An Introduction to James, Pt. 1
James 1:1
As I mentioned this morning, we come tonight to a long awaited book study for me and I trust for many of you. When we finished the epistle of Paul to the Romans some months ago and I began to put my ear to the ground a little bit and listen to folks making suggestions and writing me notes and letters, far and away, the leading candidate for our next study was the epistle of James. And so that's where we find ourselves tonight.
So open your Bible to the epistle of James. And we're going to be beginning tonight to study these five wonderful chapters in this little epistle that has so much practical life-changing truth in it. Tonight we're going to just be dealing with the first verse in order to set the scene so that we understand the circumstances, the personality of James, the features that caused him to write this very important letter.
Let me begin by saying the genuineness of something valuable is attested or affirmed through a process of examination and testing. Whether it's gold or silver or precious metals, whether it's diamonds, precious stones or money, anything that is in and of itself of intrinsic value is subjected to testing to affirm its true worth. And the most valuable commodity in all the world is the commodity of eternal salvation. It is priceless. It is of highest value. To have a right relationship with the living God is to possess the most valuable thing in existence. And all those people who believe they have that possession should subject that to a process of testing to determine its validity. There are people, you know, all over the world who if asked whether they have salvation would reply "yes," but who are wrong. We've discussed that many, many times. True salvation needs to be subject to examination, subject to testing. That is a biblical concept, the testing of salvation is throughout Scripture called for.
Listen to some verses. Psalm 17:3, "Thou hast proved my heart. Thou hast visited me in the night, Thou hast tested me." Listen to Psalm 26 verses 1 and 2, "Judge me, O Lord, for I have walked in mine integrity, I have trusted also in the Lord, therefore I shall not slide. Examine me, O Lord, and prove me, test my heart and my mind." And again the psalmist says my relationship to You is subject to testing to determine its validity.
In Psalm 139, I would call your attention to a couple of somewhat familiar verses. "Search me, O God, and know my heart. Try me and know my thoughts and see if there be any wicked way in me and lead me in the way everlasting," Psalm 139 verses 23 and 24. And here the psalmist actually cries out to God to put his salvation, his relationship to the test.
In Lamentations chapter 3 verse 40, "Let us search and test our ways and turn again to the Lord." Again the writer is calling for the people to subject themselves to the test of the validity of the their relationship to God.
In Ezekiel chapter 18 and verse 28 we find another important verse along this line. "Because he considers, or thinks through, and turns away from all his transgressions that he has committed, he shall surely live, he shall not die." It's because he took stock of his life, it's because he looked carefully at what he was that he has obtained eternal life.
The prophet Haggai, small book, it says in Haggai chapter 1 verse 5, "Now therefore, thus saith the Lord of hosts...listen to this, here's the Word of God...`Consider your ways.'" Then in verse 7 it says the same thing again, "Thus saith the Lord of host, `Consider your ways.'" Think on your life, examine yourself.
And then over in the New Testament we're somewhat familiar, I'm sure, with Galatians chapter 6 and verse 4, "Let every man prove his own work." Put it to the test.
In the familiar 1 Corinthians 11 section that we read so often in connection with the Lord's table we read this, "Let a man examine himself," 1 Corinthians 11:28. "And if we would judge ourselves we wouldn't be judged, but when we are judged we are chastened of the Lord that we should not be condemned with the world." And there again the believer is called upon to examine himself.
In the end of 2 Corinthians 13:5, "Examine yourselves whether you are in the faith." Prove yourselves. Validate yourselves.
In Hebrews, also, just to cover all the ground we can, chapter 4 verse 1, "Let us therefore fear lest a promise being left of us entering into His rest any of you should seem to come short of it." In other words, take careful stock of your life and have a certain amount of healthy fear lest you have been brought to the edge of salvation and not genuinely participated.
Now all of these passages, and others that we could suggest, indicate to us the necessity of self-examination. If, in fact, eternal salvation is the most valuable possession that anyone can have, then it should be subject to a test.
Such testing is also the essence of a very familiar sermon of our Lord. Turn in your Bible to Matthew 5, 6 and 7. The Sermon on the Mount really could be defined as a test of salvation. Jesus proposes a series of tests to those in Israel who believed they were right with God, which tests, by the way, proved that they in spite of what they thought were not right with God. But He proposes these tests in the Sermon on the Mount. He unmasks their false religion, their hypocritical righteousness, their counterfeit salvation by showing them the truth. And these really are tests.
In the beginning you'll notice, starting in verse 3 and running down through verse 12, are the Beatitudes. The Beatitudes have to do with attitude. Those who are in My Kingdom, He says, are poor in spirit, mourning, meek, hungering and thirsting after righteousness, merciful, pure in heart, peacemakers, they endure persecution and the antagonism of evil men. And in spite of it all they rejoice and are exceeding glad. Here is the attitude that goes along with true salvation. It is an attitude of meekness, humility, a sense of sinfulness, a sense of crying out for God to give you what you do not possess on your own. This is the mark of true salvation.
The Pharisees of that day when they looked at their lives were proud, boastful, self-sufficient, self-centered, seeking nothing, making trouble and strife. And they, in fact, were the persecutors. Whatever salvation they thought they had didn't pass the test of attitude. They demonstrated all the attitudes that were the antithesis of the attitudes of true salvation.
Then in verses 13 to 16 He shows how true salvation will have a testimony consistent with beatitude virtue. It will be in the world as salt and light. In other words, instead of being an evil influence, it will be a positive righteous influence. True salvation then is a question of your attitude and your influence.
Then in verses 17 to 20 He talks about true salvation being marked by a commitment to the Word of God, a commitment to obey the law of God. And true salvation can be tested by the matter of obedience to the law of God. Of course we know that the Jewish people to whom our Lord spoke came short in their obedience. Their obedience was woefully lacking. They would submit themselves to the laws of men and only reluctantly and when necessary to the laws of God and always outwardly and not often inwardly. Then in verses 21 through 48, the rest of that chapter, Jesus says, "True salvation is manifest by the keeping of righteousness in the heart...in the heart."
So the first test of salvation is your attitude, the second test of salvation is your influence, the third test of salvation is your obedience, and the fourth is the heart righteousness. And He goes through that whole section where He says...On the outside you do this, on the inside you don't. In other words, you say you shouldn't kill but inside you're full of hate. You say you shouldn't commit adultery but on the inside you lust after a woman. You say you shouldn't lie but you have all kinds of oaths which make it very convenient for you to lie within your self-conceived system of tolerance for that. And so all of these things expose the lack of heart righteousness. They had words and deeds but not changed hearts.
Then coming in to chapter 6, the first 18 verses, true salvation can be seen in right worship. How you pray and how you give and how you fast all indicate the genuineness of your salvation or the lack of genuineness in your salvation. And in chapter 6 the Lord shows that their giving and their praying and their fasting was all filled with hypocrisy and was not the mark of genuine salvation.
True salvation also then after going through verse 18 He starts in verse 19 and goes all the way through verse 34, the end of the sixth chapter, pointing out that true salvation is marked by a right relationship to money and material things. You can test your salvation in lining your life up in regard to your attitude toward money and material things. Is your treasure in heaven or is it all being amassed on the earth?
Coming in to chapter 7 He points out that another test of true salvation which the Jewish people failed was that true salvation involves right relationships, verses 1 to 12. He talks about the necessity for right relationships to mark a true believer.
And then in verses 13 and 14, the narrow way and the broad way, He says..."Now check your salvation out and if you're on the wrong road, then get on the right one. Make the move to the right road." In verses 15 to 20, watch out for the lying prophets who will keep you on the wrong road and realize that you could go all the way down the wrong road, verses 21 to 23, end up in the face of Jesus Christ being kept out of heaven in spite of your profession. And then He closes with an illustration of the judgment of God that comes in the end and those who will survive and those who will not.
Now I just go through that very briefly to let you know that the Sermon on the Mount is basically a test of the genuineness of salvation offered to the Jewish people which they failed. And the right response would have been to say, "We are sinful, we are undone, we have missed the mark. We are without God. We are lost. O help us!" And that would have been the right response. The Jewish establishment failed the test of genuine salvation.
Now that is important for you to see in the Sermon on the Mount because it could well be possible, you can turn now to the epistle of James, it could well be possible that in many ways we can consider the book of James as almost a commentary on the Sermon on the Mount. The parallels are very, very significant. All through the book of James you get the feeling that there's the undertone of the Sermon on the Mount. Jesus is almost the primary teacher, as James articulates his lessons. In many ways, then, James is a practical commentary of application of the Sermon on the Mount. And his goal, by the way, is the same as that of Jesus, to convince his audience that their religion and their religious profession and their religious activities will not benefit them at all unless they manifest true godliness from the heart. That's what James is after. And it's my belief that the whole epistle of James is nothing but a series...nothing other than a series of tests for the genuineness of salvation, start to finish. He wants to show us the character, mark this, of living faith...the character of living faith. What is true, genuine, living faith?
This was Jesus' concern. This is James' concern. And might I add, because I want you to understand how important this is, we saw verses in the Old Testament on examining yourself. We saw verses in the New Testament. We note that that's the emphasis of the Sermon on the Mount. We say that it's the emphasis of James. I want to remind you, for a moment, turn with me to 1 John and you will find that in this wonderful epistle of 1 John, John is greatly concerned about the matter of valid saving faith. He is concerned about a true child of God being tested and proven. And he gives, starting in chapter 1, that very indication. Verse 6, "If we say we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth. If we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and still righteous to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His Word is not in us."
Now what John is contrasting here is the people who say and the people who do, the "if we sayers" and the "if we doers," if you will. What he is saying here is it doesn't matter what you say, it only matters what you do. If you say you have fellowship but you walk in darkness, you lie. And so how a person is related to sin is an indicator of the genuineness, or the lack of it, regarding their salvation. Notice chapter 2 verse 3, "By this we know we know Him if we keep His commandments." And here's the test of obedience. Again, John's purpose is very similar also to the Sermon on the Mount. " If we keep His commandments we demonstrate that we know Him. He that says I know Him and doesn't keep His commandments, he's a liar and the truth isn't in him." Just like the guy in chapter 1 who said he walks in the fellowship but he really walks in the darkness. He's a liar, too.
It doesn't matter what you say, you have to be tested the way you live, the things you do. "Whosoever keeps His Word in him, verily is the love of God perfected. By this we know we are in Him," it says in verse 5. And all the way down, you come in to verse 9, "He that says he's in the light and hates his brothers is in darkness. He that loves his brother abides in light. There's no occasion of stumbling in him. But he that hates his brother is in darkness and walks in darkness and doesn't know where he goes because darkness has blinded his eyes." So it's a question of your relation to sin, your relation to the law of God, your relation to loving your brother. All of those things are tests of the genuineness of saving faith.
Over in verse 15 he gives another test. "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him." Again another test. In ve