Friends of the World

March 26^th, 2017        “Friends of the World”      Rev. Heather Jepsen

Lenten Sermon Series: Lessons from James

James 4:1-17

          This morning we continue our Lenten sermon series with lessons from the book of James.  Those who have been attending regularly will remember that a major theme of the book of James is the relationship between faith and works.  James challenges us to demonstrate the depth of our faith through our actions.  He is looking for righteous and morally upright behavior from the people of God, and so his letter is a good lesson for all of us during this season of Lent.  As we are called to consider our own sinfulness and to strive for better behavior, James is a worthy companion on the journey.

          We continue today reading the text together in worship.  I have encouraged you to bring a Bible from home, but if you haven’t then look around and grab one of those red pew Bibles.  We are in chapter four this week which begins on page 982.

          (Read 4:1-10)

          Last week, when reading chapter three, we touched on a discussion of the sinfulness that resides within the human heart.  I declared that the core sin that I believe we are all born into is the sin of selfishness, and I think that James would agree.  He continues that discussion here by declaring that the violence we experience in our world is a direct reflection of the envy or selfishness that lives within all of our hearts.

          It is our cravings that lead us to violence.  “When we covet something and cannot have it then we start fights.  When we want something and we cannot have it then we commit murder.”  On the surface this seems harsh to us but if we zoom out a bit I think we can agree that we see an awful lot of this in our world. 

          A lot of James’ argument here hinges on the Greco-Roman idea of wisdom from above and wisdom from below.  In the culture James lived in, it was commonly thought that there was a wisdom from above that derived from knowledge of and relationship to God.  In contrast, there was a wisdom from below that was an earthbound or demonic wisdom.  While talk of devilish wisdom may no longer resonate with us, I think we can agree that the “ways of God” are quite different than the “ways of the world.”

          We talked last week about how selfishness is often seen as a virtue in our culture.  James would define that as “wisdom from below” and if we submit to that he would consider us a “friend of the world.”  So this is not a positive reference to friendship with the world, like taking care of the earth or being friendly towards those we share the planet with.  Instead, James means that if we are friends with the world then we are OK with the way that the world works.

          The way the world works of course, is to feed into the cycle of selfishness, envy, and ultimately violence.  Our world teaches that to have something is to be something.  In his commentary on the book of James, Luke Timothy Johnson puts it this way:

“A person’s identity and worth derive from what can be acquired and possessed.  In such a view, to have less is to be less real, less worthy, less important.  Therefore, one feels a sense of loss and grief or sorrow.  Conversely, to have more is to be more real, more worthy, and more important.  According to the wisdom from below, humans live in a closed system of limited resources and are, therefore, fundamentally in competition with each other.  In the realm of material things, for one to have more means that another must have less.  The logic of envy demands competition for scarce resources.”

          This wisdom from below, the constant quest for more and more possessions or the belief in the scarcity of resources and the necessity for competition, expresses itself not only in our individual lives but also in the way we interact as communities and nations.  Killing the competition is the ultimate expression of envy and we frequently see this on a global scale.  Again, Luke Timothy Johnson writes:

“This passage is a reminder that the evil we experience in the world through social upheaval, violence, war, and murder is not simply the result of inadequate social structures, but is above all the result of a diseased human freedom that has committed itself to a wisdom from below, which distorts reality – and which find expression in social structures that make such distortions systematic. . . Why asks James, are there wars and battles among you?  It is because of envy, because of the craving – not only in individuals but also in corporations and states – that demands the seizing of what belongs to another in order that one might become greater.”

          The warning that James is offering to the early church speaks volumes to us today.  Though centuries have passed, it is clear that we still bow down to the ways of the world instead of the ways of God.  We are friends of the world and James would instead, have us convert our hearts to be followers of the Lord.

          Rather than being written for outsiders, the book of James is specifically addressed to the Christian community.  It is the people who go to church on Sunday, who offer prayers to God one day, and then spend the other 6 days a week worshiping the ways of the world that James is addressing.  That is why James is telling us that the reason we don’t get what we want and the reasons our prayers aren’t answered is that we are asking for the wrong things.  When we seek after God with selfishness in our hearts, then we will be left unsatisfied.  We cannot go on following the selfish ways of the world while we also call ourselves followers of the divine.  That is why James employs all of that harsh language encouraging us to repent in mourning.  In true Lenten fashion, we are called to cleanse ourselves and purify our hearts.  We must humble ourselves in our approach of God, and only then will we be lifted up in grace. 

          (Read 4:11-12)

          Following his idea of the selfish heart and the ways of the world, James goes on here to give us examples of sin that derive from arrogance.  In these verses, James warns us against slander or making negative and false comments about our neighbor.  We are reminded of our reading from last Sunday when James warned us about the power of the tongue and the words we say.

          The connection between slander and arrogance can be tricky to tease out but it is there.  I think we can all agree that slander, by its nature, involves a secret judging.  When we take the time to make negative comments about someone, then we are also taking the time to judge them in our hearts.  To assume the right to judge someone, is to place ourselves in a position of authority over them.  The worldly ways of envy come into play here as through slander we lower the status of our neighbor, and elevate our own status above them.

          James reminds us that slander is arrogance and that the only one who is in any position to judge is our Lord God.  I think we should all keep this in mind during these contentious days in our world.  No matter how “right” we believe our side or our view to be, James warns us against placing ourselves in the role of judge when it comes to anybody else’s behavior.  “Who then, are you, to judge your neighbor?”

          (Read 4:13-17)

          In our final section for this morning James continues to address sins of arrogance.  He warns us that we should not spend a lot of time planning out what we will do next because we don’t even know if there will be a tomorrow.  The expression of plans for the future is arrogant because it assumes that there will be a future for us and that our future is secure.  James would remind us that life is fleeting, like a mist in the air, and that before we know it everything is gone.  It is only by the will of God that we are allowed to live each day.

          The talk about buying and selling that James employs here is significant because it continues to connect with his argument about selfishness, envy, and being a friend of the world.  To say our future is secure in that there will be a tomorrow is one thing.  But to make financial plans for tomorrow, “to go to such and such a town and to spend a year there doing business and making money” is also about engaging in the economic system of the world for our own security. 

          James again is warning against seeing the world as a closed system of limited resources.  When we talk this way we show that we are part of the system of the world and that we think through our control and manipulation of the economic system, that we will then be able to grasp more of those limited resources.  So this is about both the arrogance of buying into the world system, as well as the arrogance of assuming that we have any control of our future apart from God.

          OK, that is enough for today.  I hope that you have found once more, that the book of James has a lot to say to us in our modern culture.  We are still a people who are driven by selfishness, envy, and greed.  From our personal desire to gather more resources to secure ourselves and our families, to our national hunger for a bigger piece of the pie, James would warn us against falling prey to the world economy of envy.  He reminds us to watch what we say, and to remember that only the Lord is fit to serve as judge of another.  James also reminds us that there is no security apart from God.

          As we continue our Lenten journey we are called to continue to ponder these lessons from James.  Now is the season to acknowledge that we have been a friend of the world and that we have bought in to unjust world systems, even as we have tried to live a life of faith.  James would call us to repent.  “Cleanse your hands, purify your hearts, and humble yourself before the Lord.”  May we continue to do so this week.  Amen.