Newspaper columnist and minister George Crane tells of a wife who came into his office full of hatred toward her husband. "I do not only want to get rid of him, I want to get even. Before I divorce him, I want to hurt him as much as he has me."
Dr. Crane suggested an ingenious plan "Go home and act as if you really love your husband. Tell him how much he means to you. Praise him for every decent trait. Go out of your way to be as kind, considerate, and generous as possible. Spare no efforts to please him, to enjoy him. Make him believe you love him. After you've convinced him of your undying love and that you cannot live without him, then drop the bomb. Tell him that you're getting a divorce. That will really hurt him." With revenge in her eyes, she smiled and exclaimed, "Beautiful, beautiful. Will he ever be surprised!" And she did it with enthusiasm. Acting "as if." For two months she showed love, kindness, listening, giving, reinforcing, sharing. When she didn't return, Crane called. "Are you ready now to go through with the divorce?"
"Divorce?" she exclaimed. "Never! I discovered I really do love him." Her actions had changed her feelings. Motion resulted in emotion. The ability to love is established not so much by fervent promise as often repeated deeds.
I. Belief and Life
We have spent these last two weeks looking at what it is that we believe as Christians. Two weeks ago we looked at the center of our faith; we remembered that God loves us and that Jesus died for us. We remembered that we are called to believe and follow him and in this we will find salvation.
Last week we looked at the importance of what we believe and we used the format of the Covenant Affirmations to point out what is important to us. We also realized that what we believe and what we do are very connected. We talked about the fact that what we believe affects the way we live and how we live affects what we believe.
And so we come to the action today. How are we to live as Christians? Once you believe the truths of Christianity, how does this affect what you do? And the best place to go with answers to this is the book of James.
We, as Covenanters, should have much affinity for the book of James, where we are told that it isn’t enough to believe right, your belief needs to affect what you do. How you live needs to be informed by what you believe. This is where we came from. We came from a church in Sweden that was a state church. At the state church, you were born into your faith. It was automatic and your actions, the way you lived your life had no meaning. And our Covenant ancestors felt that there was something missing in this. They felt that you needed to live out your faith. They felt that you needed to show your belief by what you did. And they were right.
There are churches out there that are very concerned that you believe a certain way. They want to drill right teachings into you so that you will know their theology backwards and forwards. They want to make sure you believe the world is going to end a certain way. They want to be sure that you understand exactly what it is that Jesus did on the cross and how that affects us, they want you to know the difference between justification and sanctification, two things that Jesus does for us. (If you want to know the difference, just ask one of the confirmation students). But we as Covenanters, and many other Christians say that there needs to be something more. You cannot give lip service to the right beliefs if you don’t live the right practices. Our denomination came out of a group of Christians who believed that there needed to be a personal commitment to the beliefs that are spouted. It’s not enough to say you believe, it’s not enough to call yourself a Christian, you have to live it.
And so we come to James 2 where it is spelled out for us so very clearly.
II. Faith and Deeds
“What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if people claim to have faith but have no deeds? Can such faith save them?” Now, of course, there is danger here. For we all know that it isn’t our deeds that save us but Christ who saves us, through faith. But true faith, true following involves living the life, walking the walk.
Brian McLaren, an evangelical author, describes it by saying that orthodoxy needs to be linked to practice. There is orthodoxy – right thinking, and there is orthopraxy – right practice of the gospel. And when we look at Jesus’ teaching we discover that he is much more interested in right practice than right thinking. Or maybe the problem is that we think you can have one without the other, when in truth the two need to be so put together that you cannot separate them. Right thinking – Love your neighbor as yourself. Right practice – Care for those less fortunate than yourself. Right thinking – God created this world and everything in it. Right practice – be stewards of all creation. Right thinking – Jesus died to save our sins. Right practice – share this good news with those around you. Right thinking – Jesus is Lord. Right practice – follow his will and his way. Right thinking – God answers prayers. Right practice – lift your needs before him so he can answer. Right thinking – Everything we have belongs to God. Right practice – treat the things you have as God’s and not your own. The list goes on. If the thinking doesn’t have the practice to go with it, do you really believe it?
Our beliefs need to influence our actions to be taken seriously. If you don’t act upon your beliefs then you probably don’t really believe. When Elijah stood on the mountaintop and called for God to send down fire to prove himself to the people, we know that Elijah believed that God could do this. When Peter told the man on the side of the road to get up and walk instead of giving him money, we know that Peter believed God could heal this man. For both of these as well as people throughout the Bible, belief is shown by action.
And yet we aren’t saved by our actions. It isn’t our deeds or our works that bring us salvation. But James makes it clear here in chapter 2. “Show me faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do.” James is about putting your faith on the line. He is about letting it all hang out. Don’t let your faith be something that is just a shield to protect you from hell. Don’t let it be fire insurance that you pray and then let sit in your safe forever more. Instead, live out your faith; act out your faith; make it real. Youth today put it this way: don’t just talk the talk, walk the walk! Are you ready to walk the walk of faith?
III. Love Your Neighbor
Scott McKnight, a professor at North Park College, has written a book entitled The Jesus Creed. In this book he says that Jesus takes the Shema from the Old Testament and does something revolutionary with it. The Shema is the center of the Old Testament. It is that which the Jewish people of the Old Testament took to be the most holy truth, the deepest belief, the orthodoxy of what they stood for. The Shema states, “Here, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.” But the Shema, which is Deuteronomy 6:4-9, is not enough for Jesus, he needs to add another part of the Old Testament, Leviticus 19:18, which tells us to “Love your neighbor as yourself.” In his book, Scott McKnight says this is the center of Jesus teaching; it is the center of what Christian orthodoxy and Christian orthopraxy should be. Love God; love others! This is the center of the answer to the question how should Christians act. Yet, unfortunately, this is often not the answer we receive to this question. We often think being a Christian is about being stoic or being severe. We think being a Christian means you can’t have any fun. We think being a Christian means you have to continually show everybody else that you are better than them. Yet the center of Christian behavior is found in the Jesus Creed: Love God; love others. This is truly what it means to walk the walk. This is what being a Christian, this is what living the Christian life is really about. But how do we do that, how do we love God and love others? It’s so broad, it’s so nebulous; we need something finite.
And that is why we have the teachings of the Old Testament, the teachings of Jesus and the letters of the apostles. They were written to help us know how to love God and how to love others. And even more than that, this is why we have the Holy Spirit, to help us know how to love God and love others.
God gives the Ten Commandments: don’t kill, steal, commit adultery, covet or lie; honor God, your parents and the Sabbath. Basically, don’t live your life directed towards yourself. Instead, live it directed outwards. Don’t let yourself become curled inwards. Don’t focus first and foremost on your own needs. Now this is counter-cultural. It is not how our society tells us to live. It is not what commercials tell us is important. But it is what God calls us to. Instead of thinking of yourself first, God tells us to think of him and others first. Jesus is even more explicit about this in his teachings. He wants his followers to follow God the way that he did. Jesus didn’t care about his own needs in the way that others did. He didn’t worry about catching leprosy when he approached the sick. Instead he focused on the needs and hopes of those around him. This doesn’t mean that he didn’t take care of himself. But his life was focused outwards. He acted out his love for his Father by loving all those around him: the Pharisees and the prostitutes; the saints and the sinners.
We are given a moral code as Christians. There are things we are told not to do. There are things we are told that we are to do. But what you will discover is that if you start truly thinking outside yourself and focusing on this Jesus Creed. If you truly begin acting out that call to love God and love others, you will find yourself following that moral code that God sets before us.
The message is really so simple, yet we make it so complex. Is the thing you do glorifying yourself or is it glorifying God? Is the action you take about satisfying your wants or is it about reaching out to the needs of those around you? Are you going to live for yourself or for something greater than yourself? In the Old Testament, after Israel had entered the land God had promised them, their leader, Joshua, was preparing to retire, for the wars were over. And their leader brought them together and warned them that there would be much to distract them from God. There would be much that would call them away from God and find them focused on themselves. They would be wooed by other gods who promised to meet their whims. The false gods of the people around them were much easier to follow than their God. They could be bought off and they didn’t require loyalty. The people of Israel would be chased after by other peoples who encouraged them to focus on being self-reliant instead of relying on God. They would be tempted away from God by the people and culture that they would come in contact with. But Joshua told them that they had a choice. “Choose this day whom you will serve. Will you serve the God of your families, the God of Abraham, the God that brought you out of Egypt? Or will you serve the gods of the peoples surrounding you?” We have that same choice in front of us. Are we ready to serve God by loving him and loving others or are we going to be wooed by the society and culture around us that tells us the importance of taking care of number one. Are we going to live our lives working to shine Christ’s light on those around us or will we put all our energy into making sure we are comfortable. Joshua gave Israel the choice, but then stood up to be counted himself, “As for me and my household. We will serve the Lord.” Let that be our call. Let that be our promise. Let that be our commitment. We will serve the Lord. Amen.
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