JAMES 2:25-26 A LIVING FAITH

25 In the same way, was not even Rahab the prostitute considered righteous for what she did when she gave lodging to the spies and sent them off in a different direction? 26 As the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without deeds is dead.

Rahab may have been a Canaanite woman who lived by another moral ethic than the Jews, but she threw her lot in with them through extending hospitality to the people of God. Her faith was demonstrated through actions that put at risk all she had and even her very life. She saw a need and self-sacrificially acted to meet that need. Such is the living faith that St. James exhorts all believers to possess.

Indeed, for the author, faith and deeds go together like soul and body. This is not a matter of which animates the other, but rather the fact that there is no life unless both are present, because for the Jew soul and body are not separate entities but interdependent parts of the whole of human existence. But unlike the Jewish understanding, the deeds of which St. James writes are not observance of the law in order to earn salvation, but the works that are manifested because of our state of salvation. Simply stated, they are the result of a life that imitates our Lord Jesus Christ; the natural outcome of answering his call to follow him.

St. James is echoing the words of Jesus when he speaks about the judgment of the nations as recorded by St. Matthew.

25:34 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’ (Matthew 25:34-36)

The person with a living faith will manifest an intolerance toward need. Such an intolerance will be manifested in a costly manner; not just financial or material assets, but by the expenditure of time and relational resources. If we scratch the surface we will see that there are needs in our extended families and our church community, as well as in the world.

Cure me of my blindness to the needs of others, O Lord. As you have called me to follow you, give me the faith to live my life in imitation of yours. Most of all help release me from my total dependence upon my material resources and grow me in my faithful dependence upon God. Develop in me your gracious and generous heart; your compassion and your grace. Amen.