Philippians 2
12 Therefore, my dear friends, as you have always obeyed—not only in my presence, but now much more in my absence—continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling,13 for it is God who works in you to will and to act in order to fulfill his good purpose.
Here in Utah when speaking to some of the Latter Day Saints(LDS), I usually get into the conversation about how we need to "work out our faith". See, in the LDS you have to do a series of things such as when you are saved you have the laying on of the hands by an elder, you have to be baptized, you have to be confirmed, you have to go out and do stuff to show the outward working of your faith. Because like I've had people tell me "you need to work out your faith".
Is it really an working out of faith or should it be a faith that works? Such as stepping out into an uncomfortable situation not knowing what the outcome would be but believing that God will protect you no matter what. In the passage above Paul talks about a fear and trembling but yet working out salvation anyways.
To me I see it as a "God I don't know what your going to do but I believe your going to do it anyways". So I take the plunge off the cliff because I believe Jesus is my Lord and God will protect me. I find this kind of scary and yet exciting because of how He works with this stuff.
Its really in the end not me working but Him working through me and I just take a step of obedience.
To try and take the confusion out of what I'm saying think about, are we saved because we're working out our salvation or Are we saved because of simple belief that Jesus is Lord.
If its because of working out our salvation then we are saying that what Christ did isn't enough and we must do our part.
