Isn't any of the works you do physical disciplines? Even choosing not to do something is a physical discipline. Luther said a curious thing that is quite startling at first glance. He said if we could murder and commit adultery 1000 times a day it would not cancel out grace ( I'm paraphrasing) but the point is, we aren't saved by doing or not doing. We are saved solely by God's grace. God doesn't need help. He's not restricted to saving only people who have reached a certain level of perfect.
Cor. 13:3:
If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing.
Catholic.com says:
"We are bound to follow “the law of Christ” as St. Paul said in I Cor. 9:21, but we must understand that we are saved by grace through the instruments of faith and obedience.
That obedience includes keeping the Ten Commandments, but the keeping of the commandments is an instrument—a necessary instrument—through which the grace of God flows and keeps us in Christ, the principle of reward for us. Thus, we have to keep the commandments to be saved, but we understand it is only through grace that we can do so."
Only no one truly keeps the ten commandments. Because Jesus said to hate in your heart is murder and to lust is adultery. No one even keeps the commandment to love God with thier whole heart.
“Behold I, Paul, say to you that if you receive circumcision, Christ will be of no benefit to you. And I testify again to every man who receives circumcision, that he is under obligation to keep the whole Law” (
Galatians 5:3).
James agrees. He writes, “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all” (
James 2:10).
There is only one hope: God’s mercy. The Scripture is full of this teaching. “He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy” (
Titus 3:5). “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God” (
Ephesians 2:8). “But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace” (
Romans 10:6). “If righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly” (
Galatians 2:21).
Now in regards to James: was abraham saved by works?
The works of Abraham that James mentions were a result of justification which came by faith a quarter of a century earlier. Abraham was not being saved again. Rather, he was showing evidence of his salvation. He was being confirmed in the justification by faith that had already been accomplished years before.
Titus brings it all together:
The entire truth is conveniently captured for us in one passage,
Titus 3:4–8:
But when the kindness of God our Savior and His love for mankind appeared, He saved us, not on the basis of deeds which we have done in righteousness, but according to His mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewing by the Holy Spirit, whom He poured out upon us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, that being justified by His grace we might be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. This is a trustworthy statement; and concerning these things I want you to speak confidently, so that those who have believed God may be careful to engage in good deeds. These things are good and profitable for men.
Good deeds are a result of salvation by grace and God's mercy, not a cause of that salvation.