Sunday February 8th, 2009

3. True & Counterfeit Faith (James 1:19-27)

As we return to our study of the Letter of James, we come to the end of chapter 1. In January, we first heard what James had to say about how people of faith should respond to the trials of life that we all face. Then, we considered how we who have faith should respond to temptation. This week, in the final verses of chapter 1 of the letter, we see that James now begins his teaching on how we must put our faith into practice.

First of all, in verses 19 and 20, James appears to be saying that we need to ...

Control ourselves (vv.19-20)

He splits that self-control into three distinct parts:
· first, be quick to listen
· second, be slow to speak
· and, third, be slow to get angry

Be quick to listen

These days, everybody has an opinion on everything and we are keen for everyone else to know what our opinions are. It seems that our twenty-first century society has seized upon the right to free speech and almost made it compulsory to be speaking most of the time! Of course, I’m exaggerating a little, but it does seem as though the art of listening is being lost, as a consequence.

I really believe that listening to what other people have to say is a very important, very loving thing to do, because through careful, respectful listening, we might ease someone’s pain or distress; or, we may allow someone to express pent-up frustration or anger in an appropriate way; or, we may even help to alleviate their fear of something. But the listening we do has to be good listening:

- when we listen, we need to give time and space for the other person to say what he needs to say ... if we appear impatient, or if we interrupt, he will feel insecure;

- when we listen, we need to look at the person and give her our full attention, not stare out of the window or continually look around ... we should be listening with our eyes;

- when we listen, we need to nod in the right places and show the appropriate expressions on our faces, then the other person will feel valued.

Good listening has many healing possibilities and surely this is part of the ministry to which Christ has called us. Remember, Jesus once said, “Do for others what you would like them to do for you. This is a summary of all that is taught in the law and the prophets.” (Mt. 7:12) If we can do nothing else for others, we can at least be their good listeners.

Then, James also tells us we should be ...

Slow to speak

As I argued earlier, in the modern world there is perhaps an over-emphasis on speaking, when perhaps there should instead be a greater emphasis on remaining silent.

Maintaining an attentive silence when someone else is talking is respectful and often helpful to that other person, as we’ve seen. In addition, if we hold our silence and resist the temptation to interrupt, we give ourselves time and space to consider what our response should be to what is being said to us. For instance, if someone is criticising us, or having a rant against the Christian faith, we may want to jump in and defend ourselves, or our faith without delay; but, in truth, it is much better that we wait, listen and don’t speak until we can do so in a considered way. If we speak too soon, we may say something we regret, or we may appear overly defensive, or we may exacerbate the situation unnecessarily, rather than fostering peace. As Christians, we have an important responsibility to be careful how and when we speak.

Just listen to what Proverbs 10:19 says: "The more you talk, the more likely you are to sin. If you are wise, you will keep quiet."

That says it all, doesn’t it? But James does write more about controlling our tongues later in this letter, so we will re-visit this particular topic soon.

James also maintains that, as Christians, we must be ...

Slow to get angry

And if we are obedient to this, then we are following God’s example, for He is “compassionate and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in love.” In the Jewish and non-Jewish cultures of the time that James was writing, angry speech was a sure sign that a person lacked wisdom. Indeed, Proverbs 29:11 says:

"A fool gives full vent to his anger, but a wise man keeps himself under control."

Of course, it was particularly important that, within the Christian community, people were slow to show anger to one another, because it would – and in some cases already had – caused problems. Jesus Himself was very hard on displays of anger and bitterness – in the Sermon on the Mount, He told His disciples:

"You have heard that it was said, ‘Do not commit murder. Anyone who does will be brought to trial.’ But now I tell you: whoever is angry with his brother will be brought to trial, whoever calls his brother ‘You good-for-nothing!’ will be brought before the Council, and whoever calls his brother a worthless fool will be in danger of going to the fire of hell."

Personal anger, bitterness and resentment directed towards others doesn’t serve the cause of Jesus Christ and is not acceptable to God, so we need to maintain our self-control and seek the way of peace rather than recrimination.

Next, in verse 21, James says that, in addition to controlling ourselves, we need to ...

Clean up our act (v.21)

So get rid of all the filth and evil in your lives, and humbly accept the word God has planted in your hearts, for it has the power to save your souls.

James is addressing Christians – people like us – and so, we need to heed his call to rid ourselves of every type of inappropriate behaviour. The thing is, we can so easily spend all our time focussing and commenting on the sins we see other people committing and end up not dealing with our own sinfulness. You may remember that Jesus was very firm about this – He said:

“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye.”

Interestingly, the Greek word for ‘filth’ is closely related to the word for ‘ear wax’ – something that obstructs the hearing – and this is what James is trying to convey: we must clean out of our lives anything and everything which may get in the way of us hearing what God’s saying to us. And the way that we do that is to confess our sins, show sincere repentance and conduct ourselves appropriately in the future. Only then can the word of God work effectively within us.

So, according to James, we need to control ourselves; we need to clean up our act; and, third, we must ...

Comply with God’s word (vv.22-25)

It is not enough to receive God’s message, to hear His call, we also have to act upon it – as James stresses:

“... don’t just listen to God’s word. You must do what it says. Otherwise you are only fooling yourselves.”

The example that James gives of looking in the mirror, seeing our appearance and then going away and forgetting what we look like is deliberately silly – is there anyone who gazes into the mirror, sees themself as they are, but then forgets how they look as soon as they walk away? James is saying that anyone who professes to be a Christian, who reads God’s word, who hears what God is saying to them, but then forgets about it and doesn’t act upon it, is just as ridiculous.
Obedience seems to be a bit of a dirty word today, because, when we obey someone, it implies that they have authority over us and, in our modern society, people don’t like to admit to that – they assert their independence at every opportunity and present themselves as free spirits.

We who truly follow Christ, we who recognise what He has done for us through His death on the cross and His resurrection, declare that Jesus is Lord and thereby confess that He has authority over us; that we are not independent, but dependent upon Him; that we are not free spirits, but belong to Him. This being so, we must be obedient to Christ, obedient to God and what He tells us, and through our obedience we will be blest by Him – this is what James is saying here.
And if we are obedient to God, one of the things that we will be careful to do is to ...

Curb our tongues (v.26)

James writes:

If you claim to be religious but don’t control your tongue, you are fooling yourself, and your religion is worthless.

As I’ve already said, I’m not going to dwell on this too much today, because we will be considering the importance of controlling our tongues in much more detail in a few weeks’ time when we reach chapter 3 of James’ letter. But, just in passing, let me share with you an epitaph that can be read on an old grave stone in a small country graveyard:

Beneath this stone, a lump of clay,

lies Arabella Young,

who, on the twenty-fourth of May,

began to hold her tongue.

Suffice to say that an uncontrolled tongue can cause untold upset and, in fact, it reveals more about you yourself than it does about the one of whom you’re speaking. Someone who, on the surface, seems to be very pious – attending church every Sunday morning, saying all the right prayers, giving to the collection every week – but who, at the same time is heard to gossip, speak ill of others, or be foul-mouthed, reveals that their religion is really only skin deep and therefore worthless. Let’s not be like Arabella Young, but rather, learn to hold our tongues before the grave!

Last of all, James tells us to ...

Care for the needy (v.27)

“Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you.”

It’s a theme that God returns to again and again in the Bible: true religion, true faith is seen in how we relate to the neediest in society, not in how we behave in church. In the early church, the neediest people were usually orphans and widows: there were no insurance schemes to help those who had suffered tragedy; there was no benefits system to support them; and it would be difficult for them to find work for themselves.

A true Christian faith is demonstrated by the way believers speak and act; it’s shown by how we care for and look after those who have the deepest needs – it’s not a matter of merely looking after those who are closest to us ... our friends and family ... but all who are in distress and especially those whom the world rejects. It is the extent of our love for others that reveals the depth of our faith and the sincerity of our love for God.

Conclusion

So, as we reach the end of chapter 1 of the Letter of James, we are already very much into the apostle’s very practical teaching about the Christian faith – this is not all airy fairy, theoretical stuff, this is meaty and relevant to everyday life. So do stick with it, as we learn about how we can more effectively witness to the grace of God and the love of Christ in our own lives.

Amen.