Transcript

ANNOUNCER: James chapter 2 says, “Faith without works is dead.” Is there such a thing as dead faith? And is this talking about eternal salvation? Or the faith by which I believe or live every day? Thank you for listening and never miss a podcast or broadcast of Grace in Focus. We belong to the Grace Evangelical Society, promoting Free Grace Theology. Now we have a website faithalone.org and we invite you to go there and find our hundreds of articles. There’s bound to be one on something you’re studying right now. We also have regional conferences that you can look into and our national conference coming up next May. And go to our bookstore where you can find Bob Wilkins’ latest book, The Gospel Is Still Under Siege. It’s all at faithalone.org. 

And now with today’s discussion on James 2, here are Bob Wilkin and Ken Yates. 

KEN: What we’re doing is we’re putting a plug, shamelessly putting in a plug for the GES seminary. But it’s an online seminary and one of our classes is on tough texts. As you might expect, one of those passages is the mother of all passages. 

BOB: Which is what? 

KEN: James chapter 2.

BOb: Verses 14 through 26. 

KEN: That’s right. What does James mean when he says, faith without works is dead. 

BOB: Or as they say in Georgia, “day-ud”.

KEN: “Day-ud”, you got two syllables. 

BOB: No, three. “Day-ud.” 

KEN: There you go. 

BOB: And he says that three times by the way. In verse 17, in verse 20, and in verse 26, he says, “Faith without works is dead.” “Faith works is dead.” “Faith works is dead.” If you wanted to emphasize something in the first century, which was a lot of the people were illiterate, so they would memorize things. Well, if you say it three times in a short 13 verses like this, you’re going to make it very memorable. 

KEN: JAnd that has carried over into our own day. I mean, people quote this all the time. 

BOB: Yeah. And what do they quote it to mean? 

KEN: Yeah. The vast majority of people, when they quote it, or if it’s on t-shirts, or if it’s on coffee mugs, or on their bumper sticker of their car. 

BOB: Or they’ve tattooed on their arms. 

KEN: That’s right. It means if you don’t have works, then you’re going to go to hell. 

BOB: So what they’re saying is you should be able to look at the life of someone, and you can pretty much tell whether they’re born again or not. 

KEN: Right. One thing that most of these tough texts have in common is the reason they’re tough texts is because people come to these verses and think that they’re evangelistic. Or they’re talking about how a person knows they’re going to go to heaven when they die. 

BOB: So it’s some kind of assurance. 

KEN: Right. And so we look at these verses to say, well, is that me? You know, we talked in the past about the unfaithful servant in the parables. Am I an unfaithful servant? If I’m an unfaithful servant, then I’m going to burn in hell forever. Is that the point? Or are these passages addressed to believers? 

BOB: And as you know, Ken, most pastors and most theologians say that the New Testament epistles are all addressed to what they call a mixed audience.  And the mixed audience means true believers, what they would call true believers. We would say believers are believers. There’s no true believers. But anyway, believers and false professors. They would say all the people that are being addressed professed faith in Christ, but only some of them actually believe. And so they would see in just about every New Testament epistle calls to question whether you’re a genuine believer or whether you’re a false professor. And certainly they see James that way. 

KEN: Yeah, James is right into these people. And he’s saying, listen, there’s some of you people, you know, you’re coming to church and I’m not sure about you guys. And that’s the point. 

BOB: That’s what they say. 

KEN: That’s what they say. 

BOB: He calls them my brethren and my beloved brethren 14 times. And starting chapter two, what does he say in 2:1? 

KEN: He says, “My brethren do not hold the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory with partiality.” 

BOB: And then he goes on to say when a rich person comes in your assembly, don’t kowtow to them. And when the poor person comes in, don’t belittle them. 

KEN: Yeah, you know, I’ve often wondered about people who think that James is saying, I’m not sure about you guys, is he saying, listen, if you like rich people, better then you do poor people, I’m not sure about you. You might not be a believer. Or no, if the standard view of James too is right, like, you know, you’re not a believer. So if you’d rather have rich people come to your church than poor people, you’re on your way to the lake of fire. 

BOB: But isn’t that the way most churches would rather have rich people come to their church down today? We have a lot of churches that like, if rich people come, they’re going out of their way to make them feel comfortable and everything else. Like R.T. Kendall made the point that James 2:14-26 is not divorced from James 2:1-13. He said it flows right from it. Like when you look at 2:15-16, what does that say? 

KEN: 2:15 says, “If a brother or sister is naked”, notice brother or sister. So we’re done by the believer. 

BOB: A fellow believer. 

KEN: A fellow believer. “If a brother or sister is naked and destitute of daily food and one of you.” 

BOB: One of you, one of the brethren. 

KEN: Right. One of the brethren says to them, depart in peace, be warmed and filled.

BOB: That’s a good thing to say, right? That’s a good thing to say. Be warmed and be filled. Basically, I’m praying for you. Hope it works out well. 

KEN: Yeah. I hope you get better. “But you do not give them the things which are needed for the body. What does it profit?”

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BOB: What does it profit? And by the way, verse 14 starts with those same words. What does it profit? So basically, the point is, in verse 14, if I have faith and I do not apply it, he’s not talking about saving faith and I don’t apply saving faith. He’s talking about, let’s say I believe, for example, that it’s more blessed to give than receive. But I don’t actually give. Then what profit is that to me? The answer is it doesn’t. It’s not going to be saved from God’s judgment. That’s what the end of verse 14 is talking about. Can faith save him? No. 

KEN: Not from God’s judgment. 

BOB: Not from God’s judgment.

KEN: Or even would you say also not from the consequences of yourself? 

BOB: No. But then the second, what does it profit concerns the brother or sister in need.

KEN: What does it profit them? 

BOB: What does it profit them? That’s why it’s repeated twice. 

KEN: And it’s not, what does it profit them is it going to get them into heaven? 

BOB: No. It’s, do they get their stomachs filled and they get their clothes warm? No. Not if you don’t help them. And that’s why it says faith that works is dead. Notice it doesn’t say faith without works is non-faith. No. It’s saying this combo, faith without works is unprofitable. 

KEN: It’s useless. 

BOB: That’s what dead means there. And we talked about how dead is often in misused. It’s useless. In fact, some translations say what uses it, my brethren. 

KEN: All of us, what we need to do is we need to come to this passage and say even though there’s this unbelievably strong tradition that this is talking about going to heaven and going to hell, it is clear from the context and I like what you said about Kendall. In verses 1 through 13, he’s talking about the poor person who comes into your, you know, and what good is it if that poor person comes in and he’s in need? What good is it to him if you just say, hey, I’m praying for you. You’re not doing anything. That’s the context. It has nothing to do with, are you going to heaven? What are you going to do to meet this need and you believe, okay, you believe you should help him, but you don’t do anything. Then what use is it?

BOB: And the faith there is talking about anything you believe. So let’s say you believe that I should love my wife as Christ loves a church, but I don’t do it. That’s no good. Let’s say I believe that God loves a generous giver, but I don’t give generously. What does that profit me? Look at 2:12. What does 2:12 say? 

KEN: Chapter 2 verse 12 says, “So speak and so do as those who will be judged by the law of liberty.” 

BOB: Okay. Now two things. So what? 

KEN: Speak and do. 

BOB: Okay. Now look at 14, 15 and 16. 

KEN: What does it profit my brethren? And if someone says, 

BOB: That goes back to 12. They says they believe something in scripture. 

KEN: And then 16 says. 

BOB: Well, 15 and all three. 

KEN: Right. If a brother is naked and destitute of daily food, and one of you says to him to pardon peace, be warmed and be filled, but you do not give him. 

BOB: You do not do. 

KEN: Right. You do not do the things which are needed for the body. What is it profit?

BOB: So can you see the linkage between 2:12 and 2:14-16? It’s obvious. We’re not just to be people—and you know, it drives me nuts when I read, some people translate 2:14 if someone claims to have faith. Well, okay, do we translate 2:12, “So claim and so do”? It’s the same Greek word. Why translate it claim? That’s someone trying to interpret the verse for you rather than translate it. 

KEN: Right. And so once again, we’re just really encouraging all of us. What are these verses talking about? And again, it is just so hard for most believers because they have this drilled into them. And by the way, if you say, okay, if James 2 is talking about how you know whether you’re really saved or not, how do you know if you’re really going to go to heaven or not, okay, if it does, how does that work out about helping the poor? Have you helped the poor today? You know, are you doing those things? 

BOB: Well, okay. Here’s even worse. If this is telling you how you know you’re saved and the preacher is telling you, you need to look at your works. What if your works aren’t perfect? Let’s say you are helping the poor. But you realize you lie at times. You realize that you lust at times. You realize that you cheat at times, that you’re having angry outbursts and you get road rage or you yell at your spouse or yell at your kids. Don’t you begin to question your salvation? Because no matter how much you’re going and helping people, if you’re messing up in your own family, wouldn’t you begin to doubt your salvation? 

KEN: Well, I would take it a step further. What if you’re helping the poor, but come on, you don’t help the poor all the time. You see people who are in need and you don’t meet them. You drive right by and say, man, I hope someone else helps them.

BOB: And besides, James isn’t even talking about people out there that are on the side of the road. He’s talking about people in your local assembly. 

KEN: Exactly. Because it’s your brother’s sister.

BOB: Right. 2:1-13. These are people, the poor people in your church, and about 50% of the people in the early church, it appears, were slaves, a high percentage of the Roman Empire were slaves. So you have a lot of poor people in your local assemblies. If you’re going to go with this, what a lot of people will say is, you know you’re saved by your works. We’re saved by faith alone, but the faith that saved is never alone. You ever heard that? 

KEN: Oh, sure. 

BOB: Once you do that, you don’t know where you’re going till you die. And here’s how you evangelize. I don’t know where I’m going when I die. And if you have five minutes, I can help you not know where you’re going when you die. 

KEN: The bottom line for all this is, this is not evangelism. 

BOB: Amen, it’s not assurance either. 

KEN: No, it is talking about how to have a faith that does, that operates so that it grows, that it’s strong. 

BOB: Or 2:14-16, it’s profitable. It’s useful. It helps you, and it helps the people it’s intended to help. So it’s going to help your family. It’s going to help the other people in your local assembly. It’s going to help your neighbors. It’s going to help the people who share the road with you. It’s going to help lots of other people. If you’re applying Scripture. 

KEN: Amen. Well, thanks Bob. Great discussion. And again, we want to encourage anybody who wants to discuss more about this to take our course there at the GES seminary. And in the meantime, keep grace in focus. 

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On our next episode: Are the warning passages in Hebrews about the lake of fire? Find out, come back and join us. And until then, let’s keep grace in focus.