Please realize that the WTS religion, which has people WORKING and WORKING to MAYBE SOMEDAY obtain Jehovah's approval, is a FALSE GOSPEL.
Jehovah's approval is a GIFT, not WAGES he owes us because of our good performance.
Romans 4:4-6: "Now when a man works, his wages are not credited to him as a gift, but as an obligation. 5 However, to the man who DOES NOT WORK BUT TRUSTS God who justifies the wicked, his faith is credited as righteousness. 6 David says the same thing when he speaks of the blessedness of the man to whom God credits righteousness apart from works."
The OT law was a reward and punishment system, much as we use with young children.
It was never intended as a way to show our righteousness or be saved from our sins. Romans 3:20
Romans 5:20: The law was added so that the trespass might INCREASE." In other words, to show us how sinful we are inside.
It was God's way of showing us the unrighteousness inside us and our INABILITY to work our way to righteousness so we would see our need for a Savior to give us a spiritual rebirth. Galatians 3:24
That's why Jesus told Nicodemus that as a leader of Israel he should have understood his need to be spiritually reborn. John 3:3ff.
Peter called this works system "a yoke... which neither our fathers nor we have been able to bear..." Acts 15:10.
Rule-keeping doesn't have anything to do with saving us. Galatians 3:21- Is the law, therefore, opposed to the promises of God? Absolutely not! For if a law had been given that could impart life, then righteousness would certainly have come by the law. 22 But the Scripture declares that the whole world is a prisoner of sin, so that what was promised, being given through faith in Jesus Christ, might be given to those who believe. 23 Before this faith came, we were held prisoners by the law, locked up until faith should be revealed. 24 So the law was put in charge to lead us to Christ that we might be justified by faith. 25 Now that faith has come, we are no longer under the supervision of the law."
The Israelites and their leaders didn't understand this; they tried to establish their own righteousness by works and didn't accept that righteousness would have to be a gift of grace from God through the new birth. Romans 10:1-4.
The WTS doesn't understand this either. They teach that the "new birth" is only for 144,000, and even then the WTS doesn't get what the new birth really is about.
The WTS religion is essentially an OT works system where Jesus made the down payment with the ransom sacrifice and we have to keep up the installments by theocratic works. That's not what "work out your own salvation" means at all. It means, "Now that you have been made righteous and accepted by God as a GIFT based on Christ's finished sacrifice, live like the new, saved person you are, doing good works that God will enable you to do." Ephesians 2:10
Salvation is an unconditional GIFT from God obtained by repentance of sin and faith in Christ's sacrifice.
Ephesians 2:8-10: "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith-- and this not from yourselves, it is the GIFT of God-- 9 NOT BY WORKS, so that no one can boast. 10 For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do."
Notice that Paul is writing to people who HAVE been saved (past tense; done deal).
What about "faith without works is dead"?
That doesn't mean salvation comes by faith plus works; it means that a genuine spiritual rebirth will produce good works. If we say we have been spiritually reborn but we're unchanged inside, we're deceiving ourselves. If Abraham said he had faith in God but it didn't cause him to live any differently than before, it would have been evidence that his "faith" wasn't real.
Why are repentance and faith required?
God doesn't force Himself on us.
If we want to go our own way, He lets us.
