The Scripture reading for January 22, 2015 is James 5:1-9 (Epistle) and can be found here.
1
Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you!
2
Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten.
3
Your gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have heaped up treasure in the last days.
4
Indeed the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth.
5
You have lived on the earth in pleasure and luxury; you have fattened your hearts as in a day of slaughter.
6
You have condemned, you have murdered the just; he does not resist you.
7
Therefore be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, waiting patiently for it until it receives the early and latter rain.
8
You also be patient. Establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord is at hand.
9
Do not grumble against one another, brethren, lest you be condemned. Behold, the Judge is standing at the door!
In today’s passage, James again admonishes the false believer and encourages the true one. The false believer is here depicted as a wealthy man; the form of the true believer, a farmer anticipating the harvest. The false believer is chastised, essentially, because he has laid up for himself treasures on earth (as Jesus relates in his Sermon on the Mount [Matt. 5-7]; actually it kind of sounds like James has taken this passage directly from the Sermon on the Mount. Well, they were brothers, after all…). But now comes the judgment! Now comes the return of the Son of God! Now comes the time when the destroying and refining fire of the kingdom of God consumes the earth and makes it new! And what does the false believer have to show for himself? Rusty metal trinkets and singed garments: worthless things in the kingdom of Heaven. This admonition to the false believer finds its intelligibility in the over-arching theme of James’ epistle: faithful service. The false believer is unfaithful because he does not believe God is able to provide for his daily needs, and so, he has stored up for himself earthly treasures. The false believer lacks a servant’s heart because he has mistreated his own servants, those of less worldly repute, the poor, the widows and orphans that necessitate true religion (Jam. 1:27). The false believer is no faithful servant; rather, he is judged by God to be a “self-sufficient master.” But entrance into the kingdom of God requires dependency on something greater than one’s own self, and submission to a higher authority. Woe! (indeed) to “you rich” (v. 1).
Now, let’s talk about the farmer, the true believer. As I read the latter half of today’s passage (vv. 7-9), I was immediately reminded of another passage, taken from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, “For he makes the sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust.” The point Jesus is making is this: God sends fair weather on everyone, and sends dreary weather… on everyone. Now rain is good. Indeed, rain, i.e., water, is necessary for the well-being of every ecosystem, even the desert! But Jesus distinguishes rain as the “bad weather,” so that his point, that good and bad (people) receive both good (weather: sun) and bad (weather: rain) from God, can be made. Well, in today’s passage, we are told that the farmer, the “true believer,”waits for the precious fruit of the earth [the coming of the kingdom of God], waiting patiently for it until it receives the early and latter rain.” Is this rain that James speaks of (v. 7) similar to the bad weather, the (perceptibly, more than actually) “bad things” that God sends on both the just and the unjust? You betcha! In today’s passage, James is calling the church to not only endure trial, pain, affliction and suffering (vv. 10-11 are absent from today’s cycle), but to embrace them as the means by which their faith is cultivated, by which the kingdom of God enters into the lives of individual Christian believers!
We all know that some of the best things in life come through pain. Children cannot be had but through the pains of childbirth. Athletic strength and aptitude cannot be had but by painful weightlifting and strenuous conditioning. Wisdom cannot be had but by the sometimes painful (if you learn from experience, right?) and the sometimes tedious study of nature. In today’s passage, James tells the Christians to whom he writes, “I know it’s hard, but this is the only way. The path to the kingdom of God is lined with trials, with stumbling blocks, with potholes and bumps, so endure!” Because if we don’t endure, if we don’t, like a farmer, sit in the midst of our field, as the rains come pouring down day after day, maybe even year after year, on our heads, we might never get to see our seeds (of faith) sprout, and grow, and produce fruit, fruit that we can taste and enjoy! Today, Christian, I encourage you to be like the poor farmer, to depend on God for your livelihood and well-being, to embrace joyfully the good and the bad things that come your way, and to endure, most especially, to endure “for the coming of the Lord is at hand” (v. 8). Amen.
Pilgrim at the Crossroads 