The Lord Builds the House

FC Ep IV was written to resolve a controversy over whether good works are necessary for salvation. The confessors rejected both of the extreme positions in the debate. One side taught that good works are necessary for salvation; the other, reacting against this, taught that good works are injurious to salvation. Both errors destroy the household. If good works are necessary for salvation, every family conflict, every failure of patience, every broken promise becomes a threat to the soul's standing before God. If good works are injurious to salvation, the household has no doctrinal basis for taking seriously the commands of Colossians 3 or the discipline of Psalm 127's diligence. FC Ep IV's resolution is precise: good works certainly and without doubt follow true faith if it is a living faith, as fruits of a good tree.
FC Ep IV says good works are the necessary fruit of living faith, not contributions to justification and not the product of human effort driven by law. Psalm 127 says working is the household's duty but building and keeping belong to God. How does a household that has understood this distinction approach its spiritual responsibilities differently than one that treats Colossians 3's household ethics as a performance standard whose achievement demonstrates the household's spiritual quality?
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Children, Not Servants

FC Ep IV's most pastorally significant formulation of how good works function in the regenerate life is its description of the obedience as that of children rather than servants. The believer who does good works does so not from coercion or the driving of the law, not from fear of punishment like a servant, but from love of righteousness, like children. The distinction is not about the works themselves; it is about the source and spirit of the obedience. A servant performs because he must; a child serves because he loves the one he serves and wants to please him. The same household tasks look completely different from inside these two relationships.
FC Ep IV distinguishes between works done from fear of punishment, like a servant, and works done from love of righteousness, like a child. Colossians 3's household commands are issued to children of God who operate under Christ's lordship. How does a household member whose dominant experience of her household responsibilities is obligation and fear of failure rather than love move from the servant posture to the child posture, and what does FC Ep IV say is the source of that movement?
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Weakness Covered by Grace

FC Ep IV's most important pastoral provision is its frank account of the household's inevitable failure. The voluntariness of the elect children of God is not perfect, but burdened with great weakness. The old Adam clings to the household members in their nature and all its internal and external powers, which means that even the regenerate householder who loves Colossians 3's household ethics will frequently fail to practice them. Compassionate hearts grow impatient; forgiving spirits hold grudges; the love that is supposed to bind everything together in perfect harmony gives out under the pressure of a Tuesday evening. The Epitome's comfort is direct: for the sake of the Lord Christ, the Lord does not impute this weakness to His elect.
FC Ep IV says the voluntariness of the elect is always burdened with great weakness, and that the Lord does not impute this weakness to His elect for Christ's sake. Psalm 127 warns against the bread of anxious toil, the household's attempt to secure by its own effort what only the Lord can give. How does a family that understands its inevitable failures as occasions for the grace that covers them, rather than as evidence of insufficient faith, actually approach the moment when the household ethics of Colossians 3 have failed and the conflict is real?