James 2:1-5, 8-10, 14-26
Pentecost 17B
Rev. Charles F. Degner
1My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don’t show favoritism. 2Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. 3If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, "Here’s a good seat for you," but say to the poor man, "You stand there" or "Sit on the floor by my feet," 4have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?
8If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, "Love your neighbor as yourself,"[a] you are doing right. 9But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. 10For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.
14What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? 15Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. 16If one of you says to him, "Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed," but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? 17In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.
18But someone will say, "You have faith; I have deeds."
Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.
19You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that - and shudder.
20You foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? 21Was not our ancestor Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? 22You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. 23And the scripture was fulfilled that says, "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness," and he was called God’s friend. 24You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.
25In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction? 26As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.
This is not an easy portion of Scripture, and I want you all to put on your thinking caps with me today. When I am finished, if I haven’t explained this to you properly, then you will have to tell me and meet with me so I can explain it better. But if we struggle, we are in good company, because even Luther struggled with these verses.
It is important for you to understand this chapter in the Bible because someday a nice looking Mormon missionary will come to you, as one did once to me, and argue that you are saved not just by faith alone but by your good works, too. And he will open your Bible to James 2 and say, “See, it says right here.” “24You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.” And if you remember the passages you learned in confirmation class, you will come back and say, “But Paul says Romans 8:28: “For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law.”
How can this be? How can one scripture say that we are justified by faith alone and another scripture say that we are justified by faith and our works? Scripture cannot contradict itself, so how can we understand this correctly? It is really very simple. The word justified means to be declared righteous or innocent. Before God, we are justified by faith. God can look into our hearts and see that we believe in Jesus, and he declares us righteous by faith. But you can’t look into my heart and see my faith, can you? So how will you know if I am a righteous person, a believer? How will I be a justified person in your sight? You can’t see my faith. All you can see is what I do, my works. So in your eyes, I am justified by my works and not by my faith.
This is what solves our puzzle between Paul and James. Paul talks about your relationship with God and says you are justified by faith alone. James talks about your relationship with your brother, and in that relationship you are justified by your works, because your brother can’t see the faith in your heart. If we understand this, then James 2 becomes perfectly clear to us.
You Are Justified by …
1. faith – before God
The James that writes this book is probably the same James in Acts 15 that got up at the council in Jerusalem and spoke to the assembly there. He writes this letter to the early Christians in Jerusalem and Judea. In our text he uses the Greek word for synagogue to describe their assemblies. Remember how Jesus said that Pharisees loved the best places in the synagogues? Evidently the Jewish Christians hadn’t got rid of those attitudes entirely.
James points out to these early Christians that this showing of favoritism in their gatherings was wrong. It was sinful. “1My brothers, as believers in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ, don’t show favoritism. 2Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in. 3If you show special attention to the man wearing fine clothes and say, "Here’s a good seat for you," but say to the poor man, "You stand there" or "Sit on the floor by my feet," 4have you not discriminated among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts? 8If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, "Love your neighbor as yourself,"[a] you are doing right. 9But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers. 10For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.” I would hope this couldn’t happen in our church, but I think it could. I think it could happen in any church, because as Christians, we still have a sinful nature, don’t we?
A preacher in a large church down south preached on this text one Sunday. He had his associate do the liturgy, while he dressed in foul clothes, a wig, an old dress – like a street person. He sat by himself in the pew. No one greeted him. Some even moved away from him. At the time for the sermon, there were two minutes of silence. Then this old woman slowly made her way to the pulpit, to the horror of the congregation. Then she took off the wig and the dress to reveal the pastor. To the shame of the congregation, he then slowly read the words of our text.
And shame on us when we show favoritism based on outward appearances! We have another word for that. It’s called discrimination. Sometimes people discriminate on the basis of race or color of skin. How sad that is! How ungodlike that is! Paul told the Athenians in Acts 17:26: “From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth.” We are all descendants of Adam. All of us look the same on the inside. We are all blood red on the inside. There is no room in a Christian’s vocabulary for racial jokes or racial slurs. There is no room in a Christian’s heart for looking down on someone because of the color of their skin. When we do that, doesn’t that make us look so not Christian on the outside?
And shame on us when we discriminate against others on the basis of wealth or social standing! A man’s value does not depend on how much his suit or his car cost. A woman’s value does not depend on the amount of jewelry she can wear or how fine her clothing might be. The bag lady on the street ought to have the same value in our eyes as the woman who pulls up in her Lexus. Because she certainly had the same value in the eyes of our Savior when he bled and died for her on the cross! Again, I would like to think that money and wealth don’t affect the way we look at people. But I think it can. And I think sometimes it does.
Wouldn’t it be terrible if God judged us by what he sees on the outside? I don’t mean the color of our skin or the amount of wealth we have or don’t have. How many times in Jesus’ ministry didn’t he show his special love for the poverty stricken widow! But what if God judged us by what he sees on the outside, by the sins that we commit every day. What if he judged us by the strict standard of the law that James reminds us of in our text. “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.” If God judged us by what he sees in us, by the works we fail to do, and by the sins we commit every day, then he would have to judge us guilty of hell.
Our God does not show favoritism. This is a really interesting word in the Greek. It means that literally God does not look at the face. God doesn’t see color. God doesn’t see social standing. God doesn’t see age, or beauty. God judges every person in the whole world the same. According to the law, God judges all of us guilty of sin. According to the gospel, and for Jesus’ sake, God judges all of us not guilty. Paul said in Romans 3: “There is no difference, 23for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.”
And then Paul says a few verses later: “Where, then, is boasting? It is excluded. On what principle? On that of observing the law? No, but on that of faith. 28For we maintain that a man is justified by faith apart from observing the law.” What does God look at when he judges you? He only looks into your heart to see that you believe in Jesus. Jesus died for you. He forgave all your sins. He gave you his robe of righteousness. If you believe this, then before God in heaven you are justified – by faith, not be works.
But not before man. When God chose David to be the next king of Israel, Samuel was surprised that God had chosen the runt of the litter. God told Samuel, “Man looks on the outward appearance, and the Lord looks on the heart.” God can read our hearts, so he doesn’t have to see our good works. But people can’t read your heart. They can only see that you are a believer by what you do. And that’s what James is talking about in our text when he says you are justified …
2. by works – before your fellow man
Let’s look at his words. 14”What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? 15Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. 16If one of you says to him, "Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well fed," but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? 17In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. 18But someone will say, "You have faith; I have deeds." Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.” Jesus taught the same thing in John 15 when he said, 5"I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.” If a person believes in Jesus, then he will do good works. God the Holy Spirit himself produces those good works in a Christian’s life. If you have no love for your neighbor, if you show no care for your brother, how can you believe in Jesus, who loved you and died for you?
James calls a faith without works a dead faith. He says that even the devil is capable of that kind of faith. “You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that - and shudder.”
Then James gives us an example from a man in the Old Testament whose faith we admire perhaps more than any other. “20You foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless? 21Was not our ancestor Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? 22You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did. 23And the scripture was fulfilled that says, "Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness," and he was called God’s friend. 24You see that a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.” Justified before whom? Not before God, but in our eyes. We read the story of how Abraham was willing to sacrifice his only Son, and we are amazed at what a faith he had. Who of us could do that? Who of us could take a knife to our child, even if God asked us to do so, and believe that God would raise him from the dead in order to keep his promise? God knew that Abraham believed. God didn’t have to test his faith. But because he did, we have a story that let’s us see faith in Abraham and see faith at its very best. Abraham was justified by faith before God, but he was justified by his works in our eyes.
James gives us another example. 25”In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction? 26As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.” How do we know that this prostitute, who became one of the ancestors of the Savior, was a true believer? Her actions proved it. She gave lodging to the spies and risked her life because she believed that the God of Israel was the only true God. She was justified by faith before God, and she is justified by her actions in our eyes.
Dear friends, how about you? Are you justified not only before God but also before your neighbor because your neighbor can see the fruits of faith in your life? James writes these words to spur us on to give glory to God every day by the lives we live. When that homeless person looks for food, and we feed them, they see our faith. When our neighbors’ yard is littered with debris after a tornado and we help them clean it up, they see our faith. When we visit the widow who is failing in health and we help her get her groceries, our faith is showing itself by works. There are countless opportunities every day to give God glory in our lives.
You have learned a little theology today from James. Before God you are justified by faith. Before your neighbor, you are justified by works. This is a very practical theology, isn’t it? Now go out there in the world and show people you believe in Jesus. Amen.
