be in that judgment where your works are judged IS to be among the saved. Works that are judged are works that were done because of aforementioned fact and are not the “work of God” (rather that one is always reckoned imperishable).
The imperishable are those which God prepared in advance for us to walk in them, these are matters of obedience.
The perishable, as I’ve indicated, I’m here saying are the things we just did. As an old preacher was to have once asked a young pup: “Were you sent or did you just went?” The imperishable is the former (the “sent”), the perishable the latter (the “just went”).
Now if blood bought saints can have works that will not survive judgment, and scripture plainly says it will happen no matter how I try to figure things, then what of the unsaved? What of those who fool men, and even themselves, that they are Christians?
Certainly they can ape works like those given to the Saints that they should walk in them, so of course the can counterfeit fleshly works too! They may even excel at these.
Remember that Scripture says that faith without works is dead. But what are the works approved of? Those arising from obedience if I’m not far off! So faith where the “saint” does not obey the Holy Spirit is dead.
This would include openly carnal Christians but need not be limited to them. Stealth carnality is what I’m suggesting. But that is for Christ to judge, isn’t it?
... and of course someone who is unsaved, they do not obey the Holy Spirit in anything while they remain so, for they do not have Him that they could obey Him.
Can we get rid of that word 'unsaved'? People can became done and undone, happy and unhappy, employed and unemployed, healthy and unhealthy, ambitious and unambitious.... etc. etc. etc. But one thing that a person can't become 'un' (or lose) is their salvation. Yes I know that many here will argue that point but scripture points to the obvious.... once Christ saves an individual, that person can never be plucked from His hand. There is no such thing as 'unsaved'. Very simply, there is the 'saved', and there is the 'lost'.