James: Introduction and Greeting
Notes
Transcript
Intro
Intro
Typical introduction things.
Turn to the book of James tonight. We are in a brand new series walking verse by verse through the book of James…structure is a little different for our teaching now…
I titled this message something really straightforward…introduction and greeting. Because that’s what it is. An introduction to the book of James, and a look at the first verse, which is the greeting.
So as you’re opening there…Overview of the Book:
Called the proverbs of the New Testament.
What does that mean? That it’s full of wisdom.
What is wisdom?
If knowledge is knowing God’s truth. Wisdom is knowing how to apply God’s truth.
And James is the perfect example of that. It’s the center of knowing what God word says…being a hearer of the word (like we see a bit later one) and being a doer of the word.
It’s the intersection of having Faith in God and being saved…and working for the things of God to show that salvation.
That’s why you’ll see this subtitle for our entire series… Faith // Works.
Things we are going to study in this book include…
Counting our trials as joy and being blessed by it…
Being quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger…
Hearing & Doing the word…
Partiality in the church/christian life.
Faith without works…
The taming of the tongue…
Looking like the world vs. submitting to God…
and the importance and necessity of Prayer.
And with that last one said…let’s pray for our time in the word together tonight before we read it and study it.
Pray
Alright, just one verse tonight, let’s read it.
1 James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ,
To the twelve tribes in the Dispersion:
Greetings.
That’s it…that’s what we have tonight for our passage…but just as you’ve seen time and time again…God’s word is so vast, so active and living, that we can spend the entire night on one verse and be satisfied.
So let’s look at this verse phrase by phrase.
It starts with a name. James.
It’s written by James
He had a nickname. James the Just.
- The brother of Jesus.
Who did not believe in his own brother as the Christ during his ministry…
Scripture
3 So his brothers said to him, “Leave here and go to Judea, that your disciples also may see the works you are doing. 4 For no one works in secret if he seeks to be known openly. If you do these things, show yourself to the world.” 5 For not even his brothers believed in him.
That would have included James. But what we know…is that James came to believe in Christ after his resurrection or at least sometime right before his death..we get this in a few snapshots.
Scriptures
14 All these with one accord were devoting themselves to prayer, together with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus, and his brothers.
7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.
Right here, just in the first word of this verse…we already have an application. A truth you need to embrace…
Application: It’s not too late to believe.
It wasn’t for James and it’s not for you right now.
Let’s continue.
- A Jerusalem church leader.
A prominent leader of the Jerusalem church in the first century.
Give a brief overview of the church history…
Here’s a few scriptures that show you what I’m saying and how we know it to be true.
Scriptures
17 But motioning to them with his hand to be silent, he described to them how the Lord had brought him out of the prison. And he said, “Tell these things to James and to the brothers.” Then he departed and went to another place.
9 and when James and Cephas and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given to me, they gave the right hand of fellowship to Barnabas and me, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised.
That’s what to know about James…he was a brother of Jesus, and he was a significant leader in the early church…but this verse shows us more than just that…look back at it. Next phrase…
- A servant of God and Jesus.
The question is…why not mention he was Jesus’ brother?
Wouldn’t it be a good card to pull? Hey…all these things I’m telling you…maybe listen to me…
So why? Because being a brother of Jesus gave James no authority to admonish other Christians as he does in this letter. What qualified James to write such a letter was not his physical relationship to Jesus but his spiritual relationship.
Authority was not given because of one’s standing in life…one’s connections or relations. Not even Jesus’ own brother was given leadership because he was Jesus’ brother, but rather because he above all things viewed himself as a servant to his brother, who was his LORD.
-Application: The foot of the Cross is level ground.
Explain point
Let’s move on to our last part of the text tonight…
James 1:1 (ESV)
1 James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ,
To the twelve tribes in the Dispersion:
Greetings.
For our modern readers…this is the most confusing part of the verse.
Here’s the main point.
It’s written to God’s people.
The ESV Study Bible (Chapter 1)
Jesus chose 12 disciples to signify the twelve tribes and thus to identify the church as the new Israel (see note on Matt. 10:1).
James reminds these Jewish Christians of their spiritual heritage as the people of God, gathered by Jesus the Messiah.
The tribes of Israel were scattered throughout the world by the Assyrians and Babylonians. They looked forward to being regathered as a people (Jer. 31:7–14; Ezek. 37:15–28). James implies that the true Israel is now also dispersed (away from its heavenly homeland) and oppressed, but assured of their final gathering to the Lord.
So what does this mean? It’s means that just as the Jews in the OT were dispersed from their homeland and looked forward to being regathered…James is saying that God’s people are now dispersed from their Heavenly Homeland…and are looking forward to the day they will be reunited.
And James is using this language because the Jewish Christians he was writing to (Remember he was the leader of the Jerusalem church) would have understood that…and now we understand that.
That when James is saying to the twelve tribes in the dispersion…he saying to God’s people who are now scattered.
Guys…that’s us.
We are the scattered church.
Application: Lean in.
When someone says…hey buddy, this is for you…they are saying it because they want you to listen up.