Faith That Bears Fruit

Transcript

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[0:00] So let's go now to James chapter 1, verses 17 through 27. 17 through 27, that's our sermon text for today. And I want to say a little bit of introduction about this book of James. The author is James. Probably, there's four Jameses in the New Testament, but this is most likely the brother of Jesus and one of the early leaders of the church, along with Peter and John. We think this book was written about 60 AD, and that would put it at the very earliest of the Christian writings that we have. Who was it written for? Possibly, probably, primarily for Jewish people who had converted to Christianity. So these would be people who have a background in the Jewish faith and understand things like the Law of Moses and the practices of the synagogue where they met. But now, James is helping them transition into a new faith, a new life in the Christian church. And so, it was written for them, but James is applicable to all people, not just to this particular subgroup of people. James is written for all of us. James shows, obviously, a familiarity with the teachings of Jesus. That would reinforce that it was Jesus's brother who wrote this, especially the Sermon on the Mount. So James seems to have a connection with that.

[1:14] And there's an emphasis in James throughout on faith that is matched by action, kind of like what Pastor Victoria said. You can look at a peanut butter and jelly jar, and a loaf of bread, but if you don't make yourself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, it's not going to help you any. You have to combine that knowledge of how to make a piece of toast and bread, and to actually doing it. And that's one of James's biggest messages, is that faith and action are really integrated. And that's been a challenge for the Reformation to work with, so we'll talk about that a little bit later. But as we read this, you will hear some strong guidance. For what life in Christ looks like and acts like. And we'll take up the question of how faith and action go together. So that's one of the themes for today. Let's go to our reading. James 1, 17 through 27. And it goes like this. James writes, Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. In fulfillment of his own purpose, he gave us birth, by the word of truth, so that we would become a kind of first fruits of his creatures. You must understand this, my beloved.

[2:33] Let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger. For your anger does not produce God's righteousness. Therefore, rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word of God. And let us be like the third that has the power to save your souls. But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror. For they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like. But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget, but doers who act, they will be blessed in their doing. 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. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for this word. And we ask that you would add your blessing to this. In Jesus' name, Amen. So I'm going to ask Caleb to go ahead and put the first slide back up again, because we're going to work through this.

[4:04] And maybe, Eric, can you turn off the fire alarm thing? It's like every morning at 11, so it's like without fail. There's no doubt that this is going to happen to us. We thought we had fixed it, but we haven't. So take a look at verse 19. That's where we're going to start right away, is verse 19, where James says, You must...

[4:24] This is sort of imperative. You must understand this, my beloved. And we see the affection that he has for the people whom he's writing to. He calls them, my beloved. Let everyone be quick to listen, and slow to speak, and slow to anger. And this actually mirrors a lot of the common philosophy of that day. The Stoic philosophers talked a lot about listening more than talking. There was a Greek philosopher named Zeno of Scytium, who wrote this in 336 B.C. So this is about four centuries before James. But nonetheless, this was the current philosophy of the time. He was the founder of Stoicism. He wrote that human beings have two ears, but one mouth. There's a little bit of arithmetic here, right? You have two ears and one mouth. So maybe we should listen twice as much as we talk. That was the Stoic view. And I...

[5:24] And it's a little odd because I'm talking right now. So imagine that I'm not, you know... I just have to take myself out of the equation here. But this is different because this is a sermon. This is a public speech. But in general, I'm talking about one-on-one conversations or conversations in a small group. It's a good practice. This is like good advice, right? To listen more than you talk. Right? So we set that aside from the gospel of truth. That while this is the gospel, this is also just good advice. And I think it's interesting. If we thought about it, if everyone listened twice as much as they talked, would the world be different? Like everyone in the whole world. If everyone listened twice as much as they talked, what... Like just dream with me. What would be different in this world? You know, what if before you tweeted something, whatever came to your mind, you took time to stop and think about what you were going to tweet. I don't... I have Twitter, but I rarely use it. I only comment on sports things with Twitter. And some of you may have Twitter, and if you're smart, you don't have Twitter. Because Twitter is like this amazing mechanism for getting yourself fired. It seems to be its only focus or purpose for existence

[6:38] is to get you to say something dumb and it drives traffic to Twitter and then you get fired. But if everybody read other people's tweets before they tweeted and actually processed everything they read and actually listened, and then finally after due consideration tweeted, well, we'd have a lot... I mean, the world would be different. And Twitter is just one medium.

[7:04] All the other mediums in this world where if we truly listened and tried to understand other people before we spoke, boy, the world would be different. I mean, imagine a world where people are together and they're doing community and they're making decisions and they're trying to learn and what if they all took turns not listening but seeking to understand what other people were saying? And what if there was enough time for them to think before they spoke so that an errant word did not escape their lips? Because that's the thing about words whether it's on Twitter or just speaking them right now. Once it leaves your body, once it's out there, there's no magic wand for pulling it back in. It is out there and it exists on its own. The writer of Isaiah talks about the word that goes out. The word that goes out from God.

[7:54] The word that goes out from God has the power to do what God... Words have power. Even God's word has the power to do what it purposes. The words that go out from us have power but not always for good. And there's no undo button. There's no erase button in life.

[8:08] So we all know that. But it's interesting. It's more than just good advice. It is very good advice. But it's more than good advice. It's about life and the body. This is all about what faith looks like in action. And faith knows that it does not know enough. Faith knows that it needs to learn from other people before it speaks. Faith knows that it does not need to dominate other people whether in conversations or otherwise. So that's tough words. Good words from James. But tough words. Listen more. Be quick to listen. Slow to speak. Slow to anger. And that's the next warning. There's a warning against anger.

[8:54] My family can attest to this. My children can attest to this. We all get angry. But there are methods where you can channel that anger away from other people. It takes discipline. It takes practice. It's possible to do. But sort of an undisciplined person and I count myself among them won't do that in time. And that anger will come out at other people and hurt them. So if you can learn to do that, that's good. That way you don't hurt them and break relationship.

[9:24] There is such a thing as godly anger. Because you might be thinking this, right? And that's good. Godly anger is good. When we see injustice happen and we're angry about it, that's a good kind of anger. That's not the kind of anger that's going to hurt anyone. That's an anger at the brokenness of the world. And that's a different category. This is not what that is. This is more about letting things get away from us. Our tongue, our anger, our words, or our other base impulses which James talks about. He says, put away all sorts of things. The sordidness and rank growth of wickedness.

[9:58] So this is what the life of faith looks like. It listens more. It talks less. It gets angry less. It puts away things that are destructive and wicked and that separate us from God. This is what the life of faith looks like.

[10:13] Instead, as he says, we go another way. We go away from dominating other people, away from aiming. Imagine your mouth is like a fire hose and you can just spray it all over. You can just throw it all around with anger or with other words. And he says, you need to turn that fire hose off. We welcome instead with meekness or humility the implanted word that has the power to save souls. And that, I want to focus right there and just take a pause right there where he says, welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save souls. And right now he's talking about the Gospel. He's talking about the work of Jesus Christ for us. He's talking about the story of the resurrection. This is the implanted word that has the power to save souls. It saves souls. The word has power as we will see, and we have seen, words have power, to hurt other people through angry utterances but also it has this power to redeem and to reform.

[11:17] God's word in the Gospel has this incredible power to do things. It can create faith. It's amazing what the word can do. But the striking word that stands out here is implanted. And you may guess, oh implanted, like, is it surgically implanted? No, that's not what this means. This means of a seed. It's an agricultural term. Of a seed that's planted deep in the ground. And it's watered and it's tended and you're watching it grow. And I think the word functions this way inside of us. Just like ideas do too, but words do too. Words enter. They take root. For good or for ill. They're watered, they're nourished, and at some point they grow and they emerge.

[12:03] And the question is then, what are we planting, right? But this is the key to understanding this whole passage. So we're actually going to come back to this at the end. So we want you to bookmark this idea of the implanted word.

[12:19] So now we're going to move forward and we're going to look at where it says, but be doers of the word, and that's still on this first slide. So for the things that make James really like James. This is what's next. Here James says, be doers of the word. We're talking about this word, this word that has the ability to save souls, this perfect law. He's talking about it, but he says don't just listen to the word. Don't just look at your pile of bread and peanut butter and jelly. But be a doer. Don't just listen. Don't just merely hear and deceive yourself. And so James is not relying merely on the ability to hear something as if that's all that is needed. You can hear something, and it does have power. But there's more to it. It is needed. It's an important first step is to hear the word. Something needs to be heard. The gospel needs to be heard. Now, some people think that Saint Francis of Assisi once said, preach the gospel at all times. And if necessary, use words. Has anyone ever heard that saying? And it gets quoted a lot and it's pretty tart. It's pretty good. It's a good one. Problem is, we don't think Francis ever said that. Like, it's cool. It's a hip thing to say. So there's a man named Lon Allison who was a covenant pastor. He planted

[13:38] a couple of covenant churches. He published some books with InterVarsity Press. He also worked at the Billy Graham Center. And he spoke to us pastors at a pastor's meeting in Chicago one year, and he said, I sat out to do the research. Where did he say this? Like, he poured through all of Saint Francis' writings and all the sayings. He said, I couldn't find it anywhere. He probably never said this. Now, it sounds kind of like maybe something he would say. Saint Francis did say things like, you know, your faith and your action should match. So that's kind of like that. You know, it's a similar idea. But he never said, preach the gospel at all times. When necessary, use words. As if you could preach the gospel without using any words at all. Because you can't. And even Saint Francis would have said that, because he did preach the gospel with words. All the time. He preached about the life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. So, if you really want a good proverb, I think it's this. Preach the gospel at all times using words. And have your actions match what you preach. That's probably a better proverb now. And that's one I think Francis could have gotten along with.

[14:49] So James is saying this. You need to be doers of this implanting word. This word that you have received by faith. You need to do it. Not just listen to it. Because if you listen to it, you might forget it. Just like somebody who looks at themselves in the mirror, but doesn't really remember what they look like, and they walk away, and they have no memory of it.

[15:10] And he goes on to double down on this idea that our actions have to match our faith. He says there's a perfect law of freedom which sounds like a contradiction. There's this law of freedom. See, you know, especially for us Americans, I think we can see these as sort of opposites. Law and freedom. Like they're different things. They're not really different things, but they're kind of belonging in different categories in our minds. Because freedom is letting me do whatever I want, and the law is constraining me so that I have to do things I don't want to do, or I don't get to do the things I really want to do. But James puts them together. And this is powerful. There's a perfect law of freedom. Is that on the next slide? Maybe it's on the next slide. We should move to the next slide, Caleb.

[15:57] Yeah. There we go. But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty or freedom and persevere, being not hearers who forget, but doers who act, they will be blessed in their doing. So there seems to be a contradiction if we look at this phrase, the law of freedom or the law of liberty. And that, as Christians, that's even more the case if we think about it a little bit. As Christians, we are free from all sorts of things. Like there's this real freedom that comes with being a Christian. You're free from sin, death, and the devil. Like those things have no power to condemn you anymore because of what Jesus Christ has done. That's just incredible freedom. I mean, we should all be sleeping like babies at night, you know, waking up every minute, every hour, crying for our mothers. We should all be just sleeping like sweet little children all night long because our sins are forgiven. This is a great grace. This is a great wonder to us. So we are free from those things. We're free from the claim of guilt for past wrongs. And we're free to love God and other people. And we even have freedoms about our own conduct, which is really interesting.

[17:11] But that freedom is bound up in the law of loving others. And so here's a current example for us. For example, I could say, am I free, for example, not to get vaccinated, against COVID-19? Am I free? And the answer on one level is yes, absolutely, it's your body. You can do what you want with your body. If you don't want somebody sticking something in your arm, yes, you are free. It's a personal choice. It's your body. You can do what you want. But now the law of liberty is starting to get a little more complex. But what if my not getting vaccinated puts another person at risk?

[17:51] Then my freedom needs to yield and my actions need to match my faith. The Apostle Paul talks about this in his letter to the Corinthians, where he says, am I free to eat food that was sacrificed to idols? This was just meat that had been taken from a market, had been sacrificed to an idol at a pagan temple, and then given back to the market. And you could eat it at a restaurant or eat it at the market. And Paul said, Saint Paul said, yeah, you can eat that because it's just because it was sacrificed to an idol, which sounds weird, it's still food. God made it. It's good. You can eat it with a clear conscience. No problem.

[18:28] It's just food. It didn't magically become poison when it was sacrificed. You're free to eat it. But, and there's always a but here, because the law of freedom constrains our action when it comes to other people. But, Paul says, if somebody's watching you, and this is somebody who doesn't understand that in the same way you do, and maybe they're not as mature in their faith as you, maybe they haven't grown as much yet, and they struggle and stumble because they see you eating this food, then you shouldn't eat this food. Your freedom is now curtailed by this perfect law of love and liberty. So that you care more about other people's soul or other people's health than you do about your own freedom in any one particular circumstance. That's the perfect law of freedom. So it's not a contradiction. Um, Martin Luther wrote about this in his tract called On Christian Liberty. On Christian Liberty. I mean, this is great, and we could read this sometime together. Martin Luther wrote this. This was the central premise of On Christian Liberty by Martin Luther. He said, a Christian is a perfectly free lord of all and subject to none. This is the freedom that being a Christian gives you. You're a perfectly free lord of all, and you are subject

[19:52] to nobody. Sounds great. Sounds very American. You know, he wasn't even an American. Like, he anticipated this 300 years in advance. But, he said, a Christian is also a perfectly dutiful servant of all, subject to all. Now, how can those both be true at the same time? Well, just in all the ways that we've been saying. Yes, you are free, but that freedom develops this response of love towards God and neighbor, so that thus we also become people who serve. So, freedom and service, freedom and being subject, those things belong together. And so, that's what James is saying, too. You're free. The law of freedom sets you free. But, you're also a servant to others. And there are times when their needs must outweigh your needs or your freedoms. And that is what life in Christ looks like. Their need to be heard is more important than your need to speak right now. Right? It's interesting how this all is coming together. Now, speaking of Martin Luther, and this is, it's good to say not to, like, idolize one person too much, and sometimes that has happened with Martin Luther, but he has feet of clay in many places. There are many things that Luther has done that was wrong, or said that were wrong. And Luther did not like the epistle of James. Isn't that interesting?

[21:16] He didn't like it at all. And this wraps up the idea of the implanted word I mentioned earlier. Luther was so invested in the idea that salvation was by grace alone and never by any kind of work that we could do. That was the core of who Luther was. Because he saw the teaching of the church that he was a member of. He was a Catholic clergy person. And they were, in fact, telling people, you must do these things to be saved. You must pray to the saints. You must take a pilgrimage. You must give money to the church so it can build a cathedral to Saint Peter. And all these things. And the church was a little kind of cutting the corners there. And instead of saying these are good things, and they are all good things, right? Probably. Except for praying to saints doesn't quite make sense scripturally. But these are all good things. Taking pilgrimages are all good things. You know, supporting the work of the church is a good thing. But to link that to your salvation, to motivate people a little bit more was a temptation that they gave into. And Luther, after he read Galatians and after he read Romans, he said, I can't take a pilgrimage anymore. I can't take this anymore.

[22:26] And so that's really what he became about. Grace alone. By God's word alone. Through faith alone. That was Luther's thing. And so when he found James, he read it and he's like, ugh, this is not working with my narrative. You know, this is you know, I don't like this. And so because for him it was just so, that was so important. Now, years removed from Luther, I think we can put it into a little bit more of a creative tension. But Luther called the epistle of James, the epistle of straw.

[22:58] Which, if you're in the 16th century Germany, that sounds like a real burn. Now it just sounds, I don't know what it means, like straw? Well, I don't care about straw. I don't touch straw most days of my life. But back then, you know, straw was like what you put under the animals, right? So that they could relieve themselves on it. So he had a very low view of this book of the Bible. Like I said, Luther's not perfect. And he was not able to take that next step. Where you go, okay, yes, you're not saved by your works, but your works matter. You're not saved by these things, but you need to be doers of the word, not just hearers of it. Your faith and your action need to mesh together.

[23:40] So how do we solve this problem? It comes back to the implanted word I mentioned earlier. When we look at the teachings of Jesus, we see him use agricultural metaphors often. He often does. He talks about the vine and the branches, and fields, and fig trees, and all sorts of things. The word is like a seed. Think of it this way. It sprouts into faith, and faith grows underground as it's nourished by the church, and by Christian formation, and by discipleship. And then it bursts out of the ground and grows tall. And now people can see it. Now it's visible above the ground. It's a plant. It has leaves. It sways in the wind, but it doesn't break. It gives shade to weary travelers. It's beautiful to look at. I mean, all these great things are happening with this metaphorical plant that is the implanted word grown into the life of a believing person.

[24:35] And then in time, after some seasons, something buds out. Small flowers come out, and these in turn convert into fruit. And now the plant is giving nourishment to the world, and it's in a stage where it gives more than it takes. Isn't that interesting? It sounds a lot like listening to a child more than talking, right?

[24:56] It's at a stage where it gives more than it takes. And inside each fruit, of course, are hundreds of seeds. And those seeds are words that go out into the world and plant more plants, right? So this is what it looks like. Faith is like a plant. And a plant bears fruit if it's in a healthy place. And you can't pull these things apart. It's completely true that you're not saved by your works, but it's also completely true that you will produce works if your faith is grounded deeply in the work of Jesus Christ. It will just happen. It just does happen. And I don't think we need to sweat it as much as Luther, maybe some other people. I think it just happens. But I think there's one thing we need to pay attention to, is that while we're all on this journey somewhere, and it really is, some people, they're still underground. They're still in the root-making stage. They're still absorbing a lot of nutrients. And they haven't even emerged. Other people have emerged, but they haven't yet sort of created a lot of leaves or buds or flowers or anything. And some of us haven't produced fruit yet, or not much, right? We're all at different stages in this. So you have the stalks, the leaves, the root, the water, the nutrients. But if you have all that stuff, but there's no fruit,

[26:14] then we have to start asking. We do have to start asking some important questions. If there is no fruit, we need to check the other conditions. Are you well planted near a living stream of water? Are you getting enough sunshine? Are you bent from the cares of life? And can your community come along and support you and prop up this plant so that it's healthy again?

[26:36] But if you have all those things, the fruit is bound to come. This is what Jesus says. This is what James says. This is what I wish Luther had kind of been able to wrap his mind around, but he was so focused on that one issue. And it was important that he did that.

[26:51] James tells us what it looks like when we have a fruitful plant, when words and action and faith all line up. He says it looks like this. It looks like us listening more than we talk, we keep our anger in check, we bridle the tongue, we put away wickedness, and we care for the vulnerable. That's the last slide. You take care of the widows and the orphans. We seek to serve more than we seek to be served. Our freedoms are important, but we give up our freedoms to serve others who are in need or who are vulnerable. That's what it looks like. That's what a healthy, growing, fruitful plant looks like.

[27:35] And finally, and this is the hard part, we're almost done, we need to be asking the kind of people who ask ourselves, if I am not seeing these things, and I'm not talking about you taking someone else's inventory, that's their job. That's a very good AA thing to say, is we only take our own inventory, but we need to take our own inventory. If I am not seeing these things in myself, then what is missing?

[27:59] If I am not bearing fruit, if I am not doing the Word, what is missing? And we can talk about that, like your pastors or your deacons. We can talk about that. If you want to come to us and say, something's not matching up, then I promise you that we will listen twice as much as we talk, or even more. We'll listen. But we want to help. And we want everyone in the church to be in a place where they can grow, and become the kind of people who are doers of the Word, not hearers only, who flourish and grow and bear fruit for this world. Let's pray. Father in heaven, thank you again for your Word. We pray that maybe in this next week, if we take the time to look at our own selves, and ask ourselves what fruit is coming from our lives, and what ways we can be doers of the Word, and not hearers only. Lord, that you would bless those questions, and drive us to you, to find answers. And we ask all this in Jesus' name. Amen.