James chapter 1 review

All right, James chapter one review is what we're doing this morning. We're going to look at the whole chapter. We're going to breeze by the whole chapter. There's a lot more to it than I thought there was. It's like, oh, there is some verses. But some background on this letter from James.

It's written early, 45 to 50 AD. So it's pre-Paul's epistles, right? He started his first journey in about 44 AD. So he hadn't written any of his letters yet. So all that doctrine is just yet unknown, isn't it? This time. It's written to the dispersed 12 tribes of Israel.

And that's what it says in the first verse. These are Jews who had converted to Christianity, but were still going to synagogue. And the word for when he says in chapter 2, verse 1, or so, when that rich man comes into the synagogue, he uses sunagage for that. So it's still a synagogue, not yet a church, an ecclesia. or a gathering out from the camp of Israel yet, because again, it's early, early in the church history here.

Just, you know, a decade and a half since, or maybe even a decade since Christ died on the cross. Darby says that Christian Jews remained Jews until the end of New Testament history and were even zealous for the law still. For us, he says, it's a strange thing, but God endured this for a time. And this is the, you know, the book of Acts is this sort of a transitional period between pure Judaism and Christianity that is just getting its sea legs, as you will, if you will.

The book of Hebrews, Paul wrote that, or the letter to the Hebrews, is Paul's plea to the Jewish Christians to draw near with sincere heart in full assurance of faith to Christ, their heavenly priest. That's one of the themes of the book of Hebrews. So without the law, without the sacrifices, and to confidently enter the holy place by the blood of Jesus, Paul says in Hebrews. But that's still two decades into the future. when Paul makes a plea to the Jewish people who are now going to churches.

So another point to kind of drive this point home, the Jewish Christians were early in their weaning away from Judaism. And Judaism ended with Christ is the end of the law for all who believe. It ended with Christ. F.W. Grant and J.N. Darby say that essentially James is a Jewish letter in the New Testament. Now there's one book in the Old Testament that's dedicated to Gentiles or the Gentile world. Can anyone think of what book in the Old Testament that is? Esther. Esther? I don't know. Good guess.

And that could be true, but they say that it's Book of Jonah because it deals just with Nineveh, you know, this Gentile nation that needed to repent. So there's no, there's nothing except for a Jewish prophet, Jonah is in it, but written to the Gentile nation of, or the Gentile city of Nineveh there. So the character of the book of James is more a little on that.

God put an exclamation mark on this end of Judaism and for them to embrace their heavenly calling in 70 AD. That was that he destroyed the temple. I mean, there was a break right there, right? I mean, What more could you do to really break the ties of the sacrifices and things from 70 AD?

But that's still way into the future from this book of James, this letter from James. James, the book, is not a doctrinal book per se, but practical conduct is in mind. James does not address the spiritual springs of that conduct as Paul would. You know, Paul will, for two or three chapters, just pour out doctrine and our heavenly calling and our position in Christ before he gets to addressing conduct. So F.W. Grant says, faith is a channel and not the spring.

Grace is the spring, he says. Grace is just mentioned twice in the book of James. in 4.6, in the same verse, as a matter of fact. 4.6 says, but he gives a greater grace. Therefore, it says, God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble. And here, he's quoting Proverbs.

Proverbs 3.34.

One evidence that I think kind of supports Darby and Grant's position here is from Galatians 2.12, where Paul says, for prior to the coming of certain men from James, Peter used to eat with the Gentiles.

But when they came, he began to withdraw and hold himself aloof, fearing the party of the circumcision. So those men were from James, or these very people who James is addressing. So these people from James are very very Jewish still, even though they're new believers. So certain men from James, and that's when Paul called out Peter for kind of changing his behavior in front of the Jews. James, as we know, dwells on practice upon the conduct flowing from faith. the works by which faith is made perfect," Graham says.

Okay. I'll just read James 1, 2 through 8. This is the trials section. In verse 2, we consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance, and let this endurance have perfect its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But he must ask in faith, without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. For that man ought not to expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, verse 7, being a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. So just to review this section about trials, we are to consider it all joy when we fall into various trials. It's imperative. It's a command coming from authority to consider it all joy. It's a past point fact that we are to consider this. Our mindset is to be joyous or a lightness of being.

There's to be a gladness about enduring trials, which is strange, up against our human nature, isn't it? By abiding in God's resources in the trial, we learn or come to know endurance. staying power under the trial. We learn that endurance is hupomone, to abide under. The staying power leads to a more perfected faith, nothing missing. We spiritually mature under each trial, even though it's unpleasant for a time. But that's the goal, spiritual maturity. God uses trials, tribulations, pressures, and afflictions as a proving ground, dokimion is the Greek word for our faith, for the purpose of approval under trial. We learned all about that, that dokimes trials, those are for approval.

So the result is that we lack nothing or are spiritually complete. But if we are flummoxed by the trial, which I often get flummoxed by trials, You define flummox for us? It's a doctrinal word for pulling your hair out and crying out and panicking, breathing into a paper bag. So if we find ourselves doing that, we need wisdom. We just ask God for wisdom in the trial. And he doesn't test our motivation, or he doesn't chide us for asking.

He gives generously and without reproach. Let me move these things here up. But don't be wishy-washy about it. That's my spiritual word. It'll give us wisdom. Believe it because he says it in his word. He has spoken. And at the end of this lesson, this is J.B. Stoney's point, just this point. So remember that point for the last slide. It's really good what he says. Okay, James chapter 1, 9 through 12. This is what I call sort of the Isaiah section, Isaiah 40 section, because he quotes Isaiah 40.

But let the brother of humble circumstance glory in his high position, and the rich man is to glory in his humiliation, because like flowering grass, he will pass away. For the sun rises with a scorching wind and withers the grass, and the flower falls off, and the beauty of its appearance is destroyed. So, too, the rich man, in the midst of his pursuits, will fade away. Blessed is a man or a woman who preserves under trial.

For once he or she has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love him." James 1, 9 through 12 there. And again, I call this the Isaiah, just for the purpose of this review, the Isaiah 40 section. If we believe in the reality of what God says in his word and by faith abide under trials without sinning, and he'll get to when we sin in verses 13 through 15, we are promised a crown of life. And it's a crown for faithful suffering during our lifetime. But in verse 10, there's temptation, and that's about the rich man, to rely on our own riches, resources, and our own steam to bear under trials and to focus on earthly cares and not eternal heavenly things. That's another temptation that we can have here in this life. But he says, He quotes this, and this is Peter quoting Isaiah 40.

For all flesh is like grass, and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls off. Things are temporal, things on this earth. Look at this from, again, 1 Peter, same chapter, but six through nine, how it's really amazing how this lines up perfectly with what James is saying in this first chapter. Peter says from verse 6 in 1 Peter chapter 1, in this you greatly rejoice, or consider it all joy, right?

Even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by, there's that word, various trials, erosmos, so that the proof of your faith, which is dokimon, being more precious than gold, which is perishable, he says, and that lines up really well with all flesh is like rash and it withers and fades. It's perishable. Even though tested by fire, and that tested by fire is Takimatsu, even though tested by fire may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ.

And when he is revealed, he'll have that crown of life for us. And though you have not seen him, you love him. And though you do not see him now, but believe in him, you greatly rejoice, use our rejoice word again, with joy, inexpressible and full of glory, obtaining as the outcome of your faith, The salvation of your souls.

And that would be salvation from the present power of sin. Not the penalty of sin, but the present power. And probably the eternal presence of sin, too. It's going to be gone when Christ Jesus appears. We're going to be saved from the presence of sin, which is very comforting.

That's from 1 Peter chapter 1, 6 through 9. Very, lines up perfectly with what James is saying here. Let me move my, this irritating, I have a, do you see that? Does that come up for you, the? No, no, I don't see that, no. Okay, good. I see it and it blocks my whole screen, basically. I see it. But the.

The word of the Lord endures forever. And this is the word which was preached to you. That's from verse 25 of 1 Peter chapter 1. And it's really amazing how James doesn't use that quotation, but James does talk about in verses 18 and 21 about the word of truth and the word being implanted in us. in verse 21, and so it's the same, they're on the same wavelength here, James and Peter, really amazing. Okay, the temptation process from James chapter one, 13 through 60. Verse 13, let no man say when he is tempted, I am being tempted by God to sin.

I added in to sin there. For God cannot be tempted by evil, and he himself does not tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brother.

So here's our famous stair step. And I ended in where verse 14. Uh, sort of delineates from the information from verse 15 there, but you know, you start at the top of the stairs, your, your sin nature, your old man puts these desires, these lusts in your heart. Um, you're drawn away and you're enticed and you're lured by the bait. And then my favorite part is the little fishy. And, um, That's where you sin. That's the line. Well, Andrew, I always like to think that's the point where you could go back to abiding. Yeah. You could return back there. Yeah, go ahead.

What about these mental thoughts? You know, are those sin? It's a hard question. Desires. It doesn't seem like with the picture, the phraseology and the words that until you take your You're in that time period where you're considering it, but you haven't done it. And it must relate to action, right? It's mental action, right? Many times, right? Mental action, too, yeah. Or physical action.

And eventually, you reach the bottom of the... you go down in the basement. And the basement is death. I like how Bob phrased it. If a pregnancy results in death, that's an abortion. That's a good word for that. So the famous stair-step illustration here, which is really helpful. Let me go back to it. Could stop at any point? Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's a good question. I was asking Roger, but I was just looking and thinking, it's not a slide. You have stair steps. Some people have said it's a slide. Some people like to slide. Some people like to stair step. And of course, this can happen in an instant. I mean, it doesn't take very long.

It's like you're driving your car, right? Yeah. Somebody cuts you off. Right. Okay. At that point, you can decide what you're going to do. Right. Or in my case, when you're traveling along a lonely highway at a high speed, and there's a cross street, and someone waits, and they see you coming, and then they just pull out in front of you. Yeah, yeah. It had to happen. The mountains, very similar thing, Andrew. It's pretty scary. Not so much that you're going to hit them, but they could just wait a second, and then you're passed. And then behind them, they have an open road. No one's behind me. You know what I mean? I just don't understand.

And that gets me. In fact, there's this road called Skunk Creek that comes out onto the highway. Because everyone who comes out of Skunk Creek is a skunk. That gets me all the time. That's the picture. That little stretch of road. So there it is. And this is the exact process, you know, that happens. And then I tailgate them. Yeah, exactly. You show them, right? I'll show you. Sometimes I just circle around them. And you walk down the stairs. So that's it. Verse 16 here, do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. I added this comment, temptation to sin does not come from God.

On the contrary, every good thing and every perfect gift comes from God. And that's exactly what he says here in verse 17. Every good thing given And every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting of shadow. Verse 18, in the exercise of his will, he brought us forth by the word of truth, so that we would be a kind of first fruits among his creatures. Beautiful passage, isn't it? good thing and the perfect gift comes down from the Father of lights.

Bob, in his lesson on this, posed the question of whether do not be deceived goes with verses, or I should say verses 13 through 15, that sin process, the temptation, lust, sin process, or does it belong with the above verses 17 and 18? In other words, he asked, Which one does it go with? What are we not to be deceived about?

That stair-step sin process, or this every good gift comes from God. And he left that sort of open, and I'm going to take a stab at that, because I was thinking about that, and that's a good question. My stab at it is the process of temptation. leading to spiritual death in verses 13 through 15, which is bad. That's bad. That comes from our inner old man only, not God.

Verse 17 and 18, verses 17 and 18, the good stuff, the good comes from God. So I think he's saying, perhaps, do not be deceived about the source of the sin or the source of the good things. There's the good things. One source is God. One source is your sin nature. And don't intermix the two. Don't ascribe God to sending you temptations to sin. He sends the good things, the perfect gifts from above, is my stab at it. If anyone wants to take their stab at it.

We have the author. We have the author of the question just showed up. Oh yeah, oh good. Sorry, Bob. We have issues around the house that had to immediately be dealt with. That's fine. Okay, I'm sorry this is the first part, Andrew. Can't wait to see your handouts. Oh yeah, yeah. So yeah, we're just talking about you, Bob. Only in the non-sinful good way, so. So, There's that. Yeah, it's an interesting question that Bob posed there about several weeks ago.

Without no variation or shifting of shadow, I stated earlier, and one of those is Grant or Darby was mentioning that James is not so doctrinally oriented. But this phrase, this, that there's no variation with God. There's no shifting of shadow. That's excellent doctrine, isn't it? It is. It sets forth that immutability of God, the changelessness of God. It's one of his essences. And I thought of this verse, too. Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

Same concept there, the immutability of God in Hebrews 13.8. Oh, just when I'm about to read the thing, I get the menu bar there. We are, in the Stes Quo Verb, Essence Verb, the first fruits consecrated to God, like the first lump of dough that is baked for the sacred temple loaves, or the first fruits of the cattle, or the first fruits of the crops. So these Jewish believers here in the, and about, you know, 40, 45 to 50 AD, still going into synagogue, basically, they would well understand this analogy of the first fruits. And we are birthed from the word of truth, is what James says here. Okay, James 19 through 21, chapter one.

This you know, my beloved brethren, But everyone must be quick to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger. For the anger of man does not achieve the righteousness of God. Therefore, putting aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness, in humility, receive the word implanted, which is able to save your souls." And Roy's translation there, which I really liked, and it's easy to commit to memory, is, be eager to hear. Be not eager to speak, and be not eager towards wrath, is the way he...

Or tailgating. And Roy says, what a great liberty that is. from being dominated by our own kind of humanity to being free to willingly be dominated by God's spirit, moment by moment, walking under his direction as instruments of God's good to show himself to us and to those around us so that we all may be drawn to trust and love him. So this is what I'll call the Roy slide.

I'm just kind of recreating some of the things he said during this lesson, which were good from several weeks back. We are given three commands, he says, which obey become our expression of love back toward him. Verse 20, man's wrath does not produce God's good. God produces his good only out of his goodness. from verse 20, for the anger of man does not achieve the righteousness of God.

And I've been thinking about that a lot. Isn't that true? And that's a temptation too, isn't it? To get angry about things and to want to take things into your own hand and sort of administer your own wrath or anger. that has no, that's not God's righteousness. It's a really good thing to remember. Yeah, it's very tempting in our fallen world today. Yeah. Very tempting. Yeah, I know, especially with, you know, a certain place back east called Washington, D.C., you know, how just completely messed up that place is.

It's easy to Yeah, but we are just to let God do the meting out of wrath. Roy says, and we are now free ones, not bound to continually sin because we have already taken off all things that are offensive to him. And that I learned there, that was interesting. I hadn't thought about that before, but that we have already taken off.

It's done. It was done, aorist tense. It was done at a point in time. It's a fact that it's done. And instead of us having to take off the sin nature or these things that offend, it's done. It was done at the cross positionally. We just make it our condition. So I, that, That was a really interesting point from that lesson and the lesson from verses 19 through 21. May I add something there?

Yeah. Yeah, you bet, Roy. Well, just a word in passing is that the Aorist tense really carries the idea of a fact. A fact. More than a time. You're right. And here, we have put aside already it's a fact. And it highlights the fact that it's done, right? It's not, it doesn't.

It's actually based on the unlimited merit of God himself, right? The work on the cross. Sometimes I think, I've read that you can take the heiress tends to be, you can take it to be, done at a point in the past, but it's not a past tense. Why isn't this position of truth, really?

You've got it. It's identification with Christ and his death. Not just on behalf of our sin, but also setting us free from sin. the liberty that we have now is based on his work. And that's what this means here. Putting aside is really a fact. Having put aside all filthiness. I think we need to remind ourselves more frequently about positional truth. I really do.

And I think it's laced in and out of James. Maybe it's not distinctly as well stated as Paul does, but it's there. Yeah, yeah. If you look into it, you see it, right? But he doesn't explicitly state it, right? But how he states things leads to it really easily, which is interesting about this book. I have a question. Yeah.

Verse 21 in the Homer Christian Standard Bible says, therefore rid yourselves of all moral filth and evil. Is he talking about individuals or the corporate believer, body of believers there. I would say he's addressing the beloved. Individuals, I'd say. Yeah. Beloved Christians who, of course, they're dispersed now from Jerusalem. And Jim, I don't think the Holman Christian standard brought across the heiress correctly. It doesn't sound like the way you read it. Yeah. I've noticed that.

It says you rid yourselves when... We'll see you after class, Jim. Wouldn't that be hard to do is to take it upon yourself to rid yourself of all? I can go to bed. I'm not working for it. Yeah, that's what's interesting. That's what's nice, too. When you put just the simple Greek to it, it clears up a lot of questions, doesn't it? And it also points out how our sin natures deceive us so easily. Yeah, right. Give me something to do. I'm just so eager to do something. Tell me what to do. Just tell me what to do, and I'll do it. And that's the Jewish mindset, right, too.

They acted in the desert, right? In the wilderness. But that's also much of Christianity. Yeah. Look at all the different denominations, that that's exactly what their mantra is. Just tell them what to do, and I'll do it. And they do, too. Yeah. The last point here on this slide, receive the word that was implanted. That's an imperative. We are commanded to receive in a factual way. And this is Roy again. All the reality of God and his ways that he has implanted in us as his loved, as his loved and blessed by him children.

I'll have to fix that. I don't think I got that wording correct. But you get what he's, or what I'm trying to say there. So that's the last point of that. So on to verses 2 through 25. And I won't read it all, but there it is. This point about being doers of the word and not hearers only. If anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he's like a man who looks at his natural face in the mirror.

And once he has gone away, he has forgotten what kind of person he is. So that section up to verse 27, I should fix that. I don't have that rightly stated there. I'll go back and fix that. But the last slide here is just the whole thing on the last part of the chapter from J.B. Stoney. And it's from Sown Among the Thorns, a little essay he wrote about this. And he actually wrote about it from verse 22 through 25. But he says, it is a trial to every earnest soul.

The little effect an accepted truth has on him and the little fruit produced by that truth. The Lord in the parable of the sower presents to us the various things which hinder the full effects of the truth. There are those who have heard the word and the cares of life and the deceitfulness of riches and the lusts of other things enter in and choke the word and it becomes unfruitful. This is from that parable Jesus stated in Mark 4. Other things are allowed to rule, exert control and influence, and have mastery over us, and thus not produce fruit. And I added in there, it's the quickness to hear, the slowness to speak, those are the fruits. We're avoiding our own wrath. But if we just hear those only and not act upon them or not apply them correctly, they exert no influence over our lives.

The word, Stoney says, has been accepted but not understood sufficiently that it is God's word to one's own soul. He said, he continues, my soul must be under the conviction that it is addressed to me by the Lord himself and his will and his counsel authoritatively declared to me and to which I am required to yield unqualified submission, it is, alas, quite possible, without any intended opposition to the Lord, without meaning to be opposed to the Lord, to accept truth as information, something to enlarge one's mind, and not something that didactically claims implicit obedience. And that's being a forgetful here, right? And you just accept it as information, but it doesn't sink down into your soul and change your behavior the way it ought.

So the last point is, he says, the point is there must be action in keeping with the instruction conveyed by the word. If you abide in the word, there will be action, and therefore blessing. So that's just a little summary of the last part this James chapter one without going into it too much. So that's the review of chapter one. And onward, I guess after Easter we'll start. We have a break. Yeah, next week there's no Sunday school. And then we'll pick up in chapter two. Okay, great. So we'll pick up in chapter two.

And so chapter one is, Yeah, pretty amazing. I've done reviews in the past, and sometimes not, and I think it was well worth the time to go back and look at it again. Yeah, because there's a lot there, isn't there? That was an excellent review, Andrew. Thank you.

Let's close in prayer here quickly. Our Heavenly Father, we thank you for this information. From your word, we get from James, and just pray that it does sink down into our souls and communicates with the Holy Spirit in us, and it produces good things, and that it honors and glorifies you, Lord. And we pray these things in Jesus' name, amen.