Faith in Motion- James 1

The Read

We introduced this series a week ago and I told you that we’d be taking a very broad picture view of the book of James just to see what practical Christian living looks like. So let’s work our way through James!

(ESV) 1 James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, To the twelve tribes in the Dispersion Greetings.

Greeting

1 James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, To the twelve tribes in the Dispersion Greetings.

I don’t really know why, but commonly when people wrote letter in this place and in this time, the greeting also served as an introduction. When we write letters we don’t say our own name until the end.

To the twelve tribes in the Dispersion:

Greetings.

So based on the first few words we can actually tell a couple different things. The first being, what I just said, that this is a letter, written by James.

Who is James? Well the most common belief is that this James was the brother of Jesus. So we’re talking about someone who spent a lot of time with the author and perfecter of our entire faith. So I think that we know we should listen to what he says.

The second thing you can tell by the greeting is who the letter was written to. The twelve tribes in the dispersion. James was primarily writing this letter to Jewish Christians. The twelve tribes was referring to the twelve tribes of Israel that descended from the twelve sons of Jacob.

These were Jews that had come to faith in Christ.

The greeting doesn’t really classify as practical Christian living but its still important. Let’s move into verse 2.

(ESV) 2 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, 3 for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. 4 And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

Testing of Your Faith

Being a Christian

2 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, 3 for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. 4 And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

Being a Christian