Judges 20. The second appendix: The Benjamite War; Complete commitment to God and keeping faith alive.

Title: Judges 20. The second appendix: The Benjamite War; Complete commitment to God and keeping faith alive.

 

In our study of complete dependence upon God and complete deference to His will, we have encountered the principle that:

 

Faith that has gone unused will atrophy and die out. The believer will not lose his salvation, but he will lose his vigor and diligence to live the plan of God.

 

JAM 2:14 What use is it, my brethren, if a man says he has faith, but he has no works? Can that faith save him?

 

We have grown up in a world that has for many centuries read the word "save" in the Bible and only interpret it as salvation from the Lake of Fire. No Greek reader in the first century would do this. To them, sozo (the Greek verb) appeared in many contexts.

 

James is not referencing salvation. His letter is directed toward the matter of life and death to a believer.

 

Does faith in Christ save a believer from the deadly effects of sin? No.

 

JAM 2:15 If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food,

 

JAM 2:16 and one of you says to them, "Go in peace, be warmed and be filled," and yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that?

 

Believing in Christ and then assuming that you will be shielded from the effects of sin for the rest of your life is as good as giving a kind word to a starving man.

 

Something must be done. In order to prevent our faith from losing its vigor and life, we must learn and learn the word of God and we must do and do the word of God.

 

JAM 2:17 Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself.

 

"faith … is dead" - it's not working, it has lost its spirit.

 

It is odd that James would use death to modify faith. First off, if it's dead, it must have been alive. For every believer faith leaped into life the moment they believed on Christ as their Savior. But in the context of his whole epistle, it works quite well. It is a faith that is not working.

 

He doesn't call it a dead faith. There is no such thing. Faith is faith. Faith believes in facts, that's all it does. It either is or it isn't. He states that faith has become lifeless.

 

JOH 11:21 Martha therefore said to Jesus, "Lord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died.

 

JOH 11:22 "Even now I know that whatever You ask of God, God will give You."

 

JOH 11:23 Jesus said to her, "Your brother shall rise again." 

 

JOH 11:24 Martha said to Him, "I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day."

 

JOH 11:25 Jesus said to her, "I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me shall live even if he dies,

 

JOH 11:26 and everyone who lives and believes in Me shall never die. Do you believe this? " 

 

JOH 11:27 She said to Him, "Yes, Lord; I have believed that You are the Christ, the Son of God, even He who comes into the world."

 

Martha is asked by the Lord if she believes a set of facts. Either she believes that Christ is the resurrection and the life, and that he who believes in Him will live even if he dies, or she doesn’t believe it. Faith is faith. There are not different kinds.

 

Can a faith that has gone dead save a person from the death that comes from a life of sin? The question answers itself.

 

 

 

JAM 2:18 But someone [some imagined objector] may well say, "You have faith, and I have works; show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works."

 

JAM 2:19 You believe that God is one. You do well; the demons also believe, and shudder.

 

The Greek word “one” is the Greek equivalent of echav from the Shema. “You believe that Elohim is echav, but so did the demons and look at what they did.”

 

JAM 2:20 But are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless?

 

Faith in Christ will not protect us from the detrimental and damaging effects of sin.

 

ROM 8:13

for if you are living according to the flesh, you must die;

 

It is difficult to see where the objector ends and where James starts his reply. Some commentators state that the objector states vv. 18 and 19 and James’ reply starts in verse 20 … “you foolish fellow.” The quotes show us that the translators think that the objector states only verse 18, but there are no quotes in the original. Then again, Robertson states that the objector only says “You have faith and I have works.” This is the simplest, since what is stated in the rest of verse 18 seems to back up James message and not argue with it. It is still difficult however since the statement “You have faith and I have works” is not really an argument.

 

However, it doesn’t muddy up James’ message that faith remains alive and well in the plan of God and not outside of it.

 

What is important to note is that these are the words of someone arguing James’ point that living the plan of God keeps faith alive and so the new creature alive in the life that is Christ, and that James’ reply is that the man is foolish, not seeing that faith without works is useless to keep the believer alive. The argument of the objector must be that works are not needed to keep faith alive.

 

Speaking to Jews, he uses Abraham as an example.

 

JAM 2:21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works, when he offered up Isaac his son on the altar?

 

JAM 2:22 You see that faith was working with his works, and as a result of the works, faith was perfected [matured];

 

A faith that is kept alive, as Abraham's was, will be perfected [grow to maturity].

 

1JO 2:5

but whoever keeps His word, in him the love of God has truly been perfected.

 

JAM 2:23 and the Scripture was fulfilled which says, "And Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness," and he was called the friend of God.

 

JAM 2:24 You see that a man is justified by works, and not by faith alone.

 

"by faith only."

James and his readers understand that Abraham was justified by faith (GEN 15:6). James is stating that his justification was revealed to men on Mt. Moriah.

 

So to the man who wishes to live in his flesh and claim that he is in the plan of God due to his faith is confronted with the example of Abraham. Abraham's faith matured, but it never matured so much as it did that day. If God had not asked him to sacrifice his beloved son Isaac, then Abraham would have never known that he could do such a thing, which is really saying that he would have never known that he could trust God so much. Right to the moment that he raised the sharpened blade, he might have doubted that he could do it, but he found that he could do the hardest thing that God could have ever asked him to do.

 

Rahab is also used as an example. She saved her own life and the life of her family when she sent the spies out and did not betray them. Her faith applied, saved her life.

 

JAM 2:25 And in the same way was not Rahab the harlot also justified by works, when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way?

 

JAM 2:26 For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.

 

And so, this is not in contradiction with Paul's Rom 4. Paul is clear that Abraham was justified by faith only.

 

The justification that James speaks of is before men, not God. Abraham, when he offers Isaac, is showing us the power of mature faith.

 

ROM 4:1 What then shall we say that Abraham, our forefather according to the flesh, has found?

 

ROM 4:2 For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about; but not before God.

 

We immediately read boast and think of arrogance, but that is not what Paul states. The Greek word is

 

“boast” - kau,chma[kauchema] = to glory. The glory of Abraham’s justification was shown to men when he sacrificed Isaac, and Abraham certainly gloried in it.

 

Abraham marveled at God and that God would provide and so the power of his faith was shown and he called the spot Yavah Yareh. Abraham’s mature faith was revealed to mankind when he did this, but before God, he was justified back in Gen 15 when he believed.

 

So James states, "Do you want to live with your faith gone dead, or would you like to mature your faith like our father Abraham?" What believer could ignore such an awesome call as that?

 

Faith in the word of God will become action with the word of God. And this will keep your faith alive and vigorous.

 

James therefore wishes his readers to know that works are in fact the vitalizing “spirit” which keeps one’s faith alive in the same way that the human spirit keeps the human body alive (2:26). Whenever a Christian ceases to act on his faith, that faith atrophies and becomes little more than a creedal corpse. “Dead orthodoxy” is a danger that has always confronted Christian peo­ple and they do well to take heed to this danger. But the antidote is a simple one: faith remains vital and alive as long as it is being translated into real works of living obedience.