Come now, you rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you! (2) Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. (3) Your gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have heaped up treasure in the last days. (4) Indeed the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, cry out; and the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. (5) You have lived on the earth in pleasure and luxury; you have fattened your hearts as in a day of slaughter. (6) You have condemned, you have murdered the just; he does not resist you.
Our verses today were written to the unbelieving rich oppressors by James, the half brother of Jesus and the head of the ancient church in Jerusalem. James turns his full attention to their foolishness in amassing wealth in the face of the coming of the Lord in judgment and addresses particular sins they have committed. The reason for writing to unbelievers is both to comfort the Christian who has suffered at their hands and also to warn the believers of the true condition of many of the wealthy. Weep and howl are the response of the rich when judgment falls on them; words such as rotten, moth-eaten and rusted reveal the real worthlessness of the wealth these people have accumulated. To be rich without God is to be short sighted. Wealth of this world is temporary – eternity is ahead. Man may pursue wealth to neglect pursuing God; or to trust wealth as a solution to our deepest need – both are folly. The things some trust for comfort now will result in final ruin.
There is nothing wrong with living comfortably but these things become a problem when they begin to control us instead of us controlling them. To be rich without God provides short term advantages but long term loss – nobody escapes God’s judgment. Be careful not to use wealth in an ungodly manner; hoarding, cheating people out of money, living in luxury while disregarding needs of others, hurting people for the sake of gain. A small sin always exposes us to worse sin. And no man can be certain that his wealth will abide – it may be swept away in a most unexpected manner. James rebukes selfish pleasure lovers who have been wanton and whose doom is certain in the coming day of the Lord.
The spirit the rich manifested in heaping treasures together, oppressing the poor and needy, robbing them and living in pleasure is the same which condemned and killed the just one, the Lord Jesus Christ, who did not resist. Wealth can be a good tool if we are careful to use it as stewards for the Lord – or a dangerous trap if we adopt a worldly perspective towards it.