This year was a good year, and this year was a hard year. This year has been one of loss, but it has also been a one of celebration. It’s for both the joyful times and for the comfort that sustains us in hard times that we thank our God this morning.
Most of all, we thank our God for what James calls in v 17, the word of truth and, in v 21, the word planted in you, which can save you. Of all the good gifts that God our Father gives, the true and powerful good-news word that saves us is the best. We gather on this morning once a year to thank God for a bountiful harvest, for growth and accomplishments in our families, for work well-rewarded and days well-spent in the last year. But every Sunday morning we gather to thank God for the gift of his saving word to us. Even more, every prayer, even every action we perform should be a grateful “Thank you” to the God who saves us. This is what James has to say to us this morning.
One word for living this way is “worship.” Our lives demonstrate to God and to the world the value and the worth of the gospel-word God has spoken to us in Jesus. Maybe we recall Paul telling believers to live out this kind of worship in Ro 12.1: I urge you, brothers and sisters, in light of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God--this is true worship.
Another name for living all of life in grateful response to the good news is “discipleship.” By far, this is the term the early Anabaptists used most to describe how we live in response to the gospel. Many of the sixteenth century Reformers taught that the gospel only asks for our belief, a response of faith. But the Anabaptist believed that faith is only the beginning. The gospel calls for our faith and trust, but it also asks for our faithfulness. Jesus isn’t just a divine sacrifice to trust in; Jesus is also our Lord to be followed and obeyed.
This morning, if our gratitude is only a warm emotion, it is not enough. Our gratitude must become a burning motivation that produces a glorious demonstration of our thankfulness by the way we live from moment to moment. The only true thanksgiving we offer to God is the kind we live with our lives.
Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.Here we have a kind of firstfruits of this year’s harvest spread out before us this morning. We have the aroma of our celebration of what God has given us wafting up from the kitchen. Like the ancient Israelites at their holy festivals and feasts, we offer a bit of this year’s produce back to God as proclamation that, “Yes, God, all good gifts come from you.” In doing so, we ourselves become a kind of firstfruits of a different sort of harvest. Gathered together, we are the first sheafs of wheat or oats, the first cucumbers and zucchinis, of a redeemed humanity. We are the foretaste, the preview of all nations and all creation praising God.
This year was a good year, and this year was a hard year. This year has been one of loss, but it has also been a one of celebration. It’s for both the joyful times and for the comfort that sustains us in hard times that we thank our God this morning.
Most of all, we thank our God for what James calls in v 17, the word of truth and, in v 21, the word planted in you, which can save you. Of all the good gifts that God our Father gives, the true and powerful good-news word that saves us is the best. We gather on this morning once a year to thank God for a bountiful harvest, for growth and accomplishments in our families, for work well-rewarded and days well-spent in the last year. But every Sunday morning we gather to thank God for the gift of his saving word to us. Even more, every prayer, even every action we perform should be a grateful “Thank you” to the God who saves us. This is what James has to say to us this morning.
One word for living this way is “worship.” Our lives demonstrate to God and to the world the value and the worth of the gospel-word God has spoken to us in Jesus. Maybe we recall Paul telling believers to live out this kind of worship in Ro 12.1: I urge you, brothers and sisters, in light of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God--this is true worship.
Another name for living all of life in grateful response to the good news is “discipleship.” By far, this is the term the early Anabaptists used most to describe how we live in response to the gospel. Many of the sixteenth century Reformers taught that the gospel only asks for our belief, a response of faith. But the Anabaptist believed that faith is only the beginning. The gospel calls for our faith and trust, but it also asks for our faithfulness. Jesus isn’t just a divine sacrifice to trust in; Jesus is also our Lord to be followed and obeyed.
This morning, if our gratitude is only a warm emotion, it is not enough. Our gratitude must become a burning motivation that produces a glorious demonstration of our thankfulness by the way we live from moment to moment. The only true thanksgiving we offer to God is the kind we live with our lives.
This truth is the heart of James’ letter. In each sentence and paragraph, James insists that faith that stops in our minds or hearts is not sufficient. What believers need, he says, is the kind of faith that flows over into our every action and attitude. In vv 19-22, James states the theme of his letter. This could also be the theme of our life in Christ. He writes,
You know this, my dear brothers and sisters. So let every person be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to anger. For a man’s anger does not produce God’s righteousness. Therefore, put aside all filthiness and excess of evil. With meekness accept the word planted in you, which can save your souls. But become doers of the word and not merely hearers. That would be deceiving yourselves.Receive the word. Become a doer of the word and not just a hearer. In short, when Jesus asks you to follow him, say Yes and then get up and go. This is the heart of James’ letter.
Now if some morning you and I end up talking for a while over a cup of coffee, you’ll soon hear that discipleship is very important to me. In fact, the idea of discipleship is my biggest reason for becoming an Anabaptist. If you walk into the pastor’s study, you’ll see nearly half a shelf of book on the idea of discipleship.
But the idea of discipleship isn’t enough. Fairly frequently church leaders, like me, get excited about this or that new concept or fad. There’ll be all sorts of magazine articles and conferences on the topic. But an idea only begins to matter when it’s translated into the practical details of our daily lives.
This is why I love James’ letter, and why we’ll be meditating on it for the next few weeks. Chapter by chapter it becomes more and more practical and detailed in spelling out what it means for us to follow Jesus, to be faithful to him not only in our belief but also in our actions.
Notice again where he begins in v 19. In v 22, he gives us the general principle: be doers, not just hearers of the word. But already, preemptively in v 19, James points us toward what this means practically. He says, Be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to anger.
James spends the rest of his letter showing us in greater detail what following Jesus faithfully means in these three areas. In fact, these three concerns form an outline of James’ letter. Chapter 1, v 22, through to the end of ch 2 explains what it means to be quick to listen. Chatper 3 takes up discipleship in the realm of our speech. And ch 4, v1, to ch 5, v 6, explains how we can live faithfully with passions, like anger, that rage and roar within in us. The end of ch 5 takes up again the theme of living in hard times that James begins with in ch 1.
These areas--listening, speaking, anger, and suffering too--they are where we live. The most intimate and the most mundane moments of our lives take place when we’re listening, when we’re speaking, when we’re angry or going through hard times. And what’s critical, according to James, is that we learn how to live as disciples, to live faithfully in response to the true word of salvation, in these kind of everyday moments.
The alternative, in James’ view, is to let anger, along with every other passion and desire that enrages our hearts and bodies, rule over us. He spells this out more fully in ch 4 where he talks about discipleship and anger. A few weeks back we heard from vv 14 and 15 of ch 1 that these sort of desires-run-wild give birth to sin and death in our lives. Verse 20 picks up this same idea, saying that our anger doesn’t accomplish the righteousness and justice God wants.
Any recovering addict will tell you about the power of desire to rule us. Whether it be alcohol or cigarettes or some other drug or sexual addiction, he’ll say how a desire, a craving, a need grips him. How he’s not the one controlling his drinking or his pornography habit. No, it, the addiction, is controlling him. I doubt that anyone recovering from addiction feels that their desires are working for the just and right heart and relationships God desires. If you struggle keeping your anger or resentment in check, you too know that these out of control emotions aren’t working for what God desires.
But for all the others sitting back, happy because they don’t wrestle with the demons of addiction, trust that in our culture of endless wants, not one of us is a stranger to desire running thick in our veins and dominating our minds. Advertisements on television, magazines, the Internet--they entice us. They play on our secret fears and our most private desires and sinisterly suggest that we are incomplete or inadequate without this or that new product. So we take out a new line of credit or sign up to make installment payments that we know will stretch the budget beyond the breaking point. Or perhaps we realize that we’ll never be able to purchase this or that, and then we mope, like a teen with a broken heart, lashing out at those close to us because we don’t feel whole without that thing we long for but can’t afford.
This is a disappointing summary of the state we’re in. But in and of ourselves, we can’t help it. The desires that rage within us are in control. They breed anxiety, stress, anger, despondency, self-loathing. They do not bring forth the goodness that God wants.
So I hope we can all give a hearty Amen to James’ command in v 21. He says, Therefore, put aside all filthiness and excess of evil. With meekness accept the word planted in you, which can save your souls. That way of living--living by the rules and habits of a culture where sin and death are in charge--it’s no good. It runs away from the God who gives good gifts rather than to him. Perhaps we don’t think of it in terms of filthiness or wickedness, but put in contrast with the desires of our God who is the Father of heavenly lights, filthy, foul, and wicked name very accurately the true shape of our lives lived after our desires rather than according to Jesus’ teaching.
It’s the word--that true and powerful and soul-saving message--that sets us free. No wonder our hearts overflow with thanksgiving! No wonder we sing songs of praise and proclaim the goodness of our God. That word is the lifeline thrown to us to pull us out of the storm of our desires, our anger, our anxiety, resentment, and loneliness.
I think it would be good if we take a few moments to talk about the term “word.” It’s a term we see fairly often when we’re reading the Bible. Consulting a handy concordance told me that “word” actually occurs around 700 times in Scripture, varying a bit from translation to translation.
What comes to your mind when you find Scripture using the term “word”? As I’ve mentioned before, we often think of our Bibles when we read the term “word.” After all, probably more than a few of our Bibles have “Word of God” emblazoned on the spine or the front cover. And sure enough, occasionally “word” in Scripture is referring to the inspired books written at that point in history. But statistically, only very rarely does “word” mean what we think of as our Bibles.
Much more often--most often, in fact--“word” refers to something that someone’s said, usually in the average, everyday way we use “word” in our conversations. Jesus used his words to talk with his disciples or the scribes or the leper. Peter used his word to preach to the crowds at Pentecost or to Cornelius the Gentile soldier. Moses used his words to give the law and settle arguments among the Israelites. “Word” usually means something like “saying,” “talk,” “teaching,” “conversation,” or sometimes even “message.”
When James uses “word” in this passage, it’s in this second sense. The word planted in [us], which can save [our] souls is the message of the good news that God is reconciling the world to himself through Jesus life, death, and resurrection. It’s not the Bible as a book that saves us. No, it’s the message that it contains, the same message that God sent to us two thousand years ago by Jesus. It’s the gospel, the good news that we have hope beyond simply trying to make the best of this life. That’s what we thank God for every Sunday.
But this good news message is also an instruction, a command. It’s a call to take Jesus not only as Savior but also as Lord and to live as his disciple. This is where James challenges us today. In v 22 he says, Become doers of the word and not merely hearers. If this message is something that we must do, it must be more than just news. James tells us not only to have faith--to receive the word planted in you--but also to become doers of this word.
I mentioned a bit ago that v 22 is where James starts to investigate discipleship in terms of being “quick to listen.” If our ears are well-tuned by listening over and over again the stories of the Old Testament, we’ll know that being “quick to listen” means the same thing as being “quick to obey.” James wrote this letter to home churches of Hebrew-speaking Jewish Christians scattered across the Empire. He knew they would understand that to listen, shema in Hebrew, is to obey. For instance, in Ex 24.7, after the people have heard all of Yahweh’s covenant laws given at Sinai, they respond, “We will do everything Yahweh has said. We will obey.” In Hebrew, they say, “We will do everything Yahweh said. We will hear.” Hearing, in our Bibles, entails obedience.
James tells us that because God’s soul-saving word has come to us, we must be quick to obey it. In vv 23 and 24, James uses the image of a man glancing at himself in the mirror to show us what happens if we hear the message and don’t follow up with obedient discipleship. James says,
For if anyone is only a hearer of the word and not a doer, this person is like a man who notices his natural face in a mirror. For he notices himself, he leaves, and immediately he forgets what he is like.This is a vivid image, one that strikes pretty close to home for me at least. Being a guy, and a sometimes absent-minded guy at that, I can’t count how many times I’ve glanced in the mirror in the morning yet still walked out the door with my hair a mess or toothpaste on the corners of my mouth. Thank goodness for Cindy’s gentle comments about my appearance on our drive to work. I won’t ask any other men to own up to how often they find themselves in a similar situation.
But this is how all of us--men and women too--often live our lives. We hear the soul-saving word, we hear the stories and teaching of Jesus that can bring us into his good life, but we walk right out the door and keep living our life ruled by the same addictions, fears, and desires.
In some ways the picture James paints is downright funny, if only it wasn’t also tragic in its real results in our lives. The sharply-dressed businessman who’s failed to comb his hair, the young man out on a date with something stuck between his teeth--these things make us chuckle. But addiction, broken relationships, crushing consumer debt, anxiety and loneliness--these make us sick in our hearts.
We’re like the captain of the Titanic. You probably remember the story, if not from the history books, then maybe from the blockbuster mid-90s film. As the so-called “unsinkable” passenger liner steamed across the North Atlantic, the captain received warnings from other ships of massive icebergs drifting off the shores of Newfoundland. History books report the Titanic’s Captain Edward Smith disregarding the warnings because he could not “imagine any condition which would cause a ship to founder. Modern shipbuilding has gone beyond that.” Only hours later a lookout spotted an iceberg, but the ship, cruising at full-speed, couldn’t steer around the obstacle. Within hours, the ship sank and more than fifteen hundred people drowned.
Captain Smith heard the word, the message: “There are icebergs ahead.” He believed the word, but, just like us, for this or that reason, he disregarded it. He was a hearer of the word, but he did not become a doer.
In contrast, James says that the person who becomes a doer of the work . . . is blessed in what they do (v 25). The blessing James has in mind here is salvation--the fruit of the word planted in you, which can save you. If we listen a little more closely to v 25, we hear this. James says we become doers by look[ing] intently into the perfect law of freedom and continu[ing in it.]
Christians often recoil from any mention of “the Law.” Thanks in large part to some of those same sixteenth century Reformers, Law and Gospel stand as polar opposites in our minds. “The Law condemns, but the Gospel offers grace,” the saying goes. Anyone who preaches on the law for too long pretty quickly gets accused of promoting legalism or works-righteousness.
However, what James says to us today doesn’t fit this picture. He calls the law “perfect” and “the law of liberty.” A law that give freedom doesn’t fit our assumptions. But it does fit the way Jesus talked about the law. If we turn back to Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount in Mt 5, we hear Jesus say, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfil them” (Mt 5.17). God’s law, according to Jesus and James, is good. When God gave the law, he was not just publishing a list of expectations that he knew we could never live up to. No, the law was God’s good instruction manual for how broken people in a broken world can begin to live the peaceful, joyful, just life God wants for us. The law was a gift, not a guilt trip.
But, like Paul points out and we know all-too-well from our personal experience, we always find a way to fail to live according to God’s instruction manual. We’re broken people, ruled by our addictions, our desires, our fears. From the place where we live, keeping God’s law seems an impossible task.
But thank be to God for the soul-saving word God’s given us in Jesus! Only once we’ve been set free, only once we’ve been healed and forgiven and welcomed back home to God’s dinner table, can we begin to walk the path to a life a freedom by living the law of freedom. This is a grace-based discipleship. Grace cuts the shackles from our hands, God’s instructions shows us how to get from Egypt to the Promised Land.
If we have been set free by this good news word, then we must begin to live as free people. But this means changing things in our day-to-day lives. In the coming weeks we’ll talk about what specifics James offered his original Jewish Christian audience in the following chapters and verses. We’ll also talk about how his instructions apply to us. Some of them--most of them--carry over pretty directly.
As a preview, listen to what he says in vv 26-27:
If anyone considers himself to be religious, yet does not bridle his tongue and instead indulges his heart, this person’s religion is worthless. Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and undefiled is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.James says the Jewish Christians live out the good news, they live in obedience as Jesus’ disciples, by keeping their tongues in check, by caring for women and children who have no male head of house to provide for them, and by refraining from the loose sexual habits and sexualized pagan religions. These instructions fall into the categories James outlined in v 19: slow to speak, quick to listen and obey, and slow to anger other passions.
James practical instructions to the believers there and then carry over pretty directly for us here and now, despite the two thousand year historical gap. In living out the gospel, we still need to control our tongues, care for people others overlook, and to opt out of some destructive habits of our culture. These are commands you and I can live out on any day of the week.
But some things will look different. In our society, it’s not just our tongues we need to control, but also what we write, what we email, what we text. We need to continue to look after the material needs orphans and widows, but we also need to visit elderly folks in assisted living home who are too often alone. We need to visit people forgotten in prisons. We need to support recovering addicts as they seek for a more stable life. The instructions are the same, but the details look different. We’ll explore this more next week.
When we become doers of the word, rather than just hearers, our lives become praise and thanksgiving to God. In our often stumbling steps down the path of discipleship, we become a firstfruits offering to the God who saves us. Our lives are the first bit of the harvest gathered in, a picture here and now, before the job’s complete, of what God wants for all the world. And God relishes that. According to Paul and to John of Patmos, it is a sweet aroma wafting its way up to God, just like those first sheaves offered on the altar at Israel’s temple, just like the delicious smell coming up from the kitchen downstairs.
Let us give thanks to God for the word that saves us, not just with our mouths or our minds, but with our lives.
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