THE PATH TO MATURITY

JAMES 1:1-4

FEBRUARY 13, 2000

 

Either James failed to understand reality or he delighted in cruelty or he saw a grander dimension to the vexations of life in spiritual maturity. Exuberant joy in the experience of trials sounds strange, maybe even otherworldly. Indeed, it is. We must understand that James was not encouraging us to go looking for trials. He tells us that trials will come, but not without benefit.

 

Who was this man that could begin a letter with such a strange command? There are several men by the name of James mentioned in the New Testament. Students of Scripture agree, for the most part, that the writer of this epistle is James "the Just," the half-brother of our Lord. Prior to the death of Christ, James was an unbeliever, perhaps even a bit antagonistic toward the revelation of Christ as Messiah (John 7:3-9). But after the resurrection, James came to faith in Christ. We find him later as a "pillar of the church" and leader in Jerusalem at the renowned Jerusalem Council (Gal. 2:9; Acts 15). This letter was obviously penned prior to the issues raised over Gentile converts and circumcision addressed in Acts 15. So this puts the epistle as probably the earliest of New Testament documents, written before 49 A.D.

 

James does not try to make the most of his blood relationship to Jesus Christ. Instead, he calls himself "a bond-servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ." This points to the humility of the man who was nicknamed "Camel Knees" for his labor of prayer, reminding us of his devotion and worship of the Lord Jesus Christ.

 

We enter with James into an era of harsh realities. Extreme poverty enveloped much of the church. Opposition, persecution, and rejection appeared to be more the norm than the exception. There were no "flowery beds of ease" for these believers. After the godly Stephen had been stoned to death, a persecution arose that caused the church in Jerusalem to be scattered. Believers sought refuge in Judea, Samaria, and the outlying regions of the Mediterranean coast. Having left the security of home, they faced rejection by their Jewish kinsmen since they were Christians. They were denied work, refused help, and left in the dire straits of poverty. Yet there was the certainty that the Lord was at work even in the midst of such difficulties. James writes to encourage them to look at life differently and to live each day as one who has been "brought forth by the word of truth" (1:18).

 

His letter is addressed "to the twelve tribes who are dispersed abroad," which leads to surmise that his audience was Jewish Christians living in varied regions. This epistle was not sent to a specific church, as some of the Pauline letters, but was general in nature and applicable to all Christians who might read it.

 

The Epistle of James is certainly applicable to us. Our circumstances may be different, but the harshness of trials still confronts us in a multitude of ways. These trials are no threat to God's sovereignty. The believer can be sure that the Lord is working through trials to bring him into spiritual maturity. He learns that he can put feet to his faith as he matures in Christ. What is the path to maturity?

 

I. Trials at work

 

James does not offer hidden "secrets" for handling trials. Instead, he sets forth authoritative instruction, a series of imperatives, to exhort the believer to live like a believer. This letter has an unusually large amount of imperatives, demonstrating that James is not offering suggestions from which to choose, but an authoritative word on how to live like a Christian in the most difficult of times. He insists on the Christian taking the high road of faithfulness to Christ and development of character rather than the low road of the easy way out.

 

1. Strange encounters

 

To begin with, James sets forth the idea that life is full of a series of "potholes" that we unexpectedly fall into. "Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials." The word "encounter" literally means, "to fall into something." It is the idea of driving on some of the infamous construction roads in our area and hitting potholes without warning. The same word was used of the Jewish man who "fell among thieves" in Jesus' story of the Good Samaritan. James is not a loner in this idea. Peter speaks of the sudden distress of various trials that afflict the Christian "for a little while" (I Peter 1:6). Paul assumes that "tribulations" will be part of the believer's life to help him develop in perseverance (Rom. 5:3). Jesus told his disciples, "In the world you have tribulation" and "blessed are those who have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven" (John 16:33; Matthew 5:10). "Trials" will come, that is a certainty, but they "falleth under the ordination of God" [Thomas Manton, James, 21].

 

The word James uses for "trials" (peirasmois) refers to periods or processes of distressing circumstances or experiences. They might focus on outward disturbance, as persecution for one's faith in Christ or afflictions brought on by oppressive governments or hardships experienced due to economic crises. Later James uses the word to refer to "temptations," but here the focus seems to be on the aspect of external circumstances that fall into the category of trials. Probably, James has in mind the trials these believers were facing because of their faith in Christ.

 

But he adds an adjective to explain what he means by trials, "various trials." The word literally means, "multi-colored." Trials come in all types and packages. There is no simple category in which we can place them. They cover the gamut of life. They might involve our health, our finances, our relationships, our future well-being, our status in society, our position in employment, or a hundred other things. As varied as the colors of the rainbow, so too are the trials believers face. They come with suddenness, unexpected, and swallow us up with a sense of helplessness or agony or anxiety. So how are we to respond to these encounters?

 

2. Deliberate action

 

Here we find the first imperative of many in this epistle, "Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials." The NIV translates it, "Consider it pure joy." Weymouth expresses it as, "Reckon it nothing but joy." Phillips gets to the heart of it with his expanded translation, "When all kinds of trials and temptations crowd into your lives, my brothers, don't resent them as intruders, but welcome them as friends!" Each of these demonstrates that James is calling for a deliberate action in response to the sudden onslaught of trials.

 

The Greek text places "all joy" at the beginning for emphasis, along with the middle voice that places stress on the believer's action. So he is not calling for a "let go and let God" mentality. Rather, he demands that the believer see these unwanted intrusions as instruments of the Lord to produce great strength and stability in his life. Instead of focusing upon the pain or discomfort of the moment, the believer is pointed toward the long-term effect for his good. This means that he must regard trials as useful or even essential, for exercising his faith and producing endurance.

 

Thomas Manton offers some help at this point in the deliberate action of considering the encounter of trials as joy. He tells us that when trials come, "Do not judge by sense..." for "sense can feel no joy in it, and sense will suggest nothing but bitterness and sorrow; but we are not to go by that count and reckoning." Instead, the believer must "judge by supernatural light" for "it is by God's Spirit that we come to discern and esteem the things that are of God." He adds, "Judge by supernatural grounds...as thus, it is a misery, but God will turn it to our good. God's corrections are sharp, but we have strong corruptions to be mortified; we are called to great trials, but we may reckon upon great hopes" [22-23].

 

This calls for a refocusing of our attitudes. What is the common response when a trial comes? Often we complain, either aloud or to ourselves. Complaining leads to bitterness, which poisons our attitudes toward other areas of life. You can mark it down: a Christian with a sour spirit has not been counting his trials as joy, but has given way to complaining and self-pity.

 

Consider Joseph for a moment. By the world's standards, he had every reason to complain. His own brothers sold him into slavery. His own master's wife lied about him and accused him so that Joseph was cast into prison. There he interpreted the dream of Pharaoh's butler, only to be forgotten for another two years and left in prison. By every stretch of the imagination, this man should have been consumed with bitterness: but not Joseph. He looked upon the trials of his life as being ordained by God for some future good in his life. His character was honed by the endurance he developed in trials. His faith was purified as he learned to rest in the Lord even though there was no end to his adversity in sight. He deliberately chose to consider his trials as joy and to adjust his attitude to receive all that God would do in his character. That is what James calls for by the command of this passage.

 

II. Faith for sight

 

The Christian learns to exercise his faith for sight as he walks through the crucible of trials. The writer of Hebrews tells us, "Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen" (11:1). What is this kind of faith? It is the believer's clinging to the faithfulness of God, the confidence of his love regardless of the situation, and the surety of his promises. Faith looks to the Lord to work all things together for good, so that the believer might be fashioned in the image of Christ and God will ultimately receive all the glory (Rom. 8:28).

 

1. Certainty of faith

 

Faith is not viewed as a "one time" event in the Christian's life. His life with Christ begins by faith and continues through the exercising of faith: "for we walk by faith, not by sight" (II Cor. 5:7). Paul even writes, "whatever is not from faith is sin" (Rom. 14:23). James is concerned about faith that is all talk with no substance. So he has no hesitation to explain to these struggling Christians who were living under the gun of persecution, "knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance." Real faith will produce, not because of the virtue of the person but the quality of God's gift of faith (Eph. 2:8-9; Phil. 1:29).

 

"Testing" is a word that means to prove the genuineness or worth of something. It is not a term for discovering that the person has no faith at all, proved by his failure at facing trials. Instead, it implies that as the Christian encounters trials the genuineness and reality of his faith will begin to surface. Just as the ancients would take a piece of ore that had both gold and other particles in it and throw it into the fire, they did not do so to prove the untrustworthiness of the ore, but to verify the gold in it. The gold would be distinguished from the dross in the crucible of fire. Gold that had been purified by the tests of the fire would be labeled with a "delta" for the Greek term, "dokimion," meaning, "tested and approved." James is declaring that it is in the crucible of trials that we have the genuineness of our faith verified, rather than in our mere professions. Curtis Vaughan adds, "The point is that trials are the means by which faith is tested and purged of dross" [Bible Study Commentary: James, 19].

 

Can the believer walk by faith? This is the whole message of the Christian gospel. A faith that is focused upon Jesus Christ and his sufficiency is reliable for all of life's demands. In the great chapter on faith in Hebrews 11, we are confronted with one saint after another who endured insurmountable odds through faith in the Lord. The encouragement of that text in its context is that Christians live by faith, not reliance upon themselves. Faith works, James would tell us. Alec Motyer explains this clearly:

We say that we believe that God is our Father, but as long as we remain untested on the point our belief falls short of steady conviction. But suppose the day comes-as it does and will-when circumstances seem to mock our creed, when the cruelty of life denies his fatherliness, his silence calls in question his almightiness and the sheer, haphazard, meaningless jumble of events challenges the possibility of a Creator's ordering hand. It is in this way that life's trials test our faith for genuineness [The Bible Speaks Today: James, 31].


2. Product of testing

 

What happens when we exercise faith in the crucible of trials? James tells us that we know with certainty and even experientially, "that the testing of your faith produces endurance." There is no doubt about this in James' mind, for he uses the word "knowing," which implies an ongoing experiential knowledge. It is in the midst of the trials that we know the profound strength of reliance upon the Lord.

 

"Endurance" results from this stretching and enlarging of our faith. Translators have helped us to understand the meaning of the word as "fortitude" [NEB], "patient endurance" [RSV], "perseverance" [NIV], "steadfastness" [Berkeley], and "heroic endurance" [Martin Dibelius, Hermeneia: James, 73]. Peter Davids points out that Paul uses this term 16 times and it is occurs frequently in Revelation where John is urging endurance. "The battle-tested soldier, the heroic warrior for the faith, is highly valued," he writes. He shifts metaphors to better reflect the use of the word "testing": "the tempered metal is more precious than the raw material. So, says James, testing does a service for the Christian, for the virtue of fortitude comes out of the process, however slow and painful it may be" [NIGTC, 68-69].

 

III. Endurance prized

 

The Christian life is to be lived in every phase and circumstance of life. Never are we to view it as a mere profession that makes us feel good but has no substance. The content of faith fixed upon Jesus Christ anchors us in the storms of life and carries us through the most rugged of seas. "Endurance" describes that quality that keeps you pressing forward in dependence upon the Lord. Paul glories in tribulations because the exercise of faith in such times produces endurance: "And not only this, but we also exult in our tribulations, knowing that tribulation brings about perseverance [same Greek term as used by James]; and perseverance, proven character; and proven character, hope; and hope does not disappoint, because the love of God has been poured out within our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us" (Rom. 5:3-5). We must prize the development of endurance because it is the "stuff" necessary to carry us through life.

 

1. No short-circuiting

 

James therefore tells us, "And let endurance have its perfect result." He uses another imperative to remind us that we are not to do anything to short-circuit the work of endurance in our lives. In other words, don't run interference when God is working maturity through the trials of life.

 

We short-circuit this work when we slip into self-pity or complaining over the trials of life. Complaining takes the focus off of the Lord and our spiritual development and onto the temporal nature of the circumstance. Complaining has no eyes for eternity but only for the present. Complaining forgets that we are citizens of heaven and members of another kingdom not of this world. Complaining neglects thanksgiving by which we are to enter the Lord's presence and which should mark us as believers. Complaining denies the sovereign goodness of God over our lives and treats life as though the Lord neglects those who belong to him.

 

James calls for endurance to "have its perfect result," i.e., let it carry the Christian to the Lord's intended purposes. Let endurance run its course of shaping you in the image of Christ, knowing that "though He was a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things which He suffered" (Heb. 5:8) and that the Author of our salvation was perfected through sufferings (Heb. 2:10). Isaiah prophesied that Jesus Christ would be "despised and forsaken of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief" (Isa. 53:3). The writer of Hebrews tells us that we are to press on in the Christian life, running with endurance "the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God" (Heb. 12:1-2). Look to Christ or "consider Him who has endured such hostility by sinners against Himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart" (Heb. 12:3). It means that we are to think logically and longingly concerning Jesus Christ; seeing how he suffered and endured trials beyond our comprehension, and thus "let endurance have its perfect result" in our lives.

 

2. Maturity develops

 

What is the goal of endurance: "so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." The word "perfect" carries certain connotations with us that almost immediately drive us away from considering it. But James uses it in the Old Testament concept of "a right relationship to God expressed in undivided obedience and unblemished life" [Rienecker, The Linguistic Key to the Greek NT, 721]. It points to spiritual maturity.

 

Here is what James has in mind. As the believer faces the adversities of life, he finds that the deposit of faith in his life gets purified. All of the clinging to the world, to self, to the temporal begins to lose its grip on our lives. Our focus turns to Christ and his sufficiency. We find him to be our all in all. We discover the glory of the hope that is ours in Christ. This in turn affects both our character and moral practice. We take measures to purify our lives of sin, to lay aside the encumbrances to our spiritual development (I John 3:3; Heb. 12:1). We begin to understand something of what Paul meant when he wrote, "For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain" (Phil. 1:21).

 

Being a Christian implies that we have an interest in being like our Lord. We have a forward pursuit to be apprehended by the upward call of God upon our lives (Phil 3:10-14). John Blanchard quotes Leslie Mitton with a clear note of explanation: "If by perfection is meant the complete elimination of every fault, hen it becomes a mocking word, because weakness of temperament and errors of judgment will continue with us to the end. But if by perfection we mean "loving God with all our heart mind, soul, and strength" and "loving our neighbour as ourselves" then this is undoubtedly the aim of every true Christian" [Truth for Life, 24].

 

3. Balanced Christians

 

Where does this leave us in the process of our spiritual development? The work of trials exercises our faith, producing endurance, bringing us into maturity, and leaving us with a marvelous balance in our Christian lives. "And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing." James says this two ways: "complete" and "lacking in nothing." The word "complete" means that in your entirety or in every part of your character, Christian virtues are being displayed. With the addition of "lacking in nothing" he literally means, leaving nothing behind.

 

There are some things that we learn by reading; other things we learn through preaching and teaching. But there are some things we only learn when we are in the fire of testing and trials. Areas of our character, relationships, and conversation are shaped through the application of God's instrument of trials and our corresponding response. Faith goes to work leaving in its path a believer honed with righteousness and godly character. He does not just know about these things, he practices these things. There's the balance that takes place.

 

Conclusion

 

How are you responding to the crucible of trials in which you may find yourself? Are you shaking your fist at God? Are you blaming everyone about you for ruining your life? Or are you letting endurance have its perfect result? We cannot look at our trials with the same eyes in light of this text. God grant that we might look to Christ in life's tests.

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