1 James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, To the twelve tribes in the Dispersion: Greetings.

2 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, 3 for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. 4 And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

5 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. 6 But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind. 7 For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord; 8 he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

9 Let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation, 10 and the rich in his humiliation, because like a flower of the grass he will pass away. 11 For the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass; its flower falls, and its beauty perishes. So also will the rich man fade away in the midst of his pursuits. (James 1:1–11, ESV)

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Nearly two thousand years ago, when Jesus came out of that grave, and the breath of God's Spirit came upon his small collection of followers in the city of Jerusalem, the church was born. Thousands of Jewish people there in Jerusalem turned to Jesus as their Messiah-Savior who they would follow to the ends of the earth.

There was a problem, however. The revival atmosphere in Jerusalem was wonderful, so for almost a decade, it was hard to convince anyone in the church to leave it to take the name of Jesus to far-off lands. This problem didn't last because pressure and persecution began to hit the church in Jerusalem, forcing them to scatter. Soon, they found themselves in foreign places filled with uncomfortable cultures and questionable morals.

And as these scattered believers—James called them the Dispersion—tried to figure out how to navigate life after Jerusalem, life after revival, they found themselves in need of a vision for life (1:1). They knew they had a mission to accomplish for Jesus, but they also had everyday life to handle, so they began to wonder how to live. How do we get the Jesus mission done while living every day in cultures that are far from him? How do we live for Christ outside the oasis of revival and in the desert of the nations?

Fortunately, these scattered Christians had a father figure back at their home church. James, the younger brother of Jesus, had become servant of God by considering Jesus as his Lord and Christ-Messiah-Savior (1:1). He'd remained in Jerusalem while many others had to scatter, and his heart yearned to serve his spiritual family battling out there in the trenches.[^1] He knew they needed a vision for life after Jerusalem, and he knew right where to turn.

James had watched Jesus' life and heard his teaching for many years, and he knew those dispersed Christians running for the gospel and running for their lives needed a vision of Jesus. He knew they were up against it and could be tempted to fold up shop and say, "Jesus who?" But he also knew there was a great big world that needed Jesus so badly. To James, the answer was for Jesus' people to become more like Jesus, so he wrote this little letter. It is chock full of Christ—his teachings, his lifestyle, and his mission litters this letter. It's like James ingested and internalized Jesus and then reproduced him in digested and condensed paragraph form.

If that early group of Christians needed a vision for life, modern believers need one as well. We, too, find ourselves on the same mission as that early church. We, too, find ourselves trying to navigate everyday life and cultures that aren't exactly compatible with Scripture. We, too, find ourselves asking how in the world we can fulfill Jesus' mission while living every day in cultures far from him. And on top of all that, we have the added complexity of thousands of years of church history. Some of it is good, much of it is bad, and lots of it is just darn weird. Who are we to imitate? How are we to live? Is there a voice that can cut through the clutter and bottom line it for us?

James steps forward as that voice. His letter is a paramount description of a whole life. In our opening passage, he hints at his objective: that we may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing (1:4). It's one of many concepts James borrowed from Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. There, Jesus preached that we should strive to be perfect just as our heavenly Father is perfect (Matt. 5:48). The concept is that when Christ returns for his people, he will remake us into his image, and we will be whole and complete, perfect, lacking nothing, but that we should crave that wholeness right now. We should not just crave it but pursue it while acknowledging that we can only grow toward it in this life. Only in the next will we fully attain it.

This is why I have called our study of James "Maturity Profiled." Every word from James's pen builds the image of a mature human. James knew mature people get the job done—they navigate the complexities of this world while representing Jesus well to that world. James knew that increased Christlikeness would lead to better gospel witness.

So, who should meditate on the book of James? Those who want to become more mature, more like Jesus, because of all that is at stake. Those who know that we can't climb into more maturity by merely hoping for it, but by first gaining a definite vision for what it looks like while recognizing that Jesus is what it looks like. Those who believe that only God can help them overcome their past, their shortcomings, their limitations, and whatever else might keep them from becoming more mature.

James is for people who are into becoming like Jesus because they love their Father and believe in the power of the Spirit.

To sketch his vision of the whole human, James will repeat the themes he introduces in the first chapter of his letter, his overview of Christian maturity, which comes in three main parts.

1. The Mature Want Everything That Happens to Them to Make Them More Like Jesus. (1:2-4)

In the opening verses, James sets his cards on the table. "Full disclosure," James says, "My dream is that you would be perfect and complete, lacking nothing" (1:4). As I've already said, according to the New Testament, this wholeness, completion, and perfection is your final destination if you've trusted Christ. But James—and all the other New Testament authors, by the way—tell us that we should pursue every last drop of that wholeness and maturity right now. We won't fully reach it until our final resurrection and glorification, but we are to crave and chase Christlikeness until that day comes.

So for James, since being perfect and complete, lacking nothing is the goal, it is possible for us to have joy in the face of trials, not because we are so overjoyed at the prospect of pain, but because we know what the testing of our faith produces (1:2-3). James said it can make us steadfast, a biblical word meaning staying-power, constancy, and endurance. James envisions a decided and active embrace of the pain rather than a passive riding out of the pain. It's the endurance athlete choosing to train, the parent embracing the difficult parts of training a child up, or the pastor pressing into leadership. And the reason this steadfastness is so good is because when we let that it have its full effect, we become whole, mature, and complete.

It's true. There are all kinds of trials out there—relational trials, physical trials, spiritual trials, emotional trials, intellectual trials, or financial trials. James calls them trials of various kinds. There are just too many to count. James saw these trials as a testing of our faith (1:3). He does not mean that God is trying to see if our faith is real or not. For 'test,' James used a word that indicates strengthening or tempering. Just as steel is put under incredibly high heat and then cooled as a way to strengthen it, so can believers be tempered through trials. Just as the skyscraper would not stand without the tempering process, so a great life cannot be produced without the tempering process. To borrow from Peter, trials refine our faith like fire refines gold (1 Pet. 1:6-7).

So the goal is to become perfect and complete, lacking nothing, and being tested by trials can produce steadfastness, which will lead to that wholeness, so we are to rejoice at the potential of what can be produced when trials arrive (1:2). James used language straight from the accounting world when he told us to count it all joy when we meet trials of various kinds (1:2). This joy is not a plastic smile or a fleeting feeling of happiness, but a deep-seated and unnatural response of fixed and unwavering grateful trust in God. This joy is not some strange perspective that everything that happens to us is good—confusing evil enters our lives all the time—but a conviction that however terrible life gets, if we let God work, he can produce something good in us from it. This joy is not an aberrational doctrine telling us to get back to positive thinking, manifest our destiny, and claim a better future, but a steadfast gladness that God is shaping us just as the potter shapes the clay. This joy feels to me a lot less like easy-listening and more like the most punk rock thing you could ever do.

The Jesus-person James envisioned in his letter is someone who thinks God just might be doing his finest work while they pass through trials. And because they want everything that happens to them to make them more like Jesus, they rejoice at what trials might produce in them.

Consider how God loved the world so much that he gave his only begotten Son to save us. And when you trust in Christ, you become a son or daughter of God, standing in Jesus' righteousness. Wouldn't it stand to reason that God might love the world so much that he would now give his sons and daughters? We can't atone for anyone's sins, but Jesus went to his cross for us, so we must take up our crosses and follow him. Taken in this light, sometimes God's love for all the people he is going to reach through our lives demands that we endure a bit of pain to strengthen us for the job. I mean, have you ever known a good leader, parent, pastor, mentor, or friend who wasn't shaped by adversity in some way?

2. The Mature Follow The Father's Wisdom No Matter What. (1:5-8)

James knew that trials sometimes produce confusion. The people he wrote to had been scattered to the eastern regions because of hostility at home, but they did not find hospitality abroad. It seems many of them had been thrust into some light economic persecution—jobs and housing were scarce for many of them. Trials such as these are disorienting, especially when there is this apostolic word telling us to count it all joy because of what they can produce in us, so wisdom is needed.

James said that if we lack wisdom, we should ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given to him (1:5). God is willing to deliver the perspective, insight, and next steps we need, especially when in the pressure of trials. He might not answer every question we have about our pains and pressures, but he can give us wisdom in them. Jesus told us to ask, seek, and knock (Matt. 7:7-11). And all throughout Scripture, God is presented as the source of wisdom for anyone who will seek him.

"For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding." (Prov. 2:6)

The reality, however, is that we often go everywhere and to everyone else when in pain. We think we can get the insight and wisdom we need without him. Sometimes, we refuse to seek him because we are surprised that he would allow us to walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Sometimes, we resist going to him because our trials have convinced us that he must be powerless to help us. And sometimes, we hesitate to seek him because we think he cannot be bothered by our trivial difficulties. But James said the Father gives generously to all without reproach—he will not rebuke you when you seek him for wisdom (1:5). He won't be surprised to learn you don't know what to do. He won't be bothered. He won't ridicule you. He wants to give you the wisdom you need.

Over the years, God's wisdom has come to me in a myriad of ways, but most commonly, I've gotten his wisdom from the word, from the Spirit while in prayer, or from Spirit-filled people. And the best wisdom usually comes from all three. God has shown me when a trial is there to grow my strength, develop my sanctification, give me greater spiritual victory, learn to lean on others, scale back and simplify some things in my life, go in a new direction, keep me dependent on him, or simply experience deeper friendship with him. And when in trials, we can seek God for wisdom about that trial, we can ask him to reveal what he is trying to teach us in that moment and what our next steps might be.

But there is a warning attached to James's exhortation: if we ask God for wisdom, we better do so in faith, with no doubting (1:6). Without faith, we are like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind (6)[^2]Without it, we won't receive anything from the Lord (7).

What does James mean with this big "you gotta have faith" pep talk? Is he saying we must really, really believe when we ask for wisdom? Is he saying if we believe enough that it will come, God will give us his insights?

The key to understanding what he means is found at the end of the sentence: he is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways (1:8). What you have here, to borrow from Jesus, is a man trying to serve two masters (Matt. 6:24). He asks God for wisdom, but he does not trust the Father enough to follow his wisdom no matter what. He is not seeking God with his whole heart but is leaving himself an opt-out in case he doesn't like what God tells him (Jer. 29:12-13). And James is straightforward—that man is like the chaos of the ocean in every area of his life. He vacillates wildly between masters, and God cannot be expected to lead this unleadable man.

If a teacher offers tutoring services to a student who needs it, they expect the student to take their direction. But if the student repeatedly shows up, asks for help, and then rejects that help, eventually, the teacher will stop expending energy on this double-minded student. And if a doctor has a repeat patient who never receives their diagnosis but instead goes out to find a second opinion every time, the doctor will grow discouraged in their efforts. And if we approach our Father for wisdom but repeatedly resist it because we don't like it, James says it leads to an unstable and chaotic existence, and God's river of wisdom will dry up. When we ask, we must be willing to follow the Father's wisdom no matter what.

3. The Mature Live Based On Truer, Further, and Better Realities. (1:9-11)

So, James has introduced the subject of trials and wisdom in his opening paragraphs; both are themes he will revisit throughout his book. After mentioning both subjects, James begins to touch on poverty and wealth found in the church and world his audience lived in. He mentions both because both can be hindrances to human wholeness, but the mature person lives on a foundation of truer, further, and better realities than their current financial status. In other words, our earning power, or lack of earning power, should not define us. Our identity cannot be found there.

James said the lowly brother who is living in poverty should boast in his exaltation (1:9). He should rejoice that a day is coming where the tables are turned, a great reversal takes place, and he will enter into abundance in Christ's kingdom. The impoverished believer can rejoice in the knowledge that even if they never get out of their poverty on this side of Christ's coming, they most assuredly will once Jesus returns.

James also said the rich brother should boast in his humiliation (1:10). James wanted him to celebrate that all he has accumulated in the here and now will not last. The flower of the grass passes away, and so will his wealth. The rich man will fade away in the midst of his pursuits—no one in eternity will think of him as wealthy. He will be just another person God has redeemed, and this should cause the wealthy man to rejoice.

Again, the impoverished and wealthy both need to live based on truer, further, and better realities. Yes, the lowly brother's reality is poverty. Yes, the rich man's reality is wealth. But the more true reality is that neither will matter much throughout eternity, and both should rejoice at their coming change of status.

I realize it is hard for many of us to know how to categorize ourselves. One teacher of mine told me a story about his incredibly wealthy father. One weekend, my teacher's dad invited him and his brother to go on a fishing trip. His dad wanted to pay for everything and make it nice, so he chartered a private jet to bring his boys down to Mexico, where they would meet him at his yacht. He hired a crew to help them with the fishing. Staff waited on them hand and foot. One night, while the sun was setting and the waters were calm, my friend was struck by the peace and beauty of it all. He decided to ask his dad a burning question. What does it feel like to be rich, Dad? Do people treat you differently? His father was shocked and shot up with a jolt. I am not rich. I know people who are, but I'm not one of them. This is how many of us are—we have the hardest time categorizing ourselves as well off because we always look up and see those with more. But the reality is that many of us who hear these words are well off by many metrics. Compared to historical standards and compared to many other nations, we are a people living in abundance.

And it is healthy for us to recognize the transient, temporary, and fleeting nature of our worldly wealth and status. Our boast is not in what we have or how we came into our position. As God said in Jeremiah, "Let him who boasts boast about this: that he understands and knows me, that I am the LORD, who exercises kindness, justice, and righteousness on earth, for in these I delight" (Jer. 9:23-24). To quote Paul:

"Teach those who are rich in this world not to be proud and not to trust in their money, which is so unreliable. Their trust should be in God, who richly gives us all we need for our enjoyment. Tell them to use their money to do good. They should be rich in good works and generous to those in need, always being ready to share with others. By doing this they will be storing up their treasure as a good foundation for the future so that they may experience true life." (1 Tim. 6:17–19, NLT)

But I wonder if James could have used a number of life's contrasts to illustrate his theme about testing—"loneliness and companionship, long married life and unexpected bereavement, hope fulfilled and hope disappointed, work and unemployment, family life and childlessness, marriage and singleness, health and illness" are all contrasts we must process through God's grid.[^3]No matter our station in life, we must live based on truer, further, and better realities.

Conclusion

So begins James's epistle, one of the most careful and helpful expositions of Jesus' magnificent life and ethical teaching anywhere in the New Testament. Written early in the church's existence, James gives every generation of the church a vision for maturity. If we expect our relationship with God to produce wholeness in our lives, James knows what that wholeness looks like, so he painted a picture of spiritual, ethical, moral, and, dare I say, human maturity. He profiled maturity. James's vision is not all that is needed to reach this level of human wholeness, but without his vision, even with all the doctrines the rest of the New Testament fleshes out, we might misread the destination God has in store for us. James shows us where a relationship with God is meant to take us.

Allow me to illustrate this concept with an embarrassing memory. Each summer, when my family heads off to Lake Tahoe for a time of rest, I spend every day wearing shorts or cozy pants. I leave the jeans and pants at home. It's all elastic all day. This means there is an inevitable moment of truth when I return home. Putting on a fresh-outta-the-dryer pair of blue jeans tells the truth about how much fun I had while away.

James is a bit like putting on that fresh pair of jeans after a long vacation. It might not fit us. It might be like a mirror or a bright light that reveals a bit too much for our taste. But it is important. It isn't there to condemn those who fall short or reward those who think they do. Instead, it is meant to give us a vision—this book describes Jesus, and Christlikeness is where God's Spirit wants to take us. Let's walk with him, cultivate this vision as we study James, and expect great things.

Study Questions

Group Study Questions:

Head (Knowledge, Facts, Understanding):

1. According to James, what is the ultimate goal for believers, and how do trials contribute to achieving this goal?
2. What does James mean when he says we should ask for wisdom in faith, without doubting? How does double-mindedness hinder receiving wisdom from God?
3. How does James contrast the poor and the rich, and what is the true reality both groups should focus on?

Heart (Feelings, Impressions, Desires):

1. How do you typically respond to trials in your life? Do you find it challenging to count them as joy, and why?
2. When facing difficulties or confusion, do you feel confident in approaching God for wisdom? What might be holding you back from seeking His guidance wholeheartedly?
3. In what ways have you found yourself defining your identity or worth based on your financial status or possessions? How does this passage challenge those notions?

Hands (Actions, Commitments, Decisions, Beliefs):

1. What practical steps can you take to cultivate a mindset of joy and trust in God when facing various trials?
2. How can you actively seek God's wisdom in your current circumstances, and what changes can you make to demonstrate a commitment to following His guidance?
3. What specific actions can you take to live based on the truer, further, and better realities James describes, regardless of your current financial situation?

[^1]: Amid all his direct and difficult talk, James will repeatedly refer to his audience as his family (brothers).

[^2]: Note how often James will use illustrations from nature in his epistle. These illustrations include the waves of the sea and the wind (James 1:6), the flower of the grass and the sun with its scorching heat (James 1:10-11), the shadow (James 1:17), the firstfruits (James 1:18), the horse and its bit (James 3:3), ships and their rudders (James 3:4), the small fire that sets a forest ablaze (James 3:5), fresh and bitter water from the same spring (James 3:11), a fig tree bearing olives or a grapevine bearing figs (James 3:12), heaven giving rain and the earth yielding its crops (James 5:7), the early and late rains (James 5:7), and the cries of harvesters reaching the ears of the Lord of hosts (James 5:4).

[^3]: Motyer, J. A. The Message of James, p. 45