~ "Don't be an ass." ~
James 1.19-20
Understand this, my dear brothers: every person must be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger, for human anger does not accomplish the righteousness of God.
James tells us we are not to be quick to speak, slow to listen, and quick to get angry--a tall order, given that these qualities encapsulate our natural bent without God's Spirit working in our hearts. One might point out that we see Jesus being angry in the Gospels, to the point of turning over money-changing tables in the Temple and driving people out with a knotted whip, so how can anger be so bad? We're supposed to be like Jesus, after all! Here we must distinguish between righteous anger and ungodly anger (the latter being that which James is writing about). When we see Jesus 'over-reacting' in the Temple, that's righteous anger at work. Righteous anger doesn't express itself in a 'fit of rage'; Jesus' actions in the Temple were well-planned and well-executed (it takes a hot minute to make a knotted whip, after all). Jesus didn't act from a wounded heart; rather, he acted from a heart passionate for God and upset against injustice. In the later New Testament, we are given guidelines for how to live with anger: we can be angry if we do not sin, if we don't go to sleep with it, if it's anger from God and not man's anger, if it achieves righteousness, if it comes slowly. But in the words of Jim Wilson, "Do you get the feeling that if these qualifications are met, the amount of anger would be cut drastically?"
Ninety-nine percent of the time, we can assume that the anger we feel building up in our hearts isn't due to injustice ('righteous anger') but to being angry that our preferences aren't being met. This is ungodly anger, and it is naturally quick to speak, slow to listen, and quick to get angry. One of the worst kinds of anger is a 'fit of rage,' which, in the Bible, is seen as the exact opposite of how a Christian should be. Jim Wilson writes a poignant piece on this kind of anger:
A 'fit of rage' is an act of the sinful nature. We see it clearly in very young children. We call it a tantrum. As the child gets older, we might say in a tormenting way, 'Temper, temper, temper!' This does not normally moderate the explosion. Other expressions that describe fits of rage are 'losing it' and 'going ballistic.' These euphemisms for fits of rage are descriptive, but do not sound as sinful. 'Short fuse' is another euphemism for a person who is quick to anger. All of us know people like that. Some people take pride in having a short fuse. Their friends and relatives have learned how to walk softly or to give them a wide berth. These people terrorize their families or hold them hostage to their anger, which might erupt any time. The opposite of the acts of the sinful nature is the fruit of the Spirit. It is easy to see that self-control is the opposite of a fit of rage. But it is not the only opposite. A person in a fit of rage is not loving, joyful, peaceful, patient, kind, good, faithful, or gentle. A fit of rage undoes all the fruit of the Spirit. This is why it is natural for a person not born of the Spirit.
When we feel anger bubbling inside us, we need to stop and ask ourselves, "Why am I angry?" Often we'll answer by focusing on an indirect cause--we're angry because someone stole our parking space, or the person coming onto the highway off the on-ramp is going ten under, or it's just slightly raining and traffic's bogging down. Often the indirect reasons will be far more personal, as anger is most ripe when it involves the people who are close to us. The direct reason, which gets to the core of why we're angry, is more often than not the fact that our preferences weren't met. My preference was getting that empty spot in the busy mall parking lot; my preference was keeping my speed up on the highway; my preference was traffic moving at a decent and respectable pace. What it boils down to is loving ourselves too much: "This isn't what I wanted, people aren't accommodating my desires, therefore I am angry."
An example from my own daily life: one afternoon Zoey got home from school and I had just picked up some Subway for lunch. I felt ravenous, and I desperately wanted to chow down. Before I ate, however, I needed to help Zoey knock out her homework (if we don't tackle it immediately, she'll get into the rhythm of play-time and it'll be like pulling teeth getting her back into 'school' mode). Zoey is very particular about the way she does things, practically borderline O.C.D., and that afternoon she was taking an ungodly long time to get her things done. I was hungry and grouchy, and I snapped at her to the point where tears welled up in her eyes. Not a good moment for me. Immediately I knew I'd messed up, and I took a few breaths and confessed my sin to her, informing her that it wasn't right for me to get angry with her just because I was grouchy. She forgave me and we went about her homework with absolutely no problems. To this day she remembers that moment (but thankfully she remembers my confession of sin more than the outburst itself; it's good to show your children that you're not perfect and to confess your sins towards them). The reason I got angry was because my preferences weren't being met; that was not righteous anger, and when such anger wells up inside us, we must fight it with self-awareness and prayer.
~ Doers vs. Hearers ~
James 1.21-25
Therefore, putting aside all moral uncleanness and wicked excess, welcome with humility the implanted message which is able to save your souls. But be doers of the message and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves, because if anyone is a hearer of the message and not a doer, this one is like someone staring at his own face in a mirror, for he looks at himself and goes away and immediately forgets what sort of person he was. But the one who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues to do it, not being a forgetful hearers but a doer who acts, this one will be blessed in what he does.
James just wrote about how we need to forsake the natural inclinations of our sinful self (to be quick to speak, slow to listen, and quick to get angry), and now he exhorts the recipients of his letter to embrace and live in accordance with the good news of the gospel. The Good News is that the kingdom of God is available to us, that in Christ we can live and breathe and participate in God's kingdom, and in order to do so we need to put into action what it means to be kingdom-minded and kingdom-focused in thought and behavior. Christianity isn't about rules and regulations, but it is about living as is fitting for human beings created in the image of God, and that takes self-reflection and self-determination: the willingness to acknowledge the true state of our hearts and the work of the will to pursue higher things. That is the gist of what James is saying, but we would do well to unpack this further.
"What is the implanted message we are to receive?" James is speaking of the gospel, the Good News, and here we must give clarification. A lot of people think the good news is that "Jesus died for our sins." But saying that is like saying the point of a car is having an engine. The purpose of a car is getting from point A to B, and the engine makes it run; similarly, the gospel is about the availability of reconciliation with God and life in His kingdom, both now and forever. The forgiveness of sins and the breaking of the power of sin over our lives, which is available to us because of Jesus' death and resurrection, is necessary for our reconciliation with God and life in His kingdom. The Atonement is the engine that drives the good news of the availability of the kingdom. The point of the Good News is that we can have a relationship with God in Jesus. The point, it must be said, isn't doctrine. It isn't about learning new things, though that's part of it. Sadly a lot of Christians are devoted to biblical teachings rather than Jesus as a person; this is a dry Christian existence--it is a sort of faith by which we are saved 'by a hair'--and it doesn't translate into a changed life.
"How might we deceive ourselves?" Many of those who put doctrine before Jesus seem to live double lives: a pious life in the public eye and deep-seeded sins behind closed doors. This is because mental assent to doctrine doesn't get to the heart, and it's from a transformed heart that we are able to walk in God's ways and obey all Jesus commanded. In Matthew 7.15-23 Jesus says that on the Last Day, many will be dismayed. There will be many who did all the right things, even super religious things, who will be cast from Jesus. "Depart from me," Jesus will tell them, "for I never knew you." Being a Christian, a disciple of Jesus, involves the heart, and even the right religion can be used for the wrong reasons: even in our divided culture and the mockery often leveled against Christians, the United States remains a strongly Christian nation, and being a Christian is often part of the cultural fabric. A cultural Christianity will perform the right actions to be seen as upstanding in the church community; it can be embraced from reasons other than the heart. But it remains the heart that matters: "Are we devoted to the Living Lord, as a person, or to the teachings of Christianity?" Are we giving mental assent to a particular worldview, or are we trusting in Jesus and pursuing him? We must examine ourselves, for we are great at self-deception. We unwittingly believe the best about ourselves, and at times we must assume the worse. The proof of our faith is in the pudding:
Do our lives show the evidence of the Spirit's work?
Are we producing, in increasing measure, the fruit of the Spirit?
If we claim to belong to Jesus, but he is not at work in our lives, then we may be self-deceived. It happens a lot, and the consequences will be dire for those blithely ignorant of their self-deception. Thus it is worth a warning that is echoed by St. Paul in 2 Corinthians 13.5: "Examine yourself, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?--unless indeed you fail to meet the test!" It is also echoed by St. Peter in 2 Peter 1.10-22: "Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election" (emphasis mine). James, Peter, and Paul all had something to say about this. We'd do well to pay attention.
"What is the perfect law of liberty?" The law of liberty is something that Christians 'look into', or meditate upon. It is the way of obedience that Jesus calls us to, but because 'liberty' is often used for 'freedom' in modern parlance, equating it with obedience doesn't feel natural. It is this misunderstanding of liberty that makes James' terminology confusing. Though 'liberty' has become synonymous with moral freedom and autonomy (doing what we want when we want and how we want to do it), this is a new definition of the term, a modern way of understanding it. Liberty in the biblical sense is the type of liberty spoken of by sailors. When a ship is 'at liberty', it is 'free' in that it is sailing with the wind rather than against it. The wind is filling its sails, and it's maximizing its power. It's sailing the way it was designed to sail. True liberty isn't living life however the hell we please; it's about having the power and ability to do what we were designed to do, and that liberty is found in trusting and obeying Jesus. This is what we, as God's image-bearers, are designed to do. To not trust and obey Jesus is to sail against the wind, or crosswise to the wind, with the result that we are, at the least, blown far off-course from being the people we were created to be - and at the worst, we flounder. Doing the 'law of liberty' is doing as God commands, so that we live as we are designed to live. And living this way leads to blessedness.
"What does it mean to be blessed?" It's been said that to be 'blessed' is to be happy, and that's not far from the mark. All of us are in search of what the Greeks called eudaimonia, a concept that is often translated as 'happiness' but which is more closely aligned with fully-flourishing human living. Greek philosophy sought how one could best live a fully-flourishing existence. This ultimate state-of-being is what the Jews called 'blessedness.' Blessedness, then, is what we all pursue throughout our life--'the search for joy,' as one theologian put it--but it is found only in Jesus. In Luke 11.28 Jesus says that blessedness is found in him and, more particularly, in following him. To follow Jesus is to accept him as your Master and give yourself to him as his student. A disciple of Jesus is nothing less than Jesus' student--or 'apprentice' or 'padawan'--who is actively and determinedly learning how to live from him. The followers of Jesus were called 'Disciples' until about a decade after Jesus' ascension; then they started to be called 'Christians' (or 'little-Christs') because they aimed to live as he lived and do as he did. The Christian life--the life of discipleship to Jesus and life in him--is the Good Life. Pursuing worldly things--the pride of life, the lusts of the flesh, and the lusts of the eyes--doesn't provide the fully-flourishing life, only cheap imitations of it. But living in God and for his kingdom opens the door to a life of love, joy, peace, and contentment. It was this very fact that made the early church so appetizing in a culture hostile to God. Christians were radically different, living like their Master and bringing him into all walks of life, and people saw the beauty and goodness of that life and craved it for themselves.
Do our lives show the evidence of the Spirit's work?
Are we producing, in increasing measure, the fruit of the Spirit?
If we claim to belong to Jesus, but he is not at work in our lives, then we may be self-deceived. It happens a lot, and the consequences will be dire for those blithely ignorant of their self-deception. Thus it is worth a warning that is echoed by St. Paul in 2 Corinthians 13.5: "Examine yourself, to see whether you are in the faith. Test yourselves. Or do you not realize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you?--unless indeed you fail to meet the test!" It is also echoed by St. Peter in 2 Peter 1.10-22: "Therefore, brothers, be all the more diligent to confirm your calling and election" (emphasis mine). James, Peter, and Paul all had something to say about this. We'd do well to pay attention.
"What is the perfect law of liberty?" The law of liberty is something that Christians 'look into', or meditate upon. It is the way of obedience that Jesus calls us to, but because 'liberty' is often used for 'freedom' in modern parlance, equating it with obedience doesn't feel natural. It is this misunderstanding of liberty that makes James' terminology confusing. Though 'liberty' has become synonymous with moral freedom and autonomy (doing what we want when we want and how we want to do it), this is a new definition of the term, a modern way of understanding it. Liberty in the biblical sense is the type of liberty spoken of by sailors. When a ship is 'at liberty', it is 'free' in that it is sailing with the wind rather than against it. The wind is filling its sails, and it's maximizing its power. It's sailing the way it was designed to sail. True liberty isn't living life however the hell we please; it's about having the power and ability to do what we were designed to do, and that liberty is found in trusting and obeying Jesus. This is what we, as God's image-bearers, are designed to do. To not trust and obey Jesus is to sail against the wind, or crosswise to the wind, with the result that we are, at the least, blown far off-course from being the people we were created to be - and at the worst, we flounder. Doing the 'law of liberty' is doing as God commands, so that we live as we are designed to live. And living this way leads to blessedness.
"What does it mean to be blessed?" It's been said that to be 'blessed' is to be happy, and that's not far from the mark. All of us are in search of what the Greeks called eudaimonia, a concept that is often translated as 'happiness' but which is more closely aligned with fully-flourishing human living. Greek philosophy sought how one could best live a fully-flourishing existence. This ultimate state-of-being is what the Jews called 'blessedness.' Blessedness, then, is what we all pursue throughout our life--'the search for joy,' as one theologian put it--but it is found only in Jesus. In Luke 11.28 Jesus says that blessedness is found in him and, more particularly, in following him. To follow Jesus is to accept him as your Master and give yourself to him as his student. A disciple of Jesus is nothing less than Jesus' student--or 'apprentice' or 'padawan'--who is actively and determinedly learning how to live from him. The followers of Jesus were called 'Disciples' until about a decade after Jesus' ascension; then they started to be called 'Christians' (or 'little-Christs') because they aimed to live as he lived and do as he did. The Christian life--the life of discipleship to Jesus and life in him--is the Good Life. Pursuing worldly things--the pride of life, the lusts of the flesh, and the lusts of the eyes--doesn't provide the fully-flourishing life, only cheap imitations of it. But living in God and for his kingdom opens the door to a life of love, joy, peace, and contentment. It was this very fact that made the early church so appetizing in a culture hostile to God. Christians were radically different, living like their Master and bringing him into all walks of life, and people saw the beauty and goodness of that life and craved it for themselves.
~ True Religion ~
James 1.26-27
If anyone thinks he is religious, although he does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person's religion is worthless. Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to look after orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.
In the previous verses James warned against self-deception and urged his hearers to find a fully-flourishing life in obedience to Jesus. Building upon the reality of self-deception (believing we are Christians when we're not), James links a refusal to 'bridle the tongue' (to keep watch over the things we say) with self-deception; he does this because watching over your words is one of the first things submission to Jesus results in. At the same time, bridling the tongue and taking care of those in need and being unstained by the world are not 'Christian laws' by which we're saved but signposts to what it looks like to live in obedience to God in his kingdom. True religion, then, shows itself in trying to live a life that pleases God.
Much has been said regarding self-deception, and all of us struggle at times to not say things in anger or to gossip or slander others. We may be nervous in asking ourselves the right Christian: "Am I a Christian?" It's a good question to ask; indeed, it's elemental to examining ourselves to see if we are 'in the faith' as we claim. It isn't a question we should fear, for the 'litmus test' of belonging to Jesus (of being saved) is simple: "Am I trying to follow Jesus?" Remember that the name 'Christian' (found only three times in the Bible) was coined to describe those who strove to live like Jesus and obey his commands. The term refers to a disciple, or student, of Jesus, so to ask "Am I a Christian?" is to ask "Am I a student of Jesus trying to learn from him how to live?" There is a difference between a 'cultural Christian' - one whose religion is a cultural 'boundary marker' in which he finds his place in society - and a disciple of Jesus. The cultural Christian may go to church and do very religious things, but his heart isn't upon Jesus; a disciple of Jesus may struggle to go to church and may suck at doing religious things, but he is actively relying upon Jesus and learning from him. You can be a good disciple or a bad disciple, but you'll still be a disciple--so long as you're actively trying to learn from him and obey him.
Much has been said regarding self-deception, and all of us struggle at times to not say things in anger or to gossip or slander others. We may be nervous in asking ourselves the right Christian: "Am I a Christian?" It's a good question to ask; indeed, it's elemental to examining ourselves to see if we are 'in the faith' as we claim. It isn't a question we should fear, for the 'litmus test' of belonging to Jesus (of being saved) is simple: "Am I trying to follow Jesus?" Remember that the name 'Christian' (found only three times in the Bible) was coined to describe those who strove to live like Jesus and obey his commands. The term refers to a disciple, or student, of Jesus, so to ask "Am I a Christian?" is to ask "Am I a student of Jesus trying to learn from him how to live?" There is a difference between a 'cultural Christian' - one whose religion is a cultural 'boundary marker' in which he finds his place in society - and a disciple of Jesus. The cultural Christian may go to church and do very religious things, but his heart isn't upon Jesus; a disciple of Jesus may struggle to go to church and may suck at doing religious things, but he is actively relying upon Jesus and learning from him. You can be a good disciple or a bad disciple, but you'll still be a disciple--so long as you're actively trying to learn from him and obey him.
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