Sermon Tone Analysis

Life as a slave

So, when is being a slave being a freeman?

It is when you are a slave of Christ we have our freedom.

And, having freedom in Christ we are challenged, encouraged to grow to maturity.

As we start this series may we as a slave learn from this Epistle to grow the maturity of Christ, or at least pick up some tools.

Things we will discuss, look at tonight.

Author

Recipients

Reason/theme (the aim)

Receptivity of Epistle

Authorship

So who is this James, what can we know, learn about the Epistle and the authorship of it (Jam1:1)?

Somethings to consider about authorship:

(insert who is James picture here)

James identified as the author, but what James?

Is the author James the Apostle?

surely if it was there would be a claim to apostleship and authority.

Is the author James the brother of Jesus?

surely if it was there would be some mention of his kinship to Jesus.

Is it James, the Apostle, son of Zebedee (Mt4:17-22)

Is it James the son of Alphaeus (Mt10:3)?

How about is it James the father of Judas (Lk6:16)?

Either way you look at it., the content of the book is valuable.

It was to the Jewish Christians then, and even to Jews, there are great proverbs found throughout the Epistle.

challenging the recipients to hear and grow up, to mature.

But the scholars, only by a majority would say it is James the brother of Jesus and who was the head of the Church located in Jerusalem, a Jewish Christian Church.

What James says could be addressed to Jews or Jewish Christians

There are many things found in James that can be addressed both to Christians in the early church in Jerusalem or even to Jews.

The term “the Lord” used again and again can address either Jesus or God (Jm1:7; 4:10)

The perfect law and the royal law can be Law of love or law of Moses (Jm1:25; 2:8)

Elders can reference elders of Christian church or Jewish elders (Jm5:14)

Term “brothers” is primarily used in Christianity, but is found in some Jewish writings too.

Many quotes, references from Sermon on the Mount; delivered to a Jewish audience (Jam2:12-13 Mt6:14-15)

The Recipients

While there are questions about what James is the author, more questions come when it comes to the definition of the recipients.

To the twelve tribes who are dispersed

Is this the 12 tribes of Israel that have been disbursed out of Jerusalem due to persecution?

Is this to Jewish Christians from within the 12 tribes who because of their belief have been disbursed.

Is this 12 tribes the ones Paul references in Rom9:24-26 who are the true Israel, the spiritual Israel?

Hebrew word for disbursed is “Diaspora” and that was word used for Jews who were living outside Palestine.

What we can know is that because of James reference to Jesus (1:1; 2:1) and he being a servant, bond-servant, or in some versions it says slave (HCSB, NLT), we know he is writing Jewish Christians who are outside of Palestine.

Another thing we can know is that the recipients are scattered throughout the world (nations).

and that is exactly what Jesus commanded to happen in (Mt28:19; Act1:8)

Holloway says this about what more we can ascertain just in this one verse.

“Letter is to those who accept Jesus as the Messiah that are scattered among the nations and belong only to the redeemed Israel, the 12 tribes.

They are in the world but not of the world (Jn15:18-19) they are looking for a better home as they live as aliens (1Pt1:17; 1Pt2:11; Heb11:8-16; Heb13:14).

James writes to show what it means to morally to live as scattered people who owe allegiance to Christ, and not to the standards of the world.”

Reason/theme (aim)

Every book of the bible has a theme, a reason it was written and an aim, what we are to do with the theme.

With James it is made known early on (Jm1:4)

So that you may be perfect and complete (Jm1:4; Eph4:13).

We are not perfect outside of Christ and we are being perfected in Christ and through Christ.

By His Word, by His Spirit, all to grow us to the fullness of Christ (Eph4:13)

So, the reason, the theme, the aim is to help the disbursed Christians to grow in maturity knowing in Christ they are complete and lack in nothing.

Receptivity of Epistle

James as you can already see has lot’s of questions, but again, the content is what really matters.

There were more questions raised over the centuries, even over the content, and origin.

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Book of James was not circulated at early date as were other books of New Testament

Book of James was not accepted by all as “inspired” scripture or even worthy to be in the canon of scripture

Even as late as the 16th Century it was challenged by some scholars

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First compilation of New Testament - 170; Murtorian Canon; James not mentioned

Writings of Tertullian; 3rd century; no quote from James (7258 other quotes)

First appearance of James AD350; Codex Corbeiensis; claims James Son of Zebedee is author

AD357 first version of James appears in Latin and quoted by Hilary of Poitiers

First printing in Biblical canon was in Vulgate version of New Testament as noted by Jerome; reason accepted was because of Constantine's belief and faith in the writings of James as the brother of the Lord.

AD 1546 - Council of Trent - added it to the Roman Catholic Bible

The Roman Catholic church had two forms of scripture;

Proto-canonical - unquestionably accepted from the beginning

Deutero-canonical - those writing which only gradually won way into the New Testament

Martin Luther and Epistle of James

Luther challenged the canonicity of James for the following reasons

Challenged due to lack of reference to Jesus

Challenged due to no mention of the resurrection

Challenged due to no reference to Jesus as the Messiah

Luther’s conclusion; He wrote in his German version of the New Testament he noted James, Jude, Hebrews and Revelation to be held in second behind any and all other scripture.

Listen to his concluding paragraph taken from Preface to the New Testament.

“In sum: the gospel and the first epistle of St John, St Paul’s epistles especially those to the Romans, Galatians and Ephesians; and St. Peter’s first epistle, are the books which show Christ to you and teach everything you need to know for your salvation, even if you were never to see or hear any other book or hear any other teachings.

In comparison with these the epistle of James is an epistle full of straw,because it contains nothing evangelical.

But more about this in other prefaces.”

He believes because of the heavy delving into Old Testament Law that the writing was intended for Hebrews not for Christians and yes can learn some principles, but you can learn principles outside of scripture too.

So, there you go the troubled, questionable past of this great epistle that we are going to look at.

But what can we know from the writing of the Epistle and the man James?

What can we know, for sure?

He identifies himself as a servant (slave) of God and the Lord Jesus Christ (Jm1:1)

We can know that Jesus had a brother named James (Mt13:55); who was not a believer at first (Jn7:5); He became a disciple of Jesus (1Cor15:7; ACt1:14) and became leader of church in Jerusalem (Gal2:9)

He was not always a believer

But after the death, burial and resurrection became a disciple

and a leader in the church of Jerusalem

He was a vital participant at Jerusalem conference (Act15:13-33)

It is a long passage, but let me give you a few verses

Paul visited him as one of the leaders of the church (Act21:18-19)

He is a man of prayer as much reference to pray in the epistle

There is no doubt as we study this Epistle that there were some problems within the church, there were maturity problems, unity problems so problems that we still see today James addresses several topics along the way to help us to learn to be a good slave of Christ.

Impatience in difficulties, loosing our joy (Jm1:1-4)

Talking the talk, but not walking the walk (Jm2:14ff)

Poor tongue control (Jm3:1ff)

Fighting, bickering and coveting (Jm4:1ff)

Coveting worldly things (Jm5:1ff)

How to glean the most from this series

Know where you stand with Christ, for there is no spiritual maturity without spiritual birth (Jm1:18) - rebirth through obedience (1Pt1:22-23); rebirth by water and Spirit (Jm3:5) through baptism (Mk16:16; Tit3:5)