“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.”
In his letter to the dispersed Christian Jews, James put a lot of stress on works. He famously wrote that “faith without works is dead being alone.” Of course, you can turn that around and say that “works without faith is dead being alone.” I don’t think James would disagree with that. Some people think that James and Paul had a big disagreement about faith and works. It is true that Paul stressed faith over works, but he certainly did not exclude works. Take Ephesians 2:8-10 for example: “ For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves; it is a gift of God: 9. Not of works, lest any man should boast. 10. For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hathbefore ordained that we should walk in them.” It’s not like we have to choose faith or works. I think that both James and Paul would agree that salvation comes by faith in Jesus because of the grace of God. But we are saved by faith in Jesus to do the works that He would have us do. In fact, Paul wrote that these works were “before ordained.” We were not only predestined** to be saved by faith in Christ, but also to do good works in His name.We are not saved by our works, nor are we kept saved by our works, rather we do the Lord's work because we are saved.There I’ve settled the faith and works argument. Lol If works are important then we should take James at his word and “be doers of the word.” We were not called to salvation to be “pew sitters.” I do not want in any way to denigrate church attendance, because I think that it is important. But I think that we need to view church attendance as a prelude for the work that we will do for the Lord during the week. I view church attendance as our “service station” to get us ready to do what we are supposed to do according to the word of God. I think that Jesus called us to “be doers of the word” when He commanded us to go into all the world “and make disciples of all nations.” That cannot be done without some effort. Take Paul for example: he really worked for the Lord in starting all of the churches that he started, and in writing the letters that he wrote. The letters of Paul that we have in the Bible are only a few of all of the letters that he wrote. Not all of Paul’s letters were inspired as scripture. Paul not only worked to promote the Christian faith, he also worked to support himself in order to be able to preach the word. Paul is a supreme example of a “doer of the word.” The question is, are you a “doer of the word”? I’ve “done gone to meddling again.” Of all the things that you do in a week, how many of them could be defined as Christian service? I’m not being negative here, you might be a great servant of God, but it is a question that needs to be asked, and each of us needs to answer it. I’m not necessarily referring to work done at your church, though that would qualify. I’m mainly concerned about what we do during the week when we are out in the workaday world. It is in this world that we really need to serve Jesus. What can you do to serve Him in the world? To start with you can be a decent, loving human being. Paul gave an apt reminder in Galatians 6:10: “Therefore as we have opportunity, let us do good to all, especially to those who are of the household of faith.” It begins in the church and goes into the world as we seek to “do good to all.” Being a decent, loving person is the starting point, but there are other things that the Lord would have us do. I could give you a list of what I think, but I am going to leave it to you to decide what good things you could do that would make you a “doer of the word.” The important thing is that you be aware of James’s admonition and seek to carry it out in your life. Read this and go out into the world and “be a doer of the word.” Bro. Joe ** You will note that I did not write that we are just predestined to be saved, but that we were predestined to be saved by faith in Christ. God predestined that people would be saved by their faith in Christ.
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