The Book of James - 5
True Religion
What is true religion? How can we tell it from false religion? A man once came to Jesus and asked him how he might have eternal life. Jesus asked the man what the Law of God said about it. The man replied: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind and you shall love your neighbour as yourself". That's it, said Jesus, you are right. Now James agrees with that in his letter and stresses the second part of that commandment in particular.
True religion does not demand rituals and prayers and religious ceremonies in themselves. The test says James, is do I treat my neighbour in love? He writes: "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world", (Chapter 1 verse 27). It is possible to have a religion which is really only another way of being selfish, to be so concerned with our so-called goodness that we never think of those around us who need our help.
Note also that true religion does not get caught up with the wrong that goes on all around us. James says that true religion keeps itself from being polluted by the world. That’s chapter 1 verse 27. Two translations of the New Testament I looked at use the word “contaminated” instead of polluted. When the oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico blew up, vast stretches of the American coastline were contaminated with oil slicks drifting ashore on to the sands. Sea birds caught up in the contamination died, and far out to sea the spilled oil polluted a great area of ocean. Both these words, contaminate and pollute have to do with touching something dirty and unclean. So when James writes: “keep your selves from being polluted by the world” he means don’t have contact with things in society around you that are evil, sexual immorality, lying and cheating, fighting, injustices, worshipping things instead of God. By “world” he doesn’t mean people. He is not saying don’t mix with people, don’t love them and care for them, but, if they are doing wrong, don’t do as they do.
James gives us another example of religion which is not true religion, he writes in chapter 2 verses14-16 "What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save him? Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to him: "Go, I wish you well; keep warm and well-fed, but does nothing about his physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.” To do nothing about a neighbour's troubles when we can do something to help is to show that we have no real faith in God or love for him.
Are there people near you who need help? Or even people who live far away from you whom you could be helping some way?
In the middle of the 19th Century there was a young man in London who was studying to be a doctor so that he could go abroad to help those in need. As he was doing his medical training, he ran a school for very poor children in the evenings. These children met in what had been a shed for donkeys. One evening, as he was about to lock the door of the shed after the children had gone home he found there was a boy of about 8 years of age who was still in the shed taking shelter for the night. The medical student said; "Come on, my boy, it's about time you got home to your mother and father". The boy replied: "I've not got a mother and I've not got a father". "Then where will you sleep tonight?", the student asked him. "Anywhere I can" said the boy, whose name was Jim. "And are there other boys like you sleeping on the streets tonight?", he was asked. "Yes, " said Jim, "lots of them". That night Jim took the medical student to see some boys huddled together on a roof top, trying to sleep. That sight completely changed the student's mind about what he should do with his life. He completed his training as a doctor and spent the rest of his life caring for orphan children. He was doing just what James says in this letter: "look after orphans in their distress".
We have said that James' letter is very practical in his teaching to us. Are you able to do something practical to help people in distress?
But what if you who are listening to this broadcast are in great distress? James tell us to cry out to God in our distress for he takes note of those who have been unjustly treated like workers in a harvest who do not receive proper wages: "The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty", he says in chapter 5 verse 4.
God's help comes to the distressed through people who have a real, practical religion. Are you one of these people?
Three things to remember from this broadcast:
- Religion that is real cares for people in distress, chapter 1 verse 27.
- Faith should always be accompanied by action, chapter 2 verses 14 to 17.
- God hears the cry of the distressed, chapter 5 verse 4.