Scripture Text (NRSV)
3:13 Who is wise and understanding among you? Show by your good life
that your works are done with gentleness born of wisdom.
3:14 But if you have bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts,
do not be boastful and false to the truth.
3:15 Such wisdom does not come down from above, but is earthly,
unspiritual, devilish.
3:16 For where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be
disorder and wickedness of every kind.
3:17 But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle,
willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of
partiality or hypocrisy.
3:18 And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace for those who
make peace.
4:1 Those conflicts and disputes among you, where do they come from?
Do they not come from your cravings that are at war within you?
4:2 You want something and do not have it; so you commit murder. And
you covet something and cannot obtain it; so you engage in disputes
and conflicts. You do not have, because you do not ask.
4:3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, in order to
spend what you get on your pleasures.
4:7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will
flee from you.
4:8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.
Comments:
4:1 - brought to mind the Hatfield/McCoy conflict. They spent so much
time avenging that there stopped being any other way to BE a Hatfield
or a McCoy. The conflict was embedded in their lives - until someone
just said "It stops right here." (didn't a youngster from each side
get married?)
God's purpose is not about what's fair, or who started it or who
clipped whose trees or who done whom wrong. Yet, we keep spending so
muchg time and effort into tallying up some sort of arbitrary points
to justify ourselves, or to even the score or something.
Rather, James is calling us to sow a harvest of righteousness by
making peace. In other words, let's us decide this day: "It stops with
me." Rather than reliving the past, let's live into a better future.
Such is the dilemma of the race issue (an issue almost constantly on
my mind). When my congregants tell me about racism against them
(dubious, at best), I reply, "You know what I decide in situations
like that? I've just decided that it stops with me."
Sally in GA
Sally, here I go quoting without knowing the source again, but didn't
someone once say "If we all got what was fair, we'd all be sitting in
hell"?
Loved your "It stops with me" position. (The Kentuckian in me related
to the Hatfield/McCoy thing.) Anyway, if we only knew how much evil
could be nipped if one courageous person stood up and said "ENOUGH!".
Sort of like the guy from "Network" (Peter Finch??) shouting out the
window that he was mad and not going to take it any more. How fast
would others pick up the call and be mad too, not willing to take it
any more? I wonder....
KyHoosierCat
Hi there again, KY HoosierCat!
v. 3 could be a hefty condemnation of church turn-around struggles.
We ask wrongly. We think we need members. What we need is to be
employed for the Lord. The members are just so we can enjoy church.
In my first appointment, there was this woman who kept saying "I'd
like us to have a choir." Yet, when I asked folks to sing in it, no
one would. I communicated this to her, and she said, "Well, go get us
one." We ask wrongly. The spirit is not of submission but of our own
desire.
Sally in GA
That 2nd paragraph didn't come out right:
I mean that so often declining churches want members just so they can
have life in their church. It's a displaced responsibility.
And, the choir anecdote reminds me of every church I've served (a
couple of circuits plus this one) absolutely refuses to see the need
to pay a decent musician's salary. The one church offered $25 a week,
on the theory that all they had to do was to play for an hour. While a
$25-an-hour salary is pretty good, it's not enough to attract a decent
musician.
This church pays only $75 a week. My predecessor's wife had played for
that salary, and when he left, he took his wife with him (the nerve!).
So, I was in the unenviable position of trying to hire someone, and in
the meantime working up this sort of rotation of substitutes (for $35
a week). We finally hired a college student whose skills need work and
all I've heard is kvetching. Even though I told them that guild scale
is $150 a week, they can't get past the idea that "they don't have to
do much."
I mention this, because we all seem to want something for nothing, or
next to nothing.
Sally in GA
Sally in GA, I've already comented on your Mark 9 posting, but I have
to continue with the compliments here. How many times in various
churches have I heard "we need more members!" I love what you said
about being employed for the Lord and members for greater enjoyment.
How many church conflicts start because member so-and-so is not doing
church properly? This text (particularly when combined with the Mark
text) serves as a really big priority adjustment.
I could ask the question...which is the bible truly used in the
church, the Holy Bible or Robert's Rules of Order?
DWR in NM
I'm enjoying the wisdom theme in these passages in James. Many ideas
are floating around in my head early in the week. Firstly, all true
wisdom is God's wisdom. It is His wisdom that we need to seek in our
communities of faith. Still practical wisdom comes close at times.
When it comes to the issue of muscicians' fees I'm reminded of what
one of my supervisors once said in my secular job (before I became a
pastor). "If you pay peanuts, you get monkeys." Not so different a
saying as compared to "Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out
the grain." (Deut. 25:4)
In light of the wisdom theme I also recall my OT prof saying that
Christ was not only Israel's Prophet, Priest and King but also her
Sage. I can't read 4:7 without the image of Jesus wisely quoting
Scripture to Satan and thus running him off quite effectively.
It seems to me that wisdom gets a bad rap these days. If the new
hermenutic of life is individual experience, who needs to listen to
advice? Individualism, literary deconstruction, post-modern
existentialism and a host of other forces combine to drown out, or at
least diminish the voice of wisdom. After all, if the only reality
that matters is my reality and my experience of it, why should I
listen to another's wisdom, let alone embrace it? Yet, this week the
Psalmist tells us there are two ways; one leads to life, the other to
destruction. Not a popular notion thses days, even though it's true.
In the animated movie "Fergully: The Last Rainforest" Robin Williams
provides the voice of Batty Koda, a bat escaped from a lab where he
was a test subject. At one point he loses his balance and falls, his
last words before falling are the comic statement "Oops, gravity
works!" Why does it seem that so often we discover the most
fundamental truths about life in God's world just as we plummet
straight into the inevitable consequences of having ignored them?
Now what wisdom will allow me to bring this whirling mess of ideas to
the pulpit on Sunday? I guess it's a good thing it's Monday.
....and miles to go before I sleep. (R. Frost)
Shalom, Pastor B in Saskatchewan
It's amazing how brief phrases are resonating with me these days. Last
week it was "How long?" This week it is "Draw near to God, and he will
draw near to you."
Not sure where I will be going with that this week, but there must be
a direct correalation between purity, right thinking, mercy, good
fruits, etc., and our closeness to God.
What are the things that prevent us from drawing near to Him? Why is
it that we sometimes fail to draw near to Him in our daily routine?
Worse yet, why is it that we sometimes feel so distant from Him in
worship?
Early questions, PastorBuzz in TN
Dear friends,
It is a sad reality that there are quarrels among us. It seems to me
that the speach "Enough" by Yitzhak Rabin upon signing a peace accord
with Yassar Arafat(many apologies if I mispelled names)is quite
relevant. Both sides said they wanted peace but it was hard to give
peace a chance.
The
speech itself can be found in the book "Words that Shook the World".
It is short and to the point. At least on Israeli and Egyptian found
making peace more important than making war. Maybe we Christians can
too.
The conflicts of our churches are both petty and severe. The Catholics
and Protestants of Ireland cannot get along. Our own flocks cannot get
along because of the historical baggage they each carry. I have become
convinced that most of our churches want to fight! One church I served
honestly could not be happy unless they were at war. It had been that
way for decades. Quarreling beats doing the real work of God in many
people's minds. Of course they would deny and be very angry about
someone saying that. But I believe it to be true.
Grace and peace, Mike
Mike,
Maya Anjelou has said many times, "When you didn't know better, you
didn't do well. When you knew better, you did better". Perhaps the
church members simply don't know what else to do besides debate
(loudly) their positions of right-ness. Awhile back, Sally in GA said
we ask the wrong questions. Instead of asking "What's wrong with these
people?" (a la the Prophets), perhaps we as church leaders need to ask
"How can I help them know how to do better?"
Every church has its intense issues it is debating. But in some
churches, you could do as Dr. Phil McGraw suggests: "just yank out one
topic and slip in another one and never break your stride. When you
argue about everything, you are really arguing about nothing." Has
your church decided what it is they are fighting about, or are they
just programmed to fight? I don't know you, don't know your church,
but having served one where people just seemed to thrive on hating
Person A this week and then recruiting Person A to join in the hatred
against Person B next week, I know a little bit about pettiness in the
supposedly Christian community. It was a long, hard road to even get
them to see what they were doing. They decided they liked what they
were doing, and I moved on mainly because I found myself being drawn
into the pettiness. I had little nice to say about them by the time I
left, and I was not living the example set by Christ or by the
exhortations of James to resist evil. Not a stellar time in my career.
I wish a far more satisfactory outcome for you.
KyHoosierCat (won't you all be glad when my regular group starts
meeting again???)
Sally in Ga.
So often that plea for the church to grow is an unspoken idea that the
Pastor is supposed to do it. They are the "paid employee" afterall. So
You do the work and we sit back and enjoy the ride! This morning I was
reading an article in a magazine called "Reflections for Church
Leaders." They discuss Rick Warren's Book "The Purpose Driven Church,"
which I have read and don't agree with entirely, but what he does get
right is: A healthy church is one who is warmer through fellowship,
deeper through discipleship, stronger through worship, broader through
ministry, and larger through evangelism." He goes on to say, "Every
church is driven by something, There is a guiding force, a controlling
assumption, a directing conviction behind everything that happens. It
may be unspoken. Itmay be unknown to many. . . but it is there,
influencing every aspect of the church's life."
I think this speaks to the James passage, when applied to the question
of whether we are "motivated by selfish ambition", or whether "our
good works are done with gentleness born of wisdom."
It may be a stretch but I would also question how Selfish ambition
within church members who want growth for the wrong reasons or in the
wrong way, falls into verse 4:2," You want something nd do not have
it; so you commit murder. And you covet something and cannot obtain
it; so you engage in disputes and conflicts. You do not have, because
you do not ask."
Just some thoughts.
Susan in Wa.
Susan and HoosierCat -
Good responses - yes, that's the kind of ambition I mean. It's
"selfish" ambition rather than ambition for the Lord.
Mike -
thanks for your affirmation and input.
And, to whoever brought up Rick Warren - thanks! I know theologically
he and I part ways at several points, but the basics he puts into
plain and simple language are sooooo true!!!
I'm thinking of pairing this up with the Proverbs. Both are talking
about employment.
Sally in GA (and, HoosierCat, NO! I'd miss you if you stopped coming
here)
The thing is, as an afterthought,
I'm having difficulty within myself offering a positive victory
message rather than a preachy sermon with a lot of "oughts." It makes
that easy yoke and light burden rather difficult and heavy to lay on a
bunch of "oughts."
Sally
James contrasts the wisdom from above, with all its good
characteristics, with the desire to "have things," which leads to
conflicts and disputes in the community. Meaning in life does not come
from cravings for possessions or pleasure, which only breed
competition.
Neither God nor evil draw where they are unwelcome. James minces no
words about how we can push ourselves away from God and others. The
violent and militaristic imagery in the opening verses of chapter 4
describes the cycle into which persons, peoples, and entire nations
can sink if we so choose. James offers wisdom at beginning and end:
draw near to God and draw near to life.
In doing some unrelated reading in "Bold Love" by Dan B Allender and
Tremper Longman III (Navpress 1992) I stumbled on a direct reference
to James 4:1-4. They say, "Sin, or hatred of God, is a defiant
movement, sometimes unwitting and other times quite conscious, which
refuses to depend on God for His direction and strength. In that
sense, we become enemies of God whenever we seek to find satisfication
for our deepest longings apart from relationship with Him." (page 53)
The broader perspective of the chapter is to be able to own the way
sin is often manifest as a subtle hatred of God which only results in
the person's inablity to adequately love and be loved in all of life's
various relationships.
I thought it put an interesting spin on things.
When I think of conflict in the family, the church, the workplace, the
political arena, or even on the battlefield, casting it in the light
of hating God (or sinful hatred of God) is an interesting point to
ponder. I'm still processing.
DWR in NM
KyHoosierCat (won't you all be glad when my regular group starts
meeting again???)
NO!!! You'd be sorely missed KHC -- even when your group starts again,
I hope you stay with us!
Ky HoosierCat -
I also concur that I would miss your input if you were to stop posting
on DPS. I have gained much from your posts.
Sally, when you were talking about not wanting to do a sermon of "Oughts,"
I had a clergywoman friend in Ca. who would say, "Never let anyone
Should on you!" I loved that! Thought you might enjoy it too!
Susan in Wa.
I guess I fit the earlier description, "You pay peanuts you get
monkeys." Our church doesn't pay a musician $75 a week. As pastor, I
get $50 week. Throw me a banana. I'm looking for help on this passage
on Thursday because with my 2 other jobs, I just haven't had the time.
So much for a seminary degree! As for James, this passage flows along
nicely with all of his others. Forrest Gump said, "Stupid is as stupid
does." James says, "Smart is as smart does." North Eastern pastor
Dear Sally,
I can relate to the feeling of being preachy with should's and ought's".
A college professor admonished us would be preachers to avoid those
words since most everyone already new what they should or should not
do. Your posting got me thinking. I just ran a check for should and
ought in my sermon. Four pages and not a one there! I gave myself a
pat on the back since there wasn't anyone throwing bananas my way
either.
As I approach the passage from James for this coming Sunday I am
simply trying to "normalize" the struggles of the church; the fights,
the unanswered prayers and the chummyness with the world and hoping
people will become dissatisfied and apply the lessons from James. Like
all sermons I will probably never know if it worked or not.
Grace and peace, Mike in Sunshine
