“True Religion” (James 1:26-27)

This coming October more than four thousand exhibitors and nearly a quarter million visitors from fifty-five countries will gather for an event that you’ve probably never heard of. It’s the annual Book Fair in Frankfurt, Germany. And it is not only the world’s largest book fair. It is also the oldest, dating back to 1478—which is barely a generation after Johannes Gutenberg first began to crank the gears of his printing press.

The book fair had been running for fewer than fifty years, when in 1522 a young scholar exhibited a book that would trigger a spiritual and political upheaval that would transform the world forever. The young man’s name—and perhaps you’ve guessed it already—was Martin Luther. And the book was the first edition of his freshly minted translation of the New Testament into the German language.

In addition to the text of the New Testament itself, Luther also wrote a brief introduction to each of its twenty-seven books. And here is what he wrote about the Letter of James, which has been the focus of our sermons since the beginning of the year: “St James’s epistle is really a right strawy epistle, compared to the others, for it has nothing of the nature of the gospel about it.”

It is clear that, initially at least, Luther was no great fan of this book of the Bible. Yet I hasten to add that he never questioned its divine inspiration. In fact he later deleted his rather dismissive comment from all subsequent editions of his translation of the New Testament.

James’s letter may not contain the gospel message in so many words. But that’s because it is the gospel in action. Rather than giving us an explanation of the gospel, James gives us its application. Perhaps we could summarize James’s message by another quotation ascribed to Martin Luther: “We are saved by faith alone, but the faith that saves is never alone.”

What I love about James is that he shoots straight from the hip. And that was perfectly natural, as James was not a scholar like Paul, who could speak the language of philosophers and theologians. But he was a man with a heart for prayer and a passionate desire to see the life of discipleship put into action amid the practicalities of everyday living.

And that was only natural, as James had grown up all his life around Jesus, his older brother. I sometimes wonder, Was James there listening as Jesus taught the crowds, “Blessed are the poor in spirit…”? Did he share Jesus’ sorrow as that rich young man turned his back and walked away after being challenged to give his possessions to the poor? Was he looking on when Jesus overturned the tables of the money changers in the Temple? We’ll never know. But we do know for certain that he was one of those to whom Jesus made a point of appearing following his resurrection. (1 Corinthians 15:7)

In later life James became known for his passion for justice, so that he is honoured to this day as “James the Just”. And he was so often found on his knees in worship before God and in prayer for his people that they affectionately dubbed him with the nickname “Camel Knees”, as it was said that his knees became as hard and callused as those of a camel.

In the two verses we’re focusing on this morning, James challenges us to concentrate our attention on three things: our words, our deeds and our thoughts.

Words – Bridling the Tongue

So first: our words. James is not alone in the Bible in giving a warning about how we use our tongues. Indeed what we read here is just one line in a whole chorus that can be found throughout the Bible:

·  Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer. (Psalm 19:4)

·  The tongue of the righteous is choice silver; the heart of the wicked is of little worth. (Proverbs 10:20)

·  A gentle tongue is a tree of life, but perverseness in it breaks the spirit. (Proverbs 15:4)

·  The one who has knowledge uses words with restraint… Even fools are thought wise if they keep silent, and discerning if they hold their tongues. (Proverbs 17:27-28)

·  A false witness will not go unpunished, and whoever pours out lies will not escape. (Proverbs 19:5)

·  Do you see someone who is hasty in their words? There is more hope for a fool than for someone like that. (Proverbs 29:20)

·  Don’t use foul or abusive language. Let everything you say be good and helpful, so that your words will be an encouragement to those who hear them. (Ephesians 4:29)

·  Whoever desires to love life and see good days, let them keep their tongue from evil and their lips from speaking deceit. (1 Peter 3:10)

And from our Lord Jesus himself:

·  It is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but what comes out of the mouth; this defiles a person. (Matthew 15:11)

·  For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned. (Matthew 12:37)

James will go on at some length about the dangers of the tongue in chapter 3, using some very vivid and colourful imagery. But at this point he limits himself to a single sentence: “If any think they are religious, and do not bridle their tongues …,” he warns us, “their religion is worthless.”

A secure bridle is what gives a riders control over their horses, ensuring the safety both of themselves and of their animal. And the word our Bibles translate as “worthless” can be used to mean “empty”, “fruitless”, “useless”, “futile”.

So it is that negative words can be destructive and crushing. How many times have I wished that a word had not left my mouth, that I had paused for just a moment to consider the possible consequences of my hasty and ill-thought remarks! Positive words, on the other hand, words that build up, words that give heart, can make a difference to another person that lasts a lifetime. One of my junior high school teachers used to have a sign posted above the blackboard at the front of the classroom that read something to the effect, “Caution: Be sure mind is engaged before putting mouth in gear.” I can think of more than one occasion when I wish I’d heeded that advice. And I am also grateful for the words of encouragement, support—and sometimes gentle challenge—that people have shared with me from time to time over the years.

Deeds – Caring for the afflicted

James has spent the first of our couplet of verses with a warning about false religion. Indeed the word he uses can be translated “empty”, “fruitless”, “useless”, “powerless”, “vain”, “deceptive”, “pointless”, “futile”. But what does real religion, genuine devotion to God look like? That is the subject of our second verse. And for James it is simple. It’s not a matter of merely going to church or even praying or reading the Bible. It’s this: looking after widows and orphans in distress and keeping oneself unstained (unblemished, untarnished) by the world.

Perhaps it was statements like this that bothered Luther. James doesn’t mention anything about faith, about prayer, about participating in a Christian community, about reading the Scriptures…

But that’s because he assumes all that. After all, he is writing to believers, to people who have been blown away by God’s grace and have fallen in love with Jesus, to people who pray, to people who are serious about conforming their lives to the principles of Scripture. But that inner change of heart has no real usefulness unless it is directed outwards. And that is the point of two of Jesus’ most arresting parables—the parable of the rich man and Lazarus and the parable of the sheep and the goats. The rich man was condemned because he had ignored the message of Moses and the prophets to love and to care for the poor and the alien. And do you remember how Jesus answers those privileged to take the place of honour at his right-hand side, when they wondered how they had fed and welcomed and clothed him? “Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.” (Matthew 25:40) So it is that James chooses to focus on two things.

The first of them is to care for orphans and widows in their affliction. In biblical times women were totally dependent on their husbands for their welfare. Think of the story of Ruth and her mother-in-law Naomi in the Old Testament. When their husbands died, they were left entirely on their own without any property or means. Their only option was to eke out a meagre existence by picking up the leftovers from the farmers’ fields.

Sadly, we have more than our share of widows in this congregation. But I want to take a moment to think on a world scale.

·  According to United Nations statistics there are more than a quarter of a billion widows worldwide.

·  Widowed women are twice as likely as the general population to be food insecure.

·  In many parts of the world, a widow will lose her land rights following her husband’s death and end up being evicted from her home.

·  Approximately one in ten are living in extreme poverty or destitution, in many cases without any assets at all.

James’s concern for children, which was shared by the Christian community, was unique in the ancient world. In contrast, children were often regarded as property rather than individuals with rights. Fathers had almost absolute power over their children, including the right to sell, abandon or even kill them without any legal repercussions, and it was not unknown for infants to be left to die of exposure.

Today it is estimated that there are at least 147 million orphans in the world (that is, children who have lost either one parent or both), while an additional 240 million children live in extreme poverty—and the actual number could be even higher. These youngsters face multiple stumbling blocks as they deal with grief, poverty, hunger, unpredictability, and a bleak future. Their vulnerability and proneness to various challenges, such as being forced into slave labour or prostitution or recruited as child soldiers, put them in need of extra care and support.

So how do we respond to all of this? I’m glad to say that there are dozens of Christian organizations doing that work strategically and compassionately on your and my behalf both locally and around the world. Let me challenge you, if you are not doing so already, to pick out one or two and then to be generous in supporting them—both in prayer and financially. No doubt there is more that we can do—and more than we can do—but at the very least we can start there.

Thoughts – Keeping unstained

James has challenged us about how we use our tongues. He has set before us the plight of the needy. Now he moves on to a third topic. And in our day and age I suspect that for many of us this may be the biggest challenge of all: in James’s words, keeping ourselves unstained from the world.

Some years ago Karen and I had the privilege of spending a day touring Lepsis Magna on the Libyan coast. In its day Lepsis was a city of a quarter of a million people and was the administrative capital of the Roman Empire. It was fascinating, and for me deeply moving, to walk around its ruins and be met by ichthus (fish), chi-rhos, crosses and other Christian symbols etched into its ancient stones by our ancestors in the faith. But far more prominent were the phalluses and other sexual symbols prominently displayed along the sides of its commercial streets. It was a reminder to me that ancient Rome was a deeply and shamelessly immoral society.

This was the context into which James was addressing his words. And it should cause us to take a good, hard look at our own situation today. Temptations are all around us and it is so easy to fall into thinking, “Why not?” or “Just this once…,” or, “Everybody’s doing it, so it can’t be that bad.”

I can’t speak for the women in the congregation. But I do know that for men pornography is a huge issue. I grew up in the days when boys would hide girlie magazines under their mattresses. But with the advent of the internet and now Computer-Generated Imaging (CGI) the landscape has completely changed. Allow me to give you one example:

In 2020, Pornhub [headquartered in Montreal] averaged over 4 million unique user sessions per day in Canada—more than 10% of the Canadian population used the site on a daily basis. A 2020 survey asked participants which big tech companies they think have the biggest impact on society. Pornhub ranked third on the list, behind only Facebook and Google. A majority (56%) also voted Pornhub the company with the most negative impact on society.[1]

This is the world in which we live today—a world of ever more powerful adversaries seeking to gain control over our minds and hearts. And Pornhub is only one of thousands.

In the face of all this, let me say that spiritual integrity is not a finite achievement but a lifelong journey. It requires perseverance, humility, and trust. And I would add that it is a journey that is best undertaken in community—in partnership with other believers (ideally men with men and women with women) whom we can trust and with whom we can truly level.

Whew! What a challenge James has packed into just two little verses! And he was not alone. His contemporary Paul laid down the same challenge, and I want to conclude by reading his words:

And so I insist—and God backs me up on this—that there be no going along with the crowd, the empty-headed, mindless crowd. They’ve refused for so long to deal with God that they’ve lost touch not only with God but with reality itself. They can’t think straight anymore. Feeling no pain, they let themselves go in sexual obsession, addicted to every sort of perversion.
But that’s no life for you. You learned Christ! … Since, then, we do not have the excuse of ignorance, everything—and I do mean everything—connected with that old way of life has to go. It’s rotten through and through. Get rid of it! And then take on an entirely new way of life—a God-fashioned life, a life renewed from the inside and working itself into your conduct as God accurately reproduces his character in you. (Ephesians 4:17-24, The Message)

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[1]     https://arpacanada.ca/publication/pornography-2/

“Bathed in Glory” (Mark 9:2-9)

From the slopes of Mount Hermon you can look across and see all of Galilee, fifty miles away. Rising to an altitude of 9,100 feet above sea level, and crowned with snow the year round, locals speak of it as “the gray-haired mountain” or “the mountain of snow”. Throughout the year its temperatures hover in an alpine range. From its snowy peak the land slopes downwards in a rapid descent. Melt waters rush down its rugged slopes and the broken surface of its intervening valleys. They feed into springs at its southwestern foot that form the source of the River Jordan. Along the way they give nourishment to fertile plant life—lush vineyards, and pine, oak and poplar trees.[1]

This is the setting of this morning’s Gospel reading. Once again Jesus has taken his disciples with him to one of those lonely places where he was in the habit of devoting extended periods of time to teach them and to be with his heavenly Father. This time, however, it was to be no ordinary teaching.

So extraordinary were the events that took place on that mountainside, so utterly outside the realm of normal human experience, that many people since—Christians among them—have had difficulty accepting that it really happened. Some have theorized that what we have here is really a resurrection appearance of Jesus that has somehow been transposed into an earlier place in the gospel accounts. Others have suggested that what this passage relates is not an actual event, but a vision that was given to the three disciples. Still others have gone so far as to argue that there was never any such occurrence at all, that this was a story invented by the early church in attempt to visualize the glory and deity of Christ.

It seems to me (and to much better scholars than myself) that in the end none of these theories can really hold water. Morna Hooker, for example, who is the former Lady Margaret’s Professor of Divinity at the University of Cambridge, has written,

Although the story causes problems for the modern reader, it is unlikely that Mark was aware of them. In his God-filled universe, a heavenly confirmation of Jesus’ identity would have seemed no more out of place than the acknowledgement of his identity by the unclean spirits. The true nature of Jesus is a hidden mystery which breaks out from time to time, and for Mark these revelations do not require explanations.[2]

As we think about the transfiguration this morning, then, I believe that we have every reason to accept it as a literal event, and here are a couple of reasons why. For one thing, Mark is careful to place the transfiguration at a specific point in time, six days following Peter’s famous declaration of Jesus as the Messiah at Caesarea Philippi. Added to that, the inclusion of Peter’s almost comical response to what he witnessed gives further evidence of the genuineness of what we are being told. Altogether, it seems likely that, as they stood in Jesus’ presence that day, the three disciples were at one of those points where the barrier between heaven and earth becomes thin and eternal realities are glimpsed, even if only for an instant, for what they are.

The glory on the mountain

So let us take a few moments to look once again at what took place on the mountainside that day. Jesus has gone off with three of his disciples, Peter and the two brothers James and John—the ones often referred to as Jesus’ inner circle. There, high above the Galilean hills, they found themselves entirely alone. Notice how Mark emphasizes the point: he “led them up a high mountain apart, by themselves”. It is Luke who informs us that Jesus was praying. All the while, I can imagine the three disciples either taking in the magnificent view or perhaps foraging for food (a few berries, maybe) after the arduous climb.

When they looked at Jesus again, what they saw must have taken their breath away. Jesus had utterly changed. The verb in Greek is metamorphoo. You can recognize it in our word “metamorphosis”—when a caterpillar is transformed into a butterfly or a tadpole into a frog. The transformation that the disciples saw in Jesus, on the other hand, was on an incomparably different level. It penetrated even his clothes to the point where they positively dazzled. (Here I love the quaintness of the King James Version: “such as no fuller on earth can white them”.) With Jesus were two other figures, whom the disciples were able to recognize as Moses and Elijah—perhaps representative of the Law and the Prophets.

Mark tells us that that the two were in conversation with Jesus—and I guess Peter was eager to get in on the discussion as well. “Rabbi,” he blurted out, “it is good for us to be here; let us make three dwellings, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.” Peter’s words seem almost ludicrous, but I believe they expressed the genuine desire to prolong this unique experience. I think of the words of the old nineteenth-century hymn,

Father of Jesus, love’s reward!

what rapture it will be

prostrate before thy throne to lie,

and gaze and gaze on thee!

But that was not to happen. Hardly had the words gone out of Peter’s mouth than they were all overshadowed by a cloud. Here we can only think of the cloud of God’s shekinah glory, the cloud that hung over Mount Sinai as Moses received the Ten Commandments, the cloud that accompanied the people of Israel through the wilderness, the cloud that filled the Temple at its dedication under Solomon. And then from the cloud, more terrifying still, a voice: “This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!”

It seems to me that there is a lesson in those words, a lesson that at times I find difficult to learn. It is that while I know God delights for us to come into his presence and to offer our prayers, how much more important it is that we learn to listen. I am convinced that some of the most valuable time that we can spend in prayer are those moments of silence, when we allow God’s word to sink deep into our minds and hearts, when, instead of speaking to God we give time for God to speak to us. I sometimes wonder if this isn’t part of the reason why it took forty days after Jesus’ ascension for the Holy Spirit to fall upon the disciples. They needed to run out of things to say and simply be silent before the Lord!

Whatever the case, no sooner had the words been spoken than all was silent and the disciples were alone with Jesus once more.

The glory of the cross

What are we to think about all of this? Tom Wright maintains that we cannot come to terms with what happened on this mountain until we think of what was to happen on another one. It is no coincidence that both before the transfiguration and after it, Jesus warned the disciples about his suffering and death. “The Son of Man must undergo great suffering and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.” (Mark 8:31) “The Son of Man is to be betrayed into human hands, and they will kill him, and three days after being killed, he will rise again.” (Mark 9:31) And so between the transfiguration and the crucifixion we find some eerie parallels. To quote Bishop Wright,

Here, on a mountain, is Jesus revealed in glory; there on a hill outside Jerusalem, is Jesus, revealed in shame. Here his clothes are shining white; there, they have been stripped off, while beneath him soldiers gamble for them. Here he is flanked by Moses and Elijah, two of Israel’s greatest heroes; there he is flanked by two brigands. Here, a bright cloud overshadows the scene; there, darkness comes upon the land. Here, Peter blurts out how wonderful it all is; there, he is hiding in shame after denying he even knows Jesus. Here, a voice from God himself declares that this is his beloved Son; there, Jesus cries out, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” and a pagan soldier declares, in surprise, that this really was God’s son.[3]

Could it be that this is the reason why, on the way down the mountain, Jesus ordered the disciples not to share with anyone what they had just witnessed until after he had risen from the dead? We all want the glory. But was Jesus saying that there can be no glory without suffering—and specifically without his suffering? “Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus,” wrote the apostle Paul,

who, though he was in the form of God,
did not regard equality with God
as something to be exploited,
but emptied himself,
taking the form of a slave,
being born in human likeness.
And being found in human form,
he humbled himself
and became obedient to the point of death—
even death on a cross.
Therefore God also highly exalted him
and gave him the name that is above every name,
so that at the name of Jesus
every knee should bend,
in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
and every tongue should confess
that Jesus Christ is Lord,
to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:5-11)

“If we suffer with him, we will also be glorified with him.” (Romans 8:17b)

The glory that awaits us

Before we leave the transfiguration, there is another thing we ought to note. Apart from what we read in the gospels, the word “transfigure” occurs in only two other places in the whole of the New Testament. One them is 2 Corinthians 3:18 and it reads thus:

And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transfigured into the same image from one degree of glory to another…

What does this teach us? I believe that when Peter and James and John looked on with awe at Jesus that day on the mountain, they were also looking at themselves—not as they were, but as they would one day be. As John himself was later to write, “Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is.” (1 John 3:2)

This is a truly astounding truth and it carries with it astounding implications. C.S. Lewis spoke about them in his famous sermon entitled “The Weight of Glory”.

It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship… There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilization—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit… And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feeling for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner… Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses…

All of this brings us to the one other place in the Bible where we find the word “transfigured”. It is in Paul’s great exhortation in Romans 12 to “be transfigured (that is what the word is literally) by the renewing of your minds”. And so, if we take Lewis’ words seriously, the transfiguration stands as a challenge to you and to me to see ourselves and those around us in the same way that God sees us in Christ—in other words to love with that same self-giving love with which he loves us.

I’d like us to pray using the words of Charles Wesley.

Finish, then, thy new creation;
Pure and spotless let us be.
Let us see thy great salvation
Perfectly restored in thee;
Changed from glory into glory,
Till in heaven we take our place,
Till we cast our crowns before thee,
Lost in wonder, love, and praise.

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[1]     Westminster Historical Atlas to the Bible

[2]     The Gospel According to Saint Mark, 214

[3]     See Matthew for Everyone, Part 2, 14, 15 (slightly altered)