All right, good morning, church family.
As you find your seat, let me invite you to open your Bibles
or type in your devices the book of James chapter 1.
And this morning we're going to be in verses 22 to 26.
We've been going through James for, I don't know, maybe if
several weeks now, and we've been going at at a pretty slow
pace. This morning we're in James 122
to 26. The title of the sermon is this,
The danger of listening without obedience.
And so let's read the text. I'll open this in a word of
prayer, and then we'll jump into the sermon this morning.
James one beginning in verse 22. But be doers of the word and not
hearers only, deceiving yourselves.
For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like
a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror.
For he looks at himself and goes away, and at once forgets what
he was like. But the one who looks into the
perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer
who forgets, but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his
doing. If anyone thinks he is religious
and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this
person's religion is worthless. You pray with me, Father.
I pray this morning that you would help us all to listen well
this morning and that you would also help us to go beyond that.
Guard us, God, from listening well, period.
Help us, God, to be a doer of the word.
That what we learned here this morning, what we learned next
week, last week, small group, Friday night discipleship, our
own private time of reading. Lord, help us to put into
practice and to obey what you have taught us, what we have
listened to. God, we, we recognize, we, we
see these words on the page that we are called to be doers of the
word and we pray God, you would give us the grace to do that now
and in the coming week. Lord, I pray this in the name of
Jesus, Amen. We've all heard the phrases.
Actions speak louder than words. Or maybe practice what you
preach. Or maybe talk is cheap or you
should walk the talk. Or maybe well done is better
than well said. He's all kind of hit on the
topic of what James is telling this morning, that as Christians
we can do a lot of listening and a lot of speaking.
This morning you are listening and you will be speaking in just
a few moments. I I am speaking.
We can do a lot of listening and a lot of speaking, but all of it
is for nothing if it is not accompanied by a lot of doing.
There is a great danger in the Christian life of listening
without obedience. That's what the sermon is about
this morning is the danger of us to listen well, but to not obey
what we hear. So let's start with the next
edition of the text. I'm going to explain the text
and try to open it up to its meaning for us and then I will
apply it. I have 6 points of application
this morning, but let's start with our text.
Verse 22 A where James writes but be doers of the word and not
hearers. Only last week we saw that James
exhorted the church that all of us are to be quick to hear and
slow to speak. But now James wants to warn us
about a hidden danger that exists with this.
And the danger is that someone can be quick to hear but
actually be slow to obey, right? In other words, we can get that
right. We can be quick to hear but
actually be slow to obey. This is why James begins the
sentence with the word. But he says, but be doers of the
word and not hearers only doers Hear means one who does what is
prescribed. You could even translate this be
obeyers of the word. Last week James had exhorted the
church to receive the implanted word with meekness.
And now he specifies what does that actually mean to receive
the word with meekness? And here's what it means.
It means to do it in the words. The way to know if you have
received the word with meekness is if you do it, do you put it
into practice? Jesus said, My mother and my
brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.
Luke 821. Jesus said in John 1317, If you
know these things, blessed are you.
If you do them, look at 22B deceiving yourselves.
Be doers of the word, not hearers only deceiving
yourselves. James's argument is that if a
person is a hearer only and not a doer, they are actually
deceiving themselves. Notice James doesn't say they
are being deceived, he says in fact we actually deceive
ourselves. How so?
Well, because knowledge can be deceptive.
Theology and doctrine can be deceptive.
How so? It can make us feel like we're
spiritually fine. We listen well, we know a lot,
we are well read. But if we don't put it in
practice, what we have heard, what we have read, we are
actually deceiving ourselves. Look at verse 23 to 24.
For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like
a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror.
For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he
was like. James now gives a mini parable
to make his point. He gets like a mini parable to
make his point. He says if anyone is a hearer of
the word, so they listen to the word, but they are not a doer.
They don't put into practice what they have heard.
He is like a man who looks intently.
Looks intently is actually one word in the Greek.
It means to look at it in a reflective manner, to
contemplate, to consider. It means to think about
something carefully. So this is not a casual glance.
This is not someone you know. You walk by a mirror and you
just kind of like, like this is not a casual glance.
There's a contemplation here. This is like someone who looks
in the mirror and is sit there is contemplating, reflecting,
contemplating, reflecting what James says his natural face in a
mirror, his natural face. The word for natural is the
Greek word genesis. That's where the word genesis
comes from. It's a Greek word.
It means origin or birth. Literally, it translates.
He's contemplating the face of his birth.
That's what it says, the face of his birth.
So what's going on here is that this man is staring at himself
in a mirror. He's contemplating his own face.
He looks into the mirror. He's contemplating what he sees
in this mirror, James says, For he looks at himself.
This is the same Greek word as looks intently, for he
contemplates himself. And as he contemplates, he goes
away, steps away from the mirror and at once he forgets what he
was like. What does that mean?
Could also be translated. Forgets what kind of person he
was. Could also be translated.
Forgets what he looks like. Could also be translated either
those. What is the point of this mini
parable? As I read this before, I
normally when I prepare sermons, I, I read the text, I try to
understand it myself and and and bring out meaning.
And sometimes I come across something and I'm like James, I
don't get it, man. I don't I don't get the point
you're making here. What what is the point of this
mini parable? And I found four helpful
explanations by commentators. I think they're all true.
I'm not going to choose between them.
I just like to whenever there's choices and they're all true,
I'll just take them all four helpful.
Let me read these to you. They're rather short.
The verses by Peter Davids. Here's what he writes.
The point is that the impression is only momentary.
The look in the mirror while combing one's hair may be
temporarily absorbing, but it normally bears no practical
results. When 1 engages in the business
of the day, it is useless. The momentariness and the lack
of real effect is the point of the parable.
In other words, you comb your hair in the mirror and then you
just go about your day. It's just a momentary thought to
the status of your hair, and that's it.
That's one second, Craig Blomberg writes, We begin to
wonder if perhaps this illustration is not better
understood as a deliberately ridiculous analogy.
For no one in their right mind who examines their image that
closely would then utterly neglect the flaws they discover
and instantly forget whatever they had seen.
Likewise, James seeks to stress how ludicrous it is for people
so rapidly to ignore and forget what they have heard.
What James is getting at is that imagine if you looked in the
mirror and you saw like, you know, your your roommate in the
middle of the night took Sharpie and wrote something on your
head, on your forehead. You saw it in the mirror, you
study it, you're like, what in the world who did this?
And then you just walked away as though it didn't exist, didn't
do anything about it. That would be crazy, right?
That's what James is saying is like when we listen to the word
and do nothing about it, there's another one, Baker writes.
It's like a person who examines intently his very own face in
the mirror, but within seconds, he cannot even pick himself out
of a police lineup. In other words, if I were to
look in the mirror, know what I look like, and then somebody
gave me a police lineup of suspects, I'm in that lineup.
And I'm like, I don't recognize any of these people.
Here's one more, Martin writes. What is seen in the mirror is
meant to lead to action, usually regarded as remedial.
For example, a dirty face that needs washing.
Yet this person goes away and fails to deal with the flaws
that the mirror revealed. It's very similar to the other
one. The idea here is that it may.
I think the the the general idea here is that it would be
ridiculous for someone to look in a mirror, study their face,
see flaws, see things that need to be corrected, and then just
walk away as though they don't exist.
Just pretend like nothing's wrong, James says.
That's what it's like when someone hears the word and then
they don't do anything about it. Look at verse 25-A.
But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty,
the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty.
James is now going to contrast this man in the many parable,
the man in verses 23 to 24. He's going to contrast it with
another kind of man. This kind of man is the one who
looks into, looks into. Now this is a different Greek
word than the one we just looked at.
This is the same Greek word used of John when he ran into the
tomb. Remember when Peter and John ran
to the tomb? Peter runs first, but then John
outruns him, right? He gets there.
When he gets there, he doesn't go into the tomb.
It says that he's stooped to look in.
That's that. That word there is like, so it's
like when you get to the tomb and he goes like this, he Stoops
to look in. That's the word that's used
there. It's the same word used of Mary
when Mary went to the tomb. And the text says that Mary
stooped to look in same exact word.
And so that's the idea is that James is saying is that the one
who looks into the law, the law of liberty, they stoop to look
in at this law, this law of liberty, the law of the law of
liberty. Now what is that?
What is the perfect law? The law of liberty?
When we first have to talk about what is this word law mean here
one of the difficulties of the word law.
This is true for any passage you read in the New Testament.
When you come across the word law in the New Testament, you
have to ask yourself how is the author using this word?
Because it is used in many different contexts and has many
different meanings. For example, Paul writes in
Romans 614, since you are not under law but under grace,
you're not under the law but under grace.
But then in Galatians 6/2 he writes bear one another's
burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ.
Paul says we're not under law. He says to fulfill the law.
How to make sense of that? He's using law differently
there. So how is James using law?
Here? James gives us 2 clues with his
descriptions #1 he calls it the perfect law.
The one who looks into the perfect law.
The Greek word for perfect often has the nuance of mature or
complete, right? It can be translated perfect,
mature, or complete. So what I think James is saying
is that this is not just the 613 commands of the Old Testament.
He's not saying that the one who looks into the Old Testament law
613 commands. He's saying the one looks into
the mature, perfect, complete law.
In other words, all of Scripture, the entire Bible,
this whole thing is the perfect law.
That's how he's using it there. Number two, he calls it the law
of liberty. You could also translate it, the
law of freedom. That would be a good
translation. The law of freedom.
That's best explained in the book of Galatians.
If you remember that in Galatians Paul was encouraging
or exhorting or commanding the church there in Galatia to not
submit to the law that the Judaizers were trying to get him
tell them to do. The Judaizers were telling them
they had to get circumcised. And Paul says do not submit to a
yoke of slavery for freedom. Christ has set us free.
In other words, the law of Christ is meant to set us free,
not to bring us back into bondage.
If you get circumcised, you're going to be going back into
slavery. And he says Christ came to set
us free from this bondage. And so James is using the law of
liberty and that sense here. So James writes that the one who
Stoops to look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and
perseveres and perseveres, not only do they look into it, they
persevere. This is not the normal Greek
word for persevere, the word for abide.
And John 15, you know all those uses of abide in John 15.
The word for abide in John 15 is meno.
This is the Greek word para meno.
Para meno. It means to continue in an
official capacity. It could have take the nuance of
abiding. They can't take the nuance of
abiding. That's how the NASB translates
it. The one who abides by it.
They don't translate as persevere.
They translate it as the one who abides by it.
You could translate it that way. Look at verse 25-B.
The one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty,
perseveres, being no hearer who forgets, but a doer who acts.
He will be blessed in his doing. James writes that the one who
looks into the law and abides by it abides in it, meaning he's no
here who forgets he's no. He is a doer who acts.
He takes action on what he has heard.
He will be blessed in his doing. Blessed here is not the way that
the world uses blessing. The world uses blessing in the
sense of health and wealth, right?
That's what blessing is to the world is health and wealth.
And that's not how James is using it here.
Why? How do we know this?
Because being a doer of the Word will probably lead to less
worldly blessings and often more trials.
James is using blessed here in the way that Jesus uses blessed
in Matthew 5. When Jesus says blessed are the
poor and spirit. Blessed are those who mourn, the
meek, those who hunger and thirst, the merciful, the pure
in heart, the peacemakers and the persecuted.
Look at verse 26. A if anyone thinks he is
religious and does not bridle his tongue, If anyone thinks
he's religious and does not bridle his tongue, now I'm not
going to address the phrase in this sermon.
Does not bridle his tongue. All right, I want to say ever,
but I almost almost never skip over anything in the scripture.
I preach on all of it. For now, I'm going to skip over
it because in chapter 3, James is going to spend 11 verses
talking about the tongue, and I don't want to steal that Thunder
right now. So I'm going to talk about that.
When I get to chapter 3, I'll talk about the tongue and I'll
address this phrase there. But I will address the basic
argument that James is making here.
James says if anyone thinks he is religious.
Now, we first have to ask, what does it mean to be religious,
right? What does it mean to be
religious? Not a phrase we usually use,
right? We don't talk about or it's not
a phrase I use. I don't think most of us use it.
I'm a religious person. What does it mean to be
religious? This is the only time this word
is used in the New Testament. Only time it's cognate though,
for religion is used a few times.
It's used in Acts 26 five where Paul says that he obeyed
according to the strictest party of our religion.
I lived as a Pharisee. It's also used in Colossus 218
where Paul writes insisting on asceticism and worship of
angels. That word worship.
There is actually the same word for religion, religion of
angels. The definition of religious is
this pertaining to being devoted to a proper expression of
religious beliefs. You could translate it as devout
or pious. That's the idea here.
Devout or pious. Notice that James says if anyone
thinks, thinks in other words. So this is somebody who
considers themselves devout, considers themselves pious.
They are devout Christian. They are devout or devout
religious person, a pious person, he says.
If that's if they think that. But their actions do not line up
with their beliefs. And in this particular case, it
gives the example of not bridling one's tongue.
But he could have given any example.
Here James says that this is that person deceives their own
heart. They deceive their own heart.
James is making a similar point as he did in verse 22 where he
says just as a person who live who listens but doesn't obey
deceives themselves, so does a person who thinks they are pious
and devout but doesn't obey deceive themselves.
He's making the same point. Look at and then look what he
says. It's 26B.
This person's religion is worthless.
James pulls no punches here. I love this because as a pastor,
you know, sometimes you can get the pulpit and you can, like,
tell people their religion is worthless and then get upset
with you. And I'm like, I didn't tell you
that the Bible did. This person's religion is
worthless. He has no problem telling the
church the hard truth. James says that a person who
thinks he is religious, thinks he is pious, thinks he is
devout, but they don't obey what they believe.
This person's religion is worthless.
Notice he's not saying the religion is worthless.
He's not saying the religion. He's saying this person's
religion is worthless. Now what does that mean?
The word for worthless is used six times in the New Testament.
It can be translated as vain or futile.
It's defined as pertaining to being of no use, idle, empty,
fruitless, useless, powerless, lacking truth.
In other words, the Christian who lives a double life is
living a worthless life. We'll stop there with our
exposition application of the text.
What do we do with this? 6 truths #1 There are no points
for merely listening, only for doing.
There are no points for merely listening, only doing.
One of the most important parts of the Christian walk is
listening. Let's be clear on that.
The Bible is replete with commands to listen.
The most foundational verse for the Israelites in the Old
Testament is what we call the Shema.
Shema is the Hebrew word for hear, hear, O Israel, the Lord
our God the Lord is 1 Paul writes in Romans 1017.
Faith comes by what hearing? Three times in the Gospels Jesus
told the crowd He who has ears to hear, let him hear.
And the revelation Jesus gave the exact same exertration to
all 7 churches. He said he who has an ear, let
him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.
He cannot over emphasize the importance of listening in the
Christian walk. We just can't.
And yet there are no points for merely listening, only for
doing. Let me give some basic
analogies. Very basic analogies.
Suppose a basketball team is really good at listening to
their coach. Really good.
They learn the plays, they know how to diagram them, they know
how to explain them. They know them backwards and
forwards. But come game time, they don't
actually run them. There is no stat line for
listening well. Or suppose a student goes to
medical school to become a surgeon.
They listen to their, his or her professors really well.
They get perfect grades. They know the medical textbooks
backwards and forwards. But come surgery time, they
don't follow what they learned. When you go in for surgery, you
don't want a surgeon who just listens.
Well, one of the worst things that we can do here this
morning, it's to be really good listeners, period.
One of the worst things we can do is to get an A and listening
period. James writes that we must be
doers of the word and not hearers only.
Meaning, if we leave this place week after week, if we read our
Bibles week after week, if we meet up for discipleship week
after week, and we make little to no changes in our life, we
have wasted our time #2 Don't let knowledge and doctrine
inoculate us from an accurate assessment of ourselves.
Don't let knowledge and doctrine inoculate us from an accurate
assessment of ourselves. There is a danger of listening
without obedience. Let me say it again, There is a
danger of listening without obedience.
It's like a plumber with a leaky faucet, or a dentist with
crooked teeth, or a personal trainer who was overweight, or a
mechanic with a broken down car, or a lifeguard who can't swim,
or a financial advisor in debt. So is a regularly attending
church member who listens but doesn't obey.
James writes that a person who listens to the Word but doesn't
do it, they deceive themselves. Now, how did they deceive
themselves? How does that work?
Knowledge and doctrine can inoculate us from an accurate
assessment of ourselves. What does that mean?
There are church members. This is true at our church.
It's true at every church in America or across the world.
Even there are church members who listen very well.
I mean, they always listen very, very well, and they can
perfectly explain the Trinity, the Incarnation, the hypostatic
union of Christ, predestination, election, the atonement, the
problem of evil. And yet they are regularly
looking at pornography or getting angry everyday, or
cheating on their taxes or gluttons, or give very little,
or consistently impatient in their marriage.
Have you ever considered why do pastors and theologians and
seminary professors and Christian apologists and
missionaries fall into egregious sins?
Why does that happen? Because they deceive themselves,
they deceive themselves. You can get so used to
listening, your ears can become so accustomed to the truth that
you fail to put it into practice.
You see, the sword of the Spirit is intended to cut us.
It's intended to cut you. It's intended to cut me.
But our incessant listening only has produced calluses that keep
us from being cut to the heart, Paul writes.
It is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God,
but is the doers of the law who will be justified.
Think about that. It is the doers of the law who
will be justified. Don't let knowledge and doctrine
inoculate you from an accurate assessment of yourself #3 Every
Christian must wrestle with the absurdity of our own cognitive
dissonance. Every Christian must wrestle
with the absurdity of our own cognitive dissonance.
What you I know most. You probably know this, but if
you don't, what is cognitive dissonance?
Here's the definition. Cognitive dissonance is a
psychological phenomenon that occurs when a person experiences
mental discomfort or stress due to holding two or more
conflicting beliefs, values, or attitudes, or when their
behavior conflicts with their beliefs.
This discomfort often motivates the person to change their
beliefs or justify their behavior or avoid contradictory
information in order to reduce the dissonance and definition.
So let me give you some examples of this.
Let me put some. A person is smoking a cigarette,
and as they smoke it, they say, yeah, I know, I know I
shouldn't, I know I'm killing myself.
But they just, they just keep puffing.
A person is working out to lose weight.
They worked out hard, but then they go home and they eat a
bunch of junk food and they say, yeah, I know, I know I shouldn't
eat this, but they just continue eating it anyway.
A person needs to get a task done and they say, I know, I
know, I need to get up off the couch and do it, but they don't
get up. They just sit there.
A biblical example. This is what Paul writes in
Romans 719. For I do not do the good I want,
but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing.
Even the apostle Paul acknowledges that there's a
cognitive dissonance here. And James writes, this is like a
man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror.
He goes away and at once he forgets what he is like.
Let me give an illustration of the point that James is making.
Let me give an illustration of the point he's making.
I'm going to tell it from the I'm, since I'm a, I'm a dude,
I'll tell it from a guy perspective.
Imagine if you have wanted to date this girl for two years.
You know, you have this girl that you've been observing for
two years. You really like her.
You've been wanting to date her for two years.
You finally work up enough courage to ask her out, right?
And when you do, she actually says yes.
She's like, yeah, I'll go out with you.
So you have a date on Friday or Saturday?
Saturday, Saturday. So you pick out your best
outfit. You get a shower, comb your
hair, put on some Cologne, and get ready to pick her up.
But before you pick her up, you are starving and you don't want
to be distracted with how hungry you are.
So you run to Costco. You order a hot dog with
mustard. You scarf down this hot dog
before you leave Costco's food court.
You go to the bathroom to make sure you look all right in the
mirror. As you look in the mirror, you
notice you have mustard smeared across your cheek and you have
hot dog in your teeth. And you look at it and you see
it. And then you just walk away
pretending like you never saw anything.
And you show up to your date with mustard smeared on your
cheek and hot dog in your teeth. That's what James says.
It's like when we listen to the word and we don't do anything
about it. See, listening is intended to
reveal our flaws. It lovingly shows us our
shortcomings. It lovingly shows us where I
need to make changes, where I need to grow, where I need to
correct something. We should never resent the
mirror. It's only revealing what is true
and what needs to change. 4 Obedience is always freedom and
always blessing. Obedience is always freedom and
it's always blessing. Now I was thinking about this
passes as to why all of us, including myself, why do we all
wrestle with being a hearer of the word and not a doer?
Why do all of us, including myself, why do we all wrestle
with hearing the truth and but then not doing it?
Why do we all wrestle that? It occurred to me that there's
still a part of our sinful nature convincing us that
obedience equals slavery and obedience equals misfortune.
There's still a part of us that that believes that.
Let me give some examples. Doing personal spiritual
disciplines, right? We all know that we should do
them. We can feel like, though, that
spending the time to do personal spirit discipline is enslaving,
right? It's enslaving that I have to
spend the time to do this, or waking up early to do them is
enslaving or take the command to forgive.
We know that we need to forgive this person that hurt us or
offended us or wounded us, but we can feel like that if we do
so, we will be taken advantage of.
Forgiveness enslaves us to being a doormat.
We can feel that way or think about giving, and we'd have so
much more money if we didn't give.
We can easily feel enslaved to generosity or perhaps just
misfortune. Perhaps it's just misfortune,
right? If I obey here, I've had this
situation as a pastor where somebody told me what should I
do? And I'm like, you should quit
your job or you should not quit. You should do this.
And they're like, if I do that, I'll get fired.
So get fired. If I obey here, it may cost my
job. If I obey here, it may cost the
relationship. I've talked to girls before.
They're like, if, if we don't sleep together, he'll break up
with me then then let him break up with you if that's the only
reason he's with you. He don't love you.
If I obey here, it may cost my comfort.
If I obey here, it may cost my life.
Brother, sister, obedience is always freedom.
It's always blessing. Always, always, always, James
writes. The one who looks into the
perfect law, the law of liberty and other words, obedience is
not enslaving, it is actually free.
A fish is not enslaved to water, it is freed by the water.
Land is slavery for the fish. A well rested person is not
enslaved to sleep, they are freed by sleep.
The tired person is enslaved. A sports team is not enslaved to
the rules. They are set free to win by
competing according to the rules.
The team that cheats and is disqualified is enslaved.
A person who budgets their money is not enslaved to their budget.
They are set free to have spending power.
The person who was in debt is enslaved.
A physically fit person is not enslaved to their exercise.
They are set free to not be injured.
Health conditions and injuries are enslaving.
Obedience is always free. Always.
And obedience is always a blessing, James writes.
He will be blessed in his doing. There is almost never a day
where I see an image online or a woman at the gym and I am
tempted to look, to stare because I think this will make
me happy and I have to constantly remind myself this
will not lead to my blessing. It won't lead to my blessing.
There is almost never a week where somebody says something
hurtful to me or offensive to me and I am tempted to say
something back to them or about them.
Why? Because I think I will feel
better saying it and I have to constantly remind myself this
will not lead to my blessing. Purity will lead to my blessing.
Meekness will lead to my blessing. 5A Cucumber.
Only becomes a pickle by abiding in the brine.
A cucumber only becomes a pickle by abiding in the brine.
James writes the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of
liberty, and perseveres. As I mentioned in the
exposition, this can be translated as continues or
abides or fixes his attention. The idea here is that the person
doesn't just look into the law, they abide in it.
Think about this. You cannot get a pickle by
taking a cucumber and just dipping it into brine.
Doesn't work that way. You can dip it 10 times into the
brine. You won't get a pickle.
That cucumber must abide in the brine, and likewise, so must you
and I abide in our brine. Coming to church, what you're
doing here this morning and listening to a sermon is like
dipping your heart in the Word. That's what you're doing.
You're dipping your heart in the Word.
Reading your Bible in the morning or at lunchtime is like
dipping your soul in the world. It is not enough to simply
listen or to simply read. We must abide in it.
Jesus says, If you abide in my word, you are truly my
disciples. John 831.
If you abide in me, and my words abide in you.
John 15. Seven John writes.
I write to you, young men, because you are strong, and the
word of God abides in you. First, John 214.
Whoever abides in the teaching has both the Father and the Son.
Second, John 9. You know what's funny is that
even after a cucumber becomes a pickle, the pickle still abides
in the brine. It's not as though once it's a
pickle, it's like, I can be brine free.
I made it, I'm a pickle, no more brine for me.
It continues to abide in the brine.
The brine preserves it, it gives it flavour, it keeps it crisp.
And so it is with you and me. Don't be satisfied that God has
made you a Christian. He's made you a pickle.
You made it. You won't make it if you don't
abide. Six last point.
A Christian is only as pious as their obedience.
A Christian is only as pious as their obedience, James writes.
If anyone thinks he is religious, that word religious
can be translated as pious or devout.
You know, I was thinking, how would I answer if somebody asked
me, Matt, do you consider yourself a pious man?
How would you answer that for yourself?
Somebody walked up to you at work or you know, your your dad
or your mom or somebody at your work or a family member or a
neighbor and said, do you consider yourself a pious man?
Do you consider you have a pious woman?
How would you answer that? And I was thinking about that.
I was like, how do you know if you're a mature Christian?
How do you know if you're a holy Christian?
How do you know? There are many metrics that
often get used, right? How often do you attend church?
How many of a church, how many of the church functions do you
attend? How often do you read your
Bible? How often do you pray?
How much do you give? How well revenue and doctrine of
theology, how much do you serve the local church?
There are many, many, and all those are good things.
All those are things that we should do.
But James's point is that if a person thinks they are
religious, if they think that they are pious, they are devout,
but they are living a disobedient life.
They deceive their. Own heart, James go so.
Far to say that their. Religion is worthless.
Worthless. What?
What?
Why would it be worthless? It's still worth something,
right? Why would it be worthless?
Think of it like this. Imagine if a husband.
Told his wife. That he loved her every day.
He even left her. Notes to express his affection.
Every day he would, even when he before he left for work, he
would leave a note hidden around the house somewhere to express
his affection that he loved her. He bought her flowers, folded
her laundry, he cooked her dinner.
He's got dinner ready for her when she gets home.
He gets home before her, bought her presents, even washes the
dishes after dinner. He takes her on dates.
He does all these things, but he's having an affair all while
doing it. He did 99 things.
Right and one thing wrong. How would you describe?
His love for her. I know how James would describe
it. Worthless.
How would you describe his?
Words of affection to her vanity.
Meaningless. Paul's point in Romans.
Is that all that matters for justification?
Is faith his point in Romans? Is all that matters
justification? Is faith and James's point is
that all that matters for glorification?
Is faith filled obedience a Christian?
Is only. As pious as their obedience,
let's pray.