Faith

Today when Doug and I sat with our cuppa joe on the couches and had our morning prayer and chatting time, we read from the Oswald Chambers devotional an entry that spoke about the topic of faith.  Something in his writing took my mind to the scripture from the book of James that says, "Faith without works is dead."  I'm not sure why, but the Lord immediately showed me that my previous understanding of the verse was incorrect, and he instantly gave me a new interpretation for what James was saying. 

In the past, I had always operated on the belief that James was commenting on lives that only said they believed but actually had nothing to show for it. They were not people that attended church, served their neighbors, spent time blessing others, or shared the gospel with a lost and dying world.  In essence, if we live a life which is not continuously looking for ways to display our Christian walk, then we are not operating in faith.  The focus is on what we're doing and what kind of impact it's having. The focus is on us.

Well, this morning the Lord turned that theory on its head and showed me that that's not what He's saying at all.  Instead, James is saying something even more simple and yet, more profound, than that.  He's stating that faith unaccompanied by a willingness to obey God's leading and calling is not faith at all; it's dead.  This does not mean that I get to decide what I do to serve Him--He does.  If I do all the deciding, then it's not faith at all.  It's me merely doing what I want to do. 

WOW.  That makes so much more sense and yet, it's so much more challenging to live out.  I can therefore say that I'm a Christian but if I don't listen to the Lord and obey what He tells me or leads me to do, then I'm really not a Christian.  My walk with the Lord will lead me nowhere and my actions 'for Him' are really not actually 'for Him', they are for me. 

Profound.  James is saying that the focus is to be no longer on me and my actions and how I'm impacting the world.  Instead, it's on the Lord and His words and simply whether I will obey or not.  And, like in our understanding of the world of children, the expectation is that we will obey--not when we're ready, not when we feel like it, not when we are given the entire picture of why we should obey.  Simply put, if we say we believe, why don't we listen and obey?

Something to ponder. 
Blessings, kim