Sermon for September 8th 2024, on James 2: Faith means action!

 Sunday, 8 September 2024 -  St Cyr, Stinchcombe

This month in our preaching we’re focusing on the Epistle or letter of James, written to the dispersed church around the year 50 AD, to the growing numbers of followers of Christ outside Israel.

James is traditionally understood to be a half-brother of Jesus, the son of Mary and Joseph and a respected voice in the new faith. Immediately, it’s clear his style is different to Paul.

James is a letter that does not pull any punches, its rhetorical style is direct and is not intended to comfort and assure, but to jolt readers into action. Where some New Testament texts appear to draw a distinction between faith and works, James is rather blunt on the issue: faith without action, is evidence that faith is not actually faith at all.

In the first chapter, James was clear that duplicity,[1] literally being “double-souled” or “double-selved” leads to doubt[2], unsteadiness[3] and of being easily tempted[4].

Those who are “doers of the word and not merely hearers,” on the other hand, endure: they care for the poor, and are blessed[5].

In today’s passage, there is a message of equality, James condemns favouritism in no uncertain terms.

He is clear that “pure and undefiled” faith has at its heart a deep care for the poor and vulnerable. Whereas the “religion” of the self-deceived is worthless, and in vain.

James is leaning into the idea taught by Jesus that those who are poor are blessed, aware that very often it’s the wealthy who may be going to church and may be following the letter of law, but with little regard for those around them.

Perhaps this has always been an issue, that the church favours the landowner and politicians, rather than those most in need.

James describes several unacceptable scenarios and he addresses readers directly as, “you.” A string of rhetorical questions follows each example, to which the answer is given in the asking.

First, two people enter your midst: one wealthy and the other poor. If you treat them differently, offering a good seat to the rich person and demanding that the poor one sit at your feet, “have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts?” Answer: Yes[6] 

Second, it is good to follow the “royal law according to scripture” to love your neighbour as yourself, but showing any partiality reveals you have still transgressed or stepped outside of the law[7]. “What good is it … if you say you have faith but do not have works?” Answer: It is no good at all.[8] 

Third, if you encounter someone without food or clothing and we might add any number of vulnerabilities: homelessness, displacement, enslavement and you pass by with simplistic well-wishes, as James puts it, if you “go in peace, stay warm and eat your fill,” - without providing peace, warmth, or sustenance, “what is the good of that?” Answer: Words alone are useless[9].

The “royal law” James refers to is drawn from Leviticus, material both for James and Jesus.

In Leviticus 19, instructions are given that fields are to be left alone after the first harvest and not reaped up to the edges, so that poor and itinerant people can glean what remains, for “I am the LORD your God”[10]; stealing, lying, and swearing oaths are prohibited[11]; oppression, robbery, wage theft or withholding, and cursing or intentionally tripping up those who are deaf or blind are all forbidden[12] , as are injustice in court, partiality to anyone, slander, hatred, unreasonableness, and grudge-keeping[13]. 

Instead, “you shall love your neighbour as yourself: I am the LORD”[14] This is what it looks like to follow the “royal law.” 

The same instructions appear later, in the Gospel of Mark, a scholar overhears Jesus debating with the Sadducees and challenges him to name the greatest commandment. Instead of a straightforward answer, Jesus provides two.

The first is the Shema, the central recited prayer of Judaism from Deuteronomy 6: “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one; you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength”[15]. 

In other words, the Lord is whole; therefore, you should love the Lord with your own whole being. The second is, “You shall love your neighbour as yourself”[16] . And “after this,” offers Mark, “no one dared to ask him any question”[17].

In Matthew, a shorter exchange leads to Jesus saying, “On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets”[18] 

Just as being duplicitous, is to James and most people really, a personality flaw, so is favouritism, which is also another word for injustice. 

Instead of showing partiality, we are to speak and to act as those who will be weighed not against an arbitrary law of legalism but against one of freedom and mercy, “for judgment will be without mercy to anyone who has shown no mercy; mercy triumphs over judgment”[19]

Rather than unjust favouritism, or oppressive and manipulative legalism, with priority handed to those with the money to buy it, we must show mercy, because we know that, “the Lord is full of mercy”[20] a phrase repeated often in the Bible, one we are called to emulate, to be kind and merciful without distinction. 

We heard this in Mark’s Gospel, where Jesus healed the daughter of Gentile woman, but only after she argues against his harsh words. Jesus clearly wasn’t ready to be approached that day and was grumpy, but he did listen, to a non-Jewish woman using words we will say in a prayer of humble access shortly, and he was compassionate, seeing that even Gentiles needed healing too. 

There is a crucial distinction between legalism and justice. For me, any law which is unjust, is wrong. There are laws even in church of England, which to me, are unjust. I am obedient, but I’ll happily argue against them, although not right now. 

This is a fundamental aspect to my own faith. Being a Christian means many things, but for me, it is absolutely a moral foundation for how we live and look after each other. For a time after university, I wasn’t a regular church goer and it was clear over time that something was missing. And part of it was that bedrock of faith which has a whole moral code and philosophies which guide us in how to live. 

The books of the law in the Torah, repeatedly guide us in ways which enshrine protection for the most vulnerable in society. I’ve mentioned the leaving of field borders for gleaning, but there is the law of the jubilee year, where indentured slaves, who were mostly paid, had the option to buy their freedom, that personal debts would be forgiven, however great, which sounds familiar in some versions of the Lord’s Prayer, forgive us our debts as we forgive debtors.

I was at a Christian festival last week, Greenbelt, and heard a speaker who had researched many of these topics from the perspective of someone who was chronically ill and unable to work a full week. They had looked at the books of the law, and time and again, found that people who were marginalised, outcasts and strangers had more protection than she had experienced over the last Government’s policies which effectively said, we will reduce benefits because that will encourage people to work more, which is simply unjust when you are unable to work. A message of supposed justice, which was unjust. 

There is also a movement in society to criticise people who care about such things using words like woke. A word which has entered the dictionary and is defined as Progressive or left-wing attitudes or practices, esp. those opposing social injustice or discrimination, that are viewed, to some, as , self-righteous, pernicious, or insincere. Hence: such attitudes or practices seen as constituting a collective social movement or agenda. 

I wonder if Jesus and James would be seen as woke, which I’m sure right-wing Christians in the US especially would resolutely deny. 

For the author of James, to show preference to the wealthy, especially those who show off their riches, while overlooking or even actively oppressing the lowly and poor is not only dishonourable but is a stark revelation of a person’s split apart inner being. After all, “has not God chosen the poor of the world to be rich in faith and to be heirs of the kingdom?” The rhetorical answer being: Yes.[21] 

James has given example of what faithful action entails. As such, faith with no works, is faithless. Belief without works is not faith; conviction without action is emptiness. 

James really doesn’t hold back, sometimes all we can manage is get out of bed in the morning, does that mean we lack faith? I don’t think so. We do what we can, when we can and leave the rest to God. 

And what does action look like? Well, that’s difficult and different for us all, but charitable giving, volunteering, signing petitions, joining protests, not turning a blind eye, speaking out, listening to victims of injustice without judgement, and more, but we can only do what we can and we only we know our limits. 

This is quite a stark choice, and other epistle writers may have a softer approach, but for today, the author presents a challenge: show me your faith without action—I dare you—and I will provide confirmation of my faith through action[22]. The rhetoric is clear: this separation is impossible, because faith works.

____________________

References:

[1] dipsychos
[2] (James 1:6–8)
[3] (James 1:9–11),
[4] (James 1:12–18)
[5] (James 1:19–25)
[6] (James 2:2–4).
[7] (James 2:8–10)
[8] (James 2:14)
[9] (James 2:16)
[10] Leviticus 19: 9-10
[11] Leviticus 19:11-12
[12] Leviticus 19:13-14
[13] Leviticus 19:15-18
[14] Leviticus 19:18
[15] (Mark 12:28–30; Deuteronomy 6:4–5)
[16] (Mark 12:31; Leviticus 19:18)
[17] Mark 12:34
[18] (Matthew 22:34–40)
[19] (James 2:12–13)
[20] James 5:11
[21] (James 2:5)
[22] (2:18)
[23] https://www.workingpreacher.org/commentaries/revised-common-lectionary/ordinary-23-2/commentary-on-james-21-10-11-13-14-17-6

Readings

The Fifteenth Sunday after Trinity (Accession of King Charles III, 2022)

Collect

God, who in generous mercy sent the Holy Spirit
   upon your Church in the burning fire of your love:
grant that your people may be fervent
   in the fellowship of the gospel
that, always abiding in you,
they may be found steadfast in faith and active in service;
through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord,
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.

Post Communion

Keep, O Lord, your Church, with your perpetual mercy;
and, because without you our human frailty cannot but fall,
keep us ever by your help from all things hurtful,
and lead us to all things profitable to our salvation;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

The Gospel      Mark 7.24–37

24 Jesus went away to the region of Tyre. He entered a house and did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet he could not escape notice, ²⁵but a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet. ²⁶Now the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. ²⁷He said to her, ‘Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.’ ²⁸But she answered him, ‘Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.’ ²⁹Then he said to her, ‘For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.’ ³⁰So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.

31 Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went by way of Sidon towards the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. ³²They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hand on him. ³³He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. ³⁴Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, ‘Ephphatha’, that is, ‘Be opened.’ ³⁵And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. ³⁶Then Jesus ordered them to tell no one; but the more he ordered them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. ³⁷They were astounded beyond measure, saying, ‘He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.’

 Psalm 146  

1  Alleluia. Praise the Lord, O my soul: while I live will I praise the Lord; ♦︎
   as long as I have any being, I will sing praises to my God.
2  Put not your trust in princes, nor in any human power, ♦︎
   for there is no help in them.
3  When their breath goes forth, they return to the earth; ♦︎
   on that day all their thoughts perish.
4  Happy are those who have the God of Jacob for their help, ♦︎
   whose hope is in the Lord their God;
5  Who made heaven and earth, the sea and all that is in them; ♦︎
   who keeps his promise for ever;
6  Who gives justice to those that suffer wrong ♦︎
   and bread to those who hunger.
7  The Lord looses those that are bound; ♦︎
   the Lord opens the eyes of the blind;
8  The Lord lifts up those who are bowed down; ♦︎
   the Lord loves the righteous;
9  The Lord watches over the stranger in the land; he upholds the orphan and widow; ♦︎
   but the way of the wicked he turns upside down.
10  The Lord shall reign for ever, ♦︎
   your God, O Zion, throughout all generations. Alleluia.

James 2.1–10 [11–13] 14–17

My brothers and sisters, do you with your acts of favouritism really believe in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ?²For if a person with gold rings and in fine clothes comes into your assembly, and if a poor person in dirty clothes also comes in, ³and if you take notice of the one wearing the fine clothes and say, ‘Have a seat here, please’, while to the one who is poor you say, ‘Stand there’, or, ‘Sit at my feet’,⁴have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts? ⁵Listen, my beloved brothers and sisters. Has not God chosen the poor in the world to be rich in faith and to be heirs of the kingdom that he has promised to those who love him? ⁶But you have dishonoured the poor. Is it not the rich who oppress you? Is it not they who drag you into court? ⁷Is it not they who blaspheme the excellent name that was invoked over you?

8 You do well if you really fulfil the royal law according to the scripture, ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ ⁹But if you show partiality, you commit sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. ¹⁰For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it.

14 What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but do not have works? Can faith save you? ¹⁵If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, ¹⁶and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill’, and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? ¹⁷So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.