2:12 work out your own salvation. We are not told to work for our salvation, but to work it out in practice in our lives. Our salvation is received entirely by grace through faith, not of works (Ephesians 2:8-9). Works can no more retain salvation for us than they can achieve it in the first place, but they are the visible evidence of salvation. We have been “created” to do good works (Ephesians 2:10), if we are truly saved. The very next verse, in fact, assures us that God is now working in us, through His indwelling Holy Spirit.