Juxtaposed Pride

“But He gives a greater grace. Therefore, it says, ‘God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.’” James 4:6 [NASB]

In reading James 4:1-10, we see three main things. First, we see sins keep us from God. Second, we see how we can reconnect and stay aligned with God. Third, we learn when we rightly relate to God by voluntarily humbling ourselves to Him, He provides everything we need. We say, “Surely I know this.” Yet, if we know this, why don’t we stay humble? Why do we envy other people? Why do we quarrel and fight with people?

James spoke to the Christians in Jerusalem in this letter. In these verses, he broke down his lesson to them into two opposite ways of life-the greedy, envious, and arrogant way and the content, submissive, and humble way. We think we are living humbly, but when we read the first four verses of chapter four, we realize something about ourselves. James told the Jerusalem Christians’ he knew of their quarreling and fighting. He had heard about their disputes. James pointed to the reason for these fights and quarrels. He said they came from their seeking to fill their human desires. James called these desires lust. Lusting means desiring with your heart what you do not have. It is being discontent with what God has given you. Lusting causes the person to give their desire for things a higher priority in their life and thinking than they give God. It is coveting what someone has and wanting one like or better than it. James said we want it so much we willingly murder for it. He could have meant a literal murder by killing someone to get what one wants or a metaphorical murder of running someone’s good name through muck so other people do not consider that person highly. Also, it means murdering your relationship with God so He has a lower priority in your life than the item for which you lust. Quarrels and fights come from lusting or coveting what someone else has, and it causes murder of the person, his or her reputation, or one’s relationship with God.

James added to this and said their envy caused them to fight. All the while, he said, they could have asked for it from God. Still, if they had asked for it with the wrong motive, of which lust, envy, greed, and pride are, then God would not answer. What makes what one asks for a wrong motive? James said when a person asks for something to spend it on their personal pleasures, that shows their lusts and desires. This makes a person an adulterer, he said. When someone puts someone or something higher in their estimation than God, they worship it more than God. This creates hostility toward God because the person wanted something for the wrong reasons and against God’s purposes and plans. The person purposed to go against God’s will and so made him or herself hostile, turn 180 degrees away from God (turn his or her back on God), and walk away from God.

“Surely,” we say to ourselves (because we wouldn’t dare mention this to another person), “we do not turn our backs on God. No way do we lust after and become adulterers, choosing things and people over God.” Let’s not fool ourselves; we each are guilty for choosing things contrary to God’s will. We each envy and strive for things, relationships, power, and influence. Sometimes these are contrary to God’s purposes and plans.

With verse five, James brought the sting of disappointment; we cringe at disappointing God. He said, God jealously desires the Spirit He made to dwell in believers when they became believers. When we turn our backs on God and go our own way, we cut off conversation with God or we only go to Him when we want something. That means we separate the Holy Spirit, who came to dwell in us upon our salvation to guide us in God’s way, from God with our sins. We have chosen not to allow God to guide us. We disappoint God. He jealously loves us, and He jealously desires a relationship with us, a relationship that comes through His indwelling Spirit.

What is the point James made? He painfully made the Jerusalem Christians aware of their greed and adultery that separated them from God. He told them in verse six, “But He gives a greater grace. Therefore, it says, ‘God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.’” God doesn’t take His hands off His child because they sinned against Him. He opposes the proud, the one who took his or her own life and desires into his or her own hands. God stands against the ways of His proud child. He jealously goes to combat to gain His child back from Satan’s temptations and sin. If you jealously love your spouse or child, you would go to battle to get them back from captivity. When we sin, we are in captivity and God opposes Satan to get us safely back from the sin that entangled and entrapped us. This is what James meant when he said, God opposed the proud. This is the greater grace God gives. God didn’t initially just give us grace to save us from our sin so we could be called the children of God. He gives and keeps on giving grace. The Lord opposed Satan and keeps on opposing Satan to keep us safe. He jealously loves us and His Spirit within us. God wants a right relationship with each of us. When we realize this while sinning and while in a right relationship with Him, we are humbled before God. This awareness makes us realize our littleness in comparison to almighty God. We then voluntarily submit ourselves to Him and His plans. We receive God’s grace when He rescues us, and we receive it when we have this recognition and voluntarily humble ourselves. God is favorably disposed to giving blessings from His bounty to people. These blessings are grace and can be tangible things, but also include kindness, favor, forgiveness, love, salvation, sanctification, protection, etc. Even though no one deserves God’s grace, He gives it. It’s like our relationship with our parents. Even though we did something wrong, they still love us.

James began this chapter with a list of six things that arrogance caused the Jerusalem Christians to do and be-quarrel and fight, envy, lust, adultery, not asking or asking with the wrong motives, and having a friendship with the world and being an enemy of God. As a juxtaposition to these, in verses seven through nine, He gave six commands that the humble child of God can do to turn back to God and escape arrogance and separation from God.

 James told them to submit to God, which is a voluntary personal subjecting of one’s self to God’s plans in heart, mind, actions, and word. James told them to resist the devil which means to do to Satan what they did to God when they envied and lusted. They are to turn their backs completely on Satan by turning 180 degrees from facing him and his temptations. When a person turns 180 degrees from Satan, he or she is facing God. This turning from Satan is opposing him and forcefully declaring one’s personal conviction ardently. The LORD is my Shepherd, or any other Bible verses you have memorized help with this effort.

Next James told the people to draw near to God. The closer you get to God, the farther you get from Satan and His temptations. Nothing unholy can be in God’s presence; therefore, Satan cannot be in God’s presence. So, if you get close to God, Satan cannot still be close to you. A promise comes with this command. He said when you draw near to God, God will draw near to you. What do we need to do to be in God’s presence? James reminded the Jerusalem Christians. He told them to cleanse their hands and purify their hearts. Literally, ceremonially, and spiritually clean your hands from the sin you did. Wash them to get the dirt and stains off them. Wash them to ceremonially (mentally and with the heart) remove the sin and guilt from them. Wash their “hands” spiritually and resubmit themselves to God and His purposes. A person cannot be double-minded and be God’s child. By washing, you separate yourself from your past, and dedicate your today and tomorrow for God. The spiritual cleansing is purifying one’s self. It means to take into one’s heart the morals of God and cast away the world’s morals, the morals by which you sinned.

Finally, the last command James gave the Jerusalem Christians was for them to grieve, mourn, and weep over their sins and their intentional separating themselves from God. True contrition according to James occurs with realizing your wretched condition as a sinner who lusted after the world, feeling guilt and lamenting because of those sins, and physically weeping for the grief you caused God and yourself by being opposed to God by sinning. James meant literally to weep. He emphasized this with the second half of verse nine when he told them to turn their laughter into mourning and their joy into gloom. Instead of laughing cry. Instead of experiencing joy for the things you acquired, feel gloom because they caused you to separate from God.

With verse ten, James reiterated for emphasis what he said in verse six. He said, “Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord and He will exalt you.” James spoke about humility again. Verse ten relates humility to the six commands in verses seven through nine. If you rightly relate to God, you will submit to Him, resist the devil, draw near to God, cleanse your hands and heart, and mourn your sins. As James said in verse six, God gives grace to the humble. He gives His favor to those who voluntarily submit to and fully depend on the Lord, and not on one’s self. When a person humbles him or herself, he or she recognizes and exalts the Lord as everything they need and will ever need. When a person humbles him or herself before God, then He will exalt that person in the eyes of other people. People will recognize his or her humility as they watch him or her, and all the while God will receive the glory.

It would be easy to say, “Oh, that was just for the first century. We are beyond that and can decide things for ourselves. After all, we are the ones who advanced society.” Yet, James’ words, learned from his time with Jesus, are for us today. We should be humble. We are mere, finite creatures whom God created, protects, provides for, and loves. Nothing we can do extends our lives indefinitely. More importantly, nothing we do will cleanse us from every wrong thing we’ve done. God’s grace can and does cleanse us, and He gives eternal life to the person who believes in Jesus as Savior. Our getting things for ourselves, we think, is great. “Why do we need God?” Still, we are never satisfied when we get for ourselves. We envy, desire, lust, and allow things to make us adulterers. Only God gives and keeps on giving satisfaction because only what He gives is best, filling, and fulfilling. When He gives, we have no more need. If we submit to God and humble ourselves in relationship to Him, we will have no need because He gives and keeps on giving from His grace. From His bounteous supply, He gives eternally because of His never-ending love and His forgiveness of our sins.

                      “Humble yourselves in the presence of the Lord, and He will exalt you.”                                         

John 4:10 [NASB]

God gives and keeps on giving grace to the humble.

Lord, I am a mess of contradictions. I call myself a Christian, but then I want what my co-worker, neighbor, or family member has. Lord, I get so caught up in earning enough money to buy the things I want or getting the perfect spouse or boyfriend/girlfriend then I lose sight of You, forget about You, and don’t remember You are the giver of all good things. Please forgive me, God. Forgive my pride and envy. Forgive my turning my back on You. Help me trust in You more and remember Your Promises and Your past blessings. Help me withstand temptations and stand strong with You. Amen.

Choosing to Love

In John 14:15, Jesus said to His disciples, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.” Before this verse, the disciples questioned Jesus about how to get to where He was going. Jesus explained if they knew Him, then they knew the Father and His love. He also said, the works He does, the disciples would do, too, because He goes to the Father. Next, Jesus instructed them to pray to the Father in His name asking for anything. He said He would do it-answer their prayers.

Notice, keeping Christ’s commandments comes after Jesus told them the Father loves them, He is going to the Father, the disciples would do works like Him, and they could pray asking the Father for help. Each of these assumes a personal, impacting relationship with Jesus. Without Jesus, they would not know the Father. Without Him, they would not know the works to do. Without Jesus, their prayers would have no intercessor. From this, Jesus next spoke verse fifteen.

With verse fifteen, Jesus made a profound statement for which the disciples possibly had not connected all the dots. He spoke a conditional statement with a command. Jesus said, “If you love Me.” Jesus never demanded love, obedience, or people to follow Him. Love should never have to resort to these, for these are not love. Demanded loved is involuntary slavery. Jesus never required the disciples love Him. Love of Jesus is willful; it is voluntary. Each person chooses to love or not love Jesus. It is not a requirement for living on earth. What kind of love, then, did Jesus speak about in this verse? This love is agape love. The love of Christ by any person is a preferring of Him over all others, including one’s self. This kind of love is a choosing to embrace Him and what He stands for in our hearts and our lives. Each person who chooses to love Jesus and live in this kind of relationship with Him prefers to do what Jesus wants and loves. This kind of love prefers the other person over one’s self. It is a putting of self after loving the other, a doing what the other wants instead of what you want. This love is self-sacrificial, voluntary, and submissive.

When we consider this kind of love beside the other part of this conditional command, we understand better what Jesus said to the disciples. Jesus said, “If you love Me, you will keep My commandments.” If you love me self-sacrificially like I love you, you will choose to follow and do what I prefer, which is, in a nutshell, love the Lord with all your being and love your neighbor as yourself. What Jesus said was more than that. His commandments to the disciples involved that love, but it went further. He told them to go to their Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the uttermost parts of the earth, make disciples of all nations, baptize them in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and teach them to obey everything He commanded them. Basically, Jesus told them to do what they saw Him do-love God, love people, and obey the Father by living in His power and with His direction. “Keeping” as Jesus told the disciples is guarding, preserving, and doing His commandments. “Keep” involved hearing the command, then deciding it worthy enough to make one’s own so you act upon it. “Keeping” is hearing, accepting, and acting upon.

“Loving” and “keeping” are choices for something that requires understanding with our minds, and accepting in our hearts and minds, which then results in actions because of, in line with, and in the power and direction of God. “Keeping” comes out of “love” for Christ and the Father. Loving Christ and keeping His commandments first changes our hearts, then changes our lives.

By loving and keeping God’s commandments, we become more like Christ, see the Father’s face/presence more because we are closer to Him in relationship, and the people around us experience God in our actions and words. Our “keeping” shows our love of God. Our love of God shows itself to people around us. When we truly love God, the “keeping” is inconsequential; it becomes an automatic result of our love for God, so of course we will obey Him. Our deep, devoted connection with God means we will do His will…period. There is no waffling on this; our love for Him overwhelms us so we cannot not do His will. Our will becomes His will and we must act upon it. It is who and Whose we have become. God’s will becomes our will when we live as one with Christ. In doing God’s will, we fulfill God’s plan for our lives and affect other people’s lives, so they see and hear about God and have a choice to love and follow Him, too.

Verse fifteen speaks of the preference to live with God, to choose to live with Him in His power and direction, and to choose to do His will, knowing His will is perfect and leads to others seeing, knowing, and loving Him. First, we must decide for ourselves, do we love Jesus? Do we have such a deep, devoted relationship with Him that obeying His commandments is second nature to us? How will people hear about God and His grace unless we have a deep, impactful relationship with Him? Paul stated it this way in Romans 10:14-15a,

How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher? ¹⁵ How will they preach unless they are sent? [NASB]

Lord, please help me love You so deeply and profoundly that You impact the lives of people around me with Your love and presence. Teach me to love You completely and make my words and actions come from obedience to You and Your commands. Use my life to help people know You and choose to be in a relationship with You. Amen.

Bondservant and Slave

In reading Titus, Paul’s opening statement caught my attention. In the New American Standard version of Titus 1:1, Paul calls himself a bond-servant of God and an apostle of Jesus Christ. The Amplified Bible also shows Paul calling himself a bondservant of God. All other translations of the Bible show that Paul called himself a slave or servant of God. Why are there differences in the translations between the first two and all the others? Why did Paul call himself a servant/slave of God? What did it mean in Bible times to be a servant or slave of someone else? How does this relate to anything having to do with us in the 21^st century?

In researching, I have come across a theory as to why the New American Standard and Amplified Bibles read “bond-servant” and all others read servant or slave. It is a unique theory. The thought is that the term slave or servant has a negative connotation since different people groups around the world in the 17^th-19^th centuries enslaved people based on their race. The editors of these two translations were trying to be more politically correct. In addition, they could not imagine why Paul would call himself a slave; the word has such negative connotations. I must admit, if this was the reasoning of the editors of the NASB and AMP versions of the Bible, I can understand their desire to use a word without negative connotations. However, I must note that the Greek word, doulos, that is translated as bondservant here and in Romans and Philippians is the same word translated as slave and servant elsewhere in the New Testament. So, it seems that the word servant or slave is the more correct word to use in Paul’s introductions. Doulos, according to Greek Lexicon, means one who is in a servile position.

Another consideration we must understand is the feeling toward slaves in the biblical times. In the Old Testament, slaves (in Hebrew it is ebed) were people from conquered nations or people who could not pay their debt and sold themselves into slavery/servanthood to pay the debt. If the person was of Hebrew descent, his or her length of servility lasted only until the jubilee year, year 7, at which point all Jewish slaves were given their freedom, their property, and their possessions again. (See Exodus 21 and Leviticus 25:39-43.) You will also notice that the Hebrew slave was not to be treated like a slave from another nation, but as a hired man. He was to be given rights and the master was to treat him with respect. This was not the case for non-Jews. In the New Testament, to be a servant or slave was looked down upon and neither the Romans nor Greeks would ever call themselves a servant or slave or allow themselves to be taken as one. Here we must remember that Paul was a Roman citizen as well as a Hebrew. He was raised in the Greek city of Tarsus and, at the time of his ministry, was a Christian. Each of these distinctions brings its own element to Paul calling himself a servant of God.

Paul’s calling himself a servant of God brought to realization to the readers and hearers of his letters an awareness of how Paul looked at himself in comparison to God. As a man who was born into the Hebrew nation, Paul recognized Yahweh God as greater than himself. As a Levitical priest, trained in the Jewish Law and Prophets, he recognized his “called-out-ness” by God to lead His chosen people. As a man raised in the Jewish Diaspora of Tarsus, a Greek port city, Paul acknowledged the necessity to retain his identity as a Jew. As a Christian called by Jesus Christ through his Damascus road experience (Acts 9:3-18), Paul acknowledged his own smallness in comparison to Jesus’ greatness. Paul recognized his unworthiness as a persecutor of Christians to be saved from his sinful life and called to take the Gospel to the Gentiles. These were the realities Paul faced and acknowledged to be true about himself. They were what brought him to the realization that he was worthy of nothing more than to be a servant of the true God who actually gave him freedom. This reality confronts many of us during our lifetimes and how we react to this reality shows who and whose we are. Paul’s servanthood encompassed his teachings about Jesus and his life in total – actions, attitudes, and speech. His was a conscious choice to recognize his inferiority compared to God and Jesus and to act upon his acknowledgement of their supremacy. Paul chose to be a servant of God. He chose not to be a servant of sin and Satan, but to turn around and give up his life to go where God led him, speak what the Spirit brought to his mouth, endure trials and persecutions, and live with nothing to call his own. Paul chose complete submission to the will of God for his life in the world where God led him.

That brings us to the question of what a bondservant is. A bondservant according to the dictionary is someone who serves without wages. That sounds like abject poverty and leaving oneself open to the possibility of abuse. The answer to that statement is that a bondservant can and often was abused. We must understand the distinction between a bondservant and a servant. A bondservant was unlike a slave who was worked doggedly night and day and had no rights. According to the Bible encyclopedia at http://bibleencyclopedia.com/slave.htm, Hebrew slaves had rights like freedom, justice, elevation, and good treatment. To understand this better, we can read Paul’s writings to slave masters about their responsibilities to slaves and servants and to servants and slaves as to their responsibilities to the master. In Ephesians 6:5-9, Paul wrote,

Slaves, be obedient to those who are your masters according to the flesh, with fear and trembling, in the sincerity of your heart, as to Christ; not by way of eyeservice, as men-pleasers, but as slaves of Christ, doing the will of God from the heart. With good will render service, as to the Lord, and not to men, knowing that whatever good thing each one does, this he will receive back from the Lord, whether slave or free. And masters, do the same things to them, and give up threatening, knowing that both their Master and yours is in heaven, and there is no partiality with Him. [NASB]

The word “slave” here is the word doulos. Slaves have the responsibility to be obedient with sincerity. Act to please Christ and not the people who watch, for by acting to please Christ, they show the attitude and heart of Christ in their service. Not only will the slave show Christ to his or her master, but he or she will receive a reward in heaven. Masters are also to enact their rights as master of slaves/servants just as the servant/slave is told. Both the master and the servant will be rewarded in heaven. Paul went even further in Galatians 3:28 when he stated, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” In relation to each other, Jesus broke down the distinctions humans put in place. In essence, no one is better than anyone else is because we are all one, the same, in our acceptance and following of Jesus Christ.

This, then, makes Paul’s opening statement in his letters even more remarkable (also Peter, James, Timothy, and Jude). For a man who taught that all are one in Christ, he purposely called himself and put himself in the position as a servant of God. This is what the Amplified and New American Standard Bibles translated doulos in these instances as bondservant. Paul understood that in relation to other humans, we are all the same when we become believers in Jesus Christ. We serve others in love (John 13:34-35). Additionally and more importantly, Paul recognized his relationship to God as being unworthy of God’s love, salvation, and being counted as one of Jesus’ apostles. In recognition of his relationship with God, Paul described his relationship as being a bondservant; he intentionally, voluntarily, and with all understanding made himself a servant of God for life and all eternity. His response to what God the Father and Jesus Christ did for him and meant to him was to bow in humility and life to them. He made himself a bondservant. It was of Paul’s choosing to give up his life – actions, words, and attitude. God was his master and he recognized this and made it known publicly.

We now come full circle with our final question: How does this relate to anything having to do with us in the 21^st century? First, let us remember who God is. God is the creator of the entire universe, including humankind. Our relationship to Him from the beginning is Creator to created. As the Provider of all needs, our relationship to God should still recognize our dependence on Him and our smallness and unworthiness to be taken care of. As the One who loved us so much He could not stand by and see us fall permanently to our own failures (sin), God provided the only means of salvation to cleanse us entirely and eternally, a Savior through His Son, Jesus the Christ. Our relationship to Him acknowledges our unworthiness and thankfulness. Even 2000 years after the death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus to heaven, God continues to offer this means of salvation. Our relationship to Him is still unworthiness and gratefulness. Hence, the essence of being bondservant is as relevant now as it was when Paul called himself a servant of God in the first century AD. Consider this, too, God called Abraham His servant in Genesis 26:24.

Servanthood is relevant even today in the 21^st century. God is still real. Jesus is still relevant and alive. A relationship with Him is still available. Our response to His love and our unworthiness still provokes a response of absolute devotion and humility in the face of who God is and what He has done for us. It all comes down to us: will we accept God’s love gift of salvation through His Son, Jesus? When we do, not only do we receive forgiveness and eternal life with the triune God, we also recognize His supremacy and out unworthiness. We are returned to a right relationship to God and humankind. We are bondservants to God and servants with other believers in this world living out Jesus’ attitude, words, and actions of love. We are no longer servants of sin and Satan. What prevents you from accepting God’s gift of forgiveness and salvation for eternal life with Him?