Bible Study Library

Dear Disciples:

Jesus constantly combated superficial belief during His ministry. For example, on one occasion Jesus refused to entrust Himself to people who were excited because of His miracles but were shallow inside:

Now while he was in Jerusalem at the Passover Feast, many people saw the miraculous signs he was doing and believed in his name. But Jesus would not entrust himself to them, for he knew all men. He did not need man’s testimony about man, for he knew what was in a man. (John 2:23-25)

Jesus explained in Matthew 7:26-27 that having faith without deeds is like building a house on sand, which is quickly washed away:

Everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.

Even more directly, John said “If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth” (1 John 3:16-18).

James has already touched briefly on the issue of shallow faith 1:22, “Do not merely listen to the word …. Do what it says.”

In our current study, he will examine it more fully.

» The Great Debate «
The passage we’re studying is really pretty simple to understand. That’s ironic, too, because it is one of those passages that has historically caused great theological rifts in the church. Martin Luther once said James communicated a “gospel of straw,” and he would have preferred that the books of James and Revelation were removed from the Bible. Many others have used this scripture as central to a debate on whether we are saved by faith, works, or both (with each side of the debate finding the answers they want here).

The crux (no pun intended) of this debate seems to be in reconciling James and Paul’s writing in Romans. Specifically, compare the following two verses:

A man is justified by faith apart from observing the law (Romans 3:28)

A person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone (James 2:24)

It’s easy to see the perceived problem. “Observing the law” in Romans sounds a whole lot like “what he does” in James. So, let’s explore that a bit.

I don’t murder people, do you?

[If you do, please leave your name and address in the comment box below, and you will be contacted :-)]

Assuming you answered “no,” why not? Is it because murder is illegal? Or is it because it’s wrong? I would hope that for most people, wrongness rather than the law prevents them from murdering. In fact, we wouldn’t think very highly of someone who would murder people if it weren’t illegal.

That really gets to the heart (again, no pun intended) of the difference between what Paul and James wrote. Paul says doing the right thing because the law tells you to won’t justify you. James says that doing the right things because of your faith in God will justify you.

Paul was talking about the Law of Moses. James was talking about transformed people who obey the “royal law found in Scripture, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself,’” which he just mentioned a few verses ago (2:8). James called that the “perfect law that gives freedom” in 1:8.

In 2:12, James said that law is what we are “going to be judged by,” what we will be “justified” by.

Allow me to restate all of this:

• God won’t judge and justify us based on whether we do the right thing because a law tells us to (Romans)
• God will judge and justify us based on whether we used the freedom we have through our faith in Christ to love our neighbors as we love ourselves (James)

It’s all about the source of our right living.

» 2:14-17 «
And so, James begins this section with a simple question: “…if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds, can such faith save him?” (2:14)

He then gives a specific example:

“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?” (2:15-16)

That’s pretty clear, right? What good is it to wish someone well if you are unwilling to help them be well? Is that all you do for your own needs? No, you do whatever you can to provide for your own needs, and that’s what the law of freedom that God will judge and justify you by requires that you do for others: Love your neighbor the same way you love yourself.

“Faith,” James concludes, “if it is not accompanied by action, is dead” (v. 17)

» 2:18-20 «
James now anticipates an argument from some of his Jewish readers. Essentially, he expects they will say something like “Hey, now, don’t be minimizing the importance of works. If I follow the Law, that proves I have faith.”

To understand this passage clearly, we need to correct an error in the NIV. It’s not a translation error; it’s an interpretation error on the part of the translators. It’s obvious that James is quoting his opposers in v. 18. The problem is, the Greek text doesn’t use quotation marks to tell us where the quote ends. The NIV translators decided the entire quote is “You have faith; I have deeds.” But that really makes it difficult to make sense of the rest of the discussion.

I believe (as do many others) that the quotation from James’ imaginary opposers ends after v. 19. Reading it that way makes much more sense of what follows. So here’s how it looks:

1. James: Our deeds need to flow from our faith (verses 14-17)
2. Opposers: “You have faith; I have deeds. Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do. You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that-and shudder” (verses 18-19)
3. James: “You foolish man, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless?” (verse 20)

» 2:21-26«
James then proceeds to discuss two contrasting biblical examples: Abraham (the father of Israel) and Rahab (the prostitute).

Abraham lived and died before the Law was ever given. Yet he was “considered righteous for what he did” (v. 21). What did he do? He “offered his son Isaac on the altar” (v. 21). He would never have offered this beloved miracle child of his on the altar except that (1) God told him to and (2) He had faith in God. So, Abraham’s faith was accompanied by actions. Faith and action “were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did” (v. 22).

Without action, your faith is incomplete. Conversely, without faith, your actions are incomplete. You can’t be justified with just faith or just actions any more than you can create water with just hydrogen or just oxygen.

Faith and action are complementary aspects of what it takes to please God and be justified by Him. As James concludes in v. 24, “a person is justified by what he does and not by faith alone.”

Rahab, the prostitute, was a very different person from Abraham. You may or may not remember the story. Briefly, Joshua had sent spies to Jericho. Rahab hid the spies and helped them escape. She later told them she did this because “I know that the Lord has given this land to you… for the Lord your God is God in heaven above and on the earth below” (Josh 2:9,11). Through her actions, Rahab demonstrated genuine faith in God. As a result, the city was destroyed but Rahab and her family were saved.

Let me be clear – we are saved by grace through faith; we are judged and justified through our application of that faith to the world around us. Actions/works/deeds do not save us, but they do justify us. “Justify” simply means “to prove qualified.” In other words, our actions prove that our faith was one that saved us.

Notice the order in which things happen as Paul explained them in Eph. 2:8-10:

1. “It is by grace you have been saved, through faith…not by works
2. We are… created in Christ Jesus …
3. … to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.”

Faith comes first, We are saved by it through God’s grace. God then creates us in Christ Jesus. We then do the good works He prepared ahead of time for us to do.

If al three of these things don’t happen, the first one (faith) is dead. As James concludes, “the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead” (v.26).

Jesus said it this way:
“The Father cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit” (John 15:1).

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Non-Christians cannot see our faith, but they can see what we do. Unbelievers are not impressed with Christian talk about faith, but they are impressed with the actions that come from our faith. We can impact the world with a faith the world can see.

The world needs to see the impact Jesus Christ makes on our lives so that they will love Him too. That is what God cares about most.