Good morning my siblings in Christ.
I know it is a holiday weekend. And you still showed up to church. Give yourselves a pat on the back. Robin has been talking about spiritual gifts. Who has done their spiritual gift inventory she gave out a few weeks ago?
We are going to continue to talk about spiritual gifts for a few reasons. First and foremost, the ministry fair isn’t done and over with. There is still next week to find out where you might fit in the mission of Riverside. Additionally, you can join most things in our church really whenever barring a few exceptions. At any rate, the second reason is to keep the conversation going. We should always be looking for ways to give back to the church via our gifts. Third, the topic of gifts is one of the topics for today’s scripture. It is right in the beginning of the selection.
“Every generous act of giving, with every perfect gift, is from above,”
Y’all know me and my preaching by now. We are also going to talk about the audience of the text, the author, when it was written and what it has to do with us centuries later. So let’s get after it. The author of this epistle is James.
And not just any James but like the half-brother of Jesus. Yeah, that James. Which some scholars believe is the reason the book was canonized is because of the relation to Christ. It is not a very long book in the Bible but an important one nonetheless. James wrote this letter of prose to the early Jewish Christian communities as the original audience. James was killed in 62AD. And it is believed that he wrote this in the 40’s or 50’s making it one of the oldest New Testament texts. What does this seemingly ancient text have to do with 21st century Christians? We have come a long way from those first Jewish Chirstians. What it has to do with us lies in the passage itself. It talks about both listening and hearing. I want to briefly talk about the difference between hearing and listening.
Hearing is physiological activity meaning it is an involuntary and a passive action. While listening is a psychological activity that is voluntary and an active action. Hearing occurs first. It is when one concentrates on what they are hearing that then listening begins. An example is hearing a door open then listening for footsteps or more noises.
Or this time of year hearing is the sound of cicadas in the summertime. It is when we focus on the sound of a cicada that we then listen to the cicada. James wants us to be quick to listen. Listen for what? Perhaps the voice of God, for the message of the Gospel, just to your surroundings and be present, or perhaps listen to your heart. Let's continue to discuss what else James talks about.
Let everyone be slow to speak, slow to anger, for human anger does not produce God’s righteousness. What about righteous anger? Is there such a thing? Sure there is. It is called righteous indignation.
For those that don’t know righteous indignation is a strong emotion that’s motivated by a perceived injustice or moral lapse. And surely God gets angry. What would God have to be angry about? I would imagine anything that would cause righteous indignation. Injustices we see daily. People claiming to follow Jesus and preaching prosperity gospel while their followers give them everything they have. I have to admit I get angry sometimes it is human anger and sometimes it is righteous anger.
We know that God knows and understands human emotion because we know through Christ felt emotions including anger. And when Christ was angry like turning tables in the Temple it was a righteous anger. But I digress. So what does this letter from James have to do with us almost 2000 years later?
Well, I would argue that the original audience being followers of Christ is still very relevant to today's followers of Christ, aka us. We should be quick to listen. Especially for the voice of God.
What is God calling on us to do today? Right now we are being called to worship our God because it is Sunday. But what is God calling us to do when we leave this place? God calls us to live like Christ.
To care for the least of these. The least of these being the sick, the dying, the child, the poor, etc.Because we know who the least of these are pretty much anyone not in power, also known as the rich and famous. We should be slow to speak and slow to anger. But wait there's more because those are the easy things to do.
It is relatively easy to listen, be slow to speak and slow to anger. However, James says that is not enough. It is not enough to just hear the word of the Lord.
It is not enough to be quick to listen.
It is not enough to be slow to speak.
It is not enough to be slow to anger.
We have to do. Do what? Do the work of the Lord. James says be doers of the word and not merely hearers…doers who act—they will be blessed in their doing.
So as you listen to this sermon I hope you listen for the call to action. It can be easy to hear a call to action. But to listen to the call is different. What do I mean? It is like earlier in the sermon when I talked about the difference between hearing and listening. To hear is involuntary. Something you can drown out almost like the sounds of summer in the background of the evening. But to listen to the call to action is to do something. Because to listen is to be active in a process. Justice Together is the perfect example of this process. First were the listening sessions, not the hearing sessions. Listening to the concerns of the congregants. And then doing the research to come up with a plan to do something.
They were listeners and doers. They were the audience of James. Just as we are the audience of James. We are the audience of James when we reach out to the community through outreach projects. We are the audience of James as Disciples with our mission of wholeness in a fragmented world. We are the audience of James when we listen to the voice of God and act. It can be hard to discern between our voice and the voice of others and that of the Lord. This is not to say that sometimes your voice and that of the Lord don’t have the same message.
My call to ministry is one of hearing and then listening. I was a case manager for individuals with developmental disabilities. I loved everything about my job except for my supervisor. They made my job more difficult and pretty much did everything a supervisor shouldn’t do. I kept putting in for promotions and getting interviews but it always went to someone else. And these were jobs I was well qualified for and would have been a good fit. I did not understand why I was continually being passed up for promotion time and time again. After my third rejection I was bound and determined to get to the bottom of the mystery. So I went to the VP of the company and asked why I was getting passed up. I was then informed that I was a great case manager and of great value to the company in that capacity. So they saw it as a detriment to the company if I left that role. Basically, I was never getting out.
I vented my frustration to a minister friend of mine who I have always seen as a mentor. Their first question when I was entertaining the idea of leaving the company was what about ministry. I asked what about ministry? Ya know, like as a job. I told them I didn’t think there was anything in ministry for me. I don’t know if I could see myself there in that position. They told me to enter into a discern period where I would listen to God’s call. It took me another six months before I thought ok I will enter into a time of discernment. It took me another year while I did volunteer work through the young adult volunteer program that I would finally actually listen to my call. I made a deal with God I would enter ministry as long as I didn’t have to step foot in a pulpit.
Well here I am in the pulpit. It was a compromise with God. As long as it wasn’t my full-time job. I have learned a great deal since then one thing is for certain. You can bet your bottom dollar that if you are doing the work of the Lord. Caring for the least of these. Healing the world in your own way. Following the Holy Spirit. Worshiping and giving praise to God. Then you are listening, not just hearing.
Amen.