James 1:17-27
17 Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. 18 He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.
19 My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, 20 because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires. 21 Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.
22 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. 23 Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror 24 and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. 25 But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it—not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do.
26 Those who consider themselves religious and yet do not keep a tight rein on their tongues deceive themselves, and their religion is worthless. 27 Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
Live the Christian Life: Be Quick to Listen
Did you know that some people don’t think that the book of James should be in the Bible? Especially Lutherans can read this book and see instruction after instruction – “Do this,” “Don’t do that,” – and come away feeling like James is laying out a blueprint for how to earn your way to heaven. It’s all based on what we do; we have to be a good person.
There’s not a whole lot of grace in the book of James. He doesn’t really talk about salvation, and that makes conscientious Christians a little queasy. They want to see more Jesus, and I wouldn’t blame anyone for wanting that.
There’s not much salvation in the book of James, but there is a lot of sanctification. We talked about that a couple weeks ago. Sanctification is another way to say, “living the Christian life,” which would explain why there are so many instructions – “Do this,” “Don’t do that.” James is laying out a blueprint for us to follow, just not a way to earn heaven. James lays out a blueprint for how to live a Christian life on earth.
James is writing to people who already know about Jesus, who already believe in Jesus as their Saviour from sin, the one who died on the cross for our forgiveness. James is writing to people like you and me and is essentially saying, “So you say you’re a Christian? Prove it. Don’t just talk the talk; walk the walk.”
Starting today and throughout the month of October, we’re going to be thinking about how we can do that. We’re going to read about how to avoid hypocrisy, how to exercise heavenly wisdom, how to resist the devil and come closer to God. But before we begin this journey about how to live the Christian life, James has a very important reminder for us:
Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.[1]
First and foremost, give credit where credit is due.
I don’t know about you, but I find it all too easy to complain about all the bad and hard things that we are facing right now. We just got through an election; that always stirs up discontentment on every side of the aisle. We are up to our ears in the fourth wave of a global pandemic and all of the controversial conversations that come as a result. Maybe you’re struggling to find work; your car broke down; you broke up with your significant other. We face all kinds of trials every day that test our patience, drain our energy, and can even cause us to question our faith in the goodness of God, i.e. “Why would a good God let bad things happen?”
But James reminds us: Every good and perfect gift is from above.[2] For every trial we face, every challenge we have to struggle to overcome, every cause for complaint, there is reason to rejoice. How many things could you thank God for right now? Do you have a roof over your head, clothes on your back, food on your table? Thank God! Do you have gainful employment, the support of friends and family, opportunity for recreation? Thank God! God gives you all kinds of good gifts day after day; his mercies are new every morning.
But even if you don’t have any of those things, even if it feels like your gifts are imperfect or that God has been incomplete in giving them to you, even if the circumstances of your life make you feel like you’re standing in quicksand, you still have reason to rejoice because you have a God whose goodness never changes. James goes on to share one gift from God that no circumstance in life can take away from you:
He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.[3]
God chose you. You didn’t earn his love. You aren’t such a good person that God has to love you. What an arrogant thought that would be. Of all the people in all the world, why should God love you? I don’t know. But he does. It’s a decision he made a long time ago, long before you were born, long before you could do anything to earn or disqualify yourself from his love. He chose you.
And in that mental, emotional, internal process of choosing, God also acted. He didn’t just say that he loves you, he did something about it. He sent his Son to die on a cross to forgive you all your sins. That is the heart and soul of Christianity.
But think about this grace too: God didn’t just make a one-time announcement that he forgave the sins of the whole world and then leave it at that. God wasn’t content with that. He wanted you to know personally, so he came to you individually through his word of truth. He sent parents, pastors, partners into your life to tell you about Jesus, so that by believing in him, you could become children of God, the apple of God’s eye, so to speak, or, as James puts it, “a kind of firstfruits of all he created.”[4]
Your status before God, as a dearly loved and dearly bought child of God, was entirely an act of God. It doesn’t depend on you! Even when you mess up in life, God still loves you and forgives you. He still comes to you in his word of truth to lift you up and restore you, to remind you that even though we are fickle and fainthearted, he doesn’t change like shifting shadows; his love for you will never fade away.
So, while there may be plenty of causes for complaint in our lives, James gives you one reason to rejoice always: Every good and perfect gift is from above, from the Father of all creation, who chooses to love you purely out of his good will.
Everything that follows in the book of James feeds off this truth. So, think of it this way, for the rest of this book James is essentially saying, “Because God has made you his child, go and ___________.”
As I said before, we’re going to see many examples over the next several weeks of how James fills in that blank. I just want to share one with you today. James immediately makes the application, because you are a child of God:
Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to anger.[5]
Now, this is just good advice in general. You don’t have to be a Christian to see the wisdom in being quick to listen. If we don’t listen to the people in our lives – if we just assume that everyone thinks the same way we do – then we’ll be endlessly disappointed with every conversation. But if we listen and try to understand where other people are coming from, then we might not get so angry with people who have taken the “other side” on things like the results of the election, the mask mandate, the restriction exemption program. Everyone has a reason for thinking the way they do. If we open our ears and close our mouths, we stand a much better chance of preserving relationships and showing love and respect, instead of building barriers and demonstrating nothing but anger and contempt.
(By the way, this is why social media can be so harmful –it gives us all the ability to speak instantly, i.e. to post what we think immediately, without giving any opportunity to listen or any time to pause and think about the effect that our post will have on other people.)
It is – or at least it should be – common sense to be quick to listen and slow to speak. But James isn’t just talking about how we relate to each other. He is primarily talking about how we relate to God. That’s why he says:
Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.[6]
The listening that James is advocating for, is a humble listening to the Word of God. Think about how many problems come when we’re not in God’s Word, when we assume we know what God wants, and we act on those assumptions, without taking every thought captive to Christ. That’s where terms like “Bible thumping” come from. It’s that loveless way of closing this book and shaking it in the air as if merely mentioning God’s name gives authority to what you think.
We even do this sometimes with things that are cut and dry in the Bible. Abortion is murder. Divorce is sinful. Yes, that’s true. I can even point you to passages in the Bible that say that. But if I post that on social media or shout it from a street corner, am I doing anything to understand the reason that scared teenager is secretly considering an abortion, or the trauma that woman escaped through her divorce? Is my so-called “righteous indignation” going to do anything to change anyone’s mind, or do I just like the sound of my own voice or the idea that I am right and they are wrong?
Being a Christian means humbly accepting the word of truth. It means recognizing that I am not the authority; I do not hold the moral high ground, in my life or in anyone else’s. I needed God to choose me not because of who I am, but in spite of who I am; I needed Jesus to die on a cross for all of the sins that I still commit; I needed God to give birth to me – to make me his child – through the word of truth too.
And if I needed that, that’s what the other people in my life need too. They don’t need to hear my voice. They need to hear God’s. And the only way they can hear it through me is if I keep a tight rein on my tongue.
I’m not going to win anyone over to Christ crusading for the NDP, the UCP, or the WWE. I’m not going to win anyone over to Christ if the first thing they know about me is where I stand on vaccines, climate change, or the shape of the earth. But if I look after widows and orphans in their distress, if I keep myself from being polluted by all the controversies and complaints of the world around me, then I show that my religion is not worthless – that I am listening, and not only that, but that what I’m listening to has a home in my heart.
We’re going to talk about this more in 2 weeks, but the whole point of the picture of the person looking into a mirror but forgetting what his face looks like is just James’ way of saying, “Make sure that what you hear doesn’t go in one ear and right out the other. Remember, put into practice what you hear.” That’s when your religion is worthwhile, i.e. when you listen to the needs of the people around you, sure, but, above all, to the word of truth given to you by God.
There he tells you that you are a child of God, chosen by his undeserved and unchanging love, born by faith in his Word. Follow the blueprint that James lays out for your Christian life: Close your mouth. Open your ears. Listen to his word of truth, and do what it says. Then you will produce the righteousness God desires. Then you will live the Christian life. Amen.
[1] James 1:17
[2] Ibid
[3] James 1:18
[4] Ibid
[5] James 1:19
[6] James 1:21