Christians really work, pray, serve, and resist sin. Yet the new life in which they do these things is God’s gift, not the product of an unconverted will meeting him halfway. The word behind synergism becomes clearer when we distinguish those situations instead of treating every kind of cooperation as the same.
The Word
συνεργέω (synergeō) means to work together or to cooperate. It describes joint activity; the surrounding sentence identifies the participants and the work.
First Corinthians 3:9 uses the related word συνεργός (synergos), rendered coworker. That is not the verb itself, and neither word automatically supplies a doctrine of how conversion happens.
Range of Meaning
Romans 8:28 uses synergeō in the promise about all things working together for good. Second Corinthians 6:1 uses it in Paul’s description of ministry. James 2:22 speaks of Abraham’s faith working together with his works.
Mark 16:20, in Mark’s longer ending, describes the Lord working with the preaching disciples. Its textual setting should be identified. The distinction about conversion does not depend on building an argument from that passage alone.
These uses concern providence, ministry, and the activity of faith. They cannot simply be collected as proof that an unbeliever contributes the power by which he becomes a believer.
Where You’ll Meet It
Paul writes:
“And we know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28, NET)
The next verse connects God’s purpose with being conformed to his Son. The promised good is not merely an outcome that will soon feel pleasant or an explanation we will be able to supply for every tragedy.
First Corinthians 3:5–9 likewise distinguishes real human labor from God’s giving the growth. Paul plants and Apollos waters. Their work matters without becoming an independent power that produces faith.
What Confessional Lutherans Hear
The Formula of Concord says that conversion is wholly the Holy Spirit’s work through the Word. Calling the person passive does not remove hearing, understanding, or the new willing the Spirit creates; it denies that natural human powers assist in producing conversion (Solid Declaration II.89).
Once the Spirit has begun renewal, believers truly cooperate through the new powers he gives. That cooperation remains dependent on his continuing action, not a partnership of two independent sources of strength (II.65–66).
James’s account of faith working with works belongs to this living activity of faith. It does not make an unbeliever’s contribution the cause of rebirth. See Nekros for the related distinction between spiritual death and God’s gift of life.
Where People Get It Wrong
Some accounts of conversion describe a response enabled by grace and insist that this is no unaided human achievement. The Lutheran disagreement still concerns causation: the Spirit’s work creates the believing response rather than waiting for a contribution that completes conversion.
Romans 8:28 can also be reduced to a demand that mourners discover a cheerful reason for their loss. Paul gives God’s promise amid groaning. He does not command us to call evil good or to explain another person’s suffering.
So What
Work faithfully in the new life God has given. Depend on his Word and ask for his help without treating dependence as an excuse for inactivity.
When you cannot see how he is working for good, you may lament. His purpose in Christ is firmer than your ability to trace it.