This letter, that we are about to read eleven verses from, is a fascinating one. The author calls himself “James,” a “servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.” Most scholars today aren’t sure who this James was, but the early church was convinced that the “James” who wrote this letter was a brother, or half-brother of Jesus. If that is so, then he was also one of the first leaders of the first church in Jerusalem.
If this letter was written by James, the brother of Jesus, then it may also be one of the earliest, if not the earliest, book written out of all the books in the New Testament. I say this because James died around AD 62. Some people think this letter may have been written as early as AD 45 or 50.
James writes this letter “to the twelve tribes who are dispersed abroad”. The mention of the twelve tribes suggests a Jewish audience. But obviously, James is writing to other Jewish Christians like himself because he mentions the Lord Jesus Christ twice in this letter. The address makes sense if this letter was indeed written by James, the brother of Jesus, who was a leader of the church in Jerusalem. He is writing to all of the Jewish Christians outside of Jerusalem, many of whom would have become believers in Jesus as their Messiah as a result of Peter’s preaching on the day of Pentecost, fifty days after Jesus rose from the dead.
This letter is striking in its Jewishness. It is almost like a New Testament equivalent of the book of Proverbs. As such, James falls into the category of Wisdom Literature. Thus, the title of this sermon series: How to be a Wise Guy. That’s what James is going to tell us, how to be a wise guy or gal, if you will.
This letter is also striking in its echoes of Jesus. Even though Jesus’ name is only mentioned twice, there are many echoes in this letter of Jesus’ teaching. We will hear at least one of those echoes in our passage for today. Marcus Borg has said, “James echoes more sayings of Jesus than any document in the New Testament other than the gospels themselves. Its fiery passion reflects the passion of Jesus himself.” So, let’s dig in and see what James has to tell us. Listen for God’s word to you from James 1:17-27…
Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.[a] 18 In fulfillment of his own purpose he gave us birth by the word of truth, so that we would become a kind of first fruits of his creatures.
19 You must understand this, my beloved:[b] let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; 20 for your anger does not produce God’s righteousness. 21 Therefore rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls.
22 But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. 23 For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves[c] in a mirror; 24 for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like. 25 But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing.
26 If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. 27 Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.
God loves to give good gifts to his children. And one of the gifts God most enjoys giving to us is his word. James tells us four things about the word in this section of his letter.
First, we are given birth by the word. What is this “word” that James is talking about? The Greek word translated as “word” in this passage is “logon”. And John, in his Gospel, calls Jesus the “Logos”. Jesus is the “Word” par excellence. Jesus is God’s ultimate communication to human beings.
James connects the “word” with the “law”. He uses “word” and “law” interchangeably.
But we must remember that for the Jews of old, “law” did not simply mean “rules”. The Jews called and still call the first 5 books of their Scriptures “the law,” the Torah. And those first 5 books do not simply contain rules for living. They do have that. But those books are also filled with stories.
James also connects the “word” or the “law” directly with Jesus when he says in chapter 2, verse 8: “You do well if you really fulfill the royal law according to the scripture, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’”
Why does James call the command “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” the royal law? I think one reason may be because this law was one that his brother, Jesus, the Messiah, the King, drew special attention to. This royal law is also one we find in Hebrew Scripture, in Leviticus 19:18.
Thus, there are three forms of the word. We have:
· The Living Word we find in Jesus Christ.
· The Spoken Word which is preached, and which must be heard.
· The Written Word which must be read.
But how does God give us birth by this word of truth? God does this when he plants the word in us by the power of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus talked about planting the word in us when he told his Parable of the Sower. One interesting thing to note about the time when Jesus told that parable is that Jesus’ mother and brothers were on the scene. (See Mark 3 & 4.) James most likely heard his brother tell that story. The moment when James heard that story told by Jesus, the word was planted in his heart. Apparently, the seed of the word did not bear fruit in James’ life until later. He was not a believer during Jesus’ earthly ministry, but he became a believer when Jesus appeared to him after he rose from the dead. (1 Cor. 15)
Jesus also talked about God giving us new birth by the Holy Spirit in John 3. And Peter was another one who talked about new birth by the Spirit. In 1 Peter 1:23 we read: “You have been born anew, not of perishable but of imperishable seed, through the living and enduring word of God.”
Now the one thing that is different about spiritual birth from physical birth is that you and I did not have a choice about whether we were going to be born physically. But the Scripture seems to teach us that we have a choice about whether we are going to be born again spiritually. We can either accept the word and Spirit that God seeks to plant in us, or not.
And that leads to James’ second point in this section of his letter. He says that we need to welcome the word.
Each verse in this letter is so compact, so dense, that each really invites unpacking. In verse 21 James tells us the proper preparation for welcoming the word, the required attitude for receiving the word, the thing to be received, and the expected result.
James tells us that the required preparation for receiving the word is that we first need to rid ourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness. So, this verse continues the gardening metaphor that James undoubtedly picked up from his brother’s parable of the sower.
Recently, we have had two wonderful gardeners offering their services free of charge at the Parsonage: Jean Mudgett and Kay Stephenson. And, by the way, the church has been the blessed recipient of the green thumb that belongs to Sandy Noble. You can see the beautiful result of her work in the lovely flowers in front of the church.
You may wonder, however, why we need gardening help at the Parsonage. My wife Becky is a wonderful gardener, but she works full time and so isn’t able to put the time into the Parsonage garden that she would like to. And, to be honest, I just don’t like gardening. I’m no good at it, for one thing, and for another, I just don’t like weeds. It always seems like no sooner do you pull up one weed but three others grow in its place.
And that is what James is talking about in this verse. If we want to make room for the seed of the word to grow in our lives, then we have to get rid of the weeds.
And what are those spiritual weeds? James says that sordidness and evil are those weeds. The word translated as “sordidness” can be used of shabby, dirty clothing that we have to strip off. (That’s another thing I don’t like about gardening. You get sweaty and dirty. But it sure does feel nice when you strip off those sweaty, dirty clothes, throw them in the washer and then you jump in a hot shower.) The word for sordidness can also refer to ear wax. Now that’s interesting because you sometimes have to remove excess ear wax before you can hear properly.
What is the required attitude for receiving the word of truth? It is meekness. Now, meekness is not weakness. It is, rather, the temper of spirit in which we accept what God has to say to us without disputing, without arguing.
And, as we have been saying, the thing we have to receive is “the implanted word”. How wonderful that God plants his word in us! It is as we welcome that word into our minds and hearts and souls that it can really do good.
I love this collect from the Book of Common Prayer:
Blessed Lord, who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning: Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life, which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.
It is the inward digesting of the word of truth that brings the expected result of salvation. And by salvation I do not think James means merely some religious, emotional experience. No. It is much better to think of salvation in terms of James’ brother Jesus’ healing miracles. When Jesus healed people, he saved them from disease and death. He made people whole. And that is what I think we all long for in our heart of hearts. We want to be made whole. And that is the work that Jesus alone can do for us and in us as we receive, as we welcome, his implanted word.
Now, James goes on to spell out precisely how we are to welcome the implanted word. First, we do that by listening to the word.
Have you ever noticed that you can’t really be angry with someone else and really listen to them at the same time? Anger displaces listening and listening displaces anger. This is, I think, part of our problem in America at this time. We have people living at the extremes of politics who are so angry with each other that they can no longer listen to each other. But by the same token, anger can be displaced, if we would simply stop and really listen to one another.
Of course, hearing and really listening are not the same thing, are they?
The story is told about a couple of hunters who were out in the woods of New Jersey when one of them fell to the ground. He hunter who fell didn’t seem to be breathing; his eyes were rolled back in his head. Terrified, his friend whipped out his cell phone and called 911.
“My friend is dead! What can I do?” he cried over the phone.
In a calm, soothing voice, the operator said, “Just take it easy. I can help. First, let’s make sure he’s dead.”
There was a moment of silence, and then the 911 operator heard a single shot.
The guy’s voice came back on the line: “Okay, now what?”[1]
Sometimes we hear but we don’t properly take in what we are hearing. We aren’t really listening.
One of the greatest gifts I have ever received is the blessing of being deeply listened to by various counselors I have had in my life. I have known people who listen so intently, you can feel it. And that experience has made me want to be a better listener.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer once wrote in his book, Life Together:
Christians, especially ministers, so often think they must always contribute something when they are in the company of others, that this is the one service they have to render. They forget that listening can be a greater service than speaking.
Many people are looking for an ear that will listen. They do not find it among Christians, because these Christians are talking where they should be listening. But he who can no longer listen to his brother will soon be no longer listening to God either; he will be doing nothing but prattle in the presence of God too. This is the beginning of the death of the spiritual life, and in the end there is nothing left but spiritual chatter.[2]
Of course, in James’ time, listening was the main way that people would receive the word of truth. Most people did not have a copy of the Scriptures to read for themselves. There would be copies of the Scripture in the synagogue, and literate people like Jesus would read the word to the people.
Today we have the privilege of each having copies of the Scriptures in our homes and the ability to read the Scriptures in our own languages. We need to take advantage of that tremendous blessing that many people down through history have not had. We need to not only listen to the word of truth in church, we need to read it for ourselves.
The problem is that most of us are quicker to speak, and quicker to become angry, than we are to listen. The only way that I know of really reversing this process is to ask God for help to be better listeners.
Now, of course, James does not stop there. He says that if we are to truly welcome the word of truth into our lives, we need to not only listen to the word, we need to be doers of the word.
What James describes here is hard for us to imagine because we are all so familiar with mirrors. Each of us probably has several mirrors in our homes. We all know what we look like, right? But in James’ time, few people had mirrors, and the mirrors they had were of such poor quality that it was probably easy to not know what one looked like.
But even today, we probably do not know, as well as we think we do, what we really look like to other people. I have had the strange experience of watching myself on television. In fact, I was recently interviewed for a television program that will be airing this month. And once again, when the producers sent me a preview of the program, and I watched it, I was surprised at my appearance!
How could I be surprised at my own appearance when I look into a mirror every day? Well, a television camera catches angles and movement that a mirror does not reveal to the person beholding their reflection. So even with the quality and quantity of mirrors we have today, it is easy to be deceived about one’s own appearance.
James says that when we listen to the word but don’t do the word, we act like the person who forgets what they even look like. Now that is a very sensitive point for any preacher. It is very discouraging as a preacher to realize that most of what I spend my time doing will be forgotten by others. I used to get really discouraged about that and then I realized that even I forget what I have preached after I have preached it!
Well, we’re coming into hunting season, so here is another hunting tale for your consideration…The story is told about three friends who decided to go deer hunting together: a lawyer, a doctor, and a preacher. As they were walking, along came a big buck. The three of them shot simultaneously. Immediately the buck dropped to the ground and all three rushed up to see how big it actually was. Upon reaching it they couldn’t determine whose shot had actually killed the deer.
As a heated debated ensued, a few minutes later a game officer came by and asked what the problem was. The doctor told him that they were debating who shot the buck. The officer took a look at the buck and within a few seconds, he said with much confidence, “The preacher shot the buck!” They all wondered how he knew that so quickly. The officer said, “Easy. The bullet went in one ear and out the other.”[3]
Do you know how much we remember of what we hear? Studies have shown that we remember only about 10% of what we hear. But do you know how much you will remember of what you hear and put into action? We remember 100% of what we hear and act upon.
Let us pray that God will give us not only ears to hear what he is saying to us, but wills to act upon what we hear…
Comments