PART IX
Thank you for spending some of your time today with me at the First Day podcast. Make sure you visit FirstDay.us and subscribe so you will be notified when a new episode drops.

This is part nine—and the final part—of our study of James. I am so happy that you have chosen to tune in today.

Trials will come and within them there will always be temptation. How we overcome temptation is, essentially, by removing its fuel from our lives—anger, judgementalism, pride. We place our hearts on God and change the things that we desire. We fill our hearts with good things—forcing out the bad—and share those good things through word and deed.

We place our neighbors’ needs before our own, and we face sin—not trying to justify it but no longer allowing it to direct our actions. We choose life.

We stop quarreling, fighting, and judging one another, and we have the courage to face the fact that we are not the heroes of our own stories: Christ Jesus is.

Thusly can James be summarized to this point from chapter one through four. Chapter four ends with James telling the Church to not-only think less highly of itself but also to act when it “knows the right thing to do.”

At the beginning of chapter five, James addresses why we often don’t do what we know is the right thing to do. In verses 1-5 he says,

Come now, you rich people, weep and howl for your miseries which are coming upon you. 2 Your riches have rotted and your garments have become moth-eaten. 3 Your gold and your silver have corroded, and their corrosion will serve as a testimony against you and will consume your flesh like fire. It is in the last days that you have stored up your treasure! 4 Behold, the pay of the laborers who mowed your fields, and which has been withheld by you, cries out against you; and the outcry of those who did the harvesting has reached the ears of the Lord of armies. 5 You have lived for pleasure on the earth and lived luxuriously; you have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter.

I find it interesting that the NASB titles this passage, “Misuse of Riches”, since that is not at all what James is teaching here. Why do you not do what is right, James asks rhetorically. Because you who are wealthy care about the wrong things. He doesn’t deride “rich people” for using their money wrongly, but rather that they have chosen it over doing what was right. And in doing so, they have chosen things that rot, become food for moths, and corrode.

“…and their corrosion will serve as a testimony against you and will consume your flesh like fire.” These will cause trial in our lives, too. Remember that James wants we Christians to share the heart of Jesus. Only this way can we escape the temptation in the world that is caused by lust; only then can good things come out of our hearts and make us clean.

6 You have condemned and put to death the righteous person; he offers you no resistance.

This is a conscious choice. There is no devil making them choose this. All there is hesed.

The words mercy, compassion, love, grace, and faithfulness all originate from the Hebrew word hesed. James’ audience would know this. The word is used around 250 times in the Old Testament and reveals much about God’s character—who describes Himself as “abounding in hesed.”

“The LORD is slow to anger and filled with hesed, forgiving every kind of sin and rebellion…In keeping with Your hesed, please pardon the sins of this people, just as you have forgiven them ever since they left Egypt.” (Numbers 14:18,19)

Throughout his letter, James has been telling the members of the Church that they must express hesed; that that is the only way to remain truly faithful. We humans are motivated by hesed when we meet the needs of—and show compassion and empathy to—those who are marginalized and cut off (the widows and orphans and strangers of James chapter one). For example in Ruth 3:10 Boaz describes Ruth’s actions as hesed.

It isn’t just kindness and friendship but a desire of the heart to show amazing grace—or as Jesus says in Luke 6, “Be kind to the wicked and the ungrateful and THEN you shall be children of the Most High.”

James warning here is to people who choose wealth over hesed—which just so happens to line up with Jesus’ teaching in the parable of the unforgiving servant. (Matther 18:21-35) Who, though he had been shown amazing grace, chooses to show no hesed to his debtor.

Read verses 7-9
7 Therefore be patient, brothers and sisters, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil, being patient about it, until it gets the early and late rains. 8 You too be patient; strengthen your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is near. 9 Do not complain, brothers and sisters, against one another, so that you may not be judged; behold, the Judge is standing right at the door.

James says here that we are going to be tempted to revert to form—to compare our trials to others (or their lack of trials if they are rich)—so take time to cultivate the life of Christ within ourselves and the Church.

We should be strengthening our hearts, unlearning what was by seeking to show hesed. And when we are tempted to “complain…against one another,” don’t.

And we must remember that we are not the first who are facing these trials. We are not the first who must turn to God and receive from Him what we need—the implanted word. James writes:

Read verses 10,11
10 As an example, brothers and sisters, of suffering and patience, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. 11 We count those blessed who endured. You have heard of the endurance of Job and have seen the outcome of the Lord’s dealings, that the Lord is full of compassion and is merciful.

12 But above all, my brothers and sisters, do not swear, either by heaven or by earth or with any other oath; but your yes is to be yes, and your no, no, so that you do not fall under judgment.

Be honest with yourselves and others about what you can do, James says. “And you shall not swear falsely by My name, so as to profane the name of your God; I am the LORD.” (Leviticus 19:12) There is no room for pretense or falsity in true religion.

Read verse 13
13 Is anyone among you suffering? Then he must pray. Is anyone cheerful? He is to sing praises.

We know what is the right thing to do. So do it! Now he sounds like Paul.

14 Is anyone among you sick? Then he must call for the elders of the church and they are to pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; 15 and the prayer of faith will restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up, and if he has committed sins, they will be forgiven him. 16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. A prayer of a righteous person, when it is brought about, can accomplish much. 17 Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain, and it did not rain on the earth for three years and six months. 18 Then he prayed again, and the sky poured rain and the earth produced its fruit.

These closing verses serve as a summary for James’ letter to the Church—a letter intended to help Christians remain faithful in and through all things. I do think, however, that in our hast to divorce Christian theology and practice from any hint Jewishness and a misconstrued meaning of “works righteousness”, that James’ teaching in verses 14-18 hasn’t been understood.

On one hand, the Jewish understanding was that sickness and poverty resulted from sinfulness—the book of Job and Jesus’s healing of the blind man in John 9:1-11, notwithstanding. If read in isolation, it seems unavoidable for us to take anything other than that away from this passage:

16 Therefore, confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another so that you may be healed. A prayer of a righteous person, when it is brought about, can accomplish much.

But when these closing verses are read in the context of a summary for his letter, a different meaning comes to the fore—and one that I think is the point.

James’ letter is one that that is addressed to a sick Church and a Church that seems to have a fair number sick members. The sickness of which he speaks is not physical sickness but rather is spiritual in nature. James’ Church and many of its members are sick with sin.

And it is sin—it is unrighteousness and misplaced values and the absence of good deeds—that is bringing the Church and its members into the grip of temptation. Also, if sin is the sickness that concerns James, then the closing two verses of his letter finally make sense to me.

Read verses 19,20
19 My brothers and sisters, if anyone among you strays from the truth and someone turns him back, 20 let him know that the one who has turned a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death and cover a multitude of sins.

I hope that you have received a blessing during this look at James’ letter to the Church. I think it is no coincidence that James ends his letter about Christian living through times of trial stressing the importance and the power of pray. I guess more specifically he ends it telling us about caring and praying for others—not ourselves.

Maybe because of this study, the next time you are facing a trial or some uncertain time, and in that time you feel something nudging you away from God and towards unrighteousness—away from doing what Jesus would do—you’ll take a honest look at your own heart and assess where your relationship with God really is.

And also, maybe, just maybe, you’ll find the courage to reach out to others for their prayers, their presence, and their hesed. Please don’t hesitate to reach out with an email or text if your have any questions.
Thank you for listening to First Day. I look forward to our next time together when we will begin our look at Paul’s letter to the Galatians—which was written just shortly after James.

I’m Patick Cooley, pastor of Northport Methodist Church. You can visit our Facebook or YouTube channel anytime. Blessings to you all.