James 1:1  James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greeting.
2  My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations;
3  Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience.
4  But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.

I was recently asked to do a study of the book of James and so we will be looking at this book for the next while in our devotionals. God often directed His writers to give some introductory remarks of who they were and who they were writing to. There is only one Author of the entire Bible, and that is God. He chose holy men to write down His Word. When we take God’s Word, which is the King James Bible for the English speaking world, we have the written Word of God in our hands. It is inspired of God. He has His power on it and in it. It is Truth. The wise person accepts God’s Word as truth and builds his life on the truth.
In verse 1 of chapter 1 we are told that this James was a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is not identified as an apostle. Paul was often identified as an apostle. Some have suggested that this James was a half-brother of Jesus Christ. There is nothing in this book to suggest that is the case. We can make assumptions but we need to be careful how much weight we put on those assumptions. If God gives us information we accept that as fact. If He does not give us information we need to be content with what He does give us.
It is important to note that this James was a servant of God. That is a necessary fact to note. He was one of the holy men that God chose to record His Word. James was also a servant of the Lord Jesus Christ. James understood that Jesus Christ was his Saviour but he also understood that Jesus Christ was his Lord. This is important for all born again Christians to understand. We have the privilege of having the Creator and Saviour of mankind as the Master of our lives. The Bible tells us that we are all like sheep. Sheep need a shepherd. People need a master. The Bible also tells us that we are all born sinners.

Isaiah 53:6  All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.

We see here that we cannot blame the devil for our sin. Sinners are not born possessed. A person can become possessed if he chooses to devote himself fully to the devil’s plans.
The good news is that God, the LORD, laid on Him, Jesus Christ, the iniquity of us all. Every person has the opportunity to be forgiven and saved. The only way to be forgiven and saved is through repentance toward God and faith toward our Lord Jesus Christ. James was directed by God to write to Jews who had been saved.
We are also told in verse 1, that James was directed to write to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad. God chose the Jews through a man called Abram. God changed his name to Abraham. Abraham had a wife named Sarai, whose name He changed to Sarah. They were not without sin. However, they were individuals that trusted in God and thus they learned to walk more obediently in the fear of the Lord.
Some people wrongly assume that Old Testament saints were saved by works and New Testament saints are saved by faith in God. They also assume that in the Millennium, salvation will again be by works. This is false. Cain and Abel needed to believe in God for their salvation. They did no work to be saved. They proved what was in their hearts by their actions. Cain proved to be of that wicked one, and Abel proved to be a child of God. The same is true for Enoch and for Noah and for all of humanity. Most people prove they are not saved by their continued actions in defiance of the truth. A few prove they have been saved because at some point their actions change. They suddenly begin to demonstrate a love of God and thus learn to walk in the fear of the Lord. They become what we read of James: a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ. A person must choose to turn to God and be saved.
Since God chose Abraham to be a testimony of His goodness and holiness, Abraham and his descendants would be despised by many. Since man is born a lost sinner, he does not want to be exposed for his sin. Cain did not like it that Abel exposed his sin. Cain murdered his brother because his, Cain’s, deeds were evil and Abel’s deeds were righteous. John 3 tells us:

John 3:19  And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.

The Jews were to be a light to the world. They chose not to be that light and most remained in darkness. Over time, the Jews became a despised people to the rest of the world. At the time of Christ, the large part of the Jews tried hard to fit in with the ungodly Roman society. They wanted their own land and government, but they did not want to follow the true God. Jesus was hated by His own people because He would not accept their corrupt ways. It was the Jews that cried out for His crucifixion. After His crucifixion, the disciples tried to stay hidden because they feared what might happen to them if people would associate them with Jesus.
In Acts 2, God empowered the apostles with the gift of the Holy Ghost and since that time, all saved people receive the gift of the Holy Ghost at the moment of salvation. Saved Jews and Gentiles became a hated group of people. History shows us that the Jews, whether saved or not, have been a constant target of Gentile hatred. We see that very clearly in Toronto and Montreal. The governments and the police have chosen to protect those who hate the Jews and are seeking to restrict the movement of Jews. The nation of Israel has been under attack since they were allowed back into their homeland after the second world war. Most of the Jews do not know the Lord. They are just as pagan as most Gentiles. However, the world still hates the Jews in a particular way. The result of the hatred of the Jews in the early days of the current dispensation caused them to scatter. Rather than be concentrated in one place they moved around and many became indistinguishable from the Gentiles around them. The preaching of the Gospel by the apostles caused some of the Jews to be saved. They did not move back to Jerusalem because they were saved. They were still scattered abroad. James was directed to write to these saved Jews that were scattered abroad. This does not mean that Gentiles have nothing to learn from this letter. Gentiles can be saved just like Jews can be. When a Gentile is saved, he too will become a target of the unsaved world. He too will need to know how to live in the midst of a hostile environment.
James was directed to send the saved Jews, greetings. In the following verses we see what those greetings were. They were not just some light and fluffy words. They had substance.
In verse 2 James addressed them as “brethren”. They were fellow Jews, but more importantly, they were fellow believers. There is a strong tie among those who are fellow believers in God and the Lord Jesus Christ.
As these Jews were suffering, they were reminded to count it all joy when they would fall into divers temptations. The word “divers” refers to “various” temptations. The “temptations” spoken of here are not temptations to sin. God never tempts His children to sin. They were testings and trials, to strengthen them in their faith. Some saved people, who are weak in the faith, will try to blend in with the society around them. If they are truly saved, they will not be able to do so successfully. God loves His children and thus He will chasten those who disobey Him.
There is a need for God’s child to be driven to greater dependence upon Him in all things. We can assume we have things under control. We can assume we can handle life on our own. We need to be reminded of the importance of always looking to God for direction. It is through trials, that true saints draw closer to their Master.
Verse 3 tells us that the temptations spoken of in verse 2 are the trying of our faith. We need to know why we believe what we believe. We need to get rid of any false doctrine and any imaginations and we need to get down to the bedrock of true faith. We are reminded here that the trying of our faith will work patience. We certainly need that. We can run ahead of God and we can be like Abraham and Sarah who assumed that God needed their help to keep His promise of a son to them. The result of Abraham’s sin, was a son that would be a curse to the world. Ishmael did not sin in being born. However, the ungodly influence of his father was heavily engrained in him. He could have repented and been saved but he did not. His descendants have remained a major problem for the Jews and also for Gentiles.
God never needs our help. We need His help. We need to take Him at His Word and believe that He can meet all our needs as we submit humbly to Him. Of course we can only do this when we are saved.
In verse 4 we see that patience is working in the heart of the saint. We may think we are quite patient in our lives. We often hear of the patience of Job. Job was patient in some ways, but we also learn that he needed to grow in patience. He demanded things of God that he had no right to demand. He learned patience. He learned the importance of trusting God even when he could not understand what God was doing, or what was happening in his life.
God directed James to remind us that as patience is working in our lives, we will be perfect and entire. The word translated as “perfect” has the sense of being complete. We need to be well equipped for everything we will face in life. The word translated as “entire” compliments the word perfect. It speaks of being complete in every part. God does not want His child lacking in anything. Through the testing of our faith, we will be perfected if we will submit to God’s will and word.
When we are tested, it is good to take the opportunity of searching the Scriptures and making sure that we are standing on solid ground.
In the first church that I pastored I was tested intensely regarding my faith. I sought help from the school I had recently graduated from. I found no help there. I sought help from the organization our church was connected with and I found no help there. I took God’s Word and I prayed and I studied and I found help there. I found the importance of sound doctrine and that if I would accept God’s Word as Truth, I would also find opposition from those who did not want to accept that fact. I did not always see those trials as joyous, but I have learned to look at trials more in that light. The joy is in the fact that God is purifying His child. He wants His child to build solely upon the truth which is His Word. Everything else must fall by the wayside. In fact the true child of God cannot just passively allow false doctrine to fall off. He must actively cast off false doctrine. He wants to throw it as far away from him as possible. He does not want it to come creeping back into his life and thoughts. He needs to have sound doctrine.
As we see in verse 4, God does not want His child to be wanting anything. The word translated as “wanting” speaks of absence. God does not want anything missing in the Christian’s life. The Psalmist wrote:

Psalm 23:1 The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.

Psalm 34:10  The young lions do lack, and suffer hunger: but they that seek the LORD shall not want any good thing.

God wants us to be able to stand strong in the midst of every trial we will face. As we grow in Him, we will be able to stand stronger. We can always grow more. That is part of the blessing of being a true child of God. It is a danger when a true child of God fights against the Word and will of God. When we do that, He chastens us. His desire is for us to bring forth the “peaceable fruit of righteousness”.
As we look at this book, I trust that each reader will submit to the Word of God. If you are reading this, but not saved, there is no better time to get saved than right now. There is nothing more important in your life than to know the true God as your Saviour and Lord. Then there is nothing more important than to be growing in Him.
Pastor Bartel