Text: James 1 19-26
I remember as a little boy watching Saturday morning cartoons and a consistent theme was the Genie in the bottle or the mind controlled slave who responded to the master’s every wish with the monotone reply "I hear and obey master." I’m sure that you were all much more spiritually inclined children than me and you probably spent Saturday mornings in fasting and prayer. But if you would have been watching Saturday morning cartoons with me you’d know what I was talking about.
You may be wondering how I could possibly make a spiritual application from this--A preacher can make a spiritual application out of anything. It’s not that God is our Genie in a bottle ready to respond to our every command--although some might like to see it that way. In fact, it’s quite the opposite--we are to be the mind controlled slaves hastening to every command of our Heavenly Father.
Maybe, mind controlled is the wrong word--how about spiritually controlled? And not by some V-chip implanted in our brains but in the words of James by the Word planted in our hearts--that Word is how we hear the will of the Father. This is the application step of what we’ve been talking about for the last couple of months—The role of God’s word in our lives. Today we go from page to performance.
But if we are to respond to Him in the correct way we are going to have to make sure that we clear out all the static so we get the message right; and once we receive that message we are going to have to act on it.
Interrogative: How can we make sure we get the message loud and clear, and what are our responsibilities once we get it?
Transition: The answer is in our text today. First of all James gives us some tips on how we can be sure to...
1. Hear the Word (v. 19)
My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry,
If we’re ever going to hear from God James says that there are three things we must do, first we must...
>Be quick to listen
This was especially important to the first readers of James because they Had no New Testament Scriptures--virtually all communication of the Gospel was orally. Believers met together in houses to hear preachers tell the story of Jesus and His saving grace. Good listening skills were crucial to their spiritual nourishment.
But listening is also a key need in the church today. We live in a world of fast food, 15 second TV commercials and 5 second sound bites. We are being transformed into poor listeners. Psychologist Paul Tournier has said that the majority of our conversations--even between couples--are "dialogues of the deaf."
This problem doesn’t just affect our social relationships though--it affects our spiritual development. If we have developed limited attention spans, our times of Bible reading are apt to be rough going. The devotional prayer of modern man is "Speak to me Lord, you’ve got fifteen seconds." Not only Bible reading is in trouble, though. Preaching is in some dire straights. The Puritans used to have dinner on the grounds long before the Gaithers thought of it. sermons of 3 & 4 hours were commonplace
My dad told me when I started preaching --20 minutes is about all people will hear.
The point is simply this we must make a concious effort to overcome our listening problems--limit exposure to the media--spend time reading in God’s Word, ask God to help you. Prepare to come and hear God’s Word taught. Hear the words of the Psalmist--Be still and know that I am God. Secondly if we are to hear we must be...
>Slow to speak
Another reason our listening is hampered is that we spend most of our time thinking of what we are going to say next. James is not calling on us to all take a vow of silence, nor does he mean to bar any interaction in a Bible study, what he is calling for is the common sense principle to think before we speak. Often times we open our mouth just long enough to change feet. Thirdly if we are to listen we must be...
>Slow to become angry
You may wonder what this has to do with hearing but if you think about it it makes sense. How many times have you heard a preacher say something that struck you the wrong way and spent the rest of the sermon stewing on that one point?
Often times we spread our toes our and just wait for someone to step on them. James says to us be slow to become angry. Hear what God is saying--often times anger is the disguise we put on conviction. The Lord is telling us through James to says still our tendency to fly off the handle and let God’s word get deep down in our souls and work on the things you keep hidden under those super-sensitive feelings.
The second thing we must do to hear and obey is to...
2. Accept the Word (v. 21)
James 1:21 Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.
There are some barriers, James says, not only to hearing the Word, but there are also barriers to accepting the word.
>Immorality
The fact that immoral life-styles are a barrier to accepting the Word or the Gospel is not a secret to anyone--sinners understand it instinctively.
If you have been involved in witnessing to the lost you know that well over fifty percent of the time the response to an invitation to accept Jesus is "Well, I have some things in my life I need to get straight first."
People know that salvation and immorality are simply incompatible. Now of course I usually tell them that they have the order wrong. They need to accept Jesus first and he will help them make the changes they need--but they are right in instinctively understanding that salvation demands repentance--sorrow over sins and a willingness to turn away from them.
It’s true for good church people too. Living with sin in your life that you’re not willing to deal with causes us to work not on accepting God’s word but on coming up with justifications.
The other barrier to accepting the Word is:
>Pride-- James says to humbly accept the word planted in you.
Accepting the Gospel demands that we admit that we are a wreck and we can’t do anything about it. It requires that we humbly confess that we need a savior.
There are many who claim to be Christians who live what seems to be a Christian lifestyle who have not yet jumped the hurdle of pride. They are trusting in their good life to get them into heaven
James say we must humbly accept the word--we must admit before God that we cannot ever be good enough--that we must simply rest on His grace--on the price He has paid for us. To accept the word we need to put away pride.
So we’ve talked about hearing the Word and accepting the Word, that brings us to the action step…
3. Do the Word (v. 22)
Once we have heard and accepted the Word, The Scripture makes it clear that we have a responsibility to act on it. Not that we can save ourselves by adherence to some set of rules, but simply that we recognize that He has purchased us with a price and He has a right to expect something from us.
To illustrate the difference between those who merely hear and those who hear and do James use s the illustration of men looking into a mirror lets look first at the man who only hears:
>Hearer
vv. 22-24 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.
Say a man is looking in mirror and notices he’s putting on weight--but doesn’t change his eating habits.
The word of God here is presented as a mirror that shows us what we really look like. Without that mirror we can decieve ourselves as to how we really look. We can feel like we’re pretty good by comparing ourselves to others, but like the camera, the mirror doesn’t lie--when we are brought face to face with the standards of God set by the sinless life of Jesus Christ we can not help but see our need for a savior and the expectations He has of us.
It is possible for us to get real pleasure from the study of God’s word and from theological concepts. The point that James makes here is that the importance of the mirror is not in the shiny surface itself but in what it tells us about ourselves--and what’s even more important is how we act on that knowledge. James says that we should be doers of the word
>Doer
v. 25 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.
Here is the standard for us--that we look into that perfect law that gives freedom--the law of God’s grace. And that we recognize that we need Him to forgive us and to help us live the righteous life that He desires. And note that we’re told that keeping a tight reign on the tongue is a key indicator of how we’re doing as doers of the word.
Let’s go back to our illustration of the man who sees in the mirror that he is putting on weight. James says that the doer of the word does two things
--first of all he continues to look into the mirror
--secondly he makes the necessary changes.
Conclusion:
I’d like to read to you a passage about this concept of doing the Word from Chuck Swindoll’s book Improving Your Serve:
Let’s pretend that you work for me. in fact you’re my executive assistant in a rapidly growing company. I’m the owner and I’m interested in expanding overseas. To pull this off, I make plans to travel abroad and to stay there until the new branch gets established, and I leave you in charge of the busy stateside organization. I tell you that I will write to you regularly and give you direction and instruction.
I leave and you stay. Months pass. A flow of letters are sent from Europe and received by you at the national headquarters. I spell out all my expectations. Finally, I return. Soon after my arrival I drive down to the office. I am stunned! Grass and weeds have grown up high. A few windows along the street are broken. I walk into the receptionists office and she is doing her nails, chewing gum and listening to her favorite disco station. I look around and notice the wastebaskets are overflowing, the carpet hasn’t been vacuumed for weeks, and nobody seems concerned that the owner has returned. I ask about your whereabouts and someone in the crowded lounge area points down the hall and yells "I think he’s in there." disturbed I move down the hall and bump into you as you are finishing a chess game with our sales manager. I ask you to step into my office (which has been converted into a television room for watching soap operas).
"What in the world is going on, man?" "What do you mean?" "Well, look at this place didn’t you get any of my letters?"
"LETTERS? Oh, yeah, sure, got every one of them. As a matter of fact we had a letter study every Friday night since you left. We even divided the personnel into small groups and discussed the things you wrote. Some of those things were really interesting. You’ll be pleased to know that many of us have committed to memory some of the sentences and paragraphs in your letters--one or two even memorized an entire letter or two. Great stuff in those letters!"
"OK, OK, you got my letters, studied them meditated on them, discussed them even memorized them. BUT WHAT DID YOU DO ABOUT THEM?"
"Do--uh, we didn’t do anything about them."
