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Collect

Holy Lord, maker of us all,
you call us to love our neighbours as ourselves
and teach us that faith without works is dead.
Open us to the opportunities for ministry that lie before us,
where faith and words and the need of our neighbour
come together in name of Jesus Christ, our Savior. Amen.

Readings

Proverbs 22:1-2, 8-9, 22-23

Psalm 125

James 2:1-10, 14-17

My brothers and sisters, do you with your acts of favouritism really believe in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ? For if a person with gold rings and in fine clothes comes into your assembly, and if a poor person in dirty clothes also comes in, and if you take notice of the one wearing the fine clothes and say, ‘Have a seat here, please’, while to the one who is poor you say, ‘Stand there’, or, ‘Sit at my feet’, have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil thoughts? Listen, my beloved brothers and sisters. Has not God chosen the poor in the world to be rich in faith and to be heirs of the kingdom that he has promised to those who love him? But you have dishonoured the poor. Is it not the rich who oppress you? Is it not they who drag you into court? Is it not they who blaspheme the excellent name that was invoked over you?

You do well if you really fulfil the royal law according to the scripture, ‘You shall love your neighbour as yourself.’ But if you show partiality, you commit sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it.

What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if you say you have faith but do not have works? Can faith save you? If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill’, and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.

Mark 7:24-37

From there he set out and went away to the region of Tyre. He entered a house and did not want anyone to know he was there. Yet he could not escape notice, but a woman whose little daughter had an unclean spirit immediately heard about him, and she came and bowed down at his feet. Now the woman was a Gentile, of Syrophoenician origin. She begged him to cast the demon out of her daughter. He said to her, ‘Let the children be fed first, for it is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.’ But she answered him, ‘Sir, even the dogs under the table eat the children’s crumbs.’ Then he said to her, ‘For saying that, you may go—the demon has left your daughter.’ So she went home, found the child lying on the bed, and the demon gone.

Then he returned from the region of Tyre, and went by way of Sidon towards the Sea of Galilee, in the region of the Decapolis. They brought to him a deaf man who had an impediment in his speech; and they begged him to lay his hand on him. He took him aside in private, away from the crowd, and put his fingers into his ears, and he spat and touched his tongue. Then looking up to heaven, he sighed and said to him, ‘Ephphatha’, that is, ‘Be opened.’ And immediately his ears were opened, his tongue was released, and he spoke plainly. Then Jesus ordered them to tell no one; but the more he ordered them, the more zealously they proclaimed it. They were astounded beyond measure, saying, ‘He has done everything well; he even makes the deaf to hear and the mute to speak.’

“Faith without works is dead”. This is a well-known quote from our reading today from the Letter of James.

Now, this phrase is often viewed as controversial, particularly in contrast to the writings of St. Paul whose theology is that we are “ Justified (saved) by the grace (or gift) of God”. This is taken to mean that we can do nothing of our own to earn salvation or become entitled to salvation. For Paul, Abraham was justified by his works. In contrast, for those who followed the teachings of Jesus, faith alone was sufficient.

However, if we take James to mean what he said, why would he write Faith without works is dead?

Faith, Works…do they fit together? What do they mean for us?

If you put faith into a search engine like Google, things start to get complicated –you will get over 37 million hits—just a few along the line of my search about religious faith, others being ‘Faith on Amazon, Faith Hill, Improve your Faith’ etc. Some definitions and references, however, may be helpful.

“Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the improbable” [H.L. Mencken Prejudices: Third Series] “Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” Bible: Hebrews. From the Britannica: Faith: an inner attitude, conviction, or trust relating human beings to a supreme God or ultimate salvation. In religious traditions stressing divine grace, faith is the inner certainty or attitude of love granted by God himself.

The Catholic Encyclopedia offers up 17 pages starting in Old Testament times exploring faith objectively and subjectively as the faith of God in man and man in God. Basically, it is saying that faith is given by God. (Note that the term faith is used here to define faith which is a bit like saying blue is the colour blue). In religious literature faith is often referred to as ‘the faith’. For example, the Pope sees his role as upholding ‘the faith’ and the clergy as teaching ‘the faith’. The catechism sets out the faith.

James is fairly explicit about Works. He writes about feeding the hungry, clothing naked— all reminiscent of Jesus teaching “I was hungry and you gave me food; thirsty and you gave me something to drink; a stranger and you welcomed me; sick and you took care of me” (Matt. 25:34-45). I think James means that if we say we have faith, then these works will flow forth. Otherwise, the faith is barren. In other words, we need to think of faith as verb—that faith is expressed not in the recitation of creed or statement of a fact but as actions in our everyday lives.

Thus, kindness and compassion are expressions of faith. Feeding the hungry and clothing the naked are expressions of faith. Seeking justice for all people and creation is an expression of faith.
These ‘works’ are not done to court favour with God, but rather to express our love of God and love of neighbour.

If we look at the Bible, terms like salvation and justification are very prevalent in the Hebrew (Old) Testament and relatively absent from the Gospels. The good news of the Gospels is that God and the Kingdom are in our midst, that there is a new order that seeks justice, sets the oppressed free, and shares the bounty of creation with all. Just think of the actions and teachings of Jesus.

Some of the prayers for today echo these themes. As we prayed in the collect for today:
Stir up, O lord, the wills of you faith people, that richly bearing the fruit of good works, we may by you be richly rewarded.

(Some of you may remember from years gone by, this collect which was appointed for the last Sunday before Advent was affectionately called ‘Stir up Sunday’)

And in the prayer over the gifts:
Accept our offering of labour and love
And in the prayer after Communion:
Your word and sacrament give us food and life. May we who share holy things bear fruit to your honour and glory.

To sum up, quoting from Marcus Borg’s “The Heart of Christianity”:
Compassion and justice are the primary ethical fruits of the Christian Life.
And that life is found in the words and deeds of those who call themselves Christian.

Collect

Blessed are you, O Lord and Lover,
source of beauty and depth of passion.
Strengthen and inspire us to do the word we hear
and live the faith we confess. Amen.

Readings

Song of Solomon 2: 8-13

Psalm 45: 1-2, 7-10

James 1: 17-27

Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. In fulfilment of his own purpose he gave us birth by the word of truth, so that we would become a kind of first fruits of his creatures.

You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God’s righteousness. Therefore rid yourselves of all sordidness and rank growth of wickedness, and welcome with meekness the implanted word that has the power to save your souls.

But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like. But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing.

If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues but deceive their hearts, their religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

Mark 7: 1-8, 14-15, 21-23

Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him, they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them. (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the elders; and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash it; and there are also many other traditions that they observe, the washing of cups, pots, and bronze kettles.) So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, ‘Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?’ He said to them, ‘Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written,

“This people honours me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me;
in vain do they worship me,
teaching human precepts as doctrines.”
You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition.’

Then he called the crowd again and said to them, ‘Listen to me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.’ For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.’

There is so much good advice and wise council in both the letter from James and in the gospel of Mark. Both passages we read today are about taking ownership for our lives and where they are headed and how we are living them out as well as very practical advice about being a good human being, never mind a good Christian.

Jesus says in Mark’s gospel, ‘Listen to me, all of you, and understand: there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile.’ And then continues, ‘It is what comes out of a person that defiles. For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder, adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.’

Another way to look at it is that Jesus is saying that it is not what is done to you or said to you that hurts your relationship to God but what you do and say. Jesus is always very clear that life, our relationship with God, our relationship with ourselves, with others and with the created world does not go wrong because of others but because of what we have done or said. What we believe God has done to us, or what our parents said to us, or how someone hurt us or the situation we find ourselves in is less important than how we react to the situation, because we always have the ability to choose. To choose how we will react, what we will say, how we will process and understand what happens to us. God is with us in every circumstance and every moment of our lives, through Jesus we have an example of how to choose the good and with the Holy Spirit we have a presence which strengthens and encourages us if we but ask. I think of Jesus on the cross forgiving those who are crucifying him, because he has chosen to do this, to choose the good even in the face of great evil.

James’ letter also takes that approach, that faith and religion are about actions, actions inspired by and directed by our faith and religion but actions none the less. In other words, what we do. James writes,

“But be doers of the word, and not merely hearers who deceive themselves. For if any are hearers of the word and not doers, they are like those who look at themselves in a mirror; for they look at themselves and, on going away, immediately forget what they were like. But those who look into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and persevere, being not hearers who forget but doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing.”

It is one thing to ‘think’ about being kind or forgiving but if we are not actually practicing it on a regular basis, we have forgotten whose we are. The way we remember and show others that we are followers of Christ is by acting on our beliefs, giving generously without thought to what the receiver may or may not do with the gift. Forgiving people who will not forgive us, being kind in the face of nastiness, these are all ways that we recall that we are children of God and followers of Jesus, it is not entirely for the benefit of others but also for ourselves.

Finally, one of the wisest things James says is’ ‘let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger; for your anger does not produce God’s righteousness.’ If we only practice this, we surely are walking in the footsteps of Jesus. Listening is far more important than speaking, thinking deeply about what we will say before we say it, and that anger belongs to God because we do not handle anger well or use it in ways that are helpful rather than just hurtful.
Take some time this week to read over the above passages slowly, carefully, and prayerfully. God’s Holy Word can transform us if we truly listen and open ourselves to it. Amen.