A New Year

In the fourth chapter of his letter (verses 13-17), James warns against presumption regarding the future. As he points out, when it comes to the future, we are walk in the path of humility, which our ignorance of the future, our frailty as temporal creatures, and our dependence on the Creator. We should [...]

While the same themes are found in the introduction and the conclusion, a subtle (or perhaps not so subtle) shift has occurred. In the introduction, prayer is related mainly to our own welfare. In 1:5, James writes: If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God, who gives generously to all without [...]

The last fourteen verses of the book of James serve as the conclusion to his sermon. Shorter than the extended introduction found in chapter 1, it contains the same themes we find in the introduction. Two of those themes are patience and perseverance. By patience, James points to “the self-restraint which does [...]

As James comes to the end of his third point in the sermon (keeping oneself from being polluted by the world), in 5:1-6 he deals with wrong views and uses of possessions. The big issue for many in understanding this passage is who is the audience? I am convinced James is speaking to [...]

In the final section before his conclusion, James deals with three symptoms of self-centeredness, symptoms that often do not arouse suspicion or concern because that’s just the way people are. And that is precisely the point James is trying to make. He wants his readers to turn away from such thinking. The [...]