Have you ever gotten a phone call or a text from someone who just identifies themselves by their first name? Hi, It’s Matt! And you are thinking: which Matt? Or maybe you immediately go to that Matt.
There was a time in my life when I had a plethora of Mikes in my immediate circle. And if I mentioned Mike to Angela, her question was: which Mike?
Mike Kneebone, Mike White or Mike Gillette? And if I got a call that began with the words, “Hi Denn, It’s Mike.” There were times that I assumed I was chatting to my Cornerstone Mike when in reality I was chatting to my Bedford Days Mike.
And then life changed, and Mike Kneebone became the obvious Mike.
There are some people who we immediately recognize by their first name. Cher. Elvis. Rihanna. Napoleon. Jesus.
But for the most part we need something to help identify someone who simply identifies themselves that way.
And it gets more difficult as life changes and time goes by.
When we first got married, someone gave us a guest book as a wedding gift. Anyone else get a guest book as a wedding gift? How many of you have no idea what a guest book is?
Angela faithfully had guests sign our book, and then when it was filled, we got another one, and then another one.
We have guest books that go back to 1982.
Every once in a while, I will pick up an old guest book and flip through it, and I have no idea who some of the people are who signed it. I did at the time. I mean, we invited them into our house, but now, not a clue.
We are beginning a new series at Cornerstone on the book of James, which is the 20th book of the New Testament, nestled between 2 Peter and the book of Hebrews.
It is rightfully called the Letter from James, because it is included in a grouping called the General Epistles. Contrary to popular opinion, the Epistles weren’t the wives of the Apostles. It’s a fancy term for a letter.
Many scholars say it could be the earliest written book of the New Testament.
Some call it the Proverbs of the New Testament, because instead of focusing on abstract theology, its main focus is on how the believer ought to behave, and how that is brought about by wise living.
It helps us fix things that are stuck in our Christian life, kind of like spiritual WD-40.
With that in mind, let’s go back to the original question. Have you ever gotten a phone call or a text from someone who just identifies themselves by their first name?
This was long before phone calls or texts, but the letter opens with these words. James 1:1 This letter is from James, a slave of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ. I am writing to the “twelve tribes”—Jewish believers scattered abroad. Greetings!
Now we might be thinking, James? James who? But apparently, the believers the letter was addressed to knew who the letter was from, but for those of us who weren’t there, we have to dig a little deeper.
There are three main candidates.
James, the brother of John, son of Zebedee. But he was martyred early, around 44 AD, which likely rules him out.
There’s another apostle, sometimes called James the Less… which, let’s be honest, is not a nickname you want to carry through life. However, other than being mentioned as one of the twelve, there is no evidence that he was a leader in the early church.
But the most likely author, and the one most of the early church points to, is James, the brother of Jesus.
Which is interesting because in the Gospels it would appear that Jesus’ siblings didn’t believe that the one they grew up with was the Messiah. But apparently, the resurrection changed everything for James.
Because very early in the book of Acts, we read this Acts 1:14 They all met together and were constantly united in prayer, along with Mary, the mother of Jesus, several other women, and the brothers of Jesus.
And James goes from being a skeptic to becoming a pastor, a shepherd, and eventually a leader in the early church.
So, let’s start from the beginning because the beginning is often the best place to begin.
James 1:1 This letter is from James, a slave of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ. I am writing to the “twelve tribes”—Jewish believers scattered abroad. Greetings!
He begins by telling them, You May Be Scattered, But You Are Not Forgotten.
In the Wesleyan Bible Commentary, Michael J. Walters writes,“So we look at this letter as a writing addressed to the believing communities, the majority of whom are suffering from grinding poverty and hostile environments.”
Remember, James is in Jerusalem, and he’s writing to Christians scattered around what was then the known world.
You’ll remember from two weeks ago the story about the development of the early church, in particular the account found in Acts 8:1 . . .A great wave of persecution began that day, sweeping over the church in Jerusalem; and all the believers except the apostles were scattered through the regions of Judea and Samaria.
These were the believers whom James was writing to, and this wasn’t as easy as including a CC on an email or even running off multiple copies and putting them in separate envelopes.
It probably meant writing the letter on parchment, and sending it with a messenger, who would take it to each church community, have it read and then take the original to the next community.
And so, James begins by telling them, I might be here and you might be there, but you are not forgotten.
They had been forced to move, far from their family and friends, and to start over because of the persecution they were facing as Christians.
I’m sure some of them must have been thinking; this isn’t what I signed up for. How come we had to move, but James and the rest of them get to stay in Jerusalem?
Perhaps they had forgotten why they had to move and had romanticized how life had been in Jerusalem.
That happened when the people of Israel were escaping slavery in Egypt. Remember, they had been slaves.
They had been forced to work in horrible conditions. At one point, Pharaoh had ordered their newborn male children to be killed.
But how did some of them remember their former lives? Numbers 11:5–6 “We remember the fish we used to eat for free in Egypt. And we had all the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic we wanted. But now our appetites are gone. All we ever see is this manna!”
We may have been slaves, but we had all the garlic and onions we could eat.
When I was working at sea, I was the worst sailor ever. My dad used to say that I could get seasick on wet grass.
But when I wasn’t at sea, I didn’t remember how sick I could be when it was rough, or quasi rough. No, I remembered the beautiful moonlit nights, the awesomeness of being able to look at that the nothingness of the sea. The magnificence of the sunrises and sunsets.
And so, James writes to let them know that they haven’t been forgotten.
In 2017, I made my first trip to Egypt, and it was an interesting itinerary.
You might recall that in the previous twelve months, there had been several terrorist attacks in Egypt targeting the Christian community. Those attacks left over 100 Christians dead, and three churches were bombed.
And so, we visited Wesleyan Churches in the five communities directly affected by the attacks.
We weren’t there to fix anything. We weren’t there to solve anything.
We were there for one reason and to say one thing: You are not forgotten.
And once James reminds them, they are not forgotten. He tells them something they probably didn’t want to hear.
Let’s continue with the letter.
James 1:2–4 Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles of any kind come your way, consider it an opportunity for great joy. For you know that when your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.
Your Circumstances Are Creating a Better You
When our kids were little, if things got tough, I’d tell them it built character, to which Stephen, our son would respond, “I don’t want to be a character.”
But this is what James is telling his listeners.
I recently had the opportunity to hear John Maxwell speak. And as often happened when I’ve heard John speak through the years, I bought his latest book. “How To Get a Return on Failure.”
Chapter five is entitled Embrace the Value of Hard, and Maxwell begins by quoting M. Scott Peck from his book The Road Less Travelled. And Peck wrote, “Once we truly know that life is difficult — once we truly understand and accept it — then life is no longer difficult.”
Maxwell goes on to say, “If you want to achieve anything in life, you need to embrace the value of hard and accept that climbing is challenging, strenuous, difficult and sometimes even gruelling. You must be intentional, willful, and consistent to arrive anywhere worth going.”
And that is not an easy message, because we don’t want life to be all about uphill, but Maxwell reminds us we are either climbing uphill or we will be sliding downhill. We want the hard to stop, for there to be a finish line.
Life is hard. And James doesn’t deny that. Instead, he defines it. When I first read this, I thought he was talking about a church and people who were facing persecution. The reality is that he was talking about a church and a people who were facing life.
He tells the early church that they could languish in the hard or they could understand it and allow the hard to make them better.
And it wasn’t a new message; Jesus had told his followers the same thing during his earthly ministry.
It was just before his arrest and eventual execution that Jesus told the twelve, John 16:33 “I have told you all this so that you may have peace in me. Here on earth you will have many trials and sorrows. But take heart, because I have overcome the world.”
He was telling them that life was hard and that was normal.
I’m sure that 2000 years ago, living in an occupied country, they didn’t need a reminder that life would have many sorrows and trials.
But they needed a reminder, firstly that was life, and secondly that he was going to be with them, through the hard.
There isn’t one of us here today who needs a reminder that in our lives, we will have many sorrows and trials.
But in a world of carefully curated and edited social media and filtered Instagram posts, we need a reminder that that is life.
And secondly, we need a reminder that Jesus is with us, through the hard. Like those James was writing to, and like the church in Egypt, we all need to know that we have not been forgotten.
So, let’s keep reading.
James 1:5–8 If you need wisdom, ask our generous God, and he will give it to you. He will not rebuke you for asking. But when you ask him, be sure that your faith is in God alone. Do not waver, for a person with divided loyalty is as unsettled as a wave of the sea that is blown and tossed by the wind. Such people should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Their loyalty is divided between God and the world, and they are unstable in everything they do.
God Has the Wisdom We Need, If We Want It
If the reality is that life is hard, and hard is normal, then the question we need to be asking isn’t “How do I get out of this?” but “What can I learn from this?”
Because wisdom isn’t about knowing everything, it’s about knowing how to respond.
Facing the hard and learning from it takes courage, resilience and wisdom. And if we go through the hard without ever learning, then we’ve missed the lesson.
Don’t be tempted to make excuses. Instead look for the lesson. My favourite quote from the morning I spent listening to John Maxwell was, “Our best excuses are our worst excuses, because we believe them.”
It was Thomas Edison, when working on developing incandescent lighting, who said, “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work”.
Sometimes, we think this scripture is a promise that we will be able to know everything, that if we ask God, he will reveal to us the answer to life. Which by the way is 42.
What James is telling those he was writing to, and us is we need to ask; God what will you have us learn from the hard? And then accepting what God reveals to us.
When I was in university, my theology professor used to pray before he handed out exams, asking God to help us remember what we had studied.
And my response was I didn’t need help remembering what I studied. I need help remembering what I hadn’t studied.
And then, James warns us James 1:6–8 But when you ask him, be sure that your faith is in God alone. Do not waver, for a person with divided loyalty is as unsettled as a wave of the sea that is blown and tossed by the wind. Such people should not expect to receive anything from the Lord. Their loyalty is divided between God and the world, and they are unstable in everything they do.
It has been famously said that if you have one watch, you will always know what time it is, but if you have two, you’ll never be sure.
We need to allow God to teach us, and if we are getting conflicting messages from society and culture, we need to lean into God.
This can be tough, because James isn’t just talking about asking, he’s talking about undivided trust.
I’ve mentioned before that when I check my weather app for the forecast, if I don’t like it, I will check a couple of others to see if I can find a forecast I like.
Which is relatively harmless, but if we ask God for wisdom, and don’t like what we hear, and go looking for other wisdom, then we end up divided and pulled in different directions.
The issue isn’t that God is unwilling to give wisdom; it’s that we’re often unwilling to fully trust the wisdom He gives.
So, as we go through life, the question isn’t just, “God, what do You want me to learn?” It’s also, “God, will I trust what You show me, even when it’s not what I wanted to hear?”
Let’s finish up with these last two verses, James 1:9–11. Believers who are poor have something to boast about, for God has honoured them. And those who are rich should boast that God has humbled them. They will fade away like a little flower in the field. The hot sun rises and the grass withers; the little flower droops and falls, and its beauty fades away. In the same way, the rich will fade away with all of their achievements.
The last lesson we have here is Your Circumstances Are Not Your Identity
In the culture that James lived in, people’s worth was often measured by their wealth.
And it wasn’t just their material worth it was spiritualized. Many people viewed material blessings as evidence of spiritual blessings. If you had more, then God must love you more, because he blessed you with more.
I am so glad we don’t do that today.
If you missed it, that was sarcasm; it’s one of my spiritual gifts.
Other times, it’s not what we have in life, it’s where we are in life. The circumstances we find ourselves in.
And so, James reminds his readers that our circumstances are fleeting and we can’t allow them to define who we are.
You are struggling with your health, either physical or mental. You’ve lost your job. Your spouse has left you. You have a child who has chosen to be estranged.
And before long, those circumstances start to define how we see ourselves, and eventually, because we define ourselves that way, others begin to see us like that as well.
But circumstances change.
Where you are now is not where you will always be.
If you read through the Psalms, it’s not long before you realize that the author, King David, often wrestled with depression and his sense of self-worth.
However, he leaned into his belief that things not only would change, but they would change for the better .
We hear that in Psalm 30:5 Weeping may last through the night, but joy comes with the morning.
Today, it’s not just our material and life circumstances that we can allow to define us, but our physical blessings as well.
Just as we can’t allow what we own to dictate our identity, we can’t allow how we look to do the same.
How often have you heard people described as the young one, or the old one, the pretty one or the plain one, the thin one or the heavy one?
It’s tough, especially in the age of Facebook, Instagram and TikTok, but don’t allow your physical appearance to define who you are as an individual.
Again, going back to the Psalms, David wrote, Psalm 139:14–17 Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvellous—how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed. How precious are your thoughts about me, O God. They cannot be numbered!
You are precious. Regardless of the circumstances you find yourself, you are precious in the sight of God. The creator and master of the universe.
And he doesn’t need to use filters to see you the way you are.
Your circumstances may describe your situation, but they do not define who you are.
James is writing to people whose lives have been turned upside down, and he’s reminding them: You are not forgotten. Your struggle is not wasted. God will give you what you need.
And what you’re going through right now is not who you are.”
And the reason we can say all of that, the reason we can believe all of that,
is because of what Jesus has already done for us.
We don’t gather around this table because life is easy.
We gather because Christ is faithful.
Communion is a reminder that you are not forgotten.
That your struggle is not wasted.
That God has already done what was necessary to redeem you, and is still at work in you.
Because on the cross, Jesus didn’t just deal with your sin. He declared your worth.
And so today, we come to the table, not defined by our circumstances,
but defined by His grace.