Faith without works is dead. Why would one who receives a gift take a baseball bat to it and ruin it? Would not that be the same as rejecting the gift presented?
As is so often the case, reading a popular “proof text” in context rather than by itself answers your question.
John 3:17 For God sent not his Son into the world, to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by him.
John 3:18 He that believeth in him is not judged. But he that doth not believe, is already judged : because he believeth not in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
John 3:19 And this is the judgment : because the light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than the light : for their works were evil.
John 3:20 For every one that doth evil hateth the light, and cometh not to the light, that his works may not be reproved.
John 3:21 But he that doth truth, cometh to the light, that his works may be made manifest, because they are done in God.
Notice ”is already judged” in 18 with the judgment spelled out in 19. Those who are judged are judged by their own love of darkness rather than light because their deeds are evil and those who come to the light come so their works are made manifest because they are done in God.
Grace allows us to come to the light by inspiring Faith in us and Faith always manifests itself as Christ, who can only do good, working in and through us. Grace is not made manifest by Christ hanging around while we go on doing our own thing as we "feel led" by whatever convenient spirit pretending to be the Holy Spirit manages to get our attention from one minute to the next.
There is no separation between our belief and our works.
It's not a question of "taking a baseball bat" to a gift, it's a question of accepting the gift as opposed to just admitting the gift exists. The Grace of God is a gift that possesses you, not something you park in the driveway for when you want to use it or can have lying around to beat with a bat or ignore until you want it to chase a Frisbee you toss around.