Books of James & Jude - Chapter 2 review
James; Jude · Roger Henderson · Jun 2, 2013
James & Jude, No. 21
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/4926353234228

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

Today we're going to review chapter two, which I think has really been a neat chapter. It's not too bad. We have actually, the handouts are just coming right now. With all our various schedules and stuff, we haven't had a lot of continuity among even the teachers. So hopefully today, May I can try to bring some of that together a little bit.

On page two, chart two, there's a kind of a summary that Hal Malloy did back in 2004. And basically he looked, he kind of looked at the book of James from the, you know, and we studied in chapter two about the temptation process. Well, he kind of looked at it from going through and looking at the different chapters and identifying temptations that were presented by James.

It's actually part one of page one. It's, well, okay, chart two, yeah, on page one. So, the temptation, the first one identified the temptation to be quick or swift with a negative response and irritable, and we kind of covered that back in chapter one.

Then another one in chapter one was a temptation to be only hearers of the word, not doers of the word. And the third one was a temptation to criticize others. But the whole reason I put this chart was for the next two. Four is a temptation to show partiality and favoritism. And that we covered in the first 13 verses. And we're going to look at that today again. And then the second part of the chapter is a temptation to boast about our faith and underline the word without works.

James is going to present a view that many, even historically, found very confusing. Because scripture warns about a works system for salvation over and over and over again. Well, the reformers looked at that and they understood that. They get to James and James seems to present a different view. But what we find is that after careful study of that, he's not presenting a different view. He's presenting a complementary view.

So he's going to argue that faith with works is a natural the natural outcome of your faith. That's what faith is all about. And he's going to argue rather strongly about that. He's going to use phrases like justification by works, which blew the circuits of the reformers. They said, no, we're justified by faith. So what's he talking about when he says justification by works?

So hopefully we can talk about that a little bit. So it's really, it's been for me actually, I have looked at James in the past, but this time through it's been wonderful because I really, it crystallized a lot of things that I didn't really have firmly on my head. So hopefully that'll be the same for you guys too.

So we're going to, these are the two parts we're going to cover and then we're coming up, we're going to talk about the tongue and um, temptation to walk in human wisdom versus divine wisdom. That's coming down the road. So the two parts we're going to cover today is the partiality and favoritism part, and then the faith.

The problem was that James was occurring, the Jewish believers there were basically saying, I don't need to have any works. I just have faith, and that's all I need to have. And James was trying to counteract that. So he's going to present that faith with works is the natural Christian experience. OK, so what I've done is I've done the past.

I just kind of, the sections that we covered, I'm going to skip around a little bit. So this is a section on favoritism. So it says, my brethren, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus with an attitude of personal favoritism. For if a man comes into your assembly with a gold ring, dressed in fine clothes, and there comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, and you spay him, pay special attention to the one wearing the fine clothes and you say, sit here in a good place. And you say to the poor man, you stand over there or sit down by my footstool. Have you not made a distinction among yourselves and become judges with evil motives? So my first question is, and some of these are just, you know, I don't, you know, these aren't rocket science questions. I mean, why is faith in our Lord Jesus at odds with personal favoritism.

Well, you know, we do the same thing. Oh, absolutely. If you go in and you're at a store or whatever, and here comes this person that smells, and they're dirty, you certainly turn your attention to them. I'm sure you see it in the hospital all the time. I was thinking of the Jewish system. Jewish believers, the rabbis, they were elevated. They had a position, and they were given super special attention. And there's a place for giving, honoring a person. That's fine. But in the body of Christ, that's not the way it's to be.

Another thing, this word, personal favoritism, is this word, and when we went through the class, when I taught it back, it was the first lesson here, it's this word, it's a compound word. It's the word for face and the word to receive. So it's to receive one's face and it was used in the Greek literature where a judge would look at a person's face and he would decide how he was going to rule in that case. If you were a man of well-to-do, he was lenient with you. If you were a person that had his face he didn't recognize, good luck.

To receive one's face is this that is a translation that word personal favoritism just kind of interesting little tidbit as it was it mean to say pay special attention in verse 3 now if you look if you look carefully there I'm going to ask I'm going to ask and answer these maybe this in the interest of time here you know it's really interesting the the the one who is paid special attention to.

He's kind of escorted to his seat. He's really made to sit down in this nice seat right here. The other gentleman with the dirty clothes He doesn't actually ever get a seat. He has two options. He can stand. He can stand over there or sit down by my footstool. My understanding of that is... Sit on the floor. On the floor. So you have a choice. You sit on the floor or stand up.

That's quite a distinction. I'll guide you to your seat here or you can sit on the floor or stand up. He's presenting this hypothetical case here to bring his point that it shouldn't be the way it is. Okay, actually I've answered this question already, number three. What's the contrast between sitting in a good place and my foot still? Very significant.

And then lastly, it says at the end, verse 4, have you not made distinction among yourselves and become judges with evil motives? Can you think of verses that talk about judging and that? Yeah, Jesus said that whatever judgment you use to judge others, you'll be judged the same way. Right, and there's verses like... It's amazing how The things I notice wrong with other people most quickly are the ones of which I'm guilty. I see their errors very easily. Is that true for the Christian though? I mean, I thought that was more for the millennium, the judging.

Well, there's that aspect, that's right. I was thinking of the fact that just, you know, actually there's a verse in Hebrews about, you know, God is a judge of all, you know, and basically The father said that he's given all judgment to the son. Is that right? Yeah, he's given all judgment to the son. It's sort of like also, it's not up to us to judge someone's heart. Right, exactly. Only the Lord knows someone's heart. Whether you judge what their motives are or anything, we don't have the ability to do that.

I think that is pointed out pretty clearly. Right, right. Okay, so that's the first set of verses on favoritism. Well, I think the reminder is that the foot of the cross for all made equal. I mean, I think that that's an an important truth, I think we all need to remind ourselves. We don't know anything about this man's faith, we just know that his clothes don't look so good. Right.

And we see that, and Margaret points out, we do it ourselves. We wind up, you know, we're all, you know, we have our likes and dislikes, and that's something that the Lord says, no, that shouldn't be A brother in the Lord is a brother in the Lord or a sister in the Lord. You may not be your best buddy. He's not saying that. He's just saying they're to be treated.

I heard this earlier in my Christian life. Every believer that you meet who's truly a believer, Christ died for that person. He's of tremendous value. If you think from that perspective, that's helped me a lot of times, looking at a person and saying, well, I'm not really keen on that person. He's not my good buddy. But he's a believer. Christ died for him. Wow, that makes him significant.

And keep in mind, we can't discount the rest of Scripture in verse 4 where it says, if you've not shown partiality among yourselves, you've become judges with evil thoughts. I mean, why is that? Talk about a legal principle. I mean, even if I have judged somebody based on their human appearance. That's been paid for. Not that I can justify that. I don't feel like God is judging me for that. I was judged at the cross. That doesn't mean I should carry out this behavior. In the new creation, we don't carry out this behavior.

To use James to trump everything we know about grace and all that is normal is just a huge mistake. I think the challenge is to see how James and the rest of scripture fit, and they're not in conflict, and that's the real challenge as we go through here, so that's great. Okay, good thoughts there.

Okay, so the next one is, listen my beloved brethren, did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs to the kingdom which he promised to those who love him? But you have dishonored the poor man, Is it not the rich who oppress you and personally drag you into court? Do they not blaspheme the fair name by which you have been called? This is like phase two of his dissertation on favoritism. So this is an interesting thing. This basically says that God God favors the poor. Can you think of a verse? I was just saying, I just noticed there's something missing in here. What about the middle class? I don't think there was a middle class. That's good. But I just happened to think of that. I thought, well, you know, I'm thinking of this country.

Well, many times people almost choose to be poor. I mean, if you want to... Oh, yeah. Well, we've had sometimes when they're out in the street out there, they choose to sit out in the street and do that. Not always, but sometimes. So it's kind of like, it seems like we've got rich and poor, but it's like, well, I think most of us are more in the middle. That's where I hear it. Or instead, the poor will always be with you. And that's a very helpful thing. When all these social programs come along, you kind of scratch your head and say, Christ said the poor will always be with us.

What are we doing? We'll eradicate poverty. That's a doomed project. We're trying to do it by human wisdom. Human wisdom will never achieve the desired result. Personal salvation. Getting rid of those class distinctions. So let's look at, you know, I think we see God's view on the poor and God's view on...

Let's look at 1 Corinthians here. 1 Corinthians chapter 2. I'm sorry, 1 Corinthians chapter 1. And could someone read verses 26 to 30 in chapter 1 of 1 Corinthians? For you see your calling, brethren, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called.

But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things that are mighty, and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should show glory in his presence. But of him you are in Christ Jesus, who became for us wisdom from God, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption, that as it is written, he who glories, let him glory in the Lord.

Thanks Al. So here we see that, you know, Basically, you know, Paul's talking here about, you know, there are not many mighty, there are not many super, I might say super intellectuals, I don't know if that's exactly the right word. So I took this to show God's view.

God's view is that the poor, in a way, have an advantage, almost. Because they're not enthralled by their wisdom. They're just trying to make it through the day. And so that actually gives them an advantage. So in a sense, So I think it kind of fits in here that it says, God did not choose the poor to be rich in faith and the heirs to the kingdom. So the poor do actually have an advantage. You might not see it that way, but they actually have an advantage.

And you might even argue that, you know, you look at our country and, you know, they're There are a lot of believers who are not well off and it's unusual. There are some believers that are very well off and that's not the norm it doesn't seem like and so it's interesting. So I thought it was interesting that perspective about God choosing the poor. So kind of going along with that, a little bit of a trick question. is to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom only for the poor believer.

If you're not careful, you might read that, oh, the poor gets an extra special. No, we're all rich. He's given us all his riches. We have the riches of Christ in every believer, and we're heirs of his kingdom, and we'll be with Christ in the kingdom.

So, just kind of a sanity check. Well, I mean, James goes on and addresses this partially, maybe you're going to go there. Yeah, actually I want to get there. In verse 8, are you going to? Yeah, actually, we'll get, actually. You're not there yet. Not there yet, yeah.

And then, basically, I just kind of try to remind myself and maybe you as well that, you know, you have, he's talking to Jewish believers here. Have you dishonored the, Have you just not dishonored the poor man? I think he kind of refers back to what went before, where you escorted the well-due person to his seat, and the other guy, you can sit on the floor or stand up. Apparently that was happening. The Jewish believers, they came from a very proud heritage, and so they had problems with it. Obviously James was trying to... This is a worldwide problem.

I have a friend who's in Peru right now, and she was telling me that she's doing a Bible study in her home, and a woman, she's doing a Bible study with her, she calls it her domestic employee, and the domestic employee's friend, who are believers. Another woman who runs a shop, a retail shop in the little town, won't come because she won't sit at the same table. Even though she's a believer, she won't sit at the same table with a domestic employee. Yeah, no, I can. So that's interesting. No, I mean, thanks. You know, I think you learn about history. We don't learn. We don't learn. We don't learn. Yeah. OK. That's good, Mark. Thanks. Thanks for that insight. That's good. So here's another thing that kind of came out of this.

Who are the rich? You know, James talking to these Jewish believers. Who are the rich that James is talking about? It took me a while to kind of dig this out. So who do you think are the rich that he's talking about here? We have an example there. It says he was dressed in fine clothes. If you go up higher, you know, earlier in the chapter, he said he was dressed. So they have the money to dress fine.

So who are they? Who do you think the rich Jewish believers were? Well, actually it turned out to be, Acts had a whole bunch of, there was one referred to the cat from the temple guard. But these have to be believers, don't they? They have to be believers. Yeah, so I was going to say the Pharisees, but the Pharisees wouldn't be believers. So it had to be believers. Right. There was a devout woman of prominence in Acts 13, a devout woman of prominence. In the city there was Demetrius, a silversmith. There were believers that were well off. But you're right.

In some cases if they were still hanging on to their Judaism they might be up in the Jewish pecking order so to speak. Probably there was a connection between being rich and prominent. We don't always have maybe in this country. There would be maybe the leaders of the city and the rich would be. I'm just saying. How about Zacchaeus? He was well off. He got the taxes right. He had lots of money. So there's an example of a rich person.

Interesting verse in Proverbs that relates to this a little bit. It says, a good name is to be chosen rather than great riches, loving favor rather than silver and gold. The rich and the poor have this in common. The Lord is the maker of them all. So to recognize that God has a purpose in the rich man, he has a purpose in the poor man. That each man has his own following of the Lord's will for his own life. We're not supposed to look at I'm not supposed to look at Bob's life. I'm supposed to look at my own life and follow God's will for me, whether I'm one of the rich or the poor. Where's that verse, Al? Where's that verse? I think there's 22. I turned away from it.

Alright, so in the last question, basically I just said, what are the three things the rich have done to you Jewish believers? It's in the two verses there, just in the interest of time. The first thing, right, they oppress you. Is it not the rich who oppress you? They personally drag you into court. And then thirdly, they blaspheme the fair name of God by which you have been called. So what his argument is here, you're giving, these are believers, you're giving special treatment to these believers, but they actually are hurting the cause of Christ, these rich believers. They're doing things they shouldn't be doing. So this is a hard thing he's bringing here.

So actually at this point, now Baba, you wanted to go on another verse. I actually wanted to jump over to the faith and works because we're not going to have time otherwise. So I apologize. I'm just going to skip ahead here. And if we have time, we'll come back. Because I think it's just so important. OK. So go to, it's on the third page, chart eight. I'm sorry. Actually, let's go back one here. Let's go to chart seven. So this is the section that starts in on faith and works. Let me just give you about three or four general comments that I noticed.

And I mentioned before, scripture warns about faith for salvation constantly. It says like in Romans 3, 20, by the works of the law no flesh will be justified. There are just lots and lots of verses that talk about warning you against works against salvation. So remember that there are three aspects of salvation. Salvation from the penalty of sin, salvation from the power of sin, salvation from the presence of sin. So the warning in scripture against works is for salvation. Don't think that you can do something, you can obey the law for the Jewish believers and that's going to gain salvation. Don't think anything you can bring to the table, any works will merit salvation. Well, James is going to talk about works as part of the Christian life. So that's one really important thing to see when we start talking about works here. He's going to talk about works as part of the Christian life, not for salvation.

So that's going to really help us in sorting out what's going on here. Also, what's interesting is, we know for salvation, you're justified by faith. Well, James is going to introduce, it took me a little while to catch on to this. James is going to introduce justification by works, and at first you think that can't be.

But he's not talking about salvation, he's talking about the Christian walk. And he's going to say justification by works basically proves that you, you know, proves to not to God, God already knows who you are, but it shows your fellow believer who you are. He's going to argue that justification by works is a valid topic and it should be discussed, and he's going to discuss it here. He's going to go through that in the rest of the chapter here. And it took me a while to kind of catch on to that. Justification by faith is for salvation. Justification by works is part of your Christian walk. the present aspect of salvation. So that really kind of helped.

Well, that's, you know, let go, let God. That talks about, no, that's not what it is. It's not just let go, let God. Not just have faith, and as this verse points out, you know, go and somehow the stove is going to warm up. You're going to help him get the refrigerator. I know. The example here is just mind-boggling. That's our walk. That is the beginning point. I want to just jump in here. There's a really cool thing here. Let's read verse 14 really carefully.

He says, What use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith, but he has no works? Can that faith save him? Okay, for starters here, notice that he says, if someone says, so based upon that, what kind of faith is he talking about here? And if you missed some of the classes, it's good. Actually, Macaulay, Macaulay kind of coined the phrase, he's making a profession, you can say, anyone can say they have faith. In fact, you probably run into certain people in your life, that will talk about, I'm a Christian, I have faith, and maybe you have some doubts about them. Anybody can say they have faith.

That's what he's addressing here, a profession of faith. Not necessarily that someone has faith. If someone says he has faith, and has no works, can that faith save him? And the answer implied here is, if he's only saying he has faith, then he's not saved. So that's what he's addressing. A profession of faith, and the only way that we as men can evaluate that is by their actions and their work.

God knows they're hard, but if a person says they have faith, he's saying if they only say they have faith, And he gives an example of that. And right below that he says, and here's an example of that saying you have faith, if a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, go in peace, be warmed, and be filled, yet does not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that? So he says, they're just professing faith with nothing behind it. So I kind of base my questions on that. Obviously merely saying you have faith doesn't save you. And basically taking that little term, lit-faith, That's a really super example.

The lips sound really good. Go in peace, brother. Have a good day. God bless you. You've heard people do that. They'll go around and they'll say, God bless you. Which bothers me a little bit sometimes. And they may be believers. Absolutely. And we shouldn't judge them. And sometimes we shouldn't judge them. We take them, whatever it is.

But he's addressing apparently a problem. People were professing to have faith, but there was no evidence of their faith. Well, I think we all know Christians that are like that. I was just thinking of Obama saying God bless you to Planned Parenthood. Please don't. I know. I have a problem with that too. People going around saying God bless you. That's kind of a panacea for whatever. Al?

I think the application of this is that we be careful not to look around at others and judge them by their appearances, whether it be rich and poor, whether it be evidences of a living faith. But it's a warning to us that if we say we believe in God, and we believe Christ died for our sins, and we believe that we have justification and righteousness and seething within, and all the rest of the theology and doctrine.

But if I'm not showing it in a practical way, and holding my tongue, or not judging and the rest, tonight in the chapel service at the jail, I'm going to challenge them. If you say you believe in God, but live like an atheist. And I'm not going to so much say you, but just bring it up that faith in God ought to have some evidence. Not so other people will see it, but so you yourself can validate that faith that you say you have. Because the way you live and the way you think and the way you talk If it's coming from the heart of faith, we'll show them that faith.

Well, it's Christ's character coming out in us. That's what it is. It's not us working harder to do these works. the Lord manifesting himself through us, that we want to do the works. Absolutely. That's really the thing. Your heart wants to do the works. And it's a joy. It's a joy.

And how many Christians do we know, and I can tell you, I have some friends who they do quote-unquote good works and they're complaining the whole time. Or you run into missionaries who all they can do is complain about their situation instead of trusting the Lord. And you're going, you know what? This person, I'm sure, is a believer, but they need to get out of the mission field. If this is such a burden to them, it's not coming from the heart. It's not coming from Christ's walk. with this dog. Wave a little flag and say, hooray, hooray, I'm happy. The witness to the world of the joy of Christ. Like you say, Margaret, it's sometimes sad like this. It is. It is. Anyway. Okay. Alright. So, this is kind of another little key thing here.

When you read verse 17 here, and the question is, why is it important to realize that verse 17a should read even so even so the faith, so it should read, and there's a definite article right there, even so the faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself. So what I believe this is saying is that it's referring back up to here, it's referring to this lip faith. Even so, the aforementioned faith, if it has no works, is dead. So this person is saying he has faith, and it's by itself. It's dead. It's useless, of no value. And that kind of goes along with the last question. What's a good synonym for death?

Actually, we're going to see verse 17, and you might want to make a little note, verse 17, verse 20, and verse 26 all have a a similar theme, they talk about no works, no works, and so we're going to see that as we go down through the rest of the section, 17, 20, and 26. So we'll see those as we go along.

Okay, so then the part two of this is that, and this is kind of interesting, but someone may well say to you, you have faith, I have works, you show me your faith without the works, I will show you my faith by my works. You believe that God is one. You do well. The demons also believe in shudder. But are you willing to recognize, and here's one of the parallel verses of 17, are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless?

So rather than saying dead, he says useless this time. But it's interesting up here, he goes through this argument, it seems like. He puts out this straw man, if you will, if someone says. So you've got to kind of look carefully. you almost could put a versus in here rather than saying and, there's the you's and the I's. So you have to identify who the you's and the I's are.

So I believe in this context he's saying, he's taking the I position, he's saying, you have faith, I have works. That's what James is saying. Then he goes on, he says, you show me your faith without the works, I will show you my faith by my works." So his contention is that works are the natural outcome of your faith. So he's arguing with the guy who says, I don't need to have any works. And then he goes on to say, about believing in God. Some people will say, I believe in God, I have faith, I believe in God. You'll hear that all the time.

But how many people also are not believers and they do plenty of good works. That's the other side of the point. They do plenty of good works. In fact, they outdo our good works. That's exactly right. And they're very prideful of that. And they're very prideful and they want to make sure you know about it.

We had a cleanup day in our subdivision and this guy I was talking with, he was just telling me how he's giving back to the community. He went on and on about how he's giving back to the community. I do this, I do that. And his wife apparently said, my wife's at church, and she's doing something. He kind of separated himself from what his wife does and what he does. So I don't know. I was almost going to talk to him, but this wasn't the right situation. So I didn't have a chance.

So basically James said, faith by my works. Actually, if you look in Paul's writings, he'll say things like, but faith working through love. So faith and works are the works that come in your Christian life, not for salvation. The works that come in your Christian life do have a place.

And then it says, why is believing that God is one not sufficient for salvation? At Holly Hills, that shouldn't be a problem because that's, you know, And he says, the devil believes that. And the devil isn't saved, right? So just believing that God is one is not sufficient for salvation, right?

That's not the message that God, you know, the message is Christ and his death on the cross. It's a statement, faith without work is useless, contrary to what Paul is saying. And I would say no. Basically, Paul says in Ephesians, we're creating Christ Jesus for good works.

And this is the cool part. As we talked about, God has prepared these works beforehand. So we can relax. We can say, Lord, I'm going to walk in your good works. And it's not going to be a burden. It's not going to be something, oh, I've got to do that again. No, it's going to be joyful. You're going to be excited about doing it. Well, in fact, it's not an effort at all. because it's not you. Yes, not you. But also, you didn't The works were picked out for you ahead of time based on your talent and your ability and all of that. The Lord knew all that ahead of time.

Absolutely. That sounds like a let God kind of scenario. I think we have to be very careful here. We live by active faith and that faith is in the new creations we are in Christ Jesus. That's active. We need to respond actively by faith that we're being transformed and conformed into his image.

What Paul does is set a firm foundation doctrinally of who we are in Christ. But if you look at Paul's second half of all of his epistles, it's all about what that life looks like. We have faith in what he's revealed in terms of doctrinally who we are.

And then by faith that life gets lived out. It's not like those works are already mandated and dictated by God. We don't know what they're going to be. We live by faith. So ultimately that life will live out, by the way, to his glory. I mean, you know, and James says earlier, he says, he talks about, you know, murder and adultery and all these things, and so speak and so do as those who will be judged by the law of liberty. I mean, it says that if you don't keep every point of the law, you're guilty at all, right? So this law of liberty is this life of justification by works, which is an extension of the justification by grace.

I mean, I think we just have to be careful. No, I agree. in terms of how we view this whole thing. It's not like the works are already done and God... Well no, but he has picked out the works based on everyone's ability. And he wants us to walk in those works. That's right.

So this first two sections here, he kind of gives us a... the view of the statement and then he wants to give a couple of illustrations. The first illustration is Abraham. was not Abraham our father. So what he's going to try to show here, he's going to contrast.

And here's this statement I was taught. Justification by works. And then it's implied down here, this is justification by faith. So he's going to talk about these two terms, which at first seem, justification by works, that sounds like I'm being saved by that.

But no, that's not what he's talking about. Because if you look at the context, he says, was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered Isaac up for his son Isaac, his son, on the altar. So let me just stop there. Then if you jump down to 23, he talks about that Abraham believed God and was reckoned to him by righteousness. So 23 is when he basically was a salvation and he was justified by faith, right? 21 is when in his Christian walk, by faith, And he calls it justification by work.

So he puts that term in there, which at first seems to be, wow, that kind of shakes you up. But that's not for salvation. That's for his Christian walk. And when he offered his son Isaac on the altar, that was an incredible thing, showing his faith, that he trusted the Lord in that.

Yes, that was called a work, but I think Bob's arguing here, which is right, it's driven totally by faith. You don't drop out, you don't do your works, no other mechanism by faith. It has to be by faith, otherwise you're not walking with the Lord. verse 22 really summarizes that perfectly. You see that faith was working together with his works and by works faith was made perfect.

How beautiful is that? That is a beautiful statement. I agree with you. I heard one preacher comment that it's like using a pair of scissors. If you just have works and they're not springing from faith. Just have the one blade. If you have faith without works, you've got just the one blade. But if it's working right and doing the job, you have both blades. If you go back and look, obviously, there's all these years before Isaac was born. 23 is back.

That's in Genesis 15-6. That was where Abraham was to go outside and look at the stars and he said, your descendants will be as many as the stars. And then later on in Genesis 22 is when he asks him, it's amazing when Isaac asks him, where's the sacrifice? Talk about fate. God will provide the sacrifice.

But it's interesting, you look at Hebrews, and actually Ingrid got us straight in that the other day. You look at Hebrews, and he believed, what Hebrews says, he believed that God would raise his son from the dead. He so trusted the Lord, he says, he has to go on. I don't care if I do slay him here. He's got to go on. God's going to raise him from the dead. Because he's already told me my descendants are going to be as the stars in the sky. And he believed that. That was a totally operation by faith. I mean, it's really cool. That's really cool.

We're not told all the examples in between. No, we're not told of what they said in their minds. So we realize that there's 40 years in between those two statements about being justified. Exactly. Okay, so Paul makes the same statement. He basically says, he quotes this right here, and Abraham believed God and it was reckoned him as righteous. So there's no conflict there.

Then the Rahab illustration, you see the man is justified by works and not by faith alone. In the same way, Rahab, the harlot, was also justified when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way. For just as a body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead. So what's interesting in this first verse here, it says you see that a man is justified by works. So here's this justified by works which blows people's circuits sometimes. Of course a lot of people will take that Catholicism will take that, and they'll say, that's our game plan. But what's interesting is here, it says, you see a man is justified by works, and not by faith only.

That could be translated only. So it's faith and works. You can't separate those two. You can't separate the faith and the works. If you do that, you're separating God's work and your life. You can't say, OK, I'll just do the works. I'll just do the works. The faith part I don't understand too well, but I'm going to do works. Like you say, I'll be considered a good person. They have to be together. It says alone or only. What's interesting is, think about what James has done.

He picked Abraham and he picked Rahab. He showed that they have the same kind of works in their life. They're justified by their works. Rahab was at the bottom of the scale. I think in the context, Rahab probably wasn't a harlot anymore. She became a believer in the Old Testament sense. But James picks the lowest and the highest. It actually goes very well with the fact that the rich man and the poor man get down to here and say, Rahab, she's justified just like Abraham was.

Wow, she's a woman? She's a harlot? And she's just the same. How can that be? These Jewish believers, they're thinking, how can that be? The more you think about the example he used here, it's pretty amazing. If you really look at Rahab, though, it's a tough one.

She's mentioned throughout scripture. She is, over and over again. And you really don't see the evidence that she was justified by anything that works. I know, and it's right. In fact, we'll see it in Hebrews here. She's coming up. We'll see it in Hebrews. She's in the hall of faith. We don't see her justification by faith. We see her justification by works. So you're right, Bob. All we see is the works part. So maybe the faith, obviously, because Paul and even James here faith and works are together. Right. So you know that it's understood about the faith. You're right.

In Matthew verse 11 she's listed. She's listed with all the rest of them. When she received the spies, she made the comment about we know what your God knows. Yeah, she did give them a look. If you go back, she did give them a look. There is that acknowledgment of recognition of the true God.

Right. But yes. No, we don't see a statement she was justified by faith. We don't have Paul Harvey to give us the rest of the story. Okay. That's good. That's good to hear. Let's just, we've answered a lot of these. So, you know, basically we're talking about, you know, this is our walk, our conditional walk. Another way to look at this is that when it's justification by works, that's before us. That's before men and women. God doesn't need that. No, he doesn't need that. We need that. For us to feel good about a believer, we need to have some feedback about that believer. Here's Abraham and Rahab's contrast.

OK, so the last... Jesus, even when he was with his disciples, even though he'd lived with them all that time, he'd come in toward the close of his ministry to his disciples. believe what I'm telling you about my position with the Father and our relationship and what I'm doing here on earth and all that. But if you can't believe that, believe the works. What's easier to say Your sins are forgiven, or rise up and walk. That's really good. I mean, Jesus and his ministry. Put faith in works.

In the Christian life, they're inseparable. If you try to separate them, that's you getting involved in that, and you're trying to add to them. I'm going to add to the Lord, I'm going to add to the ones he prepared for me. No, you're not going to add to them. You're going to, by faith, carry them out.

So basically, the last part of this For just as a body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead. It's kind of a stark illustration. If the body has no spirit, it's not too good. And basically faith with no works is... That could apply to the body as well, the church body. It could apply to a group as well as a person. Anything less.

You made it all the way through, Roger. Actually, I skim past those couple of hard verses. The ones that Bob went back to. But you see grace in there, I think, and Bob pointed it out. You see the law of liberty. You see that mercy triumphs. That is a tremendous, actually, statement. That mercy triumphs. Mercy triumphs over judgment. Yes, mercy triumphs over judgment. So we see God's grace, even in the midst of what seems like a very legal description, and he's talking to these Jewish believers, we see that it's God's grace and his mercy that triumphs, and it's his law of liberty. But see, I think when you're talking to Jewish believers like James is here, he has to use what they understand.

They don't understand grace. No, because it hasn't been presented yet. They just don't get it. Their whole world has been about the law. I think he has to use these examples to get to them, so they understand. Chapter 2 for me was very, very helpful because it really solidified some things that I didn't really have. I think it's been great. I'm looking forward to talking about the tongue next. That's always an exciting topic, personally too. Any last thoughts?

If, however, you are fulfilling the royal law according to the Scripture, you shall love your neighbors as yourself. Whenever you look at you shall love your neighbors as yourself, how are you doing? The flesh falls short 100% of the time. Christ said, ultimately, love for your neighbor is my love for you. Talk about exchange life. I can't love my neighbor by the power of the flesh.

Is that a salvation by works? I think you've done well bringing James and trying to understand this continuation. I think the example of Abraham is perfect, isn't it? Isaac's sacrifice. It's a continuum. It is. And James is just giving you the view from the other side of the fence. Right. It's man's view. It's man's view. We look at our fellow believers and that's all. We don't know their heart. We look at them and we judge them based upon it. That's what he's saying. And sometimes our works, they aren't the ones like Abraham. And they're unseen many times. They're unseen.

OK. Well, Bob has the first, next week he gets the first That's what you change your schedule to. At the wedding, I'm glad. Okay, well, let's close then. Dear Father, we thank you so much, Lord. We thank you for the blessings we have, Lord. We just thank you for your marvelous word, Lord, who just really gives us the perspective that we need to have and that we need to see things that faith and works are together and not opposed to one another. It's works that that you have prepared beforehand. We're not to be robots, but we're to by faith walk in those works and glorify you. In Christ's name, amen.