What does Tribe teach about dead works?
Drawn from the messages where it was actually addressed: the words said from the front, the passages taught, and where to hear the whole thing.
At Tribe, the teaching on dead works starts with a distinction that cuts against most people's instincts: the problem is not only bad deeds. Brian Hunter has walked the congregation through the argument, drawn from Hebrews and pressed hard through several weeks of the Full Reward series, that any work done from a person's own effort and strength is dead before God, no matter how useful or godly it looks from the outside. The Greek phrase from Hebrews 6:1, which Brian identified as 'Nekron Ergon,' combines the root for death and the root for energy. Dead works are works with no life in them because they did not come from God's life in us. Brian says, "What God condemns is not only our bad deeds, but our best deeds done apart from Christ."
The framework Brian returned to across these messages is 1 Corinthians 3, where Paul describes every believer's life being tested by fire. That fire is not about salvation, which is received as a gift and cannot be earned or lost by effort. What it tests is reward. Gold, silver, and jewels survive. Wood, hay, and straw burn. The person is still saved, but the passage describes them escaping as someone barely escaping through a wall of flames. To put a sharper point on it, Brian drew on multiple quotes from Watchman Nee, whose core argument is that the flesh is willing to do anything for God, including reading Scripture, preaching, or going to the mission field, as long as it stays alive and active. Work that looks spiritual but is not rooted in ongoing relationship with Jesus is precisely what gets counted as nothing.
The question the room kept pressing was whether this teaching becomes an excuse for passivity, and Brian addressed it directly. The risk of dead works does not point toward doing less. It points toward the source. The Saul story, where good intentions carried out outside of God's direction still counted as disobedience, is the clearest illustration Brian used. The Laodicean church in Revelation 3 believed they had everything and needed nothing, while Jesus described their actual condition as wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked. His response was not condemnation but an invitation to come and buy gold from him, gold purified by fire. That gold cannot be purchased with self-effort. It is the fruit of obedience rooted in genuine intimacy with God.
Taught from 1 Corinthians 3:10-15 · Hebrews 6:1 · Matthew 7:21-23 · Revelation 3:14-18 · 2 John 1:8
“What God condemns is not only our bad deeds, but our best deeds done apart from Christ.”
From Gold, Silver, and Precious Stones
The passage taught · 1 Corinthians 3:10-15
10 According to the grace of God which was given to me, as a wise master builder I laid a foundation, and another builds on it. But let each man be careful how he builds on it.
11 For no one can lay any other foundation than that which has been laid, which is Jesus Christ.
12 But if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay, or stubble;
13 each man’s work will be revealed. For the Day will declare it, because it is revealed in fire; and the fire itself will test what sort of work each man’s work is.
World English Bible
The messages that teach on it
- September 1, 2025 Gold, Silver, and Precious Stones Brian Hunter walks through what Scripture calls "dead works," asking whether the things we build for God are powered by his Spirit or just our own effort.
- August 31, 2025 Dead Works: Built with Wood, Hay, and Straw A Jackson Hole pastor walks through what it means to build your life on dead works versus Spirit-led obedience, and what that costs you at the final reward.
Mentioned along the way
- September 8, 2025 Partial Obedience Is Disobedience A Wyoming pastor walks through what Scripture says about heavenly reward, obedience, and what it means to build a life with gold rather than wood, hay, and straw.
- September 7, 2025 The Gold of Jesus A Jackson Hole pastor teaches that Christians are rewarded not for good intentions but for obedience to their specific calling, and that every moment of faithful surrender matters for eternity.