James 1:17-27
“From Within”
August 29, 2021
On the fifth shelf in my office, sandwiched between a toy Jesus and a Noah’s ark, sits a reusable calendar that I flip each day. It’s titled African Wisdom on the Sacred, and I bought it at least 15 years ago when I was in seminary. Each day has a proverb in it from one of the 54 countries on the African continent.
One that has always stuck with me comes from Kenya and says, “When you pray, move your feet.”
We’ve been taught that prayer is communication with God and a big part of that is listening and hearing.
When we pray together here in church, we usually are offering up well-known or prepared prayers, hopefully offered in such a way that a particular phrase or two may give us a glimpse of God or a hoped-for outcome or a yearned for way of being or even what might be considered marching orders.
That is exactly what James is doing here. He first describes a way of being that is truly aspirational.
In The Message, James’ words take on even more explicit imagery: “Lead with your ears, follow up with your tongue, and let anger straggle along in the rear…throw all spoiled virtue and cancerous evil in the garbage.”
And here’s where he gets quite poetic: “In simple humility, let our gardener, God, landscape you with the Word, making a salvation-garden of your life.” Oh, that it would be so!
James is my favorite of the Epistles – probably because of two experiences. The first was a study I did right after 9/11 20 years ago with a man who would be a mentor to me and a frequent preacher and part-time interim here at Federated Church periodically during the 4 and a half years between Joan’s ministry and mine. The Rev. Dr. Jerry Handspicker led an interfaith Bible study on James then that opened the book up to me in a whole new way.
The second experience was in seminary when I was in a workshop with a visiting professor where we were asked to name our favorite book of the Bible and share why.
I think it was only my second year of seminary and I still felt a bit in over my head.
When my turn came, I responded with the Book of James and it was because of the concept that he explains here about not being hearers of the Word only but doers of the Word and how that was a big part of my call to ministry.
When I looked around though, I knew that some of my fellow students around me were struggling with my response as I was the only one of about 30 of us who chose James.
They were not making eye contact with me and mostly looking at their laps or the floor – most likely because of the fact that they were in some agreement with Martin Luther that this epistle shouldn’t even be in the Bible because this idea contradicted Paul’s teaching in Galatians that we are justified through faith alone.
It didn’t help that one of the teachers present made a statement to the effect that mine was a perspective reflective of a Catholic approach to faith.
Undeterred, this made me a bit mad and my embrace of James even stronger.
This was a letter written to Jewish Christians who were spread far and wide.
These churches to whom it was addressed were struggling with their identity and these words were intended to give them strength as they tried to juggle the teachings of the Torah with the teachings of Jesus.
Some assume that James’ letter is written, when he says, “faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead,” as being in opposition with the notion of God’s grace as our justification.
This letter, though, if one reads it carefully, is not saying we earn our way into God’s good graces and thus heaven through our actions but rather that because of our faith and our love for God, we are compelled to act on that love.
It is not earning anything, rather we are moved to act from a place of love.
We want to make this world better not because of what it will get us, but because of God’s call to us as his stewards, acting on God’s behalf.
First century Jewish Christians to whom this would have been directed would have known that the word Shema, translated as hearers comes from the Book of Deuteronomy with the words “Hear, O Israel: the Lord is our God, the Lord alone.
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.”
This word Shema means more than just “hearing” in Hebrew scripture. It also means “to obey.”
It’s hearing what God has to say and then acting in obedience to God’s command.
Religion and being religious are emphasized in the final two verses of this reading.
I realize it may sound strange to you coming from a minister, but I am sometimes torn in claiming proudly my ties to organized religion.
There’s a lot done in the name of Christianity that I want to be as far away from as possible.
Too many hateful and inhumane words have been spewed and actions implemented, all in the name of religion.
Too often one or another particular faith tradition has claimed the moral high ground and then made others feel that they were somehow inferior, less than, not of the real and true religion.
The brand of religion that we’re called to is one that embraces the idea that we must care for our modern-day widows and orphans.
Those could be the Haitians, already in dire straits before the earthquake whose suffering we are called to alleviate.
It may be the Afghan refugees who will resettle here in Vermont and will need our support and advocacy in the coming weeks and months.
It might even be those who this night may have lost everything they own, including a safe home, during Hurricane Ida.
And there will be others closer to home, neighbors who are living in the shadows and whose need we have not yet learned of but to which we will ultimately called upon to respond.
Not just hearing about and praying for those in need but moving our feet as well as our hearts and our hands.
We were baptized to be doers of the Word.
Let us then prepare for the doing to which we are called with this prayer from the Unfolding Light blog:
God, help me remember today
that I am holy;
that you have chosen me as a vessel for your grace.
Let me spend my time and energy
as a holy person would,
whether in great deeds or humble drudgery.
Let every act be sacred,
every moment be a flowing of your good gifts.
May your light be born in me. Amen.
(From Steve Garnaas-Holmes <unfoldinglight@gmail.com)