James 1 - The Wisdom Of The Brother Of JesusSample

The importance of the Word

The antidote to hateful anger and all ‘moral filth’ is to “humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you” (1:21). The ‘word’ mentioned here is the ‘word of truth’ mentioned back in verse 18. 

There James emphasized the word’s power to give us new birth. Here he stresses our ongoing responsibility to accept that word in daily life. God’s word not only gives life, it also transforms life. As the instrument of our new birth, the word fashions us into the family likeness and prepares us for our ultimate salvation. 

The theme of God’s ‘word’ continues through the next paragraph (1:21-25). James insists that accepting the word means doing what it says. 

The person who hears ‘the word’ and then fails to put it into practice is like a man who looks in the mirror, walks away and immediately forgets what he looks like. We are meant to laugh at this forgetful mirror-gazer and then realize that hearing the word without doing it is equally ridiculous. 

What is the ‘perfect law’?

In verse 25, James describes this word as the “perfect law that gives freedom.” Given the train of thought from verse 18 to verse 23, there can be little doubt that this ‘perfect law’ is synonymous with the ‘word of truth’ which gives and transforms life. There was only one ‘word of truth’ in the possession of Christian communities in the middle of the first century when James wrote his letter. 

It was the all-important collection of traditions about Jesus’ life and teaching. These were memorized and rehearsed throughout the churches before later being written down in what we call the Gospels. These early verbal traditions about the Messiah’s deeds and words are what James means by the ‘word of truth’ and the ‘perfect law’. Hearing and doing this law, says James in 1:25, is the path of ‘blessing’. 

The problem with a religion like ours

Like biblical Judaism, Christianity is a religion of hearing and learning. This is right and proper since we believe in a God who has spoken in the life, teaching, death and resurrection of the Messiah and in the traditions of the apostles in the rest of the New Testament. 

But there is a problem often associated with a religion of hearing and learning: these activities can become goals in themselves. Listening to the Scriptures and understanding their meaning can come to be seen as primary acts of godliness. 

But advancing in our knowledge of God’s word is not the goal of the Christian life; it is simply the means by which God strengthens us for the life of faith. As important as church services, Bible studies groups and personal reading of the Scriptures are, they are not central acts of godliness. They are God’s provisions for a life of obedience. Doing is impossible without hearing but hearing without doing is ‘worthless’.