A Little Kindness Goes a Long Way; James

May the mumbling commence!

Sometimes I look at things and see that a little bit of evil intent can destroy years – even decades – of kindness.  I might look at this and think that evil is more powerful.  But that would be a wrong assumption.

A little kindness, too, can go a long way.  It matters who you give your allegiance to.  Do you walk with Christ or do you walk elsewhere?  Walk with Christ, and see your little bit of kindness be multiplied exponentially.  Read from James chapter two (Peterson’s The Message paraphrase):

Talk and act like a person expecting to be judged by the Rule that sets us free.  For if you refuse to act kindly, you can hardly expect to be treated kindly.  Kind mercy wins over harsh judgment every time.  (Verses 12 13)

Follow the Rule, the Way of Christ.  Follow the Way and unlock the power to make a small bit of kindness enough loving-kindness to fill the world.  It is this kind mercy that will win the day.

Final judgment is in good hands.  Let us keep it in God’s hands and sue for mercy right along with all of our brothers and sisters.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

Like a Prophet; James

May the mumbling commence!

The past couple of days we have been meditating on persevering.  Who are good examples of persevering?  James tells us to look at the prophets of the Lord and the person of Job.  Read from James chapter five (NIV):

Brothers, as an example of patience in the face of suffering, take the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord.  As you know, we consider blessed those who have persevered. You have heard of Job's perseverance and have seen what the Lord finally brought about. The Lord is full of compassion and mercy. (Verses 10-11)

Take time to think about the prophets.  It was a hard road to be a prophet… it still is.  People ridicule you.  People persecute you.  It is a life of suffering in this world.

And God called many of his prophets to do some hard things to illustrate to God’s people the error of their ways.  Think about some of the things that God asked Jeremiah to do.  God commanded Jeremiah to wear the same pair of underwear for days on end without washing them.  Think of the prophet Hosea.  God commanded him to marry a prostitute and to remain faithful to her even when she was not faithful to him.

Being a prophet of God is not an easy life.  It is fraught with suffering and calls for perseverance.  Yes, the true prophets of the Lord are good examples of patience and perseverance.

Now, let’s turn our thoughts to Job.  Job tried to be faithful in his relationship with the Lord.  When God tested him through the work of Satan, Job remained steadfast in his belief in the Lord’s goodness.  Job lost his children and his wealth.  Job had his own wife turn against him.  And Job crumpled with even his health taken away from him. 

Yet Job still wanted an audience with the Lord.  He still tenaciously clung to his faith in the Lord God. 

Could I do the same?  Could I cling to the goodness of the Lord even in the midst of personal tragedy?  Could I speak hard words for the Lord and do hard things to illustrate the shortcomings of God’s people in their relationship with God?

Let us strive to attain this level of perseverance!

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

 

Persevere for that Crown; James

May the mumbling commence!

James again calls us to perseverance.  Perseverance will preserve us.  It will lead us to abundant life in or Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.  Read again from James chapter one (NIV):

Blessed is the man who perseveres under trial, because when he has stood the test, he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love him. (Verse 12)

Persevere.  Pass the test.  Love God.  Do so, and the rewards will be tremendous… beyond your wildest dreams or imaginings.

Receive the crown of life… a life that is both qualitatively and quantitatively infinite.  Now that is reason to be joyful and celebrate!

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

 

 

 

 

 

Call to Persevere; James

May the mumbling commence!

Even as we ruminate and meditate on the light of Christ transforming us, we must also recognize the blessings of darkness and trials.  I believe that I learn the most about myself and my Lord when I am going through times of hardship and trial.  Help us, O Lord, to persevere.  It is the life that James calls us to.  Read from James chapter one (NIV):

Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.  Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. (Verses 2-4) 

Perseverance and trial and darkness are the road to completion… to wholeness.  Do you want peace… really want it?  Then you have no choice but to walk through some dark valleys to achieve it.

O God, help us to persevere.  Help us to pass the test.  Bring us to maturity so that we might bear the perfect fruit that you intended us to bear.

Help us to think of our Creator first and others second.  Keep us content with last place.

Perseverance is important.  It is a theme from the letter of James that compliments another theme of the wonderful marriage of believing and doing.  Let us hold these themes together.

Enough mumbling for today…

Peace Out

Be Fruitful; James

May the mumbling commence!

To be fruitful means that we need to be aware of where we are and where God is leading us to go.  Let us look into the unforgiving light that emanates from the mirror of God’s Word.  Read from James chapter one (NIV):

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.  Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.  But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it – he will be blessed in what he does. (Verses 22-25)  

Listening and being are important, but alone they cannot be enough.  Obedience is paramount.  Obedience is the Way of Jesus.

Obedience means manifold blessings.  Let us reach for that blessing.  Let us listen, hear and do.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

Transformed by the Light of Christ; James

May the mumbling commence!

This weekend at Western Plains District Conference of the Church of the Brethren we explore being transformed in the light of Christ.  Transformation in the light of Christ is a wonderful gift to be received… and to be received actively.  Read from James chapter one (NIV):

Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.  He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first fruits of all he created. (Verses 17-18)

Our Father is light.  On the first day of creation, the Creator spoke and light came to be… and that light was the spoken Word of God.  That Word is Jesus.

God spoke again on the fourth day of creation and the sun, moon, and stars were created.  There it is again – the power of God’s spoken Word.  These wonderful creations in the heavens help to give us the structure of time and seasons – the structure of times for work and times for rest, the structure of times to speak and times to listen, the structure of times to dream and times to strive to fulfill that dream.

God gave birth to us through the Word of truth.  Now, our purpose is to be fruitful.  Let us do the work that God has called us to with great pleasure and joy.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

Praying in Jesus' Name; James

May the mumbling commence!

Many of us end our prayers with the phrase, “in Jesus’ name”.  But what does that mean?  What does it mean to pray in Jesus’ name?  Read from James chapter four (NJB)

Where do these wars and battles between yourselves first start? Is it not precisely in the desires fighting inside your own selves?  You want something and you lack it; so you kill. You have an ambition that you cannot satisfy; so you fight to get your way by force. It is because you do not pray that you do not receive; when you do pray and do not receive, it is because you prayed wrongly, wanting to indulge your passions. (Verses 1-3)

To pray in the name of Jesus is much more than cutting and pasting the phrase at the end of your prayer.  Praying in the name of Jesus means laying aside your own wants and desires and passions to pick up the Way of Christ – the Way of Obedience.  If we pray for simply selfish reasons, then our prayers will not be answered as we might wish them to be answered.

To pray in Jesus’ name is to pray with the attitude of Jesus, the lifestyle of Jesus, and the teachings of Jesus.  To pray in Jesus’ name is to be transformed more and more into his likeness.

May it be so!

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

Faith + Works; James

May the mumbling commence!

Faith is an essential step in the Christian life.  It is the first step in a life-long journey.  To take that step alone would be woefully incomplete way to follow Jesus… to do things the Jesus Way.  Read from James chapter two (NIV):

Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.  You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that – and shudder. (Verses 18b-19)

Yes, we are saved by faith alone, but that faith needs proved by fruit.  What fruit have we shown as Christians?  What work have we done now that we have been freed to do godly works in this world?

These are important questions to ask of ourselves, because believing in Jesus as the Son of God alone is doing nothing more than the demons.  If that is all you do, then you too will shudder.

Let us take more fruitful steps in our Christian walk.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

Pray... All the Time; James

May the mumbling commence!

Pray at all times.  Pray in all states of mind.  If you allow prayer to form your life, your attitudes will change to godly ones… and so will your thoughts and words and actions.  Read from James chapter five (NLT):

Any one of you who is in trouble should pray; anyone in good spirits should sing a psalm.  Any one of you who is ill should send for the elders of the church, and they must anoint the sick person with oil in the name of the Lord and pray over him.  The prayer of faith will save the sick person and the Lord will raise him up again; and if he has committed any sins, he will be forgiven. 

So confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another to be cured; the heartfelt prayer of someone upright works very powerfully.  Elijah was a human being as frail as ourselves – he prayed earnestly for it not to rain, and no rain fell for three and a half years; then he prayed again and the sky gave rain and the earth gave crops. (Verses 13-18) 

Are you in trouble?  Pray.  Are things going well?  Pray.  Are you sick?  Call the leaders of the church… and pray together.

 What is the road to transformation?  Prayer and confession are integral parts to the road for transformation.  Confess the greatness of God.  Confess where you have fallen short of God’s glory… where you have sinned.  Make that confession in the safe place with other believers who can support you in your journey toward Jesus’ Way.

 When we pray together in these ways, we journey closer to being upright in God’s eyes.  And our prayers will become more effective because we are more in tune with the Spirit of the living God.  Let us start that journey together each day.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

Merciful Children of God; James

May the mumbling commence!

Extend the hand of mercy to others and have the hand of mercy extended towards you.  If you remove mercy from your lives and live judgmentally, then you will have your life devoid of mercy.  And, then, what will you think when you desperately need mercy?  Read from James chapter two (NLT):

So whenever you speak, or whatever you do, remember that you will be judged by the law of love, the law that set you free.  For there will be no mercy for you if you have not been merciful to others. But if you have been merciful, then God's mercy toward you will win out over his judgment against you.  (Verses 12-13)

Our words and actions have power that we cannot begin to guess.  That power is a part of being made in the image of God.  So, be careful how you speak and act.  When you have power of another person, treat them with mercy.  Then, you will be showing yourself as children of our heavenly Father.

And God will recognize our mercy and extend even more mercy towards us.  And that mercy will overcome judgment.  Thanks be to God!

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

Let Them Know That You Care; James

May the mumbling commence!

People will not care what you say until they know that you care.  Showing other people that you care is the foundation of all right relationships.  It is the foundation of good preaching, too.

If a preacher wants to be heard by a congregation – if I want to be heard by a congregation, the congregation has to know that I care for them.  If they know that the person preaching to them cares for them, the likelihood that they will listen increases.  Read from James chapter three (Peterson’s The Message paraphrase):

Real wisdom, God’s wisdom, begins with a holy life and is characterized by getting along with others.  It is gentle and reasonable, overflowing with mercy and blessings, not hot one day and cold the next, not two-faced.  You can develop a healthy, robust community that lives right with God and enjoy its results only if you do the hard work of getting along with each other, treating each other with dignity and honor. (Verses 17-18)

Real wisdom, godly wisdom, begins with getting along with others.  It is hard work to get along with others.  It is hard work to treat other people with dignity and honor.  But these are first steps in showing people that you truly care for them.  On these building stones, you can develop a healthy and robust community.

People will know that you care when you fully engage in this work.  Yes, people will know that you care, and they will care what you say.  When we achieve such a place of trust and honor, let us use it wisely.  Let us pray for God’s wisdom and seek to speak that godly wisdom boldly.

It is true.  People will not care what you say until they know that you care.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

 

P.S. I have been without internet for a while now.  You are going to get a large dose today!

Stay the Course; James

May the mumbling commence!

Stay the course and the lovely light of the Lord will cascade down upon you.  What a wonderful image!  Read from James chapter one (Peterson’s The Message paraphrase):

So, my dear friends, don’t get thrown off course.  Every desirable and beneficial gift comes out of heaven.  The gifts are rivers of light cascading down from the Father of Light.  There is nothing deceitful in God, nothing two-faced, nothing fickle.  He brought us to life using the true Word, showing us off as the crown of all his creatures.  (Verses 16-18)

What better reason is there to stay the course first set by Christ?  There is no better.  What better benefit might we hope for?  There is no better hope that has a basis in truth.

Our Lord is solid – not deceitful or two-faced.  Though we and the world may be fickle, God is not.  So, stay the course in your relationship with God.

Stay the course and we baptized with rivers of light that come from the Father of Light.  Christ Jesus is the Light of the world.  When we get out of the way, the Light of Christ shines through us.  And that light finishes off the crowning achievement of God’s creation – humanity.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

A Slave of God; James

May the mumbling commence!

When reading the letter of the New Testament, it is far too easy to bypass the first verse or so.  It is often the introductory portion of the letter.  But, have you ever paused to consider how you introduce yourself to others?  Read the first verse of James (NLT):

This letter is from James, a slave of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is written to Jewish Christians scattered among the nations. Greetings!

How willing would you to announce yourself as a slave of God?  Other translations have the Greek word translated as “servant” or “bond-servant”.  But the Greek word means literally slave…  Even in Eugene Peterson’s The Message paraphrase the word is translated slave.  Can we be comfortable with that word – slave.

Slaves depend on their masters for their food and drink.  Slaves depend upon their masters for totally defining their lives.  Slaves are property of their masters.  Slaves are vulnerable to their masters.

Too often, we like to be in control – or at least think we are.  Control is an illusion.  I need a master.  So do you.

And what better master is there than the Master of All – God, Our Creator.  There is no better master.  Do not waste your time looking for one.

Like James, let’s boldly proclaim that we are the property of God – bought and paid for through the life and death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.  I depend on the Lord to sustain me.  I depend on the Lord to define my life.

And trust in the Lord is never misplaced.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

Speak No Evil; James

May the mumbling commence!

Speak no evil.  It is a concise statement, but one difficult to live by.  Yet it is what we are called to do.  Read from James chapter four (NRSV):

Do not speak evil against one another, brothers and sisters. Whoever speaks evil against another or judges another, speaks evil against the law and judges the law; but if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge.  There is one lawgiver and judge who is able to save and to destroy. So who, then, are you to judge your neighbor? (Verses 11-12)

Do not speak evil of your brothers and sisters – nor your neighbor.  That is hard.  We know well our brothers and sisters and neighbors.  We know the dirt on them.  It is hard to refrain from harping on them. 

It can seem to make us feel better.  It can seem to make us look better.

But not in the eyes of the Lord!  Our Creator sees what division it causes and it grieves Him.

Speak evil of someone else.  Judge them.  Do so at the peril of judging the very Law of God. 

James calls us to spend less time using the Law to judge and more time using the Law to guide our attitudes and thoughts and behaviors.  And we often fall well short on the ideal of the Law.  We explored that idea yesterday.

So, indeed, who are we to judge our neighbor?  We, too, need the mercy of the Lord.  Why not pass along that mercy to those in our debt?

Only the Lord can rightly judge.  God help us all.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

All or Nothing; James

May the mumbling commence!

With the Law of the Lord, it is all or nothing.  Therefore, we should live in the attitude of mercy over and against the attitude of judgment.  Read from James chapter two (NIV):

For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.  For he who said, "Do not commit adultery," also said, "Do not murder." If you do not commit adultery but do commit murder, you have become a lawbreaker. 

Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom, because judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment! (Verses 10-13)

The Law of the Lord reflects His entire being.  If we break one of those Laws, we destroy the reflection that we are of that image.  That is a scary thought!

Thank God for mercy!  Mercy is what we are to remember when we speak and act.  Mercy allow freedom in our lives.

Be merciful and see mercy triumph over judgment!

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

Do Not Be Deceived; James

May the mumbling commence!

There are many things to divide our attention.  At times, every section of our lives suffers because of our divided attention.  Who is to blame?  Who is to blame for this temptation to spread ourselves so thin?

Do not blame it on our Creator.  Be very careful not to.  Read from James chapter one (NASB):

Let no one say when he is tempted, "I am being tempted by God"; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone.  But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. 

Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death.  Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. (Verses 13-16)

God neither tempts us nor does God seek to divide us.  God calls us together to worship Him.  Any other thought is only a deception.  Do not be deceived.

Our attentions and devotion are divided by our own desires and lusts.  We work hard to fill our desires and lusts – whether those desires are to be self-serving or to be people pleasers.  This type and attitude of hard work distracts us from the one thing that we need the most.

We need to be in healthy relationship with our Creator.  We need to be in healthy relationship with the creation… and that includes our brothers and sister, our neighbors.

Let us not follow our various lusts to their ultimate conclusion… which is sin… which lead to death.  Let us choose life instead.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

God's Bottom Line; James

May the mumbling commence!

Most of us would know what is meant by the bottom line.  It all comes down to money.  Nothing else matters.  Everything is fair game if it will improve my wealth.

God has a different bottom line.  It all comes down to relationship.  Everything else is secondary.  Read from James chapter five (NJB):

Well now, you rich! Lament, weep for the miseries that are coming to you.  Your wealth is rotting, your clothes are all moth-eaten.  All your gold and your silver are corroding away, and the same corrosion will be a witness against you and eat into your body. It is like a fire which you have stored up for the final days. 

Can you hear crying out against you the wages which you kept back from the laborers mowing your fields? The cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord Sabaoth.  On earth you have had a life of comfort and luxury; in the time of slaughter you went on eating to your heart's content.  It was you who condemned the upright and killed them; they offered you no resistance. (5:1-6)

The bottom line in the United States is a cancer.  It eats away at our bodies.  It devours relationships.  It eventually will bring judgment on us.

The message is clear – think about those you relate with on a daily basis.  Think about the people that you work with.  Think about the people in your family.  Think about the people that you play with.  Think about the people you pray with.

Think and care for them as well or better than you think about and care for yourself.  Your prosperity and security and happiness are intertwined with the prosperity and security and happiness of all of humanity.

Let us give God’s bottom line a try.  Let’s jettison the “business model” for our church bodies.  Let’s trade on the basis of relationship.  Let’s try, with the help of the guiding Holy Spirit, to make relationships right with God and all of creation.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

Be Careful How You Plan; James

May the mumbling commence!

You can depend on God.  If you seek to depend on anyone or anything else, then your chances of being disappointed rise dramatically.  So be careful how you plan.  Make sure your plans always keep God in their focus.  Read from James chapter four (NLT):

Look here, you people who say, "Today or tomorrow we are going to a certain town and will stay there a year. We will do business there and make a profit."  How do you know what will happen tomorrow? For your life is like the morning fog – it's here a little while, then it's gone. 

What you ought to say is, "If the Lord wants us to, we will live and do this or that."  Otherwise you will be boasting about your own plans, and all such boasting is evil. 

Remember, it is sin to know what you ought to do and then not do it. (Verses 13-17)

It is far too easy to get caught up in our plans for the future.  We may even think that we plan with God in mind.  But if we do not take the time and effort to listen to the Spirit of God speaking to us, then we may not have such a good idea of what God wants us to do.  And we can get very far off the track (which is a narrow one, by the way).

Once we find out what God wants us to do, we cannot stop there.  We must do it.  Clear your planner or you calendar.  God has His best in mind for you.  So do it.  Anything less is settling for less than who God created you to be.  Anything less ends in evil.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

A Key to Deepening Community; James

May the mumbling commence!

Want to know a key to deepening community?  The community that prays together stays together.  Be open.  Be honest.  The synergy between you (all) and God will help miracles to happen.  Read from James chapter five (Peterson’s The Message paraphrase):

Are you hurting?  Pray.  Do you feel great?  Sing.  Are you sick?  Call the church leaders together to pray and anoint you with oil in the name of the Master.  Believing-prayer will heal you, and Jesus will put you on your feet.  And if you’ve sinned, you’ll be forgiven – healed inside and out.

Make this your common practice: Confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you can live together whole and healed.  The prayer of a person living right with God is something powerful to be reckoned with.  Elijah, for instance, human just like us, prayed hard that it wouldn’t rain, and it didn’t – not a drop for three and a half years.  Then he prayed that it would rain, and it did.  The showers came and everything started to grow again.

My dear friends, if you know people who have wandered off from God’s truth, don’t write them off.  Go after them.  Get them back and you will have rescued precious lives from destruction and prevented an epidemic of wandering away from God.  (Verses 13-20)

Give full expression to your hurts and glories and sicknesses.  You will make yourself vulnerable in doing this, but you will also open the door to a deeper level of community.  With the grace of God, this level of God-like community will bring healing both inside and out. 

The world will see individuals and a community whole and healed.  What a witness to the power and love and mercy and grace of God!

Together, we will find the God-groove.  Then the things that we ask for would be in the keeping of the Way of Jesus.  We can be confident that we will get what we ask for in those cases.

And, when things go wrong (which they will), know that you are to pursue those who are wandering from the God-groove.  Go get them.  Get them back.  Precious lives will be saved.

This kind of rich communal prayer will make for an ever-deepening community, where belonging is no longer a question.

May it be so!  Amen.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out

Conflict Resolution; James

May the mumbling commence!

All of us like to be well and whole.  Peace is a wonderful place to be.  But how do we get there when our lives seem to be nothing but a string of conflicts?  Read from James chapter four (NRSV):

Those conflicts and disputes among you, where do they come from? Do they not come from your cravings that are at war within you?  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.  You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, in order to spend what you get on your pleasures.  Adulterers! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. (Verses 1-4)

If we allow our appetites and cravings reign, there will be no peace.  They only know how to ask for more and more.  Their intent is to satisfy themselves and worry little or not at all about others.  Soon nothing else will matter other than satisfying our appetites and cravings.

What happens when two different people’s appetites conflict?  Sometimes we covet what another person has.  You want it but do not have it.  Eventually, if left unchecked, our appetites will stop at nothing to satisfy themselves.  Conflict and disputes will be the order of the day.

And if conflicts and disputes will not get what we want, then we will up the ante.  We will be willing to overlook damage done to others… even so far as counting their lives as forfeit.

You may stop and think that we don’t do this.  But you’re wrong.  In this country, we have been accustomed to low prices on products and service.  Those low prices come at the cost of refusing to offer a living wage to an employee.  Those low prices come at the cost of sub-standard health care insurance.  Those low prices… well, someone else is taking the proverbial short end of the stick.

It is no wonder that conflict and disputes in our world are many and manifold.  Until we bridle our appetites, the peace and wholeness and wellness of all creatures in this world will be impossible to attain.  And that, my brothers and sisters is enmity with God.

Help us, O Lord.  Help us to know what to ask for and why to ask for it.  We greatly desire that peace.  Help us to be willing to pay the price for peace – a price that never should include violence of any sort: physical, mental, verbal or spiritual.

Enough mumbling for now…

Peace Out