JAMES 1:22

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.

TO PONDER

I love James. This is not one of the sons of Zebedee, brother of the apostle John, but the brother of Jesus. We understand that he struggled to accept who Jesus was until after Jesus’s death and resurrection. He became leader of the church in Jerusalem. His letter is about practical, living Christianity.

I know that some of you reading this may not have a Lutheran background, so you may not relate to this, and it is generally no longer true. But my upbringing in the Lutheran church, quite some decades ago, was all about knowledge. We went to Sunday School and heard the Bible stories and learned Bible verses and the catechism. But we didn’t talk about living in the security of a loving relationship with God. When we spent a year in Confirmation classes, we went into the catechism in greater depth. This is a very valuable document and I don’t want to belittle its importance, but the way it was taught was the teacher would ask a question and then teach the student what the correct answer was. It was very easy to be all about head knowledge. The practical aspect of living out the answers was never mentioned – or if it was, it had so little impact on me that I don’t remember it.

The impact on me was that later on, as a young adult, I didn’t have many answers to the challenges I faced in my relationships with others, and I had a very distorted view of what my relationship with God was supposed to be.

Thankfully, the Christian training of our children has developed a lot since then, and we have learned how important the way we adults live our lives in our relationships with others, including children, has a huge impact on our children growing to understand that being a child of God is not about being good, but in trusting God’s unconditional love for them.

James’s advice is not to stop listening to God’s word to us, and only be busy doing stuff. He wants us to apply what we hear from God’s word to our daily lives. For example, when we read that God has forgiven our failures and mistakes, do we still let ourselves be loaded down with a sense of guilt and failure, or do we rather thank God for the forgiveness and the promise of Holy Spirit, and get going again trusting Holy Spirit to teach us how to respond with God’s love when we face similar situations.

Or, when you face challenges in life, is your first response, “O God, why have you let this happen to me”, or rather, do you remember God’s promise to always be with us and respond, “OK, God, You have identified something in my life You need to deal with, so although I might not always enjoy what You are about to do, I will willing go with you on this journey, knowing that It will grow me in my relationship with you.”

As we grow in our relationship with the Heavenly Family, it will change how we read our bibles and listen to God’s revelations to us. Yes, we will still enjoy growing in our head knowledge, but we will also seek to understand how God wants to be actively involved in our lives for us to be a reflection of God’s love to those we interact with each day.

Prayer: Heavenly Father, I so much want to grow in living as Your child, sharing Your love with all those I meet each day. Thank You for the bible which helps us to know who You are and how You want to be involved in our lives, but also that You are there, through Your Spirit, in all my activities of each day guiding me in living out what I have learned from Your word to us. Amen

Today's devotion written by Charles Bertelsmeier, LifeWay Epping