One of the great tragedies of the modern church is that Christians have become passive with their faith. Especially in the United States, we grow comfortable in our passiveness. What am I talking about? We become passive when we never speak up about the things of God. We become passive when we never share our faith with others. We become passive when we never allow others to see Christ in us.
Passive Christianity is morally wrong – Bruce Barton
We cannot be passive but proactive when it comes to obeying the Word of God. We need to live a lifestyle of radical obedience to the Word of God. The Word works in our lives, through the power of the Holy Spirit and helps to transform us into the likeness of Jesus.
22 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. 23 Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror 24 and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. 25 But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it–he will be blessed in what he does. 26 If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless. 27 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. James 1:22-27
James reveals a pattern for life change here in chapter 1. It is one that literally can change the lives of people if they would just follow it. The pattern is extremely simple in concept but much, much harder in practice.
Three Step Process to Life Change
Listen
Before there can be any real life change, we must be willing to listen. Faith comes by hearing the Word of God and there is no possible way for a Christian to experience true, life change without listening to God through His Word. When we listen, it is more than just hearing what is said, or reading what is said. Listening means that we are ready and willing to obey the Word of God.
Learn
We can only learn after we have first listened. Too many people want to skip the listening and say they know how to live the Christian life. Honestly, it does not work that way. Learning is applying what we have listened to into our living.
The only way to learn is through personal obedience. It is putting what is we have heard into action. It is turning the hearing into habits. It only takes 21 days to form a habit. If you can change your habits, you will be able to change the way that you live
Live
The final step is changing the way that we live. It is changing the manner that we live our daily life. It is a surrender of our old lifestyle in exchange for a new life.
This happens when we change enough of the old habits that it affects the entire way that we live. All of this starts with a willing heart and openness to hear God speak through His divine Word
James said that we should be quick to listen to the Word. This literally means that we should be constantly ready to obey when God’s Word connects with our lives. James carries on with this theme when he calls his readers to obey the Word. We need to always be ready to obey and then follow through with actual obedience. It is not enough to say that you will obey or have the intent to obey.
God does not call us to be successful, but to be obedient. -Billy Graham
Obedience finds completion through our actions. There is no such thing as passive obedience. We cannot settle for just hearing God’s Word or even have a willingness to obey. Anything that falls short of actual obedience is not being a doer of the Word.
James continually talks of listening and hearing the Word, why such a strong focus. One thing is that the early Christians often heard the scriptures read to them. Copies of letters or books of the New Testament were difficult to obtain and at times illegal to possess. The church would hold one copy of every letter that they had and would spend time together reading the scripture. The goal was to listen and learn the Word of God.
Only hearing the Word leads us to deception
You cannot hear the Word, know the Word and then live however you please. Just listening to God’s Word does not make you acceptable with God. This makes it too easy to slip into sin. The acceptance of God flows through the fact that we confess our sins and repent of them. We are saved by grace through faith in Jesus
21 But now a righteousness from God, apart from law, has been made known, to which the Law and the Prophets testify. 22 This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe. There is no difference, 23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus. 25 God presented him as a sacrifice of atonement, through faith in his blood. He did this to demonstrate his justice, because in his forbearance he had left the sins committed beforehand unpunished-Romans 3:21-25
Only hearing the Word leads us to forgetting
When you do not put learning into practice is will soon be forgotten. The Word then never becomes part of the person’s life. James uses a powerful illustration of looking into a mirror. The understanding is of a person looking into the mirror and then never doing what needs to be done. The bed head hair would stay in place, the makeup would never come on and the clothing might never be straightened.
Hearing and doing the Word leads to blessing
When the Word is heard and obeyed it leads to freedom. We are set free by the grace that comes from the gospel. The only way to freedom is by surrendering yourself to obedience to the Word of God.
To obey God is liberty – Seneca
We see ourselves as we truly are when we look into the mirror of God’s Word. There is no way to avoid God’s mirror because it reveals not the outer person but the inner reality. The perfect law that James is talking about is not the law of the Old Testament. James is talking about what is elsewhere called the royal law or the law of love. This was spelled out by Jesus in Matthew 22:37-40
37 Jesus replied: ” `Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ 38 This is the first and greatest commandment. 39 And the second is like it: `Love your neighbor as yourself.’ 40 All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.” Matthew 22:37-40
The mirror of God point out areas of disobedience and then gives us the opportunity to seek forgiveness.
