On St James Fr. James Jorgenson

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and

of the Holy Spirit, amen. Glory be to Jesus Christ.

Today is October 23rd, the Feast of St. James,

the Brother of the Lord. It is also, by the way,

the fourth anniversary of the repose of our daughter,

Daria, who died of a massive heart attack four

years ago today. So I would ask you today especially

to remember her in your prayers. St. James. If

you look in the New Testament, you'll see that

there are three Jameses that are mentioned prominently

as apostles. Two of them were of the twelve apostles.

That's James. the son of Zebedee, and James,

the son of Alphaeus. James, the son of Zebedee,

went on to preach the gospel in Spain, where

he is especially revered. And then James, the

son of Alphaeus, probably went to Egypt, though

the tradition about where he preached is not

as strong as the tradition about James. in Spain.

Then we have the third James, who is called an

apostle in the broad sense of that word. He wasn't

one of the 12 original apostles. Who is this

James? He is called in the, well, you hear it

in the gospel, they say that it's not his father

Joseph and his mother Mary. and his brothers,

and mentioned a number of brothers. This is that

James is one of them. So James is, to use our

technical term, a half -brother of Jesus. A son

of Joseph by a previous marriage. He is by tradition

an older person than Mary. and he had been married

before, so Joseph was a widower. So James is

called by that rather exalted title, the brother

of God, because Jesus is God who became man.

Ha -adelphotheos in Greek, brother of God, brother

of the Lord. If you notice sometimes, in icons

or frescoes of the flight into Egypt when Mary

and the Christ child and Joseph fled because

of Herod's desire to kill the infants. Sometimes

you'll see a young man who's leading the donkey.

Mary and the Christ child are on the donkey Joseph

is following alongside, and there's a young man

who's leading them. Iconographically and artistically,

that represents this James, the brother of the

Lord, the half -brother once again of Jesus.

He was also the first bishop of Jerusalem. You

hear this mentioned in today's second epistle,

Paul's epistle to Galatians. He said he went

up and conferred in Jerusalem with Peter and

James, the Lord's brother. That is the James

who was the first bishop of Jerusalem. He ended

his days as a martyr. He was thrown off a wall.

didn't die from the fall, and they stoned him

to death. That is the way this James ended his

earthly life and earned the crown of a martyr.

First Bishop of Jerusalem, he's also accredited

with being the author of one of the ancient liturgies

of the church, the Liturgy of St. James, which

the church allows this particular liturgy to

be celebrated on the feast day of St. James.

And I've served that several times. It's a fascinating

liturgy, but I think the reason why, one of the

reasons it isn't done more frequently is that

the priest's prayers are much more prolonged

than they are even in the liturgy of St. Basil.

But this liturgy of St. James is really the grandparent

of the liturgy we serve now. So in liturgical

history, you have this very ancient liturgy of

St. James, from which was drawn a shorter liturgy,

the Liturgy of St. Basil. And then St. John Chrysostom,

the liturgy we're most familiar with, is, if

you will, an abbreviation. of the Liturgy of

St. Basil. So he's the author of this particular

Divine Liturgy of St. Basil. He also figures

prominently in chapter 15 of the Acts of the

Apostles, which was the first, if you will, council

in the church when the apostles got together

and... decided that vexing question, which was

really in many quarters tearing the church apart.

Do the converts to Christianity from paganism,

the so -called Gentile converts, do they have

to observe all the ritual prescriptions and particularly

the dietary laws of Judaism? Your familiarity

with St. Paul's epistles, you know how often

he addressed that particular issue. But the bishops,

the apostles got together in the mid -50s probably.

They gathered together, reassembled in Jerusalem,

and they addressed this issue. And the head of

the church in Jerusalem, who in a way was the

spokesman, for the Hebrew party, the Jewish party

within the church. He said, this is his articulation

of the apostolic decision of the Council of Jerusalem

in Acts 15. James says there, it has seemed good

to the Holy Spirit. and to us, to lay upon you

no greater burden than these following necessary

things, that you abstain from what has been sacrificed

to idols, and from blood, and from what has been

strangled, and from unchastity. That what has

been strangled might seem rather peculiar to

us, but this was the ancient, this is an expression

of the ancient attitude that the blood of a living

thing contained its essence or its soul, so to

speak. So if you eat this blood of an animal,

then you sort of acquire the animal characteristics,

so to speak. Now, we, of course, know that that's

not true, but this is one of the sensitivities.

So, same thing with strangling, because you strangle

an animal, the blood's still in it. So, James

said, all you have to do is don't eat anything

that's been sacrificed to idols and anything

that hasn't had the blood drained out of it.

Then, of course, that very... general admonition

to abstain from chastity, from immoral behavior,

which was so prevalent, I was going to say so

prevalent in the ancient world, but I think our

society nowadays sort of rivals that. So that

was the apostolic decision which was articulated

in Acts 15 of... St. James of the Acts of the

Apostles. Finally, the importance of James. He

also wrote one of the epistles in the New Testament.

Obviously, the epistle of James. And this epistle,

it contains a number of just sort of brief exhortations.

From what I can get, I don't see any kind of

connecting. idea in this epistle. They're just

words of advice here and there. And I'm going

to share these words of advice with you because

they're pertinent to us. The epistle begins,

James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus,

to the twelve tribes in the dispersion, greeting.

Well, right away there you get the Jewish background

of this, the 12 tribes. He's addressing the Hebrew

Christians in the dispersion. Dispersion is that

they scattered throughout all the ancient world.

So he goes on to, James goes on to say, count

it a joy, my brethren, when you meet various

trials. A joy when you meet trials. for you know

that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.

Another one. Blessed is the man who endures trial,

for when he has stood the test, he will receive

the crown of life, which God has promised to

those who love him. Every good and perfect gift

comes from above, coming down from the Father

of lights. That should sound pretty familiar,

doesn't it? That's mentioned in the prayer before

the Ambon at the Divine Liturgy. Every good and

perfect gift is from above, coming down from

the Father of lights. Now here's one. For me

and for all of you too, I'm sure. Know this,

my beloved brethren, that everyone be quick to

hear, slow to speak, slow to anger. Be quick

to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger. He

says, be doers of the word, not just hearers.

So what we hear in the scriptures, what we hear

in sermons, what we hear our Lord and the apostles

tell us to do, let's not just hear them, but

let's do our best to practice these. Be doers

of the word, not just hearers only. Here's a

rather peculiar one. Even the demons believe

and shudder. That might seem kind of strange

to you. Do demons believe? Well, it depends on

what you mean by believing. There are several

levels of believing. The basic fundamental one

of believing is what is called historical knowledge.

Who Jesus is, what he taught, what he did. This

historical knowledge is something that Anyone,

a Jew, a Hindu, a Buddhist, anyone can know about

Jesus, that basic historical knowledge, but the

faith of the heart, of course, is lacking. So

this is why it seems peculiar to us. Even the

demons believe. And so what do they do? They

shudder because they know what they have missed

out on. and what they are destined to not have

throughout all eternity. The demons believe in

shudder. Draw near to God, and he will draw near

to you. Do not speak evil against another, brethren.

Oh, how we can be prone to gossip. We have to

watch that. Do not grumble, brethren, against

one another, that you may not be judged. Don't

grumble. He could say to me, don't arp. You know,

I think I've told you before what arping is.

A -A -R -P, retired people. An arper is an old

person, like your grandfather. dictionary tells

us, who complains constantly about small things

that he can't do anything about. So let's not

grumble and arp. You don't have to be old in

order to be an arper. Then there's a second from

the last. In chapter 5, And this you probably

hear if you've attended the anointing of the

sick. This is the scriptural proof text, if you

want to say, that the anointing of sick people

with oil took place in apostolic times. St. James

says, Is anyone among you suffering? Let him

pray. Is any cheerful? Let him sing songs. Is

any among you sick? Let him call for the elders,

the priests or the presbyters of the church.

Let them pray over him, anointing him with oil

in the name of the Lord. And the prayer of faith

will save the sick man, and the Lord will raise

him up. And if he has committed sins, he will

be forgiven. The last one is a bit like some

of his aphorisms that we've heard a little bit

earlier. He talks about the tongue. Our tongue.

He says, the tongue is a little member. It's

a very small part of our body. The tongue is

a little member. but the tongue is a fire. How

great a forest is set ablaze by a small fire.

What we can say with our tongue. How hard it

is to tame the tongue. With it, we bless the

Lord and Father, and with it, we curse man. who

is made in the image and likeness of God. From

the same mouth comes forth blessing and cursing.

So we have to watch our tongue. How often we

hurt other people, I think most of all, not just

with dirty looks or anything like that, but what

we say to people. And frequently, the ones that

we're closest to. the ones that we love the most,

we take for granted. And we speak harsh words

to them. Don't want to give them the time of

day sometimes. We'd show more civility and courtesy

sometimes to an absolute stranger than sometimes

kids can show to their parents. Husbands can

show to their wives. Wives can show to their

husbands. So this is a good word of advice about

the tongue. How we can use it to bless God and

to say nice things about people. Not critical

and evil things and talk about them and gossip.

We can use it and say good things. We can use

that tongue to be nice and loving. to our parents,

our children, our spouse. So these are words

of advice of my patron saint, James, the brother

of the Lord. If you want to, I'd advise you.

It's a short, his epistle is a relatively short

one. You can just read it straight through without

pausing and praying over it in less than 10 minutes.

But read it through. Pause and pray over some

of his advice. And James can speak to you and

to me just as directly as he spoke in this epistle

to the 12 tribes of the dispersion. So, through

the prayers of our Holy Father, St. James, a

brother of the Lord, God have mercy upon us and

save us. Amen.