My dear brothers, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, 20 for man’s anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. 21 Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.
22 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. 23 Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror 24 and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. 25 But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what he does.
26 If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless. 27 Religion that God our Father 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.
My Understanding: As I prayerfully examined this passage of scripture, asking the Lord Jesus to grant me the practical understanding he would want me to receive and/or to share from this passage of scripture today, I recognized that there were four basic problems presented in this passage of scripture, and each problem was followed by a solution. So, I believe the Lord would have me to examine these four problem areas and then to look at the solutions that have been provided for us in this first chapter of the book of James.
Man’s Anger
The problem is man’s anger. I find it interesting that it does not merely say “anger,” but rather this is speaking specifically of man’s anger. The reason I believe this is so is because God gets angry, so there is such a thing as righteous anger, too, i.e. getting angry over the same things God gets angry over, yet not sinning in our anger. See Eph. 4:26-27 where it says: “’In your anger do not sin’: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.” I also believe emotions are A moral, i.e. that they are neither moral nor immoral. God gives us emotions. He created us as emotional beings, and he gave us the same emotions as he has, one of which is anger. Anger is a motivating emotion. It points to problems that exist that need to be resolved. Yet, anger can also be rooted in sin and the anger thus points to an underlying sin problem that needs to be addressed. Man’s anger, thus, is anger that is rooted in sin and/or that results in sin.
The solution is to be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry. How many times do we get angry (man’s anger) because we failed to listen closely to what someone had to say? Listening does not merely involve hearing with our physical ears. Real listening involves our brains, hearts and our emotions, too. It considers carefully and thoughtfully what the other person is saying, and it does not make false assumptions. It gives feedback, such as “This is what I am hearing you say. Is this what you are saying?”
Sometimes we don’t hear right, maybe because we already have our minds made up, we are distracted by our own selfish thoughts and desires and what we want to be doing next, we have had a bad day and we have already built up frustration and anger inside of us, or perhaps we have unforgiveness in our hearts toward the person we are “listening” to and so we don’t really want to hear what he or she has to say, etc. So, we don’t really listen. We cut the other person off, we interrupt, we are rude, we finish his or her sentences, and/or we try to hurry the person along, etc. Most all of this has selfishness as its root, and most of man’s anger is also rooted in selfishness. When we forget self and truly listen to other people and we are slow to interject our own thoughts, we are able to ward off much anger.
Moral Filth
Moral filth is the problem. Moral means ethical, good, right, honest, decent, proper and/or honorable. Filth means lewdness, immorality, rudeness, obscenity, gossip, slander, and the like. So, “moral filth” is an oxymoron, i.e. “a phrase in which two words of contradictory meaning are used together for special effect, e.g. ‘wise fool’ or ‘legal murder’" (Encarta). This oxymoron thus results in a paradox, i.e. in “a statement, proposition, or situation that seems to be absurd or contradictory, but in fact is or may be true” (Encarta). And, perhaps that is the “effect” that is desired, i.e. to show how filth is absolutely contradictory to being moral and to show the absurdity of trying to combine the filth of this world with the moral purity of our relationship with Jesus Christ. You can’t be both moral and immoral. When you combine the two together, it still comes out as immoral. That is why the Bible teaches that believing in Jesus Christ means leaving our lives of sin behind us, and putting on Christ.
The solution to moral filth is to first of all get rid of all of it – that moral filth (oxymoron) which occurs, is accepted, and is practiced commonly or widely - out of our lives. This means that we are to get rid of these contradictions in lifestyle and the absurdity of trying to live for the Lord Jesus while still holding on to pet sins. And, the problem about this oxymoron way of living in this kind of contradiction is that it is widely and commonly accepted and practiced among Christians today. So, to get rid of filth out of our lives means to get rid of living in contradiction, but it also means to go against the flow and to not follow what is widely and commonly accepted among Christians who are living oxymoron kinds of lives. We must be willing to step away from all ungodly influences that would lead us to live lives of contradiction, and we must humbly (respectfully, submissively and meekly) accept (receive; agree with) the word of God planted in you, which can save you. We need to put off living oxymoron lifestyles that combine morality and filth together, and we need to receive the truths of scripture into our lives and to act upon those truths, instead.
Worthless Religion
The problem is worthless religion that does not keep a rein on its tongue. Matthew 23 gives us a good picture of worthless religion. The Pharisees were prime examples of religious people whose religion was worthless. They were hypocritical, i.e. they did not practice what they preached. Everything they did was for men to see. They loved places of honor and recognition. They were proud and they exalted themselves. They shut the kingdom of heaven in men’s faces through teaching salvation through works (earning one’s salvation). Today’s “Pharisees” have gone the opposite extreme by teaching a false hope that waters down the gospel message and does not teach that true faith is faith that proves itself genuine by what we do in heart response to God/Jesus via repentance and obedience and lasting faith that perseveres to the end. The Pharisees were careful to follow the letter of the law but they neglected the more important matters of the law—justice, mercy and faithfulness. They were like “whitewashed tombs,” i.e. they made themselves look clean on the outside but inside they were full of greed and self-indulgence (dead men’s bones).
They murdered the prophets, they crucified Jesus Christ on the cross, and they murdered Jesus’ followers. Saul was one of them until he met Jesus on the road to Damascus and God/Jesus radically changed his heart. And, Pharisee-like Christians - whether works-based salvation teachers or watered-down gospel teachers – still exist today. And, Jesus is still saying to them, and to us, if we qualify, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing.”
The solution is first of all to keep a tight rein (restraint) on our tongues. Matthew 12:34 says: “…out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks.” Matt. 15:18 says: “But the things that come out of the mouth come from the heart, and these make a man ‘unclean’.” So, if what comes out of our mouths comes from what is within our hearts, then to put a restraint on our tongues involves first of all cleaning up what is in our hearts as well as what we are taking into our minds which then goes to our hearts. You have heard the saying, “Garbage in – garbage out.” If what we take into our minds gets settled into our hearts, then from the overflow of our hearts our mouths will speak. So, we need to find out what is in our hearts and what is at the root of our words so that we can clean up our hearts so that our mouths will follow suit. In cleaning up our hearts, we change our priorities from living to please ourselves to living to minister to the needs of others, such as orphans and widows. Again, this goes back to a root of selfishness. Worthless religion is based in selfishness. True religion that God accepts is based in loving God and in caring for the needs of others.
Listen but Not Do
The problem is that we listen (read; hear) the word of God, but we don’t do what it says. This is a BIG PROBLEM, and is probably at the root of all other problems. It is deceptive because it gives the person a false sense of pleasing God merely by hearing, reading or studying the word. God does not need our five minutes a day to read his word just so we can mark that off of our list of things to do that we think credit us somehow with having fulfilled our Christian duty to God for that day. I like the analogy of this being like a man who looks at his face in the mirror, because that is what the word of God does, i.e. it reveals to us what is in our hearts and minds. But then the man walks away and forgets what he looks like, which is what happens when we close our Bibles after having read and examined the scriptures, but then we walk away and forget what the Lord Jesus revealed to us about what problems exist in our lives, minds and hearts that need correction. The word of God is not just a book to study, but it is a book to live out in our daily lives. Knowledge that is not applied knowledge is not much good to us other than to compete in quiz shows.
The solution is that we need to look intently (carefully; attentively) into the perfect (brought to its completeness) law (instruction given by Jesus Christ, who is the fulfillment of the law), and to continue doing this as a normal course of our daily lives. The OT laws with all their human regulations did not bring about freedom. The perfect law that brings freedom comes through genuine faith in Jesus Christ – faith that is proved genuine by her actions of repentance, love, obedience and perseverance. If we say we have faith and yet we continue to live sinful lifestyles, we are not free. True faith brings with it freedom from sin – not only freedom from the penalty of sin, but freedom from the control of sin on a daily basis. So, this perfect law that brings freedom, when followed and obeyed, will deliver us from our oxymoron ways of living constantly in contradiction. Yet, the catch is that we have to not walk away and forget what we have heard, but we must remember what we have heard by putting it into practice. You have heard the saying, “If you don’t use it, you will lose it.” This is so true! The best way to remember is to do what we have heard and to obey what we have been shown in the mirror (the word) that reveals our true characters and motivations.
My Jesus, I Love Thee / William R. Featherstone / Adoniram J. Gordon
My Jesus, I love thee, I know thou art mine;
for thee all the follies of sin I resign.
My gracious Redeemer, my Savior art thou;
if ever I loved thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.
I love thee because thou hast first loved me,
and purchased my pardon on Calvary's tree;
I love thee for wearing the thorns on thy brow;
if ever I loved thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.
In mansions of glory and endless delight;
I'll ever adore thee in heaven so bright;
I'll sing with the glittering crown on my brow;
if ever I loved thee, my Jesus, 'tis now.
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