Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning. (18) Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures. (19) So then my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath; (20)for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God. (21) Therefore lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. (22) But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. (27) Pure and undefined religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.

This book of the Bible was written by James, the half brother of Jesus and the head of the church in Jerusalem. James is writing to the faithful here of God’s care and grace and he addresses what we face in this world of trials and burdens, temptations and the brevity and vanity of life. We live in a world where difficulties are brought about by sin, including our sinful nature. God is not responsible for this; all that comes from God is holy and just and is for our benefit. In God there are no degrees of goodness – goodness cannot be improved on. God is sovereign and things don’t happen in our lives by luck or chance. Every gift is given for a purpose with intended results. The faithful are God’s first fruits and they are by God’s will. He chose to redeem us, knowing man would fall in sin – knowing we would need redemption He provided a means of conciliation in Christ.

James is telling us how to deal with trials and affirm God’s sovereign goodness – he is dealing with biblical religion (Christianity) which is not a creed of men but a personal relationship with Christ Jesus. There can be vanity in mans religion where men deceive themselves – where men are proud of their religious activity and achievements; a haphazard religion which is not genuine but worthless – where men become today’s legalists. These men/women are not capable of being honest with themselves. True religion is founded in faith in Christ Jesus; motivated by service to others and pure in heart; lived by those right with God, who reveal their relationship with Him by devotion to others. Such people live in the world and not of it.

Religion cannot save man and salvation comes by faith in Christ. Our daily activity is a good indicator of genuine rebirth. The Word of God becomes the law of liberty and our change of heart is accompanied by the work of the Spirit. There is no room for an empty profession of faith and we are now, in Christ, to behave as we believe.

(25) Husbands, love your wives, just as Christ also loved the church and gave Himself for her, (26) that He might sanctify and cleanse her with the washing of the water by the word, (27) that He might present her to Himself a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish. (28) So husbands ought to love their own wives as their own bodies; he who loves his wife loves himself. (29) For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as the Lord does the church. (30) For we are members of His body, of His flesh and of His bones. (31) “For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife and the two shall become one flesh,”. (32) This is a great mystery, but I speak concerning Christ and the church.

The letter to the Ephesians was written by the apostle Paul. In our verses Paul is teaching Christian duties of the husband in marriage with the purpose of illustrating the nature of the union between Christ and the church – the same mysterious and intimate relationship exists between them both. The words impose on the husband the duty/obligation of love as Christ loves the church; Christian husbands are to love their wives as their own bodies. The church belongs exclusively to Christ as husbands and wives belong in an exclusive relationship in which no other participates. All other relationships are subordinate to that of husband and wife and Paul speaks in the same terms of the union between Christ and His people.

Marital love is a commitment; it is self-sacrificing – shows itself and seeks the highest good of the one loved. It is purposeful and realistic. It is nourishing and cherishing – a permanent condition, not temporary. These were radical ideas in those ancient days that these duties imposed on Christian husbands. They were/are not a suggestion but a commandment.

I love to close with words from c.s.Lewis: ‘…ceasing to be in love need does not mean ceasing to love. Love in this second sense – love as distinct from ‘being in love’ – is not merely a feeling. It is a deep unity maintained by the will and deliberately strengthened by habit; reinforced by (in Christian marriages) the grace which both partners ask, and receive, from God. They can have this love for each other even at those moments when they do not even like each other; as you love yourself even when you do not like yourself.’

But now Christ is risen from the dead, and has become the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep. (21) For since by man came death, by Man also came the resurrection of the dead. (22) For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ all shall be made alive. (23) But each one in his own order: Christ the first fruits, afterward those who are Christ’s at His coming. (24) Then comes the end, when He delivers the kingdom to God the Father, when He puts an end to all rule and authority and power. (25) For He must reign till He has put all enemies under His feet. (26) The last enemy that will be destroyed is death. (27) For “He has put all things under His feet.” But when He says “all things are put under Him,” it is evident that He who put all things under Him is excepted.

The first letter to the Corinthians was written by the apostle Paul. Today’s verses address the bodily resurrection of the dead – and here Paul thinks only of believers. In chapter 15 Paul first proves the historical fact of Christ’s resurrection and then moves to the certainty of the resurrection of His people. There were false teachers in Corinth who denied the resurrection of the dead; they taught eternal life was spiritual only, not material. This false teaching included questioning of Paul’s status and authority so here he sets out to correct bad theology and to remind the Corinthians of his right to do so. To deny the resurrection of the dead is to deny the resurrection of Christ – to subvert the gospel and to make the apostles false witnesses.

“But now” in verse 20 means hypotheticals are set aside; Christ did rise from the dead. The resurrection of Christ was the pledge and proof of the resurrection of His people. Just as there is a causal relationship between the death of Adam and the death of his descendants there is a causal relationship between Christ and His people. Death here means physical death and resurrection means restoration of the body to life. The bodies of believers will be adapted to a heavenly, not earthly condition. Christ cannot end His dominion over the universe as mediator until the end comes; until the purpose of His reign is accomplished. His enemies – those being hostile to Christ – include all forms of evil, physical and moral including death, shall reign in this world until the resurrection with the absolute universal dominion of the Messiah according to the immovable purpose of God.

At death believers pass into eternity – in which there is no past, present or future – to await the resurrection of the body and the coming of Jesus Christ for His people in time. Between death and resurrection there is no soul sleep. Then this “end” will come.

And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. (31) Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice. (32) And be kind to one another, tender hearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you. (5:1) Therefore be imitators of God as dear children. (2) And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma.

The letter to the Ephesians was written by the apostle Paul. In our verses today we are unambiguously urged to holy living as God is in us – at the moment of faith we are sealed by the indwelling Spirit. We must remember that the Spirit dwells in others as well as ourselves and offensive conduct (speech, thoughts, actions) wounds the Spirit as well as ourselves. This doesn’t mean the Spirit finally withdraws but withdraws the manifestation of His presence which robs us of our joy.
The mind itself is the seat of passions and desires and the expressions of misplaced passions. Any form of speech from anger to either wound or injure others injures us: not only do we lose the sense of the Spirit’s presence, it creates distance between ourselves and God – we should ask who moved? Paul exhorts us to put away all malice and leaves no wiggle room for anger. We cannot afford it. We have been reborn as new creatures in faith in Christ and we are not just to “let go and let God”. We are not to just practice restraint but to deal with how we think – to get over bitterness and stop blaming others in disappointment and to stop justifying ourselves. Don’t keep score. As c.s. Lewis wrote: “Everyone thinks forgiveness is a lovely thing until he has something to forgive.” We are to forgive just as we have been forgiven. In Christ God remembers our sin no more.
We have a new life and relationship with God who chose us. Love is a conscious choice, not just an emotion. We are to consider behavior that characterizes a believer and not to walk in the ways of this world; we are to behave the same way before man as before God. We will imitate God by forgiving but also become dear children of God by walking in love.

This I say, therefore, and testify in the Lord, that you should no longer walk as the rest of the Gentiles walk, in the futility of their mind…….(20) But you have not so learned Christ, (21) if indeed you have heard Him and have been taught by Him, as the truth is in Jesus: (22) that you put off, concerning your former conduct, the old man which grows corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, (23) and be renewed in the spirit of your mind, (24) and that you put on the new man which was created according to God, in true righteousness and holiness.

The letter to the Ephesians was written by the apostle Paul. Our verses today are a general call to holiness and lead to the specific duty to walk as a witness to Christ – we are to be, in deportment and our inward lives, the manifestation of Christian living. The faithful hear Christ – they receive with understanding and the heart that He is the Son of God; that He is eternal God. This knowledge is inconsistent with sin and doesn’t allow living as do the unbelieving Gentiles who live a futile life alienated from God. This hardness of the heart means being insensible to things divine and an ignorance of real knowledge of truth; it is moral deterioration and destruction leading to eternal death

Paul is teaching here that there is no distinction of cognitive and emotional faculties – that there can’t be one faculty saved and the other lost. The mind includes feelings. In faith, in knowledge of Christ, we receive the moral and spiritual excellence of truth. Truth and holiness are united – there can’t be one without the other. God reasons with us through the gospel – the truth of His word is not relative but absolute. We are God’s workmanship, originally created in God’s image; God is the pattern of the new man and in faith our hearts and minds have been changed.

In 2006, in Jerusalem, I had a bracelet made for a little girl who seemed to float when she ran – the engraving was from Hebrews 12 – “let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us”. This now young woman runs this weekend in the Olympic marathon and she has lived with grace and endurance. With God nothing is impossible.