October 30, 2010 – James 2:14 - 3:18

James 2:26 For just as a body without a spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.
There was a debate about James 2:24 at the beginning of Aug., but this is the verse I wanted to discuss.  This post is pretty much the last post of the debate that I added and there were no comments after that.  So either it stumped them and they had to reflect on it or no one read it.  But here it is.

Faith and works are analogized with body and spirit. The Body is Faith and the Spirit is Works. So, I was thinking about these together and separate. What is a Body separate from Spirit? The verse says it is dead, but not looking at the verse, just thinking about it, it is a corpse, a dead body. There is still a body there, to be buried or cremated or whatever, but there is still a body that exists. What is the other side, a Spirit without a Body? Well, that is what we consider an angel. I guess you could also say that this will be our existence after we die. Put them together, Body and Spirit, and you have a living human person.
So, what is Faith Alone? A dead body. What is Works alone? A Spiritual Being which can be good or bad. Angel or Demon. Someone in Hell or Heaven or Purgatory. But when they are together you have a person who is alive, in our situation, alive in Christ.

What does this do with the idea of being saved by faith alone and that being shown by our works? If you use the analogy of the verse, that doesn’t seem to fit. You are not a dead body that is given a spirit to live, they are created in you at the same time. God works in the process along with your parents to give you life at your conception. One is not the product of the other in either way. They are complimentary to the whole.

Have you heard the saying “Do you kiss your mother with that mouth.”  This 3rd Chapter could change it to say “Do you praise God with that mouth.”  I used to curse a lot.  Working construction didn’t help, but that is only an excuse.  I have always known it was wrong, I just didn’t care.  I don’t curse now.  It has gotten to the point where I am uncomfortable around people that curse.  It is really an amazing shift when I think about where I have come from.  We reflected just recently on watching what we say.  This is just another reiteration of that.