Saved by Faith or Works? Yes

James 2:1-17

        If Bill Nevill were here this morning, I would never have made it to the pulpit.  Bill possesses a keen theological mind and if he had seen the title of this morning’s sermon, Bill would have grabbed me, gently waltzed me into the library and asked, “Do the names Pelagius and Augustine ring a bell? Ever heard of Anselm and Abelard?  Hasn’t anyone informed you that the greatest controversies in Christianity evolved through the misguided thought that human beings have the ability to achieve salvation through their own actions?  Has no one told you that Luther dismissed James as a book of straw because the great reformer was convinced the epistle was a treatise on salvation by works?”

        While I am poking fun at Bill when he is away and unable to defend himself, I do hope that some of you felt a little uncomfortable when you saw the title of this morning’s sermon.  Any good Presbyterian, that is to say anyone of the reform tradition which believes the very basic foundation our faith is that we are saved by the grace of God should find this title objectionable.  Gracious, I find it objectionable and I am the one who selected it.  Yet I believe the title is incredibly compatible with the scripture we read this morning.  As my favorite philosopher from the 24^th century might say, “Fascinating.”

        First, let me dispel any concerns that I woke up one morning this week and suddenly reversed my total dependence on God’s grace.  I don’t see that happening any time soon.  I am so immersed in the notion of God’s universal saving grace that I find discussions on restrictive beliefs such as predestination to be embarrassingly and irrelevant.  It took me a long time to reach this point and I have no intentions of returning to doctrines that are not only counterproductive but stand opposed to God’s covenant of salvation.   To build on an illustration offered in this pulpit a few weeks ago when I was away, I believe there is an elevator, but thanks be to God, there is only one button.

        A number of years ago a friend handed me a book by Will Campbell, titled Brother to a Dragonfly and suggested I read it.  Other than the Bible this book has had as much impact on my life as anything I have ever read.  It is the semi-autobiographical story of the formative years of Will Campbell, a famously irreverent Baptist minister.  Will had a brother, the dragonfly, who was older than Campbell and Campbell describes as a philosophical drunken malcontent.  Joe and Will engaged in deep discussions on race, religion and country music.  After Will was fired from his first job for supporting integration at the University of Mississippi, Joe asked Will to define his understanding of God’s grace in ten words or less.  Will said, “We’re all bastards, but God loves us anyway.”  Later in the book a young black seminarian was shot and killed after dark on the streets of Birmingham by a deputy sheriff.  Will was very close to the young man and on hearing of his senseless death went into a deep rage.  Once Will calmed down, the dragonfly brother asked a very sobering question, “OK Will, which bastard does God love more?”  It was then that Will Campbell, a standard bearer for civil rights, began to see integration in a whole new light.  He began to invite members of the Klu Klux Klan to join him for lunch.  He would listen to their stories even when their words were hard to hear. Eventually he became their friend and I believe some of them even came around to Will’s way of thinking.  Why would he do such a thing? According to  Campbell, “That’s what you do when your God loves everyone.”

        Why did I share this story?  Because while I believe with all my heart in the saving grace of a God who loves even a wretch like me, I also believe there is much work to be done on our part in response to God’s grace.  That work is hard and difficult but it is work that will eventually saves us from ourselves and our propensity toward righteous indignation.

        The writer of James believed in the grace of God.  The writer, a Jew, had been raised to observe the Hebrew Law. Furthermore, he was highly influenced by Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount.  For James, salvation was just the beginning of the journey.  He makes some incredible statements in this text.  The one that really hits me between the eyes is, “If you show partiality, you are sinning.”   Who among us is not guilty of this?

        It is so easy, no that is not strong enough, it is so natural to judge someone by the way they look or the way they speak.   When I was young and had not been in ministry very long if someone came to the church looking for help with food or their electric bill I was all over it.  I would sit and talk to them, trying to know their story.  I never turned anyone down.  Word got out that I was an easy mark.  Finally the treasurer had a conversation with me that there was only so much money in the budget and I was free to exceed that number but it would start coming out of my monthly pay check.  As I have grown older and some might say wiser, I now cringe when someone comes to the door looking for assistance.   I am often suspicious of their story.  I wonder if they are taking me for ride rather than considering the legitimacy of their plight.  I am not the first person to suffer from this reversal in attitude.  It is well documented during the Reformation that Calvin found it important to address the needs of the beggars on the street.  Up until this time it was considered “saintly” of the rich to offer money to the poor.  But Calvin wanted to reverse the cycle of poverty. He founded schools for children. He created jobs in Geneva in order that the poor could have a trade that offered them dignity.  But eventually the poverty of Geneva overwhelmed the good intensions of Calvin and his followers. Those poor who bought into the message of hard work and self-reliance and found work were designated as the worthy.  Others worked equally hard but jobs were scarce and they returned to begging. Eventually begging was outlawed in Geneva and they were eventually expelled from the city.  They were seen as lazy folks trying to take advantage of the system. I think if James were here this morning he might suggest that more often than not it is the system, and those who manipulate it who have created the economic disparity of our social landscape.   (stop)  Of course that is the text speaking and not me.  While I recognize poverty to be systemic, I am still too quick to place judgment on someone I have never met.

        And that is my point.  While I am saved by God’s grace I still have to work hard to save myself from preconceived notions and prejudices which keep me from acting in a way that would meet with God’s approval.   Linus, the thumb sucking, blanket carrying theologian from the comic strip Peanuts used to say, “I love humanity.  Its just people I can’t stand.”

        The story that I am about to tell might be a story any of us could tell. At my last church there was a woman who had a difficult time with me.  She was a good person from a good family and was respected in the community.  She quietly let it known that she would not participate in the life of the church until I was gone.  I decided reconciliation was going to be too difficult and so instead of visiting the family  ministered to other members of my congregation.  Then a tragedy struck her family.  I gathered my courage, put on my best face and went for a visit.  It was awkward at best.  Pleasantries were exchanged, we spoke of the incident and after an appropriate amount of time I offered a prayer and left.  If you were expecting a happy, Hollywood ending, it did not happen. At the time, I felt under the circumstances I had done my best.  Truth is, all I did was what was required.  I had not done the necessary work of cultivating and restoring a relationship.  Some might suggest there was nothing that I could have done but the truth is I was not willing to do the hard work needed to minister to that family.

        James wrote, “What good is it if you say you have faith but do not have works?  Can faith save you?  If a brother or sister is naked or lacks food and we say to them, “Go in peace, keep warm and eat your fill but do not supply them with clothing or food what good is that.  Faith that has no works is dead.”

        We are not capable of reversing the poverty in this world.  We are not capable of making every relationship in our lives healthy.  But too often, we could have tried harder to make a difference in the life of one person.  It starts by forgetting who that person is in our eyes and remembering who they are in the eyes of God. 

A few years ago I invited Will Campbell to visit the church I was serving in West Texas.  I took him by a soup kitchen operated by a group of local churches.  He looked at the number of folks that had signed in that morning and then he asked me, “How many churches are there in San Angelo?” 

I thought for a second and said, “30 or 40.”

Campbell looked at the signup sheet and said, “There are about 40 names on this list.  If each church adopted one of these people for a year, gave them shelter, helped them find a job and showed them how to pay their bills, you could shut down this soup kitchen. Of course it would be hard work.”

Taking Campbell’s suggestion, my congregation took a section of our church and turned it into a two room apartment.  We adopted a single parent with a child and gave her free room and board for up to a year.  We helped her find employment and worked with her writing and math skills.  After two months the woman left the apartment and went back to her old neighborhood.  We thought about what we might have done wrong and we tried again.  Eventually we learned how to do our job better and the results were remarkable.  That was over fifteen years ago.  The apartment is still being occupied.  I am sure some women found reasons to leave. But I know that many others have new lives, jobs and are now self sufficient, living in their own apartments or homes.  It has been is hard work for both the church and the women.   No one, not even Will Campbell, said it would be easy.

Did this guarantee that church a ticket to heaven?  How can you buy something that has already been purchased?  It did give them a taste of what is possible when we trust God and get our hands dirty. More importantly, it saved them from the conventional wisdom that some folks are beyond God’s mercy.

“We are all bastards, but God loves us anyway.”  Good words to remember the next time you hesitate going the extra mile for someone who doesn’t seem worth the effort.       Amen.