I recently saw this question on Yahoo Answers. Below is my response:
Romans 3:23 states “All have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”
Therefore we need God’s grace and mercy no matter what to save us.
However further scripture states everyone who dies (so everyone: ) will stand before God and be judged of their works (Revelation 20:12-13)
Further scripture supports this:
“And it is requisite with the justice of God that men should be judged according to their works; and if their works were good in this life, and the desires of their hearts were good, that they should also, at the last day, be restored unto that which is good.” (Alma 41:3)
In addition we are all given the light of Christ (some call it a consience) and knowledge of what is good and what is evil as quoted in this scripture:
For behold, my brethren, it is given unto you to judge, that ye may know good from evil; and the way to judge is as plain, that ye may know with a perfect knowledge, as the daylight is from the dark night.
16 For behold, the Spirit of Christ is given to every man, that he may know good from evil; wherefore, I show unto you the way to judge; for every thing which inviteth to do good, and to persuade to believe in Christ, is sent forth by the power and gift of Christ; wherefore ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of God.
17 But whatsoever thing persuadeth men to do evil, and believe not in Christ, and deny him, and serve not God, then ye may know with a perfect knowledge it is of the devil; for after this manner doth the devil work, for he persuadeth no man to do good, no, not one; neither do his angels; neither do they who subject themselves unto him. (Moroni 7:15-17)
To sum everything up. We are all given a consience and ability to choose good or evil. We all will come short of the glory of God so we need His grace and mercy to save us. However, we will be brought to the judgement seat after we die and stand accountable to the knowledge we’ve been given from God.
Would you add or take anything out on this answer?
Grace for Grace 
11 comments
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February 19, 2008 at 4:05 pm
Mormon Heretic
The answer to your question, depends entirely on a person’s understanding of grace. Are we saved by grace, works, or both? Different people will have different answers, and I doubt you will get a consensus.
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February 19, 2008 at 7:19 pm
Dan
Hi ama49,
I wrote a post on myblog about Grace vs Works which can be found here http://thoughtsonlds.blogspot.com/2008/01/thoughts-on-grace-vs-works.html
When I worked in Salt Lake I had a good friend that I worked with. Great guy. He devoted a significant amount of his time to the Make A Wish Foundation, and did a lot of other charitable work. Unfortunately, he was not active in the church.
I am certain that the Lord loves him for allof the good he does. He is probably also a bit saddened that my friend isn’t availing himself of all the wonderful blessings that could be his if he kept the covenants he had made.
Grace and works go hand in hand. In the 2nd chapter of James it states, “shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works.”
As I work out my salvation by doing good, I qualify for the Savior’s grace, to become what I am incapable of becoming on my own.
Just my two cents.
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February 19, 2008 at 8:24 pm
larryco_
When two things are both “essential”, the idea of which is more important becomes moot.
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February 20, 2008 at 1:59 am
J. Stapley
I imagine that if you phrased it: “What is more important, the atonement of Jesus Christ or ourselves.”
Well, there would be no atonement without sinful people. It is pretty clear without the atonement we are doomed to hell. The question then becomes what is the true manifestation of grace (or the atonement) in this life?
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February 20, 2008 at 2:27 pm
ifokus
larryco said it best, I believe……..both are essential. Grace is for everyone, while our works is essential for our own progression. Thus, both are essential IF we choose to progress….if not, then grace will suffice.
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February 21, 2008 at 5:11 pm
Grace vs. Works Followup « Grace for Grace
[…] February 21, 2008 by ama49 I recently posted a blog on Grace vs. Works (https://graceforgrace.com/2008/02/19/do-you-believe-living-a-good-life-is-more-important-than-grace-o…). […]
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February 21, 2008 at 11:11 pm
KC
The fact that we will all be judged of our works is not at all contradictory to our need for grace. A judgment implies a law, and about this, Lehi said:
“And the law is given unto men. And by the law no flesh is justified; or, by the law men are cut off.” (2 Ne. 2:5)
We’ll all be judged of our works, its true. And we’ll all get a guilty verdict. After our judgment, that’s when we’ll be looking for grace.
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February 25, 2008 at 9:14 pm
Cristina
I think we kid ourselves when we think we can answer this question. The question itself is moot because the answer isn’t something we can concretely know. The point is: be a good person, follow your conscience. Don’t worry about where that gets you. The end.
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February 26, 2008 at 5:57 am
ama49
Cristina,
I agree with you in the sense that no one knows 100% for certain where we’ll end up and worrying about it definitely isn’t going to help matters. Being a good person is definitely good.
The reason why I bring this conversation up is because there are many of the Christian faith out there who use grace and just confessing Jesus as an excuse to not do exactly what you recommend by living the best you can.
Thank you for your comments.
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February 26, 2008 at 6:30 am
Allen
I like the way D&C 19 brings the two concepts (grace & works) into view. Christ suffered for our sins and provided the Atonement through his grace, and if we repent the Atonement will cleanse us of our sins. If we don’t repent, we will have to suffer for our sins ourselves. Part of repentance is doing good works. I thus think of repentance & doing good works as the doorway by which the Atonement comes into my life. As Paul said, we all sin, but even if we were able to live a life without sin, we would still need the Atonement to provide the resurrection. So, to me, repentance and service are prerequisites for God’s grace, and it is God’s grace that cleanses us from sin and provides the Atonement.
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March 27, 2008 at 5:54 am
brooksrobinson
I think its pure grace. Ephesians 2:8-9 “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith-and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God-not by works, so that no one can boast.” Faith is merely what we go through to achieve grace(you must have faith that Jesus is God and savior). Romans brings the point of our imperfection to heart, Romans 3:10-12 “As it is written,’There is no one righteous, not even one, there is no one who understands, no one who seeks God…there is no one who does good, not even one.”‘ We are justified by Jesus Christ. Romans 3:28 “For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law.” We are justified by Jesus Christ, through our faith. In other words those who do not have faith in Jesus are not justified, they do not have the faith that justifies them. The law is merely what God used to make us concious of sin (Romans 3:20). Why we must do good works is a combo affect from multiple verses. The old saying found throughout the Bible, “you cannot serve both masters.” In Romans you find a more indepth reason, we died to sin, there fore we must not live in it anylonger. Giving into sin again brings us back to being slaves of sin, and as Jesus declared in John, “Those who remain in me, I will remain in them.” To summerize, we are given grace through Jesus’ death, ones faith in Jesus through the confession found in Romans 10(Those who confess Jesus is God with mouth and heart are saved) justifies the one believing in Jesus, and works merely affirm one, by keeping his faith from fading and keeping him from becoming a slave to sin again risking losing ones salvation. Works also glorify God by doing what he commands us to do *loving God with all your heart,soul, and mind and loving your neighbor like wise* without works one will not see God work and are risking oneself, in the words of Paul, to fall asleep. Not doing works however, does not gurantee loss of salvation i.e. Theif on the cross awknowledged he was wrong(through faith in Jesus), but did not do any “good” works before his death, yet he will see heaven. I attempted a blog to express this idea under my tab “mere Christianity.” There I go into more detail.
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