Why Christians can't boast about their good works

The answer: They don't have any.

It's all God's work. All the good that I do is actually not me, it's God working through me.
How can I make this claim? Well, besides that it's scriptural, from my own experience.

You see, I used to be a lying, stealing, cheating, envying, gossiping, hating, coveting, lusting, blaspheming, idolatring, vile person.
And I used to think I was a pretty good person. I hadn't killed anyone or cheated on my husband or anything like that. I didn't think I was half bad.

Then I came to know God, and He showed me my wickedness. It was like a torch light aimed straight into the depths of my soul and my darkest secrets. The Holy Spirit in me condemned my sin. That's what he does. He condemns sin and glorifies Jesus Christ. Suddenly I was sickened with myself and I repented. And from then on my conscience was transformed and it would not let me sin like that any more. And whenever I sin anyway, the torch light shines on it and I have to repent. It is the in-dwelling Holy Spirit, that will start to work on us, peeling away evil and giving us a pure heart that wants to do God's will that is written in our hearts. If you ask God to do that for you, to start transforming you to the person you were meant to be, beware. He WILL do it. And it WILL hurt. But then you can repent and be forgiven, and it's glorious!

The Scriptures say "There are none good, no, not one."

So you say that atheists and people from other religions do good works too. Yes, they do. I used to do some good works. A morsel here and there. But I was mostly selfish. And then I would congratulate myself on a tiny good deed. But what I did not, and people do not realize is that all those good works are from God's grace and they wrongfully take the credit. If it wasn't for God's grace restraining us, people would be so evil that I think we would have all taken each other out a long time  ago.

(Just look at Syria. Look at Egypt. Look at Pakistan.. Need I go on? It's delusional think that we are going towards a new enlightened humanity that is capable of all good and becoming god-like.  It's scary to think what the Bible says about the restrainer of evil: It will be taken away at the very end of times and humanity is allowed to reach full depravity for a short while. )

I've been watching a lot of sermons and teaching on youtube. In one of them the pastor told people who thought they were "pretty good people" to think about having ALL OF THEIR THOUGHTS AND ACTS from their whole life span displayed publicly with the data projector to the wall in the front stage. Would anybody be willing to do that? Even knowing that all the other people in the room were sinners just like he was?

Ah, we are such rebellious people.
We want to be good.
We want to be God.
But our god is what we think about the most.
What consumes us the most.
We fight against the light that would show us our true condition.
It is against our sinful nature to humble ourselves in front of our Lord.
We hate that which would set us free.

There are really only two religions in this world : One of Grace, and one of Works. Only true Christianity does not ask for your good works. No, even more than that: It tells your good works are rubbish. Dirty rags. You can not please God with your works.  But oh how we want TO BE ABLE TO SAVE OURSELVES. We want to work our own salvation. Thus, all the other religions in the world are based on something you do to gain eternal life or enlightenment or whatever.

No, the good that I do is Jesus Christ working through me, a vile person who was saved. My desire to do good was given to me as a gift. What we are asked to do is "the will of my Father" in Jesus' words. The will of His Father is that we believe in Him whom the Father sent for us.

That's it- that's the work that we are asked to do. Believe in Him. He will do the rest.

Jesus Christ saved me from myself.