...with all your strength...

So we are wrapping up uh a three-week series that we're calling head, heart, and hands.

If you like big words, the three big words are orthodoxy, orthopathy, and orthopraxy.

But I like head, heart, hands because it says the same thing and it's a little simpler.

The question we're asking is how can we be whole people?

How can we be more like Jesus?

Where our head and our heart and our hands are integrated, that they're all working in harmony with one another.

Two weeks ago we looked at Mark chapter 12, where Jesus says the greatest commandment is to love the Lord your God with all of your heart and all of your mind and all of your strength, and to love your neighbor as yourself.

Mark 12 · chapter mention

Last week, Andrew Russell asked us to consider what it means to love God with all of our heart, that our emotions are fully engaged and they're functioning in harmony with our head and our hands.

Today's question is how do we love God with all of our strength?

And how is that love expressed itself in loving our neighbors?

So I'm going to read from James chapter 2, starting in verse 14, and as you listen, let's ask that the Holy Spirit enables our hearts, minds, and hands to be engaged in ways that honor our Savior.

James 2 · chapter mention

James 2, verse 14.

James 2:14

What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works?

Can that faith save him?

If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, Go in peace, be warmed and filled, without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?

So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.

But someone will say, You have faith, and I have works.

Well, show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.

You believe that God is one, you do well.

Even the demons believe and shudder.

Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless?

Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar?

You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works.

And the scripture was fulfilled that says Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness, and he was called a friend of God.

You see that a person is justified by works, and not by faith alone.

And in the same way was not also Rahab the prostitute justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way.

For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead.

Let's pray.

Holy Spirit, would you impart to our hearts and minds what you would have us to understand?

Help me to get out of the way, that the word of the Lord might speak directly to the people of God?

And may it be more than an academic or intellectual exercise as we consider this text.

But would you be doing work in our hearts, even new work in our hearts, that we might glorify you in all that we think and feel and do?

We ask in Jesus' name.

Amen.

So, three points faith or works.

We're going to get that out of the way first.

Are we saved by faith or by works?

Second, Christ's work for you, and third, your work for Christ.

Point one, are we saved by faith or by works?

That's the question that inevitably comes to mind when you hear this text, because it seems to contradict what Paul said in a well-known passage in Ephesians 2, 8 and 9.

The Apostle Paul writes, By grace you have been saved through faith.

This is not your own doing.

It is the gift of God, not a result of works.

So you hear that, and then you read James saying in verses 20 and 24, faith apart from works is useless.

A person is justified by works and not by faith alone.

So who's right?

Could one of them be wrong and be in the Word of God?

They might seem to contradict one another, but they don't.

You see, Paul is correcting those who think that they can justify themselves by their works.

James is correcting those who think they are justified, therefore they don't need works.

You can fall off a horse, either left or right.

So Paul is arguing against legalism.

Legalism is when you depend upon your works for salvation.

James is arguing against license.

License is depending on salvation to avoid doing works.

So just to make it more clear that Paul and James are in agreement, listen to what Paul wrote to Titus.

Titus was an elder in the church on the island of Crete.

He was training elders and deacons, and he was dealing with both legalism and license in the church of Crete.

So Paul told Titus that as an elder he was to be a model of good works.

Paul wrote in Titus 2.14: our Savior Jesus Christ gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness, to purify for himself a people for his own possession who are zealous for good works.

Jesus gave himself to redeem us.

That is zealous, that he would give himself.

And so if we're not zealous for good works, maybe we haven't absorbed how zealous Jesus is for us.

Paul also wrote in Titus 3 remind the believers to submit to rulers and authorities, to be obedient, to be ready for every good work, to speak evil of no one, to avoid quarreling, to be gentle, to show perfect courtesy toward all people.

I think that should be a rule on Facebook, huh?

To show perfect courtesy toward all people.

He said, I want you to insist on these things, that those who have believed in God may be careful to devote themselves to good works.

So you see, Paul and James agree about the importance of good works, but Paul is focusing on the root of salvation, and James on the fruit of salvation.

Without the root, there can be no fruit.

But without fruit, you must question the root.

What we do is a result of what we think and feel and believe.

The worship of your heart directs the work of your hands.

And that's why we have to pay attention to what we pay attention to.

That the affection, the attention, sorry, what our mind is paying attention to will direct the affections of our heart.

And that drives the actions of our hands.

So when you are born again, your spiritual DNA changes, and that's invisible.

Those around you can't see physically that you have gone from spiritual death to spiritual life, but you've been changed inside, and therefore your behavior should change.

I became a Christian after 10 years as an atheist.

And my roommate, who was a non-Christian, said to me about six months after I started coming to this church, he said, when you first started going to church and everything, I thought it was just some phase you were going through.

But you're really different.

I'm still changing.

I have a long way to go.

But my non-believing roommate saw that something was happening visibly as a result of the invisible change that Jesus had wrought in my heart.

If you've ever made bread and forgotten to put the yeast in, when do you find out about your omission?

Right?

The dough will look exactly the same, whether there's yeast in it or not.

For a while.

But eventually you will see whether the yeast is there or not.

If I can paraphrase verse 17, so also dough by itself, if it does not have yeast, is dead.

However, dough that is made with yeast proves itself to be yeasty when it rises.

The invisible yeast makes itself visible in time.

The person in verse 16 of James 2, he isn't yeasty.

He claims to love God.

He claims that his love of God is being expressed when he tells his brother some good things, go, be warm, be filled.

But he's a liar.

And so if we truly love God with our heart and our soul and our strength, then we will love our neighbor as ourselves.

Not perfectly, not completely, not consistently, not thoroughly, but progressively, more and more, as the love of God sinks deeper in our hearts, it will change us.

But the necessary precursor to loving your neighbor is Christ's work for you.

So that's point two.

It's remarkable when you read the Gospels and you spend time just observing the way Jesus loved and interacted with people, to see the way that his mind and his emotions and his actions were all synchronized.

And it goes all the way back to the earliest part of the Bible.

In Exodus 3, we see God see, feel, and act.

The three movements of love.

The Lord said to Moses, I have indeed seen the misery of my people in Egypt.

I have heard them crying out, and I am concerned about their suffering.

So I have come down to rescue them.

The Lord sees and feels and acts.

And Jesus sees you.

He sees the unseen hurts and regrets and burdens that you struggle under.

He sees the weight of the hurt that other people have inflicted on you and that you've inflicted on others.

He knows the burden of shame and guilt you carry, of your failure to love God and love your neighbor.

He sees all of that.

And he's concerned about your suffering.

And that's why he came down.

That's why he moved towards you.

Proactive love.

He moves towards you and says, Rest from your labors, dump all your burdens on me.

Whether it's the guilt and shame of what you've done or failed to do, whether it's the hurt and pain of what others have done.

Jesus says, Let me wash you from the inside out.

Make you new on the inside.

And then the outside will begin to change.

But let's start here.

He says, I have expectations of you.

There's things I want you to do that I've called you to do.

But first, you rest.

First, let me renew your mind and give you a new heart.

So you won't act out of obligation or fear, but out of love.

James is reminding his brothers and sisters who are believers of how they have been loved, of Christ's work in them.

And that's the only foundation of any work that's going to honor the Lord.

Paul makes the same connection in Philippians 3.12.

Listen to what Paul's source of joy is, the reason why he pursues holiness.

Paul says, not that I've already obtained this or that I'm already perfect, but I press on to make it my own because Christ Jesus has made me his own.

If Jesus has made you his own, then press on to be more like him.

Gripped securely by his love, you have the strength to do good works, even sacrificial, radical love for your neighbors.

We are saved by works, you know.

But not ours.

We're saved by Christ's works.

We believe in work salvation.

Christ's work for us.

There's two theological terms for this: active obedience and passive obedience.

Jesus Christ was actively obedient to the law.

Fully human, he obeyed every one of God's laws perfectly.

He did the work that you and I never could.

He also was passively obedient, hanging on the cross, enduring the shame, the guilt, the punishment of the Father that was meant for us, that we deserve, and he was passively obedient to his father's will.

And so by Christ's passive obedience, our guilt and sin is transferred to him.

And by Christ's active obedience, his righteousness is transferred to us.

That's why you can't be saved by your works.

There are none left to be done.

He already did them perfectly.

You have a hundred percent on the test.

There's no extra credit to earn.

You've got a hundred percent if Christ is your Savior.

Ephesians 2.

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and it is not your doing.

It is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

For we are his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that you and I might walk in them.

So point three, our work for Christ.

Good works are the inevitable fruit of Christ's work within us.

Think about an apple tree.

What makes it an apple tree?

Is it the fruit or is it the root?

Listen to what Jesus said in Matthew 7, verse 15.

Matthew 7:15

Beware of false prophets who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves.

You will recognize them by their fruits.

Are grapes gathered from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles?

Every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit.

A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit.

Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.

You see, deeds that are disconnected from our heart are like a thorn bush pretending to be a fig tree.

You can't stick figs on thorns and say, voila, it's a fig tree.

It's still a thorn bush.

If we're going to do the kind of works that Jesus is calling us to, the kind that glorify God, then they're going to require the roots that God gives us, because the kind of works that glorify God are sacrificial.

They're draining.

We need roots to persevere.

And so there has got to be this connection, this living connection between the root and the fruit.

I love this story that I've told before about 10th Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia.

Some students at Covenant College were doing a documentary about 10th Pres, which is a historic church in Philadelphia where James Montgomery Boyce used to be the pastor, and Philip Riken was the pastor at the time.

And the opening words of the documentary said 10th Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia is committed to the historic orthodox truths of the Christian faith.

However, they also have a robust outreach to the poor and the needy.

Some of you heard the word, right?

Philip Riken said, you have to change one word.

You have to change however to therefore.

It should say 10th Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia is committed to the historic Orthodox truths of the Christian faith.

Therefore, they have a robust outreach to the poor and the needy.

But that story illustrates an unfortunate tendency in the church to think that somehow those two things are incompatible or they're different branches of the church.

And so very often we have roots without fruit, or fruit without roots.

And we see in the way that churches have divided, and Presbyterians are the first to be guilty of this, the split peas, as sometimes we are called, too many different Presbyterian denominations.

Some are committed to outreach to the poor and the needy, but have shallow roots.

Going back a hundred years, we saw this split in the church and liberal churches that were committed to addressing material needs, but neglected to really love people by telling them that Jesus was the only way and the truth and the light, the only way to find eternal rest and healing.

If you love your neighbor without telling him about Jesus, without telling him that he needs to be saved, then you're like an empty gift box.

It's beautifully decorated on the outside and empty on the inside.

You have fruit without roots.

But on the other hand, there are many conservative churches with strong theology, committed to doctrine, but often suspicious of those people who are out there being so busy with their hands.

They're so busy building their roots deeper that they have little fruit.

And they can be quick to label people as a social justice warrior or that we're preaching the social gospel.

I've been accused of that, of having fruit without roots.

But if you say, I love God, and you can read Greek and Hebrew and you know all of the Westminster standards, you you love God so much in your head, but your brother, who is Right in front of you, who you can see, and you don't love him, then it must, the question must be asked: how much do you really love God?

And how much do you really understand his love for you?

I like how Bob Goff describes in his book, Love Does.

It's a simple book the kids and I were listening to on our way home from vacation.

Goff says that Jesus is describing a brand of love that doesn't just think about good things or agree with them or talking about them.

Instead, the kind of love that God created and demonstrated is a costly one because it involves sacrifice and presence.

And so I think that's a good way to lead into James using these examples of Abraham and Rahab, which at first might seem like they don't fit, but let me explain why I think they are expanding on James' argument here.

In verse 21, James writes, Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar?

You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works.

If you remember, in Genesis 15, Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.

Abraham believed God's promise that he would be the father of many nations, that he would have thousands and millions of descendants through a son that he had not yet had.

He was childless, and yet Abraham believed the Lord, and it was counted to him as righteousness.

In Genesis 22, that faith bears fruit.

That root is proven to be true.

When God tells Abraham to sacrifice his only son, the son through him all these descendants are supposed to come.

The root bore fruit.

Abraham didn't understand how it was going to all work out.

But he acted on the faith and he acted sacrificially.

And then James reminds us of Rahab.

Rahab was from Jericho.

She lived in the city of Jericho.

She did not know the true God, but she came to know him.

And when these Israelites came into the city, these spies, she protected them.

She snuck them out of the city.

Verse 25, in the same way, was not also Rahab the prostitute justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them by another way.

You see, that kind of sacrificial, dangerous love that she demonstrated was evidence, it was fruit of a heart that had been changed.

Costly love is evidence of true faith because of the costly love you've received from Jesus.

I used to work in a homeless shelter in DC, and we had a home for women who were trying to quit crack cocaine.

One day I was sitting in the house director's office, Judy Ashburn, and a phone call came in and she said, Excuse me, and took the call.

And I could hear on the other line a woman from a wealthy suburb in Virginia who told Judy that she wanted to mail some Christmas gifts to the ladies in the house.

And she asked what they would like.

And Judy said, Yeah, we can't do that.

And the woman said, Well, I don't understand.

Don't the ladies need things?

And of course there were things that the ladies needed.

But Judy understood that the women in the house needed more than toiletries or clothes.

They needed people to walk with them, to encourage them, to pray with them, to be their friends.

And that's a lot more costly and sacrificial than mailing some gifts to DC.

It requires our presence, it requires our head, heart, and hands to all be engaged.

Each of us needs someone to be present with us who's willing to set aside their agenda, their needs for ours.

Isn't that what Jesus did?

Isn't that what Jesus did when he left the safety and security of his father's side in heaven?

He was warm and safe, and he could have mailed us some blessings from heaven.

But he came himself.

He came into the bad part of town where he was beaten and murdered.

He came for you.

So Judy tells this woman on the phone, she said, here's what you can do.

Why don't you come here on Wednesday night?

Join us for dinner.

Join us for Bible study.

Get to know the ladies.

And then at the end of the evening, you can give them your gifts.

She was inviting the woman to practice the kind of costly sacrificial love that brings about real change.

The kind of love that we've received.

So as I wrap up this sermon and wrap up this series, I want to repeat the question I asked you two weeks ago.

What's on your mind?

What do you think about?

I really want you to answer this question, and I really want you to tell someone the answer.

And if you don't know who to tell, then talk to me.

And you can tell me, or I'll find someone you can talk with.

But I want you to share with somebody what's on your mind.

What do you think about when you're sitting in traffic?

What do you think about when you're waiting in line?

When you're laying in bed trying to sleep.

As I said two weeks ago, in your idle moments, I D L E, in our idle moments, our minds often drift to our idols, I D O L.

There's very often a connection between what is in our heart and what is in our mind, and they are driving our actions in ways we may not even understand.

But when we fill our head with examples of the way that Christ loved others sacrificially, when we fill our hearts with reminders of how Christ has loved us sacrificially, what he did for us on the cross, it is going to affect what we do with our hands.

What we do with our time and talent and treasure.

In other words, gratitude for Christ's work in us will make us generous enough to love our neighbors as we've been loved.

Let's pray.

A people who are zealous for good works.

Jesus told us to let our light shine before others, that they might see our good works and give glory to our Father in heaven.

And so, Holy Spirit, would you help us?

Help us to consider how we might stir one another up to love and good works.

Lord, would you take my life and let it be consecrated to thee?

Take my hands and let them move at the impulse of thy love.

Take my will and make it thine.

It shall no longer be mine.

Take my heart, it is your own.

It shall be your royal throne.

Take myself and I will be ever only all for thee.

Amen.