Week 2

January 17, 2007

James 1:1-4

Wow, is all I can say! God’s word is alive and kicking…. kicking me in the butt that is! I hope you are as excited as I am about becoming more Christ like, for it is evident that just in the first four verses of this amazing letter from James, that we are about to enter “changing” territories. The message is just too clear and practical to be confusing. Are you ready?

James, a bondservant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.

To the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad.

Greetings.

2 My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, 3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. 4 But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.

Let’s pray God’s Word:

Father God, and our Lord Jesus Christ, I sincerely desire to become your bondservant, but I lack the wisdom and experience required to totally grasp this title. As I reflect on some of my past trials, I see now how I tried to get around them with my own power, rather than go through them with Your power. I see how I reacted to them, rather than counting them as joy. I am back again asking for forgiveness and I pray that you will continue to mold me into Your image, teaching me patience so that I can be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. I want to be a reflection of your Son.

In Jesus Christ’s name I pray.

It didn’t take me long to realize that verses 1-8 would be way too much to cover in one night. In fact we will barely get through the first 4. It took me forever just to get past, “James, a bondservant of the Lord Jesus Christ”! I have never realized how much I have missed by trying to “hustle” through God’s Word. We are going to tackle James going at a snail’s pace. I’m excited!

James, a bondservant

Like mentioned last week, James was the half brother of Jesus. James grew up with Jesus but along with his brothers, (John 7:5) did not believe that Jesus was the King of the Jews, the promised Messiah, the Redeemer, their Lamb of God who’s blood was shed once for all to pay the penalty for their sins, the Son of God. Remember, the Jews were looking for a powerful King, one who would destroy and conquer all their enemies, not an innocent babe in a manger. Even though they grew up with Jesus, they did not automatically accept Him as their Messiah, personal Savior.

And in Mark 3:21, James was possibly one of those who thought Jesus was out of his mind. Crazy!

Remember James along with the rest of his brothers, Joses, Judas (Jude) and Simon did become believers until somewhere between the Resurrection and Pentecost. Acts 1:13

Skeptic to Believer…

But we see that James becomes the leader of the Jerusalem church in Acts 12:17; 15:13-22.

And in 1Cor 15:7, after the resurrection, James was one of the people Jesus appeared to.

So James, Jesus’ half brother, the leader of the Jerusalem church, and one of a very few that the resurrected Jesus appeared to introduces himself as:

James, a bondservant

Two things I want you to think about…journal/ponder:

How do you introduce yourself? By your husband’s position, the mother of (child’s name), what job or title you have, or who you know?

Why didn’t James introduce his letter by saying: Hi my name is James. I am the Messiah’s half brother. I am the leader of the Jerusalem church. Jesus appeared to me and he did not appear to you. I am an associate apostle.

Why does James call himself a bondservant? Just the exact opposite of what might be expected. As if he were nothing. James considers himself to be a slave to God and to the Lord Jesus Christ.

The definition of a bondservant is: a person who is the property of another.

James considered himself God’s possession, God’s property. A person bound to God to serve Him with nothing in return (wages). Nothing! We deserve nothing: We are to be totally devoted to God to serve Him, to be obedient and to carry out our earthly calling.

He knew exactly what level of influence he had! NONE! James said, I am a servant of God, the Lord Jesus, and Christ. He knew God and Jesus Christ were the same.

Just from his introduction of himself, we know that James is a true believer.

What are some of the character qualities does this man have just from his introduction of himself? Humility, servant hood, meekness...

So again, how do you describe yourself? Do people know that you are a follower of Jesus Christ after they meet you?

This is what we must do too. We must put ourselves in our rightly place and make sure we never think of ourselves as more important than we really are:

James puts it very bluntly: We are God’s property, bound to God, to serve Him alone, while desiring nothing in return.

Journal entry:

Write a short prayer to God, the Lord Jesus Christ that you are committing the rest of your life to being merely a bondservant, His possession, His property, living to serve Him and only Him. Make sure you ask Him to help you not to think of yourself as being that important!

Second: Remember I told you about Bryce, my son pointing out that I wasn’t any different even after doing all those Bible Studies? Well Bryce also said to me, “Mom, in spite of what I do or how I treat you or regardless of whether or not you agree with where I am going spiritually, you should not be any different around me then you are your Bible Study group.”

I am thankful for Bryce’s honesty.

How did James go from being a skeptic to being a bondservant? He was imitating the example that Jesus set for him. It is exactly what Bryce was saying to me. Do not be any different mom, no matter who you are around. Know who you are and live your life accordingly.

You see, Jesus continued to be Jesus around James in spite of the fact that he never believed in Him until after the Resurrection. Jesus did not change who he was because James was not responding the way He thought he should. Jesus just kept being Jesus, doing exactly what God had sent Him to do. Jesus was not flippant. He remained who He was in Christ regardless of the adversity.

Often rejected, Jesus continued to teach the great principles of the kingdom of God planting seeds of Truth along the way. It is not my responsibility whether or not that seed will germinate. I only have the responsibility to make sure that my fruit is blooming. That’s it!

But that is not the natural response to things. We naturally want to fix everyone and every situation. We naturally want to change everyone because if they change, we’ll be happy.

We’ll have “JOY” if so and so would love me. Or if so and so would change.

It is just the opposite. Let’s see how.

Journal: Do I know who I am in Christ?

James 1:1 cont. To the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad.

As you recall from last week, the letter of James was written to the Christian Jews probably the first book of the NT (AD 44-49). James wrote this letter before Paul began ministering to the Gentiles, not long after Paul …who you remember was Saul before his conversion and was killing Christians.

In the Old Testament, the original dispersion (scattering of the Jews) took place when the ten tribes of Israel (Northern Kingdom) were carried into captivity by the Assyrians in 721 BC because of their disobedience. After many years of captivity, King Darius allowed the Jews to return the ruins of Israel (described in the books of Ezra and Nehemiah). The ones that returned were called the remnant. But only a few out of the many that were taken into captivity actually returned.

Read (Acts 2:4). This tells us that the Day of Pentecost had come. The Feast of Weeks or Harvest. The devout Jews would come to Jerusalem to pray. During the first celebration of this feast after Jesus’ resurrection is when the Holy Spirit first entered the hearts of believers, including James.

You must know that there was another reason why the Jews were scattering. Just prior to the James’ conversion, the early Christians were scattered throughout the land because they were fearing for their lives. A man named Saul was killing them by the thousands. They were afraid. Also King Herod Agrippa (grandson of Herod the Great) found favor with the Pharisees by killing Christian Jews.

This explains two reasons why the tribes were scattered. So the people (Christian Jews) that James wrote to were fearful for their lives, hiding out, and suffering from oppression (unjust authority over them). Their jobs had been taken, their possessions, some killed, some imprisoned.

THINK:

Wouldn’t it have made more sense to write them a letter about a safe place to hide? Or a letter of sympathy?

If you had been James, and considering the current circumstances, what would your letter sound like?

James has the nerve to tell them to REJOICE!

“Greetings” he says which is Greek for REJOICE!

And then in the next breath he told them to “count it all joy when you fall into various trials”?

Is he kidding? What is he thinking? We are being killed because of our faith and he wants us to rejoice!

Are they really that strong (mature)? They are probably wondering at this point what they really believed in. Do I really want to die for a Man who was the leader of “The Way”? I barely knew Him. He only lasted three years! It sounded good then, but that Man is dead and I myself am about to die too because I am saying that I believe this! What was I thinking!

I believed Jesus was the Messiah, when I was in groups of 5000 and everything seemed to be so perfect. But now we are scattered everywhere.

He’s dead. It’s scary now. Am I really what I say I am? Do I really want to be persecuted and killed for my beliefs?

This is a serious trial.

And James is telling them to “Count it all joy!”

I cannot begin to understand what they must have thought when they read the letter from James. But let’s take a look at what James is saying to them and to us.

Brethren simply means: those of us who believe

Count: Two things to consider

Count means to number and bring to remembrance all the past trials you have experienced so that you can reflect on how God brought you through them. Do you remember when Moses had the children of Israel place huge rocks on the other side of the Red Sea so that they could remember how God saved them from the Egyptians? Same thing.

Count up all the times when God brought you through these trials.

Specifically: Journal the details and the results of your most recent trial.

Count could also mean to consider, to evaluate. Our human nature does not automatically REJOICE during trials, therefore we must do just the opposite of what we would do (Phil 3:1)

Count ….number it… ALL (everything) joy …. A state of emotion of happiness.

This is only possible with spiritual maturity. It is going to take a lot of work on my part.

Count it all joy when…not if…but when…in other words no getting around those trial…you are going to fall so just brace yourself.

Please read James 1:4-8 this week.