24. More Than

Meditations in James: 24 :  Faith is more than just believing

Jas 2:19 You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that–and shudder.

As we have been saying over these past few days, it is our belief that this matter of faith is one of the most crucial issues for the church of the twenty-first century, no doubt as it has been for the church of every century. The temptation, for every one of us who is a Christian, is to lapse into a belief mentality that is merely an assent to information. I can assent to what astronomers tell me about the planet Jupiter, but it has absolutely no bearing on how I live my life. I can assent to what scientists tell me about the structure of atoms and molecules and even smaller particles of matter, but it has absolutely no affect on how I live my life.

When it comes to the Bible, I have a feeling that there are probably many things which, if we are honest, have little or no bearing on our lives. Thoughts about the Millennium for instance. Different theologians have different interpretations about what will happen and so rather than argue it, which does nothing more than massage the ego, I’m happy to say, “I’m a pan-millennialist – I’m sure it’ll all pan out in the end.” Large parts of the Bible, again if we are honest, merely go to reinforce or confirm our faith which is why I always advocate read all of it. In fact I am of the opinion that we can meditate on any passage in the Scriptures and God will feed us through it, and in feeding change us. Yet, I will still maintain that some parts of the Bible will be more alive and vibrant to us than others. The New Testament will have far more impact on us as Christians with all of its teaching about Jesus, salvation and the life God has for us, than say Ezekiel’s descriptions of the new temple he sees in his vision. That’s simply being real. But again, there is a danger here in just absorbing information – ‘knowing about’.

We’ve focused on this one little verse today because in it James is making this further point here about faith – it’s not just about having knowledge. Now knowledge is important as I have just been suggesting, (and would never want you to take what I have been saying as a reason for not reading the Bible – read it even more!) and indeed without knowledge it is really impossible to have Biblical faith.  We quoted the other day, “By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.” (Heb 11:3). The implication there is that we have been told through the Scriptures that God made this world from nothing, and that creates an awesome response to Him. That response is worship and worship is an act of faith. The writer later went on, “anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him” (Heb 11:6). Again something in us believed there was a supernatural being, because that is how we are made, but when we came to the Bible we found it was ALL about God. The more we read the more we were convinced that He exists and desires a relationship with human beings, whereby when they seek Him with all their heart, they find Him (Deut 4:29), and when they find Him He blesses them. This knowledge evoked a response in us. That response is faith. The only question is, will we continue to let it evoke responses in us?

You believe that there is one God. Good! says James. Oh yes, knowing about God is a good starting place, is what he is saying, but he’s not happy for us to stop at that place. Even the demons believe that, he continues.  Why is he saying that? Well demons are fallen spirits who are led by Satan, and they are in rebellion against God.  God so permits that state of affairs because He makes use of them, but the truth is that they are not God’s children and they are not living in the blessing of God’s love and are not called to live by faith -  but they still ‘know’ about God!  You see what James is saying?  Even God’s enemies know about Him, but that doesn’t mean to say that evokes a faith response in them.  To the contrary, they shudder with awful fear, knowing that God is All-mighty and one day He will decree their end (Rev 20:10).  Oh no, they have every reason to shudder, but that is not faith.

Yes, you can have a variety of responses to hearing about God. It can be the response of the atheist, the response of denial, and for that the Bible calls them fools (Psa 14:1). Then there is the response of the agnostic which, when they hear, is, “Well, I’m not sure,” and so they sit on the fence and remain lost. Then there is the response of the would-be believer who responds gladly and receives salvation, but it is at this point that James challenges us for it’s like he says, don’t stop believing AND responding. Don’t let your Christian faith lapse into a knowledge thing, for it’s meant to remain alive and vibrant, a relationship where we go on hearing God and go on responding to Him. Make sure it is, won’t you.

23. Faith No Deeds

Meditations in James: 23 :  Faith without deeds

Jas 2:18 But someone will say, “You have faith; I have deeds.” Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.

Faith is at the heart of the reality of the Christian Faith. That is why James perseveres with his argument and why we continue with it for a third day. Remember behind all James’ teaching is the thought that he is writing to a dispersed people living in the world and so James is saying things that they particularly need to hear, to combat the deception of the enemy in the world. One of the enemy’s strategies is to try to get us into an extreme position, so there are some ‘faith’ people and there are some ‘action’ or ‘deeds’ people. The ‘faith’ person is a great prayer warrior perhaps, or a great Bible expositor and the rest of the church hold their spirituality in awe.  Then at the other extreme is the person who is full of good works, constantly helping the poor and needy but who is never heard to utter a prayer and never spends time with God in the Bible. One of them has their head in the clouds of heaven, but that is all they have. The other has their feet on the earth, but that is all they have.

Now when we look at verse 18 there is a problem. Ancient manuscripts don’t have punctuation or quotation marks, and some Bibles change the punctuation marks to include the whole of the debate, but let’s accept it for what we have above. James imagines one of these ‘extremists’ saying, “Well you’re a faith person James; I’m a deeds person. I’m not a great spiritual giant like you, but I do stuff.” James’ reply needs to be seen as saying, “Well if you separate the two out, if you think they can exist separately, if you are a Christian show me your faith separated from deeds, and then I’ll show you a better way, faith shown by deeds.”

Do you see what James is doing? He is showing us the folly of trying to make faith and deeds two separate things that can exist by themselves. Well, deeds can exist by themselves, that is true. An unbeliever can do good works, and many do. Yes, good deeds can exist entirely separately from religious faith, but faith cannot. As we said in a previous meditation, and we keep on needing to hear, faith that doesn’t express itself in some way is merely a mind thing and we can’t be sure it even exists. If you say, “I believe” but there are no signs of the expression of that belief, then the reality is that you don’t believe; it’s just words. “But I go to church on a Sunday morning,” someone might say as a defence to this challenge. If that is the only expression of your belief, then it is rather shallow isn’t it? “But I keep the Ten Commandments as well,” I hear you protest. Still rather a shallow faith isn’t it, when you line that up with what we said previously about faith – about it being about hearing God and responding to Him in a daily, living relationship.

No, we would do well to consider further a “faith that works”. That little phrase sums up the Christian life well. It is, indeed, a faith that works. It works in the sense that a machine works, and it works in this way because it is simply an expression of how God has designed things to be. When we come into a living relationship with the Lord, we find a new peace, harmony and order appearing. Living God’s way, and in harmony and in fellowship with the Lord means that all His resources, His grace, are available, including things like wisdom or strength, and so suddenly there is an observable change that takes place that can only be explained using such words as peace, harmony and order.  Suddenly this life starts working as it should do. Until we became a Christian we had been dysfunctional, only working in the material realm, yet we are beings designed to work in the material and spiritual realms. If the latter is missing we can never fully function as we are designed to. No, we suddenly see a faith that is now working.

But even in saying that, what we mean is that there is a visible outworking of faith by the way the life is now being lived, seen by the things the person does. The actual living out of their life, the ‘doing’ of it, is what reveals the reality of the faith that is there. The person who goes to church on a Sunday morning but who still remains a self-centred, grumbling and moaning person, godless in every other way except Sunday morning, actually doesn’t have faith. The truth is that when God speaks, and a person responds and is born again, that affects the whole of their life. Satan will try and tell us to compartmentalise our lives and keep faith away from work or school or whatever, but when we came to Christ we surrendered the whole of our lives to him and he is to be Lord over every aspect of our existence. The result should be that every aspect of our lives, all the things we do, will reflect that.

Check this out. Are there areas of your life where you try to keep God out? Are there areas of your life where faith does not operate? If there are, you’ve obviously not realised that God is concerned to bless every aspect of your life, every single thing you do. It’s time to let Him have free access to every part of your life so that faith may work in all areas, and that all areas may work as He’s designed them to work.

22. Good Deeds

Meditations in James: 22 :  Faith needs good deeds

Jas 2:15,16 Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him, “Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it?

Yesterday we laid down the foundation for working through what James is saying by considering what faith is and how it comes. We started by suggesting that in fact this is some of the most vitally needed truth for the church in the twenty-first century if we are to avoid being church in name only. In the meditation we saw that faith needs to have a ‘doing’ element in it for it to be true faith, otherwise it remains simply a mind thing, a dead thing, lifeless and meaningless.

In our verses today James provides an illustration from church life to show how faith without action is a meaningless thing. Perhaps this is better explained if we first consider Jesus’ teaching on caring for one another: “Jesus replied: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: `Love your neighbor as yourself.” (Mt 22:37-39). Loving your ‘neighbour’, anyone near you, was a central core teaching and came a very close second to loving God.  To his disciples, Jesus added, “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another.” (Jn 13:34), implying a sacrificial love that lays down its life for others. If we weren’t sure about it, he repeats it: “My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.” (Jn 15:12,13) Now there is no room for doubts or questions about this; it is quite specific – love others as you would like to be loved, and let your love be sacrificial.

Now the point is emphasized by the apostles. Paul wrote, “as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.” (Gal 6:10) and John later wrote, “If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth.” (1 Jn 3:17,18). Now even if there was any question about loving outsiders, and there isn’t, there can be no question whatsoever about loving other Christians. Moreover John hasn’t given us any grounds to make excuses when he said If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need and similarly now, James refers to a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. These two apostles place the situation well and truly in front of us with these two clear references to love being expressed in very practical and tangible ways – especially in the church.

Let’s spell it out even more. Yesterday, we saw that real faith has a practical ‘doing’ aspect to it. Now we are considering Jesus, John and James saying that practical ‘doing’ aspect is to be first and foremost expressed to those in need closest to you. Paul was most specific about this: “If anyone does not provide for his relatives, and especially for his immediate family, he has denied the faith and is worse than an unbeliever.” (1 Tim 5:8). The ‘love command’ that Jesus gave (Jn 13:34 – see above) is to be worked out in very practical ways. If you don’t care for and look after those who are closest to you, you are not fulfilling or obeying the command to love which is at the heart of the Faith.

James rubs the point in even more. There is no point in saying “I wish you well” without doing something about it. Pious words don’t help put food in a person’s stomach or clothes on their back. In a day when, in our country, the State provides ‘benefits’ for many people, we might think that our obligation under this teaching is removed. Surely, we think, they have food and clothing, so I don’t need to worry about them. Hold on, the basic teaching was Love your neighbor as yourself. If you love yourself you want to care for yourself and not in a most minimalistic way. Is it loving to see some one just getting by when you have plenty?

So let’s summarise what we have been saying. Jesus and the apostles taught that we are to care for one another and provide for one another when there is need. Faith is responding to God’s word which, in this case, came through Jesus, John and James, not merely giving mental assent to it, but actually responding in practical ways so that others in the church who have little benefit from our plenty. Faith is ‘doing’ and doing means practical help for those who need it. May we be that sort of church!

21. Faith & Deeds

Meditations in James: 21 :  Faith needs deeds

Jas 2:14,17     What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? …. In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.

We will, over the next few days, cover this subject being now laid out by James in some detail, but we will take it step by step. Now there may be some who reading these verses say, “Oh this is so obvious that we don’t need to bother with this.” I would suggest that that is far from the truth. My observation is that the truth of these verses is only truly perceived when we give some little thought to it, and in fact this is some of the most vitally needed truth for the church in the twenty-first century.

Our starting point must be to ask, what is faith? Hebrews chapter 11 is the chapter of faith: “Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.” (Heb 11:1)  Faith is about belief.  Faith is about believing about the future and it’s about believing about what we cannot see.  It’s believing about the future because if it was about the past we would ‘know’ for a certainty, and faith is being sure about what is yet to come.  Now supposing God said to you, “Pray for this person in front of you and I will heal them.” Now that is a future event because you haven’t yet done it.  When you stretch out to pray for them, that is faith.  You are expecting something to yet happen because God has said so.  In this instance, healing is something you can’t see until it has happened, yet when we sense we have heard God’s voice, we have an inner certainty that it will happen.  This is faith.

Now in our example we referred to God speaking. So how does faith come? “faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ.” (Rom 10:17)  In other words, very simply, faith comes when God speaks. Now we may not be very conscious that we’ve ‘heard a voice’ because it may just be the quiet inner witness of His Holy Spirit within us.  Yet we hear something and that ‘something’ brings a sense of assurance in us, we become sure that it will happen.  That is faith.

Now suppose a third party is watching us.  We sense we have just heard God. Our observer sees nothing at this point; it is all going on in us.  We are sure that God has spoken but so far we have done nothing.  Now is this faith?  In one sense, yes it is, because we are sure of what we hope for and certain about what we do not see. But how can we be sure we are sure of what we hope for? (Yes, that question is right!)   We can only prove it, by responding to what we have been hearing, by doing what we heard.  Until then it is only a mind thing and we may be kidding ourselves, but faith is only real faith when there is action involved.  Faith starts with belief, so the Hebrews’ writer starts out, “By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.” (Heb 11:3)  We’ve heard or read, he says, that God created the universe, and so we live in the light of that.  He continues on with varying ‘belief’ items, until he comes to Noah when, warming to his theme, he says, “By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear built an ark to save his family.” (v.7)  Noah heard from God and showed his faith by doing something, building the ark. He continues, “By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.” (v.8).  Similarly Abram heard from God and showed his faith by going.  All of the examples that are then given in that chapter are examples of people DOING.

The big temptation that Satan puts before us, is for us to just be believers who believe things in their minds but do nothing with it.  Thus for instance we have believers who say they believe in the God of the Bible but deny anything that could be Him moving, and they certainly don’t expect (or want) Him to do things through them.  Passive, inactive Christianity is a denial of the Bible. Every now and then I come across seekers who say, “Well yes, I believe all this about Jesus Christ being God’s Son and dying for our sin.” and they remain completely unchanged.  Why?  Because they haven’t seen yet that that applies to them and he died for them, and they’ve got to ask God for it to apply to them.  That is faith, responding yourself to what God says. As James says, What good is it if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? If it stays in the mind and the life is untouched, what good is that.  That is not salvation.  That person is still stuck in their sins and doesn’t know forgiveness or the powerful presence of God’s Holy Spirit who only comes when we respond to His word in obedience: “We are witnesses of these things, and so is the Holy Spirit, whom God has given to those who obey him.” (Acts 5:32).

So you were born again.  Was that the end of it?  No, just the beginning! From then on you entered into a new life: “For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” (Eph  2:10)   There is a life to be lived, responding to God’s word and to His Spirit.  If we don’t respond, nothing happens and it just stays in our mind and we and the world get no benefit.  So-called faith, that is just belief in the mind, is in fact dead.  Nothing is happening, nothing is changing, there is no life here, and God is not able to move.  This is a dead situation.  Now there is a challenge in all this: “without faith it is impossible to please God” (Heb 11:6) God’s salvation through Jesus is meant to change us, change people, change the world, for that is what God’s will is.  He is only pleased when that is happening, and so if we just remain with a set of dead, inactive beliefs, that is doing nothing!  Nothing doesn’t please God!  God is pleased when His children respond to Him and He is able to move through them and bring blessing to His world.  Has your faith got actions to it? 

20. Judgment & Mercy

Meditations in James: 20 :  Judgement & Mercy

Jas 2:12,13     Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom, because judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment!

Sometimes in Scripture we move into areas where there is language being used that is not used in common, every-day life, and which, therefore, requires some definition.  This is one such place. ‘Judging’ is fairly easy because we have TV programmes where people have to perform and are then ‘judged’ by a panel. When we talk about judging, we talk about assessing or, to use an older phrase, being weighed in the balances. ‘Mercy’ is not so commonly used. Mercy is unfounded compassion. Mercy isn’t earned or deserved; it is just given. Now we have to apply these two words to see what James is saying in these rather complex verses.

First of all he makes a call in respect of our behaviour – speak and act. But we are to speak and act in a particular way, a way governed by what is going to happen to us in the future. He says, when you speak or act remember that you are going to be judged or assessed by the law of love that we have been recently considering. That law of love brings a freedom of movement; it allows us to reach out and touch others in very positive and purposeful ways. The law of love will be the yardstick by which we are measured.

Now earlier we didn’t go the full extent with the definition of judgement because it doesn’t only refer to the act of assessing, it also involves the act of determining what happens to the person being judged.  On these performance-TV shows the person or couple who is judged to have been bottom of the contestants, leaves the show and doesn’t appear any more. When we read of judgement in the Bible it can be either eternal judgement – where our eternal destiny takes us – or judgement that is short-term discipline, or even long-term if that discipline doesn’t bring the fruits that God is looking for when he brings it.  Judgement is also used in terms of rewards in heaven.

There is a clear Scriptural teaching that we Christians will receive in heaven according to how we have lived here: “If any man builds on this foundation using gold, silver, costly stones, wood, hay or straw, his work will be shown for what it is, because the Day will bring it to light. It will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test the quality of each man’s work. If what he has built survives, he will receive his reward. If it is burned up, he will suffer loss; he himself will be saved, but only as one escaping through the flames.” (1 Cor 3:12:12-15) and “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad” (2 Cor 5:10) and “Behold, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to everyone according to what he has done.” (Rev 22:12). The message is very clear. When we are Christians we have an eternal destiny in heaven with God, but the nature or character of that destiny (to start with at least) appears to be determined by the nature or character of the lives we lived here.  That is the judgement that James is possibly referring to.

But we need to consider his comments about mercy as well. Remember that he has just been speaking against favouritism and favouritism puts some people down while it elevates others. The poor needed our kindness and we didn’t give it.  We failed to show them mercy is what James is implying.  Oh yes, this isn’t a branch off to some completely different subject; this is an extension of his argument about treating all people equally and well.  If you don’t show people mercy, is what he is saying, you will not be shown mercy when it comes to your judgement time.  When you have finished your performance and are being assessed on it, if you haven’t included mercy in your performance, don’t expect to be shown mercy.  Expanding that word, if you haven’t shown undeserved compassion to those who needed it, don’t ask for special favours to get more than you deserve in heaven. Everything we have and will have, comes by God’s mercy and grace. He doesn’t HAVE to give us anything. We deserved eternal punishment, but in His mercy, His undeserving compassion, He offered us salvation through Jesus. That gave us a new eternal destiny.

But within that new life, He still gives us free will to choose how we will respond to His word and His Spirit and, therefore, we can be dilatory and casual and fail to be the people He wants us to be. If we are like that, we need to realise there are consequences. We may not loose our eternal destiny (though I believe Scripture indicates that is possible where there is apostasy) but we may not get all we could get if we had fully entered into the will of God, what He desired for us – which included letting His love reach out through us to those who were poor and needy.  Oh yes, there are definitely long-term consequences to what we do or don’t do today, and we really do need to consider those in determining how we will live now.

19. Avoid Lawbreaking

Meditations in James: 19 :  How to Avoid Becoming a Lawbreaker

Jas 2:8-11 If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing right. But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it. For he who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” If you do not commit adultery but do commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker.

They say that in the modernist movements of the twentieth century, artists sought to paint ‘universals’, things that summed up all other things in that group, such as a human being, or a chair. What James refers to as the royal law, “Love your neighbour as yourself” is a spiritual example of a universal because it sums up all other laws that protect human beings from human beings, because that is what most laws do. That particular law was found in Lev 19:18 and the Lord knew that each person has a self-love, a concern for their own well-being. What that simple law says is that anyone should view other people as they view themselves.  Now if we do that, we will always be concerned for the well-being of others, just as much as we are concerned for our own well-being, and if we do that any other law about human relationships will be covered. Now it is called the royal law because it is a law that comes out of the character of God Himself, and God of course is the King of all things.

The apostle Paul understood this when he wrote: “The commandments, “Do not commit adultery,” “Do not murder,” “Do not steal,” “Do not covet,” and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this one rule: “Love your neighbour as yourself.” Love does no harm to its neighbour. Therefore love is the fulfilment of the law.” (Rom 13:9,10).  Jesus had likewise previously declared this: “One of them, an expert in the law, tested him with this question: “Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the Law?”  Jesus replied: “`Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: `Love your neighbour as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” (Mt 22:35-40). So, instead of having to think about the technical legalities of any particular situation, we ask ourselves, “If this was me, how would I like to be treated? This is how I ought to act towards this other person.”

But this is not a theoretical, abstract discussion; this is all to be seen in the light of what James has been saying about local gatherings of Christians. In case you’d forgotten, he was castigating them for showing favouritism and exalting the rich and ignoring the poor.  Implied in all this, he is saying, “Think about this, how would you feel if you were the poor coming into your congregations?  How would you feel if you saw the rich being exalted and yourself being ignored?”  There is an obvious answer to that which implies that the behaviour being referred to – favouritism – is wrong, because it demeans the poor and makes them feel bad about themselves, if not about you!  This favouritism must stop!  It must stop if for no other reason that it is wrong and ‘wrong’ is sin.  The law of love has revealed you as a lawbreaker. You are not loving part of your congregation as yourself.  If you were in their shoes you would not feel good; you would feel hurt, rejected and isolated.  Oh no, if you thought the previous meditations were the rantings of someone with a chip on their shoulder about being rejected, you have missed the point.  It’s all about sin in the local church!  Sin is breaking the Law whether it is the ethical Law of Moses or the law of love that summarises it.  Did you not realise this?   Favouritism is sin and we should never knowingly continue in sin.  We should repent of all known sin, and repentance involves giving up the sin.

To make his point even more forcibly James points out that if you break the law on just one point it makes you a lawbreaker.  If that doesn’t say much to you it’s simply that you haven’t thought about it yet.  If you are a lawbreaker you are a criminal in the eyes of the law. It doesn’t matter which law you break; if you break ANY law you are automatically a criminal.  Indeed for the purpose of definition every sin is the same, so once you sin by whatever means, it makes you a sinner and that puts you on the same footing as every other sinner, including those that you might have thought were ‘big’ sinners. No, a sinner is a sinner.  We are all lawbreakers if we knowingly do this thing. Once we say that, we need to add three comments:  First God is against knowing-sinners.  Yet, second, Jesus died for all sinners.  Third, all known sin is to be confessed and rejected.  When we do the third thing, the first thing ceases to be, because of the second one.

So, check it out. James has spent quite a while on this subject.  If not dealt with it can undermine the very foundation of the Church.  If not dealt with it causes division and hurt and is an issue that God is deeply concerned about because it flies in the face of His very character – love.  So, are there people we exclude?  Are there people we look down on?  Are there people we feel negative about, simply because of their looks or the culture they come from? Perhaps it’s time to do a reassessment of our church life.

18. Rich & Poor

Meditations in James: 18 :  Understanding the Rich & Poor

Jas 2:5-7 Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him? But you have insulted the poor. Is it not the rich who are exploiting you? Are they not the ones who are dragging you into court? Are they not the ones who are slandering the noble name of him to whom you belong?

For the most part we just live our lives and accept people as they are.  In the United Kingdom there is not poverty as parts of the world know it, but there are the poor, those who are on state benefit perhaps; they are there.  At the other end of the scale are the great and the glorious, those with more money than they know what to do with, but we only see them occasionally on TV.  In between is a range of people ranging from the postman to the banker but, as far as James is concerned, as we saw yesterday, we are to be class-blind.  So strongly does James feel about this that he continues on in these next three verses to expound this subject. This new Christian faith is to be something completely different in terms of valuing people, from the ways of the world, and if we didn’t get the message yesterday, he ploughs on to stir our consciences in today’s verses.

To do this he makes comments first about the poor and then about the rich. First of all, let’s consider the poor.  He speaks about those who are poor in the eyes of the world with the clear inference that material poverty may be seen as a demeaning thing in the eyes of those who are godless and don’t understand these things, but there is another side to it.  These people have been chosen by God to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom. So why should this be?  When you are poor and struggling, you tend to be much more aware of your personal need and when Jesus comes along the poor tend to be far more responsive to him.  From God’s perspective the poor are frequently much more like a bunch of responsive little children who want to be adopted than the rich who stand aloof in their self-sufficiency.  For this reason alone the Lord’s heart is strong for the poor.  Yet how did the church then and how does the church today respond to the poor?  According to James, the church then at least, was insulting them by paying more attention to the rich and almost disregarding the poor who came into their meetings.

I gave three illustrations yesterday, of modern instances of this happening, not that I or my family were poor but that, by our clothing, in the minds of certain local churches, we appeared poor and were thus given a negative reception.  New churches tend to be far less formal and people dress far less formally for church, but do we actually accept those who come in from a different cultural background to the majority of middle class England?  America, I observe, is often equally bad at this.  It isn’t merely a matter of clothes, if you think that it what I have been saying; it is all about heart acceptance of others, whoever they are and whatever they look like.

But, in case we haven’t got the point yet, James pushes on even further.  Who is it in the world who exploits the rest of us, either (surmising) by land grabbing, making use of money, or by being a harsh employer?  It’s the rich! And you are welcoming them and giving them pride of position?  Today we tend to think of large corporations as being the big ogres who charge too much interest, give out mortgages that are too big that lead people into financial difficulties, or require their workers to work on a Sunday, or work ‘flexible’ hours to make more for the company, but which means that family life is weakened.  However large corporations are run by people.  Managers are just as culpable as directors of the company.  If you are a manager or senior person in a financial institution, have you salved your conscience over these practices by saying, “Well everybody does it; it’s business.”   Really?  You are still answerable to God.

Part of my history was in a Baptist church, and I’ve seen the same in other similar churches.  The deacons or elders were all the big business men of the community, but in today’s life, they probably feel uncomfortable or defensive about my comments above.  Well according to James you have a right to feel uncomfortable.  In many parts of the church it is run by people from middle or upper-middle class cultures.  I’m beginning to let loose other people who actually may have a more open heart to God and who may have more faith. These words of James aren’t an outdated ranting of an early church leader with a bee in his bonnet!  They are the prophetic declarations of a man of God, one of God’s chosen voices, and so we would do well to listen to him, as uncomfortable as that may be.

We are to keep a right balance in all these things.  It is not wrong to be well educated and well off.  It is wrong if we use questionable methods to get to that place.  It is wrong if we look down our noses at the poor (slandering the noble name of him to whom you belong).  It is wrong if our riches make us feel secure so that our spiritual relationship with Him is shallow.  It is wrong if we ignore the needs of those around us that we could meet.  Oh yes, there are inherent dangers in the kingdom of God for the rich, and we need to be aware of them and avoid them.  The biggest danger in terms of church life, as far as James is concerned, is that wealth separates out people and demeans those who don’t have it, and wrongly elevates those who do have it.  The kingdom of God is about spiritual realities and not material realities, and the poor are often much more well off in the kingdom than the wealthy.  We need to take these things on board, because they are as relevant in the twenty-first century in the West as they were in James’ time.

17. Beware Favouritism

Today we pick up again the meditations in James

Meditations in James: 17 :  Beware Favouritism

Jas 2:1-4 My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don’t show favoritism. Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, “Here’s a good seat for you,” but say to the poor man, “You stand there” or “Sit on the floor by my feet,” have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?

When we speak about the ‘world’ in Scripture we sometimes refer to the earth on which we live, sometimes the people of the earth, but more often in the New Testament at least, to the godless, self-centred attitudes of so many in the world.  ‘World’ is equated with a bad attitude.  John in his first letter wrote, “Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For everything in the world–the cravings of sinful man, the lust of his eyes and the boasting of what he has and does–comes not from the Father but from the world. The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.” (1 Jn 2:15-17).  There, five times, John refers to the godless, self-centred, materialistic, atheistic attitude that prevails in so much of life.  John sums up those things as sensual desire, covetous desire and pride. All of those things are greatly stimulated by the eyes, by what we see.  The world goes on what looks good: smart cars, latest designer clothes, special hair cuts, sensual beauty, macho handsomeness, these are the things the world looks at.  Not so James!

The focus of the verses today, says don’t look on the outward side.  Samuel had to learn that: “The LORD does not look at the things man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance, but the LORD looks at the heart.” (1 Sam 16:7).  Our tendency, so often, is to sum up people by their appearance and if they don’t conform to the expectations of the ‘world’, we write them off. There are many, many people who feel demeaned by life, put down by people and who now have a low self-esteem as a result.  The ‘world’ is a hard place that exalts the glorious few and put down the many.  James is aware of this tendency and says this should not be how it is in the church.  Tragically it is.

Our family once went to a big well-known evangelical church in Wales while we were on holiday.  We were camping and, having three young children, we went to church in jeans.  The looks we were given and the obvious avoidance of us, would have had James denouncing them loudly.  My wife and I were on a caravanning holiday only a few years ago.  At the last minute she decided to ‘go to church’ in the beautiful village in the West Country where we were staying.  Jeans again were her attire.  She wasn’t looking scruffy; to the contrary, she looked good, but she was wearing jeans.  The vicar purposefully avoided having contact with her because she stood out from his garden-party-dressed ladies in hats.  One of my sons and daughters-in-law were away at a wedding and stayed overnight.  Walking around the town next morning they wondered about going to church.  As they walked towards the building they realized that every person going in was either suited or dressed to a high degree.  Their smart but casual clothes seemed out of place and they were put off and didn’t enter.  But large majorities of the population don’t have suits or smart dresses, and so would be put off going into such establishments.  Such ‘nice’ people don’t realize how exclusive they are and if you aren’t sure what that means, they don’t realize how they exclude people from encountering God!  As my younger son commented, “Suppose I had been someone at my wits end and came seeking God and found I wasn’t dressed properly!”

Do you see the point?  James rather labours it but it is just the same. Favouritism, as he describes it, is just the same as looking down on people because they aren’t dressed as well as we are.  A young man came to our church several years ago wearing a coat of many colours that Joseph would have been proud of.  I confess I thought, “I like that! I wish I had the courage to wear something like that!”  He carried on wearing it, went through a phase of wearing a lot of ironmongery and black leathers but is remarkably straight today and is still with us.  Clothes aren’t an issue.  Neither is whether someone is a street cleaner, or a bank manager.  Jesus didn’t make distinctions and neither should we.  This is what James is on about, that’s why he starts off referring to us as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ.  Jesus is the all-glorious Son of God, but “made himself nothing, taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness.” (Phil 2:7).  It was the Pharisees who made themselves look something and in doing that they drove a wedge between themselves and the ordinary people. Jesus gathered to himself fishermen, tax collectors and the like.  He made no distinction between the great and the humble.  When a Jewish leader, Nicodemus, came to see him, he treated him just the same as anyone else.  This is the truth of what James says.  We neither exalt rich and influential people nor demean poor, uneducated people.  Each and every person stands before God in their own right and we accept them as they are.  Now, be honest, is that really how it is with you?  If not, it’s time to read this meditation again.

52. Where is He

Meditations in Job : 52.  Where is He?

Job 23:3,4 If only I knew where to find him; if only I could go to his dwelling! I would state my case before him and fill my mouth with arguments.

I have noticed that Jesus approved at the saints ‘bothering’ God, as seen in his parable of the persistent widow (Lk 18:1-5).  Job wants to ‘bother’ God but just can’t seem to make contact with him.  That is the gist of chapter 23.  He starts out, “Even today my complaint is bitter; his hand is heavy in spite of my groaning.” (v.1,2)  He would have thought that, seeing his anguish, the Lord would have drawn near, but the burden upon him remains just as heavy. Thus we come to our verses today when he makes this statement, that if only he could find God he would bring his situation before Him.  If only he could find Him, “I would find out what he would answer me, and consider what he would say.” (v.5).  i.e. then at least I would be able to get His side of all this!  “Would he oppose me with great power? No, he would not press charges against me.” (v.6)  i.e. if I were able to get to see Him I’m sure He wouldn’t slap me down, I’m sure He wouldn’t condemn me!  Why?  Because I am sure of His righteous judgment: “There an upright man could present his case before him, and I would be delivered forever from my judge,” (v.7) and I am sure He would acquit me of wrong doing!

Yet, I can’t find him: “But if I go to the east, he is not there; if I go to the west, I do not find him. When he is at work in the north, I do not see him; when he turns to the south, I catch no glimpse of him.” (v.8,9) i.e. He’s nowhere to be found!  Wherever I turn there is no sense of His presence, is what we might say.  But then comes a remarkable testimony of awareness with a confidence in his own responses in what has been happening: “But he knows the way that I take; when he has tested me, I will come forth as gold. My feet have closely followed his steps; I have kept to his way without turning aside. I have not departed from the commands of his lips; I have treasured the words of his mouth more than my daily bread.” (v.10-12)  i.e. yet I  trust in Him, that He knows what is happening to me and when He’s finished with me I’ll come out victorious for I have kept to His way and His word.

Rather like David in the psalms, Job concludes this section by an affirmation of the Lord’s sovereignty: “But he stands alone, and who can oppose him? He does whatever he pleases. He carries out his decree against me, and many such plans he still has in store.” (v.13,14)  Yes, He is at work in all this and, no doubt, has still more to do.  But that isn’t a comfortable thought! “That is why I am terrified before him; when I think of all this, I fear him. God has made my heart faint; the Almighty has terrified me.” (v.15,16)  This is a terrible experience and if the Lord has yet more to do in it, that is not something to be accepted easily.  He concludes with a word of determination: “Yet I am not silenced by the darkness, by the thick darkness that covers my face.” (v.17)

As we look back over this chapter now, there are a couple of things that stand out. First, times of anguish come and it seems that we are utterly alone in them. As James was wont to say (Jas 1:2-4,12), we are to see such times as tests and Job affirms that here. But there is a specific feature of these sorts of tests, and that is that the Lord seems to have vanished. We seem to be utterly alone and however much we cry it, it seems some while before He seems to make His presence felt again. It is almost as if He says, “I want you to see that you can stand with the resources I have given you. I want you to remain faithful even though it seems that nothing else of my reality is real.” As David once wrote, “weeping may remain for a night, but rejoicing comes in the morning.” (Psa 30:5) There may appear a ‘night’ of anguish, but the morning will eventually come.

The second thing to note is that such times ARE SERIOUSLY DIFFICULT and, if we are honest, we find the thought of God disciplining, training and testing us to be something that is really scary. Now that is reality! Everything about us shies away from pain and difficulty and worry and anxiety. Normally those emotions act as a protecting force to keep us away from danger, but sometimes, the Lord in His love for us, disciplines us and that is far from pleasant (Heb 12:5,6,11).  Beware the superficial Christianity that preaches that life will always be wonderful and everything will always go well. It won’t! We live in a Fallen World and things go wrong.  We live in a hostile world and have an enemy who wars against us.  We are redeemed sinners that God is sanctifying.  Now the truth is that the Lord IS always with us, even when we don’t feel His presence (Heb 13:5) and He is always working on our behalf (Rom 8:28).  It may not feel like it, but that is the truth and part of God’s training is to bring us to the place when we can declare these truths, which ARE true, even when we don’t feel them. Beware of letting feelings reign! Learn of Job.

51. A Sinner

Meditations in Job : 51.  You ARE a Sinner!

Job 22:4,5 Is it for your piety that he rebukes you and brings charges against you? Is not your wickedness great? Are not your sins endless?

I have noticed that there are those who only look for the negatives in mankind and constantly go on about our sin. Eliphaz seems to be one of those people. As he comes back on Job again he starts by asking what benefit God gets from us being good: “Can a man be of benefit to God? Can even a wise man benefit him? What pleasure would it give the Almighty if you were righteous? What would he gain if your ways were blameless?” (v.2,3) The implication is that God doesn’t bother with us when we are good, because he goes on with our verses at the top today, saying that it is not for our goodness that He rebukes us but for our sin – so Job, you must be a sinner!  Well actually God does bother with us when we are righteous – He loves us and blesses us, even if we don’t realise what is going on!

When he asks “Are your sins not endless?” he is assuming that Job must have sinned and so he reels off a list of possible things that Job has done – demanded of the weak and poor (v.6), failed to help the needy (v.7,8), disregarded widows and orphans (v.9).  This he concludes, “is why snares are all around you, why sudden peril terrifies you, why it is so dark you cannot see, and why a flood of water covers you.” (v.10,11).  This is his logic; he doesn’t know that Job has sinned but the fact of everything is going wrong brings him to that conclusion.

He then turns Job’s words back on himself, “Yet you say, `What does God know? Does he judge through such darkness? Thick clouds veil him, so he does not see us as he goes about in the vaulted heavens.” (v.13,14).  Look, he replies, God’s above the darkness and sees everything: “Is not God in the heights of heaven? And see how lofty are the highest stars!” (v.12) You’re just doing what sinners of old have always done, “Will you keep to the old path that evil men have trod?” (v.15) “They said to God, `Leave us alone! What can the Almighty do to us?” (v.17) and suffered because of their foolishness: “They were carried off before their time, their foundations washed away by a flood,” (v.16) not realising that it was God who had blessed them in the first place: “Yet it was he who filled their houses with good things, so I stand aloof from the counsel of the wicked.” (v.17) (and here he is quoting Job back to himself – see 21:16) “The righteous,” he concludes, “see their ruin and rejoice; the innocent mock them, saying, `Surely our foes are destroyed, and fire devours their wealth.” (v.19,20)  i.e. the righteous see how things go wrong for the wicked and mock them for their stupidity.

In the remaining verses of this chapter, Eliphaz makes what, in any other circumstances, would be a good call to repentance, but that is based on the assumption that Job has sinned – and of course we know that he hasn’t.  His sin is not the cause of his present difficulties!  But what he now says does so often apply: “Submit to God and be at peace with him; in this way prosperity will come to you. Accept instruction from his mouth and lay up his words in your heart.” (v.21,22) Good advice!

“If you return to the Almighty, you will be restored: If you remove wickedness far from your tent and assign your nuggets to the dust, your gold of Ophir to the rocks in the ravines, then the Almighty will be your gold, the choicest silver for you,” (v.23-25) which might be summed up as don’t put your trust in riches but in God – also good advice! “Surely then you will find delight in the Almighty and will lift up your face to God. You will pray to him, and he will hear you, and you will fulfill your vows. What you decide on will be done, and light will shine on your ways.” (v.26-28).  Yes, in those circumstances that would be a good and right outcome.

“When men are brought low and you say, `Lift them up!’ then he will save the downcast. He will deliver even one who is not innocent, who will be delivered through the cleanness of your hands.” (v.29,30)  Yes, when the righteous are in a good place before God they can be used by Him to be a blessing to others. Yes, all of this is really good advice – if it was being given to a different person!  This is the problem here.  Job’s afflictions are not coming from sin.  We need to reiterate this again and again.  At the outset the Lord declared him blameless.  At the end the Lord chastises the three ‘friends’ and says that they have not spoken rightly as Job has.  He says it twice! (42:7,8)  Job has not sinned.  He has misunderstood what is going on and has flapped around trying to find an answer but that is not sin!

The warning that comes here again and again, as we consider these attempts of the ‘friends’ to get to grips with what is happening to Job, is beware of applying answers when you don’t know the truth of what is going on!  That surely must be a truth that applies when we encounter so many people.  Do we know everything that is going on in them?  No!  Do we know why they are in difficulties – really what has caused it?  No!  No, in every case we need the revelation and the wisdom and the compassion and the grace of God.  Without those we need to shut up!