Can we have faith without works?
No. We believe good works are the necessary fruits of faith and follow regeneration, but they do not remove our sins or allow us to avert divine judgment.
Catechism for the Global Methodist Church, question 66
21Not everyone saying to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of the heavens, but the one doing the will of my Father who is in the heavens.
15If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
13For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law will be justified.
8For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is the gift of God, 9not from works, so that no one may boast. 10For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
22Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. 23For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, this one is like a man observing the face of his origin in a mirror. 24For he observed himself and went away, and immediately forgot what sort he was. 25But the one who has stooped into the perfect law of freedom and has continued, not becoming a forgetful hearer but a doer of work, this one will be blessed in his doing.
14What is the gain, my brothers, if someone claims to have faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? 15If a brother or a sister is naked and lacks the daily food, 16and one of you says to them, 'Go in peace, be warmed and fed,' yet does not give them the things necessary for the body, what is the gain? 17So also faith, if it does not have works, is dead by itself. 18But someone will say, 'You have faith and I have works.' Show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works. 26For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.
This question guards the doctrine of justification by faith against a misreading. The answer is Article X of the Confession of Faith, Good Works, quoted nearly verbatim: "good works are the necessary fruits of faith and follow regeneration but they do not have the virtue to remove our sins or to avert divine judgment." Article X of the Articles of Religion says the same thing with a picture: good works "spring out of a true and lively faith, insomuch that by them a lively faith may be as evidently known as a tree is discerned by its fruit."
The second half is settled by Ephesians 2. "By grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not from yourselves; it is the gift of God, not from works, so that no one may boast" (Ephesians 2:8-9). Works do nothing to "avert divine judgment," as the catechism puts it; salvation is a gift. The first half is settled by the next verse: "we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them" (Ephesians 2:10).
James supplies the sharpest language. A brother or sister who is naked and hungry is sent away with "Go in peace, be warmed and fed," and James asks, "what is the gain?" His verdict follows: "faith, if it does not have works, is dead by itself" (James 2:16-17), and again, "just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead" (James 2:26). Jesus says, (Matthew 7:21) He ties obedience to love: "If you love me, you will keep my commandments" (John 14:15). Paul agrees: (Romans 2:13)
Wesley's phrase for this was faith working by love, and his General Rules asked Methodists to show their faith by doing no harm, doing good, and attending on the ordinances of God. For a Methodist the teaching removes both anxiety and complacency. Works cannot earn pardon, so a believer need never wonder whether enough has been done. Works are the fruit of faith, so a believer who finds no fruit has reason to ask whether the tree is alive (Article X of the Articles of Religion).