NOTES for Jam 4:7-17

For unbelievers, humility is perhaps the most irritating concept in Christianity. How it is caricatured: as weakness, lack of will, passivity, slavish submission... Is that right? After all, Christ says of Himself, "I am gentle and lowly in heart" (Matt. 11:29), and He is not weak, not lacking in will, not passive; and if He is submissive, then not as a slave, but as a Son, that is, obedient rather than submissive.

This word irritates because it is the opposite of pride, the main driving force of every sin. Pride seeks strength, power, self-assertion; a person possessed by it places himself above everything and everyone and is incapable of real love. Humility, by contrast, is the path to love, because for the one who loves, the other, the beloved, is always more important than himself.

Christ's work on the Cross brings all of us out of slavery to sin, redeems our guilt before God, and gives us reconciliation with the Heavenly Father. But there is a step no one will take for us: recognizing God's rule in our own life, opening our heart to God's voice and will. And this is humility. The Apostle James says that in this case God will be able to take responsibility for our "fate," our life, and it will become an ascent into eternal life, full of love.

The apostle James implies by the form itself of the question that man doesn’t only have to, but is not also simply in the state to judge the neighbor. On one hand, to judge the neighbor means appropriating the right belonging only to the Creator. On the other hand, it means trying to make what we cannot.

Do we have the right of our opinion on the acts of another person? Certainly, yes. But then the right to judge the neighbor is obviously not given to us: about this is spoken not only in this verse of James' epistle, but also in some evangelic passages, above all, in the sermon on the Mountain. In what is thus the difference?

Probably, in which status we assign to ourselves furthermore. Our opinion is and remains our opinion, the opinion isn’t qualified for absolute justice. And so, when we judge, we take the position of the bearer of the absolute knowledge about truth and righteousness (it is natural that with such a position we don’t only judge, but condemn!). But only God can have such a position, and it is of this that reminds us the apostle James. It is still advisable to remind here that God is not only the Lawgiver and the Judge, but also perfect love, that is why we can hope in His judgment (Ps. 119:43). The judgments of men are never executed with love, we can only be afraid of them.

Why, indeed, should we not plan ahead? What is wrong with that? It is probably important to distinguish planning from self-confidence. It is one thing to make a plan while understanding that circumstances may change and, moreover, that what we have planned may prove displeasing to the Lord, in which case the plans will have to be adjusted. It is quite another to devise a program for half a lifetime and follow it with the determination of a bulldozer, crushing every obstacle. That will most likely end very quickly in a painful collision with harsh reality. Apostle James warns against this second path, reminding us that any undertaking will be brought to a truly successful conclusion—that is, without either material or spiritual devastation—only if it is pleasing to the Lord.

James does not specify from whom those who ask wrongly ask and do not receive, but we may compare these words with what he wrote at the beginning of his epistle about people who turn to the Lord not with complete faith, but with divided minds. Even today one may hear the question: why do we not receive what we pray for? James’s answer is simple: consider whether you ask in faith and whether you always ask for what is good for you. Is your prayer divided and weakened by lack of faith? Of course, much that belongs to the higher world cannot be explained “in human terms,” and we should not imitate Job’s friends, whose reasoning was logical and plausible but wrong. Yet sometimes we must still reflect on James’s words.

James also speaks of the inadmissibility of friendship with the world, and these words have often been understood literally. But we must withdraw not from the world that the Lord created and loved, and into which He sent His Son, but from the sin that has afflicted and enslaved the world. It turns out to be simple to resist sin: one need only submit to God and, with His help, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. This is true, yet for some reason what is simplest and most accessible to us proves very difficult. Perhaps this is because we are afraid to draw near to God, since doing so requires us to reject many tendencies that He hates and that bind us to the sinful world...

How often we are afraid... How often we say, “Oh, I am so weak; there is nothing I can do...” And we surrender without a fight, giving the devil an opportunity to act through our inaction. Yet the Apostle James tells us that we can free ourselves and, moreover, that it is not so difficult! Simply resist the devil, and he will flee from you! But it is we who flee... Why? Why does it seem to us that nothing can be done? Perhaps it is easier for us that way? But if we sincerely desire to draw near to God so that He will draw near to us, there will be no choice: unless we resist the devil, we will not be able to draw near to Him.

The intensity with which James denounces the rich reaches its peak. But next we see an appeal to those being oppressed to be patient, and here numerous opponents of Christianity have often exclaimed: “Aha, working people must endure oppression! So you Christians are on the side of the exploiters!”

Yet an attentive and unbiased reading does not permit such an interpretation. Just protest against social evil does not contradict the apostle’s words; the epistle itself bears witness to this. Nor is patience required in order to encourage oppressors, but because they are already condemned if they do not repent. A violent protest against earthly evil has too often turned into a destructive revolt which, after bloodshed, ended in defeat and renewed enslavement. But persistent and patient defense of justice has often proved more fruitful and victorious. This, too, is labor, and it is impossible without patience. Labor is necessary under every social order, and therefore we must be patient until the coming of the Lord.

Here James also reminds us of the power of prayer, something every Christian knows in principle but which in practice is all too often underestimated. To those of us who do not consider ourselves capable of boldness in prayer, he points to the great prophet Elijah, unexpectedly calling him a man like us (rather than calling us people like him!). This means that the spiritual power the Lord gave Elijah He can give to us as well. If only we will receive it.

Today the apostle James returns us to a time of waiting. Waiting in uncertainty - that is what the life of the prophets is. To live in a state where you know how things must be, to believe that this will certainly happen, and at the same time not to experience it yourself. Not to touch what you know about, and at the same time to awaken people who know as you do, but do not wait.

Our situation, compared with the life of the prophets, can be considered comfortable and well arranged. What they spoke about has been fulfilled. We can now join John the Baptist, about whom the Savior says: "blessed is the one who is not offended by Me." That is, knowing everything that will take place, knowing that He will be born, die, and rise, we can and must not be offended by Him. This is one of the beatitudes most accessible to us.

The Apostle James tells us today: “Do not grumble against one another.” Let us remember: how long has it been since we last said, “If it weren't for him...” “It's all his fault...” “How can anyone work with people like that?!” It would be good if it stopped there, but we often also say, “If it weren't for you...” Is it easy to refrain from such phrases? Is it easy not to look for someone to blame and not to complain, even if only to oneself? After all, this happens essentially automatically. And it is precisely this automatic response that we must do something about. To begin with, we can try not to say any of this aloud... and pray that the Lord will teach us not to seek someone to blame or complain, but simply to do our work as well as possible under the circumstances in which we find ourselves.