ANOTHER BIG QUESTION

I have recently felt an inner challenge to wrestle with one more of the big questions of the Christian faith - and that gets scary because you might come to the conclusion that widely accepted and preached ideas don't actually have as strong of a Scriptural foundation as you have always assumed.

In recent years, I have wrestled with the nature of hell, the doctrine of original sin, all of TULIP, and the definition of "the gospel".

Now I am exploring "faith alone" and the relationship between "faith" and "works". What does the Bible mean by "faith"? Is faith the opposite of works? Are works necessary for salvation or not?

This is a BIGGIE and another hot potato that many Christian leaders get very passionate about. 

And I guess I have been largely oblivious to this before, but apparently a lot of people see faith/works as THE major boundary between Protestants and Catholics.  

In other words, it's another one of those theological topics where, no matter which side you finally find yourself landing, you are bound to be called a heretic by SOMEBODY.