The Fruit of Wisdom- James 3-4

Proverbs 31:10-31; Psalm 1; James 3:13 - 4:3, 7-8a; Mark 9:30-37

I would like to return to the letter of James this week. Again, he continues to talk about wisdom. He says, 

“Who is wise and understanding among you?” (3:13).

 I think most of us would like to be considered wise, though we know there are many others who are wiser than us. Many of us make political comments and give advice to others, so that is probably some kind of declaration that we think ourselves to be wise in some areas, at least. … What does James have to say to us? 

“Show by your good life that your works are done with gentleness born of wisdom” (3:13).

One modern view of wisdom sees the wise person as having a lot of information available to them. Maybe they know how to solve certain intellectual puzzles. But this wisdom doesn’t necessarily have to manifest in their relationships. A person can be considered a wise professor and be on their 6th marriage, with no real relationship with their children, who treats their teaching assistant with cruelty, and still be considered “wise”. In the ancient world wisdom was much more wholistic. Wisdom had to do with living life well.

The wisdom James is talking about is supposed to manifest in our lives, not just our words. Our wisdom should show itself by a good life. The good works we do should be done with gentleness. That is an interesting consequence of wisdom- a good life with works done with gentleness.

He goes on, 

“if you have bitter envy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not be boastful and false to the truth” (3:14).

 These things being present in our lives give counter-evidence to the presence of the kind of wisdom James is talking about. It might be the wisdom of a society turned away from God (earthly wisdom), but it isn’t godly wisdom. James continues, 

“for where there is envy and selfish ambition, there will also be disorder and wickedness of every kind” (3:16).

 The motivations of envy and selfish ambition will produce bad fruit. … Envy and selfish ambition seems to have become almost valuable in our economy. Envy can be a driver for advertising and shopping, and tabloid magazines. And selfish ambition is often admired and considered a mark of the “successful”. …

Selfish ambition is likely what is behind the disciples arguing about who is more important, which leads to Jesus saying, 

“Whoever wants to be first must be last of all and servant of all” (Mk 9:35).

 Jesus pulls the rug out from under that kind of pride by making the way to the object of pride the very thing that will teach humility.

Envy and selfish ambition, and other bad motives poison everything, though. Even if we seem to do good things, those good things will be twisted by our bad motives. … Maybe you’ve experienced someone trying to help you with the wrong motives. It leaves you with a strange feeling. Like you’ve been used in some way, maybe. Maybe you have been given a gift, and it seems like it is more about them, than it is about you. A bad motive can twist what could have been a very good thing.

Godly wisdom, on the other hand, 

“is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, willing to yield, full of mercy and good fruits, without a trace of partiality or hypocrisy. And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace for those who make peace” (3:17-18).

 Godly wisdom will show itself in all these good ways. Notice how often peace is mentioned. It seems that peacemaking is a particular mark of godly wisdom. … Pride will separate us from others, so if we come with pride, we will naturally be in a state of conflict with others- we will find it very hard to be a person of peace- internally or externally.

James writes about another sign that the community is lacking wisdom. 

“Those conflicts and disputes among you, where do they come from?” (4:1).

 Those external battles come from internal battles. We have cravings that are at war inside us, James says (4:1). We want what we don’t have, and this leads to disputes and conflicts (4:2). Our desires are disordered. We want the wrong things.

Back at the beginning of the letter James says, 

“one is tempted by one’s own desire, being lured and enticed by it; then, when that desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and that sin, when it is fully grown, gives birth to death” (1:14-15).

 James is reflecting this again, that disordered desire, if not dealt with, leads to destruction. …

When we think about the ills of our society we can be tempted to think that we can fix things by just changing a bit of the structure- just tweak the system here and there. But the problem is deeper than the way we organize ourselves as a society. What systemic problems we have originate in the heart- from a diseased human freedom that distorts the good creation. And without addressing the heart, where these disordered desires arise, we will never have a just society. We will find a way to twist any system that we set up to serve our own selfishness and envy. … And the flip side is likely true as well. A people who are more and more like Jesus, can live in a bad system and probably bring about more justice for that society, than a good system filled with people with unchecked disordered desires. … This is why I tend to not focus on specific social issues in sermons. I think the more we can focus on Jesus, and the more we can be shaped by his grace and discipline, then many of the social issues we face will be solved in a way that focusing on them specifically might not.

James then relates this idea of disordered desire to prayer. He says that what we ask for in prayer we don’t receive because we ask wrongly, we ask out of our desire for pleasures. We are double-minded. We want God and the disordered pleasures of this world.

We should probably be grateful that we don’t always get what we ask for in prayer. Especially when it comes to love and teenage relationships, for example. … When in prayer, are we asking that we can be led into deeper holiness? And are we asking for God’s sake, not so we can be seen to be holy? Are we asking for a neighbour to come to believe in Jesus so we can feel spiritually “right”, or for the good of their soul? Do we pray for God to bless and influence our leaders to be people of integrity and justice? But not just for our own political interest? … Are our prayers focused around our own disordered desires, maybe hidden under a veneer of spirituality? Are we asking from a worldly point of view, or are we asking from a God-centered point of view? … I don’t think James is giving us the reason all prayers aren’t answered, but maybe this is one of the reasons. Maybe we ask with the wrong attitude for the wrong things. Maybe there are deeper things we should be focusing on.

Our lectionary reading actually skips a part of this section of James, I’m not really sure why. But James seems to be quoting a proverb, 

“God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble”.

 These are the two basic root ways of being. The Desert Monks tell us that pride gives rise to all sin. And humility gives rise to all virtue. In humility James encourages us, 

“Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you” (4:7-8).

If we desire wisdom, then we should draw near to God in humility.