The Perfect Law Of Freedom - James 1:23-25 Series

Tools

“What if I ask all those questions and do all that thinking and reflecting and I still don’t know what the passage means?”

This is the best piece of advice I can give you for Bible study: If you don’t know what a passage means – find out! Use some of the amazing resources we have at our disposal. Get a good study Bible. I have hundreds of commentaries in my library but very often the first place I check is my old 1984 NIV Study Bible. Those commentary notes are absolutely outstanding. The ESV Study Bible notes are also very good. And the HCSB study Bible notes are not bad either.

If you want to look up Greek and Hebrew words – I would be more than happy to show you how to use the Greek Hebrew Keyword Study Bible, or E-sword Bible software (which is free).

Teachers

What happens if you study a passage the best you can and you still can’t figure it out? Then what? Have you ever noticed, reading through the New Testament, how many times teachers and preachers are mentioned? The fact that God gave teachers to the church is a major emphasis in Scripture. Why did God give us teachers? I have a theory about that. I am going to go way out on a limb and say I think the reason God gave us teachers was so that they would teach us. If everybody could easily understand the Bible at first glance, there would be no point in having teachers. But God gave us teachers because He knew we would need them. God knew that some of you would have to work a job all day in order to make a living. And some of you would have children to take care of all day. He knew that your time for studying the Bible would be very limited so He called certain men to give their full time to the study of His Word so they could teach it to the rest of us.

So if you run into a passage in the Bible that you cannot figure out, ask a teacher or preacher. I know that some of you are hesitant to ask me Bible questions because you think I’m too busy. What do you think I am busy doing? Teaching the Bible is my job! So don’t hesitate to ask me or Bob or Sam or Andrew or one of the other teachers in the church. That’s what we are here for – God called us to help you look intently into His Word.

The third principle has to do with the way you think about God’s law.

5) Understand What The Law Is (Law of Freedom)

6)

25 But the one who looks intently into the perfect law of freedom and perseveres in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of work - this person will be blessed in his doing.

James refers to the Scriptures as the word four times just in that little section from verses 18 to 23. But in verse 25 he shifts to calling it law, and that is what he is going to call it from now on. One reason for that might be that James is really focusing in this book on doing – obeying ?so he uses a term that brings to mind specifically the parts of God’s Word that are commands.

So he is drawing our attention to the law of God, but instead of just saying “law,” James calls it the perfect law of freedom. He calls it that because thinking of it that way will help you be more successful in your efforts to obey it. When you open up the Bible and read a command from God, and you want to obey that command, one key to success will be in thinking of God’s commands as the perfect law of freedom.