The first step to any recovery or healing or moving forward is to face the facts of our reality.

17-18 We call Abraham “father” not because he got God’s attention by living like a saint, but because God made something out of Abraham when he was a nobody. Isn’t that what we’ve always read in Scripture, God saying to Abraham, “I set you up as father of many peoples”? Abraham was first named “father” and then became a father because he dared to trust God to do what only God could do: raise the dead to life, with a word make something out of nothing. When everything was hopeless, Abraham believed anyway, deciding to live not on the basis of what he saw he couldn’t do but on what God said he would do. And so he was made father of a multitude of peoples. God himself said to him, “You’re going to have a big family, Abraham!”

19-25 Abraham didn’t focus on his own impotence and say, “It’s hopeless. This hundred-year-old body could never father a child.” Nor did he survey Sarah’s decades of infertility and give up. He didn’t tiptoe around God’s promise asking cautiously skeptical questions. He plunged into the promise and came up strong, ready for God, sure that God would make good on what he had said. That’s why it is said, “Abraham was declared fit before God by trusting God to set him right.” But it’s not just Abraham; it’s also us! The same thing gets said about us when we embrace and believe the One who brought Jesus to life when the conditions were equally hopeless. The sacrificed Jesus made us fit for God, set us right with God.

Romans 4:17-25, The Message

So we set our faith in who You are
Even though You reign high above us
You tenderly love us
We know Your heart
And we rest in who You are

The young man in this video just wants to drive his car (“live by faith”) but he keeps running into the facts of reality (flat tire, no gas, policeman, etc). God calls us to go beyond belief (orthodoxy) and let Him live in us through action (orthopraxy).

Yes Christians are “not of this world” but yes we still live “in this world”. We are not free from reality. The recklessness of the young man in the video reminds me of my reckless decisions in my prior UBF lifestyle.

For example, the great reformer, Martin Luther, nearly threw James out of the Bible.

“Therefore St James’ epistle is really an epistle of straw, compared to these others, for it has nothing of the nature of the Gospel about it.”
Luther’s Works 35, 362

“We should throw the epistle of James out of this school [i.e. Wittenburg], for it doesn’t amount to much. It contains not a syllable about Christ. Not once does it mention Christ, except at the beginning. I maintain that some Jew wrote it who probably heard about Christian people but never encountered any. Since he heard that Christians place great weight on faith in Christ, he thought, ‘Wait a moment! I’ll oppose them and urge works alone.’ This he did.”
Luther’s Works 54, 424

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A Faith That Works

Today I share from what we learned in our men’s James Bible study. I am thankful for those who see the Bible purely, as a child, through the lens of grace!

I am finding that many of the “either/or” contradictions supposedly in the Bible are merely lack of understanding. The power of understanding the Bible comes from the Spirit Himself, from logic (such as the power of “and”), and from the lens of grace.

Two Paradigms

I contend that James and Paul are not contradictory, but complimentary. They are speaking about different issues and approaching faith from two different angles.

• Paul exhorts against legalism; James exhorts against idleness.
• Paul addresses works enslaved by the law; James addresses works after salvation.
• Paul looks at the root of salvation; James looks at the fruit of salvation.
• Paul asks, How do we come to have faith?; James asks, How do we know we have faith?
• Paul demonstrates how to become a Christian; James demonstrates how to behave as a Christian.

The two paradigms are thus not contradicting each other. The Scriptures compliment each other in this case. Apostle Paul’s great Epistles teach us the manifold nature of having faith in Jesus. The Book of James, though short in length, is a super-packed discourse on acceptable living for those who claim to have faith in Jesus.

I see this very similar to Jesus, who taught the Sermon on the Mount (much like Apostle Paul’s Epistles), but then immediately after, touched and healed a leper (much like what the Book of James teaches).

Faith Is Something We Do

To summarize what I’ve learned from the Book of James, I would say that faith is something we do. Faith is not just words (but includes words). Faith is not just feelings (but includes feelings). Faith is not just thoughts (but includes thoughts). Faith is not just belief (but includes belief). Faith is not only avoiding sin, but it is also doing good.

Luther Got It

Fortunately, the Christian giants were great because they eventually found rest in the grace and truth of God, letting God be true, and every man a liar (Romans 3:4). In the end, Luther did not reject the Book of James. God led Luther to this conclusion.

“Still, he [Luther] did not go so far as to reject the canonicity of James. Indeed, he himself at times attempted to reconcile Paul and James: “Faith is a living, restless thing. It cannot be inoperative. We are not saved by works; but if there be no works, there must be something amiss with faith”
Bainton 259 

Could you live one month with no UBF activity? What would you do if you were told you could not participate in any UBF programs or go to the UBF center or campus for 30 days? How do you think UBF leaders would react to such an absence?

Let faith arise