More than Just Words
Text: James 1:17-27
Any time that we hear from the Epistle of James, I think those of us with deep protestant roots begin to twitch. We know from history, the main voice of the protestant movement, Martin Luther, hated James with a passion. Much of Martin Luther’s cries for change had come out of observing the church abusing its power, by selling tickets to heaven… or his own personal angst of realizing that he could never truly earn God’s favour through his pious acts alone. It was our faith, not what we did that determined our end state with God.
Yet when Luther would argue this in the debating forums of the church, his opponents would frequently quote James back at him. It’s not surprising that he hated it…
…but 500 years later we are hopefully removed from the politics and polemics of the Reformation to actually try and see what James was trying to get at… because chances are James might personally agree with a lot of what Luther had to say… but for James it wasn’t about getting our facts right… nor was it earning our way into God’s good graces…
In fact, despite what Martin Luther said about James, this preacher in the early church fully understood God’s gift in Jesus Christ as being something that we could not earn. The letter of James is actually a sermon circulated to the early church, and in the opening of it he reminds the faithful that “Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights…” He starts with reminding listeners that God’s grace came first… Jesus Christ is that gift that God freely gave.
But James didn’t need to hammer that point terribly hard in this sermon… for James the challenge lay in the whole question of “what next?” We’ve received this wonderful gift from God… what do we do with it?
After some basic advice, James gets to the heart of the matter…
“But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves.”
I get a bit of a smile when I read this passage… because of something I was once taught called the “no spitting rule.” It’s a simple principle… if you see a sign that says “no spitting” then it stands to reason that at one point in time people were spitting there… translating that to what James preaches, it stands to reason that there were those in the early church who simply came to listen, but otherwise their lives never displayed anything about their faith. In other words, their faith was a Sunday morning only thing… it was only theoretical… but people rarely put it into practice. It motivated James to preach a sermon powerful enough to be circulated throughout the early church.
Don’t be just hearers, but doers of the Word. Our faith is more than just words.
In many ways James is much more practical than Paul. When our faith really does engage with our real life, and isn’t this kind of separate component in our lives. It becomes the foundation of who we are and how we relate to the people and world around us. Faith isn’t just a Sunday morning thing where we come and be pious for an hour.
There is a story is told of St. Francis of Assisi going down to a village with one of his monks. Their purpose was to preach the Gospel. When they arrived at the village they quickly engaged the local folk in conversation and passed their time helping the villagers with their work, sharing stories, entering into the life of the community. As the end of the day drew near, Francis said to his companion that it was time for them to return to the monastery. They were about to make their way out of the village, when Francis’ companion, with great concern, said, “Didn’t we come here to preach the Gospel to these people? When are we going to do that?”
Francis turned to his brother monk and said, “If these people have not heard the Gospel today, then reading from the Bible will not make any difference to them!”
“Be not hearers who forget”, advises James, “but doers who act”.
For James, simply hearing the gospel was not enough. For him, hearers simply sat passively, and weren’t changed by the gospel. If anything, changed the gospel to bolster their own image, that being part of a church was good for their reputation. They’d say all the right things, but not actually do anything about it.
There is a Japanese fable about a man who went to heaven and to his surprise he saw a shelf covered with human tongues. The heavenly guide told him, “These are the tongues of people who spoke sweet words of virtues, who said what was right, but never did anything to follow their words. So their tongues have come to rest in heaven and the rest of them are somewhere else.”
As James reminds us, what we do as a community on Sunday morning is to come together and worship God together… but where it really matters… where we make a difference is what happens when we go out those doors for the rest of the week. It’s the practical part… and in his sermon, James gets specific.
“If any think they are religious and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. 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.”
–Jas. 1:26-27
In other words… live out your faith… make the world a better place to live… and make sure nobody gets left out.
But even so, as much as Martin Luther railed against James, this sermon of his in no way talks about us earning our way into God’s good graces. James talks about the gift of God first… every gift that we have, including our faith, is something God gives us. It is meant to be shared… the gift comes first… the outward expression of that gift… and how it becomes part of our lives… that’s where it gets practical. We can listen all we like, but until it is reflected in who we are and what we do… it means nothing.
There has been a movement afoot in the United States that has grown out of the conservative evangelical groups… it is very much in reaction to the Religious Right concept that if one is to be politically engaged, one must vote Republican. These are good and faithful people who found themselves tired of being lashed to the raft of one political party, and realized that their faith was calling them to tend to the needs of the poor, to stand for peace instead of war, and to seek justice rather an impose a social order. This movement is called “The Emerging Church” –and it is very much rooted in finding a practical way to live out one’s faith.
Ultimately, that’s what James is proclaiming… stop simply listening, and actually put your faith to work, and get your hands into it.
It’s not about earning our salvation, but about being so grateful for what God has done in Jesus Christ that we are simply compelled to reach out and try to make the world a better place. St. Francis was well known for the saying “Preach the gospel always, use words if necessary.”
Amen.
Any time that we hear from the Epistle of James, I think those of us with deep protestant roots begin to twitch. We know from history, the main voice of the protestant movement, Martin Luther, hated James with a passion. Much of Martin Luther’s cries for change had come out of observing the church abusing its power, by selling tickets to heaven… or his own personal angst of realizing that he could never truly earn God’s favour through his pious acts alone. It was our faith, not what we did that determined our end state with God.
Yet when Luther would argue this in the debating forums of the church, his opponents would frequently quote James back at him. It’s not surprising that he hated it…
…but 500 years later we are hopefully removed from the politics and polemics of the Reformation to actually try and see what James was trying to get at… because chances are James might personally agree with a lot of what Luther had to say… but for James it wasn’t about getting our facts right… nor was it earning our way into God’s good graces…
In fact, despite what Martin Luther said about James, this preacher in the early church fully understood God’s gift in Jesus Christ as being something that we could not earn. The letter of James is actually a sermon circulated to the early church, and in the opening of it he reminds the faithful that “Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights…” He starts with reminding listeners that God’s grace came first… Jesus Christ is that gift that God freely gave.
But James didn’t need to hammer that point terribly hard in this sermon… for James the challenge lay in the whole question of “what next?” We’ve received this wonderful gift from God… what do we do with it?
After some basic advice, James gets to the heart of the matter…
“But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves.”
I get a bit of a smile when I read this passage… because of something I was once taught called the “no spitting rule.” It’s a simple principle… if you see a sign that says “no spitting” then it stands to reason that at one point in time people were spitting there… translating that to what James preaches, it stands to reason that there were those in the early church who simply came to listen, but otherwise their lives never displayed anything about their faith. In other words, their faith was a Sunday morning only thing… it was only theoretical… but people rarely put it into practice. It motivated James to preach a sermon powerful enough to be circulated throughout the early church.
Don’t be just hearers, but doers of the Word. Our faith is more than just words.
In many ways James is much more practical than Paul. When our faith really does engage with our real life, and isn’t this kind of separate component in our lives. It becomes the foundation of who we are and how we relate to the people and world around us. Faith isn’t just a Sunday morning thing where we come and be pious for an hour.
There is a story is told of St. Francis of Assisi going down to a village with one of his monks. Their purpose was to preach the Gospel. When they arrived at the village they quickly engaged the local folk in conversation and passed their time helping the villagers with their work, sharing stories, entering into the life of the community. As the end of the day drew near, Francis said to his companion that it was time for them to return to the monastery. They were about to make their way out of the village, when Francis’ companion, with great concern, said, “Didn’t we come here to preach the Gospel to these people? When are we going to do that?”
Francis turned to his brother monk and said, “If these people have not heard the Gospel today, then reading from the Bible will not make any difference to them!”
“Be not hearers who forget”, advises James, “but doers who act”.
For James, simply hearing the gospel was not enough. For him, hearers simply sat passively, and weren’t changed by the gospel. If anything, changed the gospel to bolster their own image, that being part of a church was good for their reputation. They’d say all the right things, but not actually do anything about it.
There is a Japanese fable about a man who went to heaven and to his surprise he saw a shelf covered with human tongues. The heavenly guide told him, “These are the tongues of people who spoke sweet words of virtues, who said what was right, but never did anything to follow their words. So their tongues have come to rest in heaven and the rest of them are somewhere else.”
As James reminds us, what we do as a community on Sunday morning is to come together and worship God together… but where it really matters… where we make a difference is what happens when we go out those doors for the rest of the week. It’s the practical part… and in his sermon, James gets specific.
“If any think they are religious and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. 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.”
–Jas. 1:26-27
In other words… live out your faith… make the world a better place to live… and make sure nobody gets left out.
But even so, as much as Martin Luther railed against James, this sermon of his in no way talks about us earning our way into God’s good graces. James talks about the gift of God first… every gift that we have, including our faith, is something God gives us. It is meant to be shared… the gift comes first… the outward expression of that gift… and how it becomes part of our lives… that’s where it gets practical. We can listen all we like, but until it is reflected in who we are and what we do… it means nothing.
There has been a movement afoot in the United States that has grown out of the conservative evangelical groups… it is very much in reaction to the Religious Right concept that if one is to be politically engaged, one must vote Republican. These are good and faithful people who found themselves tired of being lashed to the raft of one political party, and realized that their faith was calling them to tend to the needs of the poor, to stand for peace instead of war, and to seek justice rather an impose a social order. This movement is called “The Emerging Church” –and it is very much rooted in finding a practical way to live out one’s faith.
Ultimately, that’s what James is proclaiming… stop simply listening, and actually put your faith to work, and get your hands into it.
It’s not about earning our salvation, but about being so grateful for what God has done in Jesus Christ that we are simply compelled to reach out and try to make the world a better place. St. Francis was well known for the saying “Preach the gospel always, use words if necessary.”
Amen.
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