Autopsy of a Dead Faith
James 2:14-20
Crime Scene Investigators, forensic sciences, recombinant DNA, and epithelials have all become part of our cultural vernacular in the last ten years or so. Medical investigations have become the main entrée on the buffet of TV network programmers. Our nation is engrossed with scientific analysis to solve crime mysteries. Even back in the 1970s, many of us learned about the intrigue of forensic medicine by watching shows like Quincy. Like all medical examiners, Quincy would be called in to investigate the scientific details that contributed to the death of those who died under shady circumstances. And as television would have it, he always got his man.
The word “autopsy” comes from the Greek meaning: to examine with the eyes (from opsis). It’s often used to determine the exact cause of death when such is unknown or to confirm the obvious. But it’s also used more generally to describe any critical examination or assessment of something now past. We know that Luke was a medical doctor and his writings in the NT are filled with medical nuances – such as we would expect to find in the writings of a trained professional. But it is James, not Dr. Luke, who gives us a critical examination of a dead faith.
To know if someone or something is clinically dead, one must first know the fundamental signs of life. In the biological realm, we can narrow this down to even the brain waves of a comatose patient. But fundamentally, a living person must have a heart beat or a pulse, and they must have respiration. Without these for many minutes, a person is soon beyond the reach of medical resuscitation. James is qualified to do an autopsy of a dead faith because he knows exactly what constitutes spiritual life. Let’s consider his examination and test ourselves this morning. In honor of God and His Word, let’s stand for the reading of these verses.
14 What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him? 15 If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? 17 Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.
18 But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works. 19 You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe—and tremble! 20 But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is dead? [NKJV]
[Prayer] There are two major observations James presents in this autopsy of a dead faith. The first has to do with something a dead faith may have and the other involves what a dead faith fundamentally lacks. First, notice what a dead faith has…
I. A dead faith has an empty confession demonstrating a false compassion (2:14-17).
Look at verse 14: “What does it profit, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can faith save him?” This is the opening premise for understanding how to recognize a dead faith. The question at the end of verse 14 “Can faith save him?” is a reference to the so-called faith that has no works. It should read: “Can that kind of faith save him?” James knows that salvation is by genuine faith alone. There is no disagreement between James and Paul on this. James is saying the faith alone that truly saves is always accompanied by works of faith. This is fundamentally obvious.
It would be like a doctor saying that it’s not sufficient to call a person alive if they don’t have brain waves and a heartbeat and respiration. Can a person without those signs still be called “alive”? The label “alive” doesn’t make a person alive. They must have the fundamental signs of life whether they have the label or not, or the label is false. Calling something alive when it’s dead doesn’t change the facts of nature. Faith is not a semantic argument; it doesn’t hinge on definitions. Faith in Jesus Christ is spiritual life and all the definitions and semantics in the world won’t raise a spiritually dead person to spiritual life.
When Abraham Lincoln was debating Stephen Douglass, he wanted to make this point that calling something by a different name doesn’t change the facts of nature. Lincoln would ask his opponent the question: “Let me ask you: How many legs does a horse have?” Douglass conceded that a horse has four legs. Then Lincoln said, “But sir, what if we decided to call the tail a leg; then how many legs would a horse have?” Douglass, wanting to prove he could do the math replied, “Well Mr. Lincoln, if we decided call the tail a leg, then I suppose a horse would have five legs.” “Wrong!” bellowed Lincoln. “No matter what we call the tail, a horse still has only four legs!!” And likewise, no matter what we call faith, living faith always produces the genuine works of righteousness.
So James gives a living example of a dead faith in verses 15-17: “If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food, 16and one of you says to them, “Depart in peace, be warmed and filled,” but you do not give them the things which are needed for the body, what does it profit? 17Thus also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.”
As Lincoln would say: It doesn’t matter what we call the tail, a horse has only four legs. As the doctor would say: It doesn’t matter if we call a person “alive,” without a pulse and respiration, they’re still dead. So James is showing his readers that a dead faith may well claim to be genuine and real, but it’s an empty confession demonstrating a false compassion.
The brother or sister who is naked and destitute of daily food is a fellow Christian in verse 15. This is not just about our policy toward the poor in general; this is about our love and concern for fellow believers. When a Christian brother or sister has unmet physical needs that we can alleviate, we must do what we can to help them because of our faith.
This is exactly what the apostle John was saying in 1 John 3:16-19. He wrote: “By this we know love, because [Jesus] laid down His life for us. And we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. 17 But whoever has this world’s goods, and sees his brother in need, and shuts up his heart from him, how does the love of God abide in him? 18 My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue [that is, with false compassion], but in deed and in truth. 19 And by this we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our hearts before Him.” So this benefits us!
Living faith gets involved. It doesn’t just mutter empty clichés with hollow benedictions. When you see a genuine need in the church and you have the ability to meet that need, you get involved. You roll up your sleeves and get dirty to help a fellow Christian. For the joy of God’s people and the health of Christ’s Body, living faith is willing to toil, and to sweat, and to bleed, and to weep. Not because it feels good at the time, or because it’s convenient, but because our joy comes from honoring God as we serve other Christians. James is giving a severe warning to all of his readers. People who won’t commit to the church for fear of being asked to get involved in its mission may well be spiritually dead and self-deceived. If someone has no love for the people of God and no investment in the mission of the church, they may have a said-faith, which is really a dead faith.
That’s what James is telling us in these verses. But he goes further. Not only does a dead faith have an empty confession demonstrating a false compassion, but second…
II. A dead faith lacks deep, trembling conviction falling short of even demonic belief (2:18-20).
Listen to verse 18: “But someone will say, “You have faith, and I have works.” Show me your faith without your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.”
This verse is not pitting faith against works; it’s contrasting a dead faith without works against a living faith with works. The main point is that genuine faith always has genuine works. He says, “Show me your faith without your works…” which can’t be done. What a person believes in their heart cannot be seen by others until those beliefs are manifested in behaviors. Another way to put is this: how we behave demonstrates what we really believe. Without faithful works, no one can see what we really believe. But even people with a dead faith can have firmly held beliefs, even doctrinally correct beliefs.
Look at verses 19-20: “You believe that there is one God. You do well. Even the demons believe—and tremble! 20 But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is dead?”
This is a direct strike. These words of James explode like a well-placed grenade in the bunker of inactive dead orthodoxy! If a person has all of the right facts about God and gives all of the right answers about doctrine and theology, and even gives ten-percent to the church, many Christians would say, “That’s enough! Who could ask for anything more?” But James says, not so fast. If someone has a well-informed head full of facts, that’s enough to make them a legalist, or an informed opponent, or a scholar or even a good theologian perhaps, but it does necessarily make them a true believer. Faith is seen when those facts are translated into a changed life… when all of that information makes that 18-inch journey from the head down to the heart. The Spirit-informed conscience knows what is right and cannot rest until obedience is accomplished.
Verse 19 refers to the orthodox position of monotheism: “You believe there is one God. Congratulations! Join hands with the demons – they believe the same thing – and tremble!”
You see, one of the problems with the dead-faith group in James’ audience is that they said they believed all the right stuff. But there was no trembling! That is, there was no penetrating conviction that it was radically true and demanded a radical obedience on their part.
If someone has demonic orthodoxy: they believe all the right things, it just doesn’t make any difference – then they have a dead faith. James makes this point clearly in verse 20: “But do you want to know, O foolish man, that faith without works is dead?” The NIV has “faith without deeds is useless”, but ‘dead’ is the point James is trying to make. It’s worse than just useless, it’s dead. And because it’s dead, James does a public autopsy of a dead faith for the whole church to see. It’s so we can learn what a dead faith looks like, so we can avoid it and make changes.
We can avoid cultivating a dead faith by putting our whole trust in Jesus Christ. Wanting to have His rule in your life so much that you’re willing to do anything, give up anything, or alter your life in any way to have it – is the first sign of true conversion in your life. Neither dead faith nor demonic orthodoxy is willing to make those changes. It was Christ who made you want it in the first place. He alone can give you a genuine confession that demonstrates a true compassion for fellow Christians. And He alone can give you a deep, trembling conviction that goes beyond mere head knowledge to produce a radical transformation of your heart.
Let’s pray…
(c) Charles Kevin Grant
November 25, 2005