Works do NOT save anyone. It's the faith that does. Works are the natural outgrowth of that saving faith but are not necessary for it.
Nor are adding works to intellectual assent going to do any good.
To me, that is the BIG danger and pitfall of saying that works save or that they are necessary FOR salvation. That is that someone will believe intellectually and think that putting works on intellectual assent = salvation. They have then been deceived by thinking that if they add a few of the *right* works, being baptized, taking communion, feeding the hungry, etc, that they've got saving faith.
Doing the do's as a matter of self-discipline doesn't wash with God if the heart is not right. The Pharisees had all the works of the Law down pat but still were not saved. Perfect outward performance is no guarantee of anything.
King David committed blatant, outward, gross sin, sin that virtually anybody or any denomination would say is clear evidence of having not been saved, and God still considered him a man after God's own heart and went to great lengths to restore him rather than condemn his as so many of the religious would do today.
Lot was called *righteous Lot*, hardly the term I would use to describe Lot based on his life decisions, but again, God looks on the heart.
Isaiah 55:9 For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.
God is the loving, heavenly father who longs for fellowship with us and wants to have us come to Him. He is not looking for excuses to reject us, *oops you sinned, too bad for you* but is looking to restore. He is not the capricious, judgmental, harsh, intolerant God portrayed by the Catholic church, one who has to be appeased by prayers to saints, Mary, penance, begging for mercy, following every little rule and regulation set forth by the Catholic, hoping against hope that in the end you might be found *worthy* of a place in heaven, because God is so hard to please and you won't find out until you get there.
That is NOT a father's heart and that is NOT how God portrays Himself to us in Scripture.
“Works do NOT save anyone. It’s the faith that does. Works are the natural outgrowth of that saving faith but are not necessary for it.”
However, Ye shall know a tree by the fruit it bears. If the fruits “works” are sin, then the actions of sin are the works and that tree bears bad fruit. In that case, thy faith is shallow or based upon lies and the result is that their is no room for the Holy Spirit.
While works are not necessary to be saved; Works that are inconsistent with the behavior of one who is saved means that their faith is based upon a lie. That shallow faith is much less than that of a mustard seed.
I think we are in agreement. We are just discussing semantics.