Biotic Faith

What’s the difference between a wooden plank and a rock?

This is an introductory bellwork question I’ve used on several occasions as a middle school science teacher. There really aren’t any ‘wrong’ answers to this question, but let me save you the time and just tell you the answer I’m looking for. The plank was once living, which we call in science a biotic factor. The rock, on the other hand, is the accumulation of sediments and debris – an abiotic factor, something that is non-living. Did you know that it’s the same exact way with your faith? Which type of faith do you have – biotic or abiotic? Living or dead?

In James 2:14-26, James paints a very clear picture of what both living and dead faith look like. Writing to the persecuted Jewish Christians who had been scattered all across the Roman Empire (dominated by polytheism and false gods) James urges them to examine the authenticity and livelihood of their faith.

1. Dead Faith

In verses 15-16, James tells an account of a person who did not tend to the physical needs of a brother or sister in the church (described as poorly clothed and without food) but rather ’served them’ only with his lips, “Go in peace, be warm and filled.” This person had absolutely no actions to back up what he was saying with his lips. His ‘faith’ was merely ‘all talk’.

Verse 14 asks, “…Can that faith save him?” This question is not meant to be answered, it’s a rhetorical question. The answer in itself is so blatantly obvious that James does not expect a response. Of course faith that is ‘all talk’ and without actions cannot save you! Verse 17 clearly states, “…faith by itself, if it does not have works is dead.” Faith without works is dead faith, and dead faith cannot save you!

In verse 19, we see a description of what Piper calls demon faith, “You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe – and shudder.” Quick conclusion – mere mental agreement and intellectual understanding of the attributes of God (“God is one”) does not mean your faith is alive. Knowing all about God does not mean you know Him.

2. Living Faith

James seems to get fired up in the text as he says in verse 20, “Do you want to be shown you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless?” He goes ahead and supports his argument using the examples of two Old Testament ‘Faith Hall of Famers’ (Hebrews 11) – Abraham and Rahab.

I want to zero in on Abraham for the sake of this entry. In verse 22 James says, “[Abraham's] faith was completed by his works.” If his faith was completed by his works, we can easily draw the conclusion that his faith came first – but his works (that came after his faith) completed his faith – which in this context means “brought to maturity.” But, where do we see this in the life of Abraham? The answer is in Genesis 22.

It was a very peculiar and odd request that God would command Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. God miraculously blessed Sarah (age 90) and Abraham (age 100) with the birth of Isaac. God then makes a covenant with Isaac to bless his descendants and family lineage (Genesis 17:19). However, what I always missed in this story was that as Abraham took Isaac to the land of Moriah to offer him as a burnt sacrifice, he believed deep inside his heart that his son would be spared.

Genesis 22:5; “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then WE will come back to you.”

As Abraham left his servants at the foot of the mountain, he told them that he and Isaac would return, “WE will come back to you.” Which came first – Abraham’s faith or his works? His faith! Abraham had faith in God’s promise that Isaac and his offspring would be blessed. Abraham’s faith was living and active long before he held up a knife to sacrifice his own son. This is what it means in verse 22 when it says Abraham’s, “faith was completed by his works.” His faith was already alive, but it revealed itself and reached maturity in the form of his works – active obedience to God’s request.

Closing Thoughts…

Abraham was screwed up and so was Rahab. Abraham in fear of his own life lied to King Abimelech that Sarah was his sister. Rahab was a prostitute. But, even though they had issues – they’re both mentioned all over scripture for their faith!

Conclusion? Living faith doesn’t mean perfect faith. Living faith doesn’t mean perfection but it means progression. Living faith means that you are growing. Living faith means that you are fighting and struggling to overcome the sin that is present in your life. Living faith means you fall but by the grace of God you pick yourself up and grow through your failures.

The Best Mirror is the Word

James 1:22-25; “But be doers of the word, and not hearers only deceiving yourselves. 23 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. 24 For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. 25 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.”

1. The One Who Looks And Forgets (vv. 22-24)

This person examines his face in the mirror of God’s word and sees nothing more than his, “natural face” (v. 23) – literally “the face of your birth.” The word of God penetrates through all worn makeup, clothing, and even bodily flesh to reveal and reflect the true colors of your heart.

Hebrews 4:12; “For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”

But, after examining and taking a look at his own reflection he walks away and forgets what he looks like. It is evident that this person intentionally chose to forget and walk away. This person could not humbly accept the ugliness of his heart, could not confront face to face the shortcomings in his life, and preferred pretending that everything was okay rather than doing anything about it.

 

2. The One Who Looks And Remembers (v. 21, 25)

v. 21; “Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.”

I first want to address the word “meekness.” In this context it is clear that a person who receives the word of God with meekness is someone who in gentle submission hungrily seeks to gain something from looking into Scripture. A person who receives the word with meekness is someone who is teachable and moldable – ready to allow the word into his heart in a way that will produce external fruit in his life.

Next, take a look at the next phrase, “implanted word, which is able to save your souls.” The word “implanted” infers that the reader of the verse is already saved, regenerate in Christ. Therefore, when it says “[the implanted word] is able to save your souls,” James it speaking of the sanctifying nature of God’s word in conjunction with the Holy Spirit that makes us more glorious each day until the time of Christ.

Initially this text can be disheartening in that it seems to be such a “downer” passage leaving us with little hope as fallen people who will never be genuine “doers” of the word. I think that the hope in this passage comes in v. 25.

v. 25; “…the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty… will be blessed.”

There is tremendous hope in this verse. We do not have to remain captives to our sin. What does it mean to truly be free? To have heard the perfect law of the Gospel of Jesus Christ which in its entirety, when received by faith, liberates us from the due punishment of sin.

 

The best mirror to look into is the word of God.

The word of God is the perfect law that perfects us.

Steadfastness.

When I was 8 years old, my dad had me memorize the entire book of James. He would pay me $0.50 per Bible verse as long as I recited them a chapter at a time. James is one of my all-time favorite books in the Bible mostly due to the fact that I love James’ style of being straight-forward and getting right to the point. He includes over 50 commands within the 5 chapters of this short letter!

“James 1:2-3; 2 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, 3 for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.”

My entire life I had superficially taken this verse and drawn the conclusion that we ought to be joyful about trials because they produce in us ‘perseverance’ as stated in the NIV version. The way I interpreted this verse was that trials make us into stronger more enduring people with a higher pain tolerance to the storms in life. Thus, trials are a good thing and we ought to somehow find joy in them.

“3… the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.”

Steadfast means “resolutely or dutifully firm and unwavering” - firmly fixed on to something and not subject to change. The joy that we find IN the midst of trials shouldn’t be because they make us into ’stronger independent beings’ but rather because they produce in us a dependence in God that is firmly fixed and unwavering. In other words, we ought to rejoice in our trials because trials are sent by God to test our faith and actually draw us closer and make us more steadfast to Him. This joy James speaks of is found in the growing of one’s steadfastness to God.

Here’s my attempt to paraphrase what Dr. Jon Choi from OIL ‘09 so cleverly said. Having the right amount of pressure in life is a good thing. Think about tires for example. If tires don’t have the right amount of pressure in them, they become dangerous. God cures us of our deflated lives by placing the right amount of pressure into our lives through trials. God is absolutely committed to doing whatever it takes to keep us rolling, from getting stuck and enabling us to unswervingly continue down this narrow bumpy road we call Christian life.

MercyMe – “Bring The Rain”

And I know there’ll be days
When this life brings me pain
But if that’s what it takes to praise You
Jesus, bring the rain.

Salvation: Past, Present & Future

I have been saved from the penalty of sin.

• Justified by faith in Jesus Christ.

I am being saved from the power of sin.

• Being made more glorious and Christ-like each day by the sanctifying work of the Holy Spirit.

I will one day be saved from the presence of sin.

• Soon to be glorified when Christ returns to take me to my Father.

3 Months Since Leaving U. of I

Tuesday October 27, 2009

I’m not sure if anybody will ever read these entries, but I’ve decided to start blogging more regularly – for the sake of my own personal accountability. Things have been such a blur balancing work-life and serving at church that it’s seldom that I take the time to stop, reflect and process my thoughts. Through these entries I also hope to share about what God is teaching me and about the ways in which He is presently working in my life. Okay, here we go.

I gave a youth group message this past Sunday on repentance speaking about how when someone repents of their sins for the first time and places their faith in Jesus Christ – all of their sins are completely forgiven – past, present and future. This is the amazing truth of God’s saving grace and the doctrine of justification for those who are in Christ. But, continual daily repentance is still necessary in our lives because our struggle with sin still remains and sin in itself creates a barrier between God and us.

Isaiah 59:2; “…but your iniquities have made a separation between you and your God, and your sins have hidden his face from you so that he does not hear you.”

It’s been a tough week for me. Even though I spent my Sunday morning passionately urging my youth group to turn away from their sins in repentance – I’m really questioning myself about the authenticity of my own personal repentance before God. Am I really taking steps to turn away from the sin in my life?

It’s been about three months since I left U. of I and CFC. It’s been quite a transition leaving campus and getting accustomed to working life and ‘doing ministry’ in Chicago. The honey-moon phase of serving for the first time as a youth pastor is over and I recurrently find myself sitting in my empty classroom longing to have the heart I once had when I first fell in love with Jesus. For the first time in years, God feels distant. As much as I don’t want to admit it my heart is getting old, hard and as I recently learned through the teaching of Pastor John Teter – more and more tainted by the influence of the fallen city of Babylon (Revelation 18).

James 4:8; “Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.”

The one thing I am thankful for right now is that there is still a fight inside of me. I know that this fight is not of myself but of the Holy Spirit indwelled within me.  I am understanding more and more James 4:5 where it says, “…the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely…” (NIV). Oh Lord, how I long to draw near to you. Help me to turn away from Babylon. Help me to turn away from compromise and settling for a self-glorifying life. Help me to hate my cold hardened heart and fall ever so deeply in love with You again. I am in absolute need of Your grace. Holy Spirit, empower me and help me to persevere, help me to turn away from my sin, help me to live for Your glory.

So It Begins…

While sitting at Barnes earlier today I came to the conclusion that I want to start blogging. Not quite sure exactly what I’ll write on here, but feel free to comment or ask me about the entries that I post. I don’t expect many people to actually read this, but I’m going to try to be as honest as possible. I feel that if I can’t even be honest in my own journaling and blogging, there’s no way I’ll be honest when it comes to examining myself and own life. I don’t typically like to share because I can never process my thoughts quickly enough when I’m having a conversation – so hopefully I’ll be able to express myself better through this blog, taking time to actually map out what I want to say. So, it begins…

Here’s something I wrote last year as I was marathon-ing through my Old Testament reading…

Nehemiah

Nehemiah heard God’s call and responded to the conviction placed on his heart to go to Jerusalem to rebuild its walls. The walls had been demolished as described in 1:3, “The wall of Jerusalem is broken down, and its gates have been burned with fire.” Nehemiah’s response can be described in 1:4 as he,“…sat down and wept…mourned and fasted and prayed…” Nehemiah’s heart burned as he heard about his people struggling and falling into sin as they inter-married and adapted other religions – which was due to the fact that there was no wall to unify and distinguish them from foreigners. His calling was clear, to bring his people back together through the reconstruction of Jerusalem’s walls and to draw them to repentance and revival in their hearts! Therefore, he gave up his cup-bearer job position to the King of the Persian Empire and responded to God’s call with absolute devotion to carrying out His purposes.

As Nehemiah came to Jerusalem and began to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem, there’s a ton of things that I feel we can really relate to. Now, as I read about the wall-less Jerusalem, I couldn’t help but think about my own heart. So many times I lose sight of God, and when this happens… when I stop reading His word and praying my heart is so prone to wander and “inter-marry” with this world. It’s so easy to fall into sin and to conform to the patterns of this world when I don’t fight and neglect God and His word. I was thinking, as Christians we need walls in our lives… we need to depend on God to seal our hearts – we need to put on the full armor of God. This doesn’t mean that we’ll never fail, but it means that we recognize the reality of our depravity and how our flesh so eagerly wanders away from God. Therefore, we then fervently depend on the Lord for strength to fight our sinful natures as well as pray for protection and empowerment to resist Satan and his schemes. Just as how Nehemiah yearned to build walls to seal the city off from impurities and foreign gods, we must long for our hearts to be sealed as well.

Something else that I pulled out was when the Jews were rebuilding the walls, there was much opposition and foreigners who tried to intervene and keep them from completing the reconstruction of the wall! As we go about our Christians lives trying to fight our sinful nature, do you ever feel like everything around you gets more difficult? That everybody around you is anticipating your failure? That the rest of the world doesn’t want you to overcome that specific sin or storm that is raging on in your life? Now I thought this was cool: What did Nehemiah do when the foreigners tried to stop the rebuilding of Jerusalem’s walls? It says in 4:8-9, “They all plotted together to come and fight against Jerusalem and stir up trouble against it. But we prayed to our God and posted a guard day and night to meet this threat.” Later on in 4:16 it says, “…half of my men did the work, while the other half were equipped with spears, shields, bows and armor.” It’s really easy to become a victim when opposition comes our way, and it becomes easy to give up and to just stop doing everything when things get hard. I really liked how Nehemiah had everyone pray to God for deliverance as well as continued to persevere in his ministry while increasing his defenses! We really need to have this same attitude, to turn to God in prayer when Christian life gets difficult, when ministry gets tough – to CONTINUE serving our Lord while constantly being ON GUARD and willing to put up a FIGHT. When the wall was completed, foreigners were described in 6:16 as, “…they realized that this work had been done with the help of our God.” Let’s not be victims, but rather let’s persevere by running to God and in the end His name will be made known and praised.

Upon the completion of the rebuilding of the walls of Jerusalem the Jews were described in 9:3 as, “They stood where they were and read from the Book of the Law of the Lord their God for a quarter of the day, and spent another quarter in confession and in worshipping the Lord their God.” I’ve always been taught that the word of God is the only thing that can change one’s heart, and I can really see this in these few verses as revival spread among these people. I was just thinking if I depended on God to seal my heart, to empower me to fight my sinful nature and to fight the temptation of conforming to this world – the end result would be revival in my life as long as I filled my newly sealed heart with more of Christ, with more of His word. This whole book of Nehemiah just reminds me of my theme verses for 2008, Hebrews 12:1-2. When it comes down to it, I need to take my eyes off this world and throw off everything that hinders and the sin that trips me up in my life and FIX my eyes on Jesus. I need to depend on the Lord to help me seal the walls of this wandering sinful heart, and fill myself up with more of Him.

Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it,
Prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it,
Seal it for Thy courts above.