Do not merely listen to the word and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.
James 1:22
Dear Father,
Your word speaks volumes about your heart, and shows me the condition of mine. With the Holy Spirit, it brings the pain of conviction, provides the words for repentance and speaks the freedom of truth. I want to delight in your word to the point that I also delight in following what it says. It's easy to stop at just reading and analysing. What does it mean to do what your word says?
Religion that God accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
James 1:27
Dear Father,
To do what your word says, I think may be this: to seek after your heart, and at the centre of your heart is your love for us, for the weak and defenceless. For the people whom society ignores and despises. I'm sure we're not barbaric enough to hate widows and orphans, but to you, to allow someone to continue living at the short end of unequal wealth distribution is to despise, isn't it? Your love is so much that to be apathetic is to hate.
If every nation in the world gave 2% of its GDP to alleviate world poverty we could eradicate poverty (assuming people used the money to become self-sufficient). If every Christian gives 2% of our time on earth to social causes, how much would we accomplish for your name? That's one year out of 50. What if everything we do in our lives is not to achieve financial security for ourselves but to seek the benefit of others? Does that sound just a little crazy?
If we were to live by your word, what does gaining the world and losing my soul really mean? Trying to gain pieces of the world, I lose pieces of my soul. I fragment, break apart. I am torn between two masters.
I am sorry.
Not many should presume to be teachers, my brothers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly.
James 3:1
Dear Father,
Why should I be given the gift of discerning and teaching the Word I would like to know. You...you....you--well, there's no contradicting you, is there? What shall the clay say to the potter? Shall it whine for being given what can probably be considered a noble purpose? Still, I would like to have my say. I would like to say that what with your word being a light unto my feet and a light unto my path and all that, the world still looks like a pretty dark place to me. That I am afraid. Sometimes it's hard to admit being afraid. In this world it's weak to be afraid and uncertain. It's weak to be honest and transparent to the point that you sound like a child.
But your word wells up in my heart like a spring of water, washing away the creeping doubts. There's a power that's made perfect in weakness, a peace that passes all understanding, a strength that goes beyond the marshmallow crust we develop from being burnt by life's trials--crusty on the outside but mushy on the inside. Ineffable power, peace and strength. Ineffable...I like that word: incapable of being expressed in words. Sounds lazy, like I don't want to describe this. But in the end perhaps there are some things that are beyond understanding yet within experience. A strength with an unbreakable core. The strength of saints.
But why this gift? Why given at one and the same time mastery of and vulnerability to words? What am I for? The clay would still like to speak to the potter.
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