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Intro: Good morning friends.
Today we begin our study through the book of James.
Here the sufficient word of the Lord.
This is God’s Word.
As we consider our text this morning it is important to see several things.
James The Just
Acts 15:13-
The first thing we need to see is who our author is.
This is James is none other than the half-bother of Jesus.
He is often called James the just because of how he lived his life.
He was so well loved by the people of Jerusalem that it caused the political elites to kill him.
He is writing this letter sometime between 40-50 AD and it is the first book of the New Testament written.
When he is writing it he is the senior pastor of the church in Jerusalem, which is still the epicenter for Christianity.
It is the largest church and the missionary movement has just begun.
Paul has either just begun his first missionary journey or he is about to.
The counsel of Jerusalem has yet to happen.
This is actually where we see James acting as the senior pastor.
As the Apostles begin to spread their ministry James is placed in charge of the church.
So much so that the apostles submit to his authority.
A doulos (δοῦλος) of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ
As he begins his letter he gives himself a very interesting designation.
Look at the word he uses for himself.
Depending on your translation it will probably say “servant” or “bond servant”.
Those words while accurate don’t give the full breadth of the meaning behind the word.
The word is actually the word for a slave.
It is the Greek word doulos and it describes a slave in the Roman Empire.
So you might be thinking “Jon, if slave is the right word then why do they translate it servant?”
It is because of the evil sinful history of slavery in the English world which makes our understanding of slavery have different connotations than it would have during the day of Jesus, James, and Paul.
Now it does share some similarities, but they are not entirely equal.
Yes a slave would belong to a master, but a slave in that day was primarily economic.
In fact a slave could actually expect to eventually buy his or her freedom.
This was not a life sentence, unless the slave decided to attach himself to his master.
Another key distinction is that slavery was not particular to any one group of people.
As the Roman empire expanded they would take slaves from any conquered people.
It was not the systematic oppression of one ethnic group against another specific group.
The Romans would enslave anyone they conquered, unlike the European slave trade that exploited various African peoples.
Please hear me, I am not saying this slavery was good.
Slavery was not viewed as positive in that day.
Nor should it have been.
Slavery in our history is not good.
Nor is the slavery we see in our world today.
Slavery is NOT GOOD!
However, it is not identical to what we observed in history.
It is shares more in common with indentured servant.
This is the term James willingly chooses for himself.
He says he is a slave of Christ, and indentured servant, of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.
He is telling us something about how he views himself.
To the twelve tribes
To the twelve tribes
He continues and tells us to whom he is writing.
He says to the 12 Tribes in the dispersion.
The 12 tribes is an allusion to the Biblical concept of the 12 tribes of Israel.
But who the 12 tribes are has shifted.
Although the church at this point remains primarily Jewish it is not entirely Jewish.
The 12 tribes is a way of expressing all the people of God.
He is not limiting his scope to just Jewish people.
He is referring to all the people of God, which now includes all who believe.
No longer are the people of God ethnically identified.
They are spiritually identified.
So when he writes this he is writing to all the people of God.
The complete number.
In the same way the the 12 tribes represented the full number of God’s people in the Old Testament they here represent the full number of God’s people.
in the Dispersion
Then he says in the Dispersion.
This again is looking back to the Old Testament.
This is the term used to describe what happened when the Jewish people were removed from their homeland.
When because of their disobedience God scattered the tribes of Israel into various nations around the ancient world.
Now James is not suggesting that these people have been disobedient, but simply that they are dispersed away from their home land.
This is clear when we understand that James is writing after the martyrdom of Stephen which dispersed the believers.
James is a good pastor seeking to care for the people who have been displaced because of persecution.
He’s writing to tell them how to live in the world in light of their new identity in Christ.
A world that is hostile to their new faith.
A world that has little understanding of what their faith claims are.
A world that has little understanding of who they worship is.
A world that would rather they keep quiet.
A world that will let them coexist if they shut up.
A world that will let them worship as long as they don’t make any ultimate truth claims.
A world that says “let us do as we please”.
Does that sound like a familiar world?
It should.
It is remarkably similar to our current world.
As we look to this book we will see some crucial things for living in our modern world.
With that in mind let’s see how this applies to us now.
Like James, we have a new identity.
What is so interesting about James’ introduction is that he doesn’t list any of his worldly qualifications.
Look at it again.
He doesn’t say “James, the half-brother of Jesus” or “James the senior pastor of the largest church in the world.”
or any other designation that we might expect for him to attach to himself.
It is because he understands his new identity.
James has a brand new identity and it is one rooted entirely in Christ.
He is not concerned about anything but being a indentured servant of Jesus.
Jesus bought him and redeemed him.
James has been born again and he has a new identity.
If you are a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ you too have a new identity and we see three aspects of that new identity in our passage.
We Are Indentured Servants
The first thing we see is that we too are indentured servants.
This point is going to take the majority of our focus because there is so much we need to see about our identity in this term.
As Indentured Servants We...
As Indentured Servants We...
Obey The Master
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