The Straight to the Heart Series

60 bite-sized insights

Phil Moore

• Publisher: Monarch Books
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9780857216823
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Commentary

A series of devotional commentaries, which allow people to get to grips with each book of the Bible one bite at a time.

Phil Moore focuses on key sections of each book. There will be 25 volumes in all.

Although the tone is light, the text is full of useful application and backed by substantial scholarship.

Hebrews addresses Jews who were in a dangerous position: a wave of persecution had caused many of them to drift back to the Jewish synagogues. The writer warns them that they are turning their backs on the gospel. Having started out with Jesus, they have started to side with the Sanhedrin who crucified Him. The book of James addresses Jews who understood and believed the Christian gospel but were tempted to compromise on lifestyle.

James is very practical, spelling out how Jesus shows us a better way of living.

Straight to the Heart of Hebrews and James is part of a series of devotional commentaries that allows people to come to grips with each book of the Bible one bite at a time. Each book contains 60 punchy and relevant chapters, crammed with fascinating and accessible scholarship.

Part One:

A Better Way of Living

(James)

Synagogue Sermons (1:1)

James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.

(James 1:1)

Everybody knew who James was. He needed no introduction. Two of Jesus’ twelve disciples were called James, but Peter felt no need to clarify which James he meant when he told the early Jewish Christians in Acts 12:17 to “Tell James and the other brothers and sisters about this.”¹ James was the half-brother of Jesus, the son of Joseph and Mary, who became an apostle and the leading elder of the church in Jerusalem. Acts tells us that he led the influential church in the Jewish mother city, and Paul describes him as one of its pillars.² James needs no lengthy introduction at the start of his letter because everybody knew who he was. He was the man who spoke for Jewish Christianity.³

In the first century, more Jews lived outside the borders of Israel than lived in Israel itself. Philo of Alexandria tells us that there were more Jews in his Egyptian city than in the whole of Judea. These expatriate Jews were known as the Diaspora Jews or Scattered Jews, and they would travel back to Jerusalem for major festivals at the Temple.⁴ They therefore came into contact with the church that James led in the city and were exposed to some of his preaching. James evidently felt a sense of responsibility towards them because he addresses his letter “to the twelve tribes scattered among the nations.”⁵ He sent them a collection of his sermon highlights, perhaps inspired by the prophecy in Isaiah 2:3: “The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.” If his letter feels disjointed, it is because he turned his sermons in the Jewish capital into a letter to the Jewish Christians who were scattered across the world.

That’s one of the reasons why this letter is so valuable. The book of Acts does not tell us what was preached in early Christian meetings. Most of the sermons it records were delivered to crowds of unbelievers or as legal defences before judges. The church that James led changed the whole world, so it is an enormous privilege to be invited to feast on the same diet that made it strong. This collection of highlights from James’ sermons teaches us how to live in light of the fact that the Jewish Messiah has come.

James saw a clear difference between Christian preaching and the sermons that were delivered in the Jewish synagogues. In Acts 15, he pointed out to the Council of Jerusalem that the pagans had not been converted in large numbers despite the fact that “The law of Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath.” James argued that a different type of preaching was needed, and this letter shows us what type of preaching he had in mind. We need to study it because much modern preaching is what James would dismiss as a synagogue sermon.

Synagogue sermons preach morality from God’s Law. Christian sermons preach Jesus as the fulfilment of God’s Law. Synagogue sermons urge people to do good works in order to please God. Christian sermons tell people that God is already pleased with them through Jesus and that he will enable them to do the good works he has prepared for them to do.⁶ Synagogue sermons are focused on ourselves. Christian sermons are focused on Jesus. Since this letter is a compressed collection of practical applications from many sermons, James does not use the name of Jesus frequently, but all of his teaching proceeds from his opening statement. James tells us that the Christian lifestyle which he preaches stems from the fact he is “a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ” – or, more literally, from the fact he is “a slave of Jesus the Messiah, God and Lord.”⁷

Those are remarkable words. James used to laugh at his half-brother and to call him mad for telling people that he was Israel’s long-awaited Messiah. His mocking scepticism changed in a moment when Jesus appeared to him after his resurrection and confirmed that he truly was the Messiah.⁸ All of the practical teaching in this letter was inspired by what he saw. James discarded his old way of thinking like an obsolete ZX Spectrum and began proclaiming that Jesus is the God of the Old Testament and the Messiah of Israel.

James shows us that Christian preaching demands that people undergo a similar revolution in their thinking. He reinterprets the entire Old Testament for his Jewish readers in view of the fact that their Messiah has come. In just five chapters, he refers to the Law ten times, quotes directly from the Old Testament at least five times and offers Christian commentary on the lives of Solomon, Cain, Abraham, Rahab, Job and Elijah. Preaching from the Old Testament that could be delivered just as easily in a Jewish synagogue is not Christian. It must always proclaim that something far better has come.

James told the Council of Jerusalem that synagogue sermons are powerless to save anyone. He called Christian leaders to preach a different kind of message in their churches. It is therefore no coincidence that the New Testament contains highlights from his preaching in Jerusalem to show us what he means. In this short letter, James teaches us how to preach so passionately about Jesus that we provoke a change of lifestyle in those who hear. It isn’t enough for us to make people nod their heads that Jesus is the Messiah. We need to make them get out of their seats and live in the good of it.

James captures our attention with strange paradoxes, vivid metaphors,⁹ rhetorical questions and imaginary conversations.¹⁰ In just 108 verses, he uses almost sixty Greek imperatives to issue strong commands, for his sermons to the church in Jerusalem were not meandering essays, like the synagogue sermons that are described in Matthew 7:28–29. He uses strong language to grab his listeners by the lapels and to plead with them to surrender everything to Jesus while they still can.¹¹ James shows us that Christian preaching always calls for a radical decision and for urgent action. If Jesus is truly Lord, boring preaching is a crime against heaven.

James shows us some of the preaching that made the Early Church so strong, but make no mistake, he also wants to call us to urgent action of our own. He wants to convince us that the arrival of the Messiah has changed everything. Jesus has brought a better way of living.

Better Than Solomon (1:2–11)

If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously.

(James 1:5)

There had once been a time when people came from every nation to Jerusalem in order to hear the wisdom of Israel’s God. The Queen of Sheba exclaimed to Solomon, “How happy your people must be! How happy your officials, who continually stand before you and hear your wisdom!” We are told that “The whole world sought audience with Solomon to hear the wisdom God had put in his heart.”¹ Living as they did in foreign lands, the Diaspora Jews often longed to recapture those heady days back 21 in the golden age of Israel.

Nowadays things were very different for them. The pagans wanted nothing from the Jews except their silence. The Emperor Tiberius had found their religion so distasteful that he expelled them from Rome in 19 AD. They returned, but the Emperor Claudius banned them in 41 AD from holding any religious meetings, expelling them from Rome for a second time in 49 AD.² It helps if we understand this when James begins his letter by telling his readers to persevere under trials. He reassures them that Jesus will grant them an eternal reward for their suffering and that he will grant them the same wisdom as Solomon. During the golden age of Israel, the Queen of Sheba envied Solomon’s servants for being able to stand before him and hear his wisdom, but Jesus has begun a better golden age in which we can each receive heaven’s wisdom for ourselves.

In verses 2–4, James encourages us to do more than endure trials. He commands us to enjoy them!³ This is surprising until we think back to the life of Solomon. His father David only learned how to rule over Israel by suffering as a forgotten shepherd-boy and as a fugitive outlaw. He only learned how to conquer giants by warding off attacks on his sheep from lions and bears. Solomon only learned how to reign in his place by suffering exile with him during Absalom’s rebellion and by needing to deal firmly with his father’s enemies in his early days as king.⁴ James reminds us that trials exercise our faith, that strengthened faith enables us to persevere and that perseverance produces godly character. He reminds us in verse 12 that our joyful attitude towards suffering is therefore a demonstration of our love for Jesus. We may be surrounded by temporary troubles,⁵ but they are earning us an eternal victory crown from the nail-pierced hands of the Saviour for whom we suffer.⁶

In verses 5–8, James encourages us to ask God for the same wisdom that he gave to Solomon. We are told in 1 Kings 3 that Solomon began his reign by offering blood sacrifices at the Tabernacle and by asking the Lord to grant him “a wise and discerning heart.” The pagans flocked to hear him because his prayer was answered. God responded to his faith by filling him with the Holy Spirit, whom Scripture calls “the Spirit of Wisdom.”⁷ We can expect to receive this Spirit too if we put our faith in a better blood sacrifice than those offered by Solomon. Although these verses do not come from the same sermon as the one about “lacking anything” in verses 2–4, James links them together because pressure shows us that we “lack wisdom.” James therefore makes these opening verses an echo of wisdom’s call in Proverbs 1–9. He tells us to believe that the Gospel means that “Christ Jesus… has become for us wisdom from God.”⁸

Jesus offered a better blood sacrifice than the ones Solomon offered at the Tabernacle. It removed the sin which stood against us and granted us access to the blessings of heaven. The Lord finds no fault in those he has forgiven and never reproaches us for asking him to be generous towards us.⁹ If we believe in Jesus without any of the double-minded doubting which almost drowned Peter when he tried to walk on the stormy sea, we will receive the great Old Testament promise: we will be filled with the Spirit of Wisdom.¹⁰ The Lord will grant us the wisdom of Solomon and will convince the unbelievers around us that Jesus brings a far better way of living.¹¹

In verses 9–11, James encourages us not to throw away this gift of wisdom, as Solomon did. The first half of Solomo...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Praise
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• About the “Straight to the Heart” Series
• Introduction: Something Far Better Has Come
• PART ONE – JAMES: A BETTER WAY OF LIVING
• PART TWO – HEBREWS 1–7: A BETTER GLIMPSE OF GOD
• PART THREE – HEBREWS 8–10: A BETTER WAY TO KNOW GOD
• PART FOUR – HEBREWS 11–13: BETTER REASONS TO BELIEVE
• Conclusion: Something Far Better Has Come