Welcoming the Implanted Word: Part Deux

Text: James 1:17-27

Being a Southerner I grew up rather insular in my ideas of hospitality.  We Southerners with our fried chicken, homemade biscuits, and various kinds of cooked greens like to think we invented hospitality.  It is likely that our ideas about hospitality are rooted in the biblical idea of not turning away strangers for you might be entertaining angels unawares (Heb. 13:2).   But…since growing up and having seen a bit of the world, I've come to see that hospitality exists everywhere and every culture has its own way of showing it.  So, I can’t get too conceited about my Southern roots.

Hindu people have some interesting beliefs about hospitality and the ways they show it.  They're main teaching about hospitality is what they call Athithi devo bhava which means "the guest is God".  Treat your guests as if they were God come to visit, which means reverently.  The way they show hospitality involves five formalities that are rooted in the way they worship their gods.  First, there is fragrance.  While receiving guests the rooms of your house must have a pleasant smell because odour is the first thing a person will notice and it sets the stage for the visit.  A pleasant fragrance will put a guest in good humours.  Down South we use fresh coffee and bacon to serve this purpose.  Second, there must light.  You set a lamp between yourself and your guest when at a table so that facial expressions and body language can be clearly seen.  Down South, this is when we turn the light on in the gun cabinet.  The third formality, there must be fresh fruit and sweets made of milk; hence all the sweet shops in Hindi neighbourhoods.  The fourth formality involves rice, which for Hindu’s is a symbol of unity.  They make a red dot on the guest’s forehead and then stick rice grains to it.  In Hindu Indian families this is the highest form of welcome.  Finally, you must give flowers to your guests when they leave so that sweet memories may linger for several days. 

Welcoming guests as if they were gods.  I think this is a very profound way of going about life and regarding other people.  This teaching is very similar to what Jesus meant when he said, “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one the least of these who are my brothers and sisters, you did it to me.”  We of the Christian faith should always pay attention to how we welcome others, to how we open our lives and show hospitality to others for it really isn’t a stretch to say that by doing so we are showing hospitality to Jesus himself particularly when we are hospitable to “the least of these.”  

Yet, if I might be a bit analytical here, I think we all know this.  We were raised to know that showing hospitality is a good thing especially if it’s helping others in their need.  So, I don’t want to stand here this morning and give just one more sermon on altruism in the name of Jesus.  I want to prod us beyond that and get us thinking about how we actually show hospitality to God himself, how we welcome the presence of God into our lives. 

Verse 21 here says “…welcome with meekness the implanted word which has the power to save your souls”.  James wants us to know something profoundly transformative about ourselves.  God the Father of his own will and desire has made us to be born anew by means of the New Creation producing Word of Truth that he spoke and continues to speak in, through, and as Jesus in the power of the Holy Spirit.  The Father by his own choice (not ours) has spoken a new word of creation into us like the first one he spoke that brought creation itself into being.

James goes on to say here that God the Father spoke this Word of Jesus in such a way as to implant it into us.  God the Father has implanted his utterly life-transforming union of God the Son and human being and flesh, which is Jesus, into us through the gift of the Holy Spirit to us.  This implanted word by the power of the Holy Spirit, the same power by which God the Father raised Jesus from the dead is at work in us changing us, healing us, making us to be more and more like Jesus.  This word has brought us to want to know the love of God in Jesus Christ.  It has brought us to want him in our lives.  It has brought us to faith in him.  It has brought us to want to turn from sin and hurtful ways to the ways of compassion.  It has brought us to want to be and do want God wants us to be and do.  We wouldn’t have these God-ward desires if this Word were not implanted in us but God’s gracious gift.  It is the good and perfect gift that comes down from above from the Father of lights.  It is the good gift and perfect gift of God’s very self to us.  Therefore, we must receive it.  Welcome it.  Show it hospitality.

James here is saying that the Christian walk is founded upon on welcoming this implanted Word of God into our lives as we would a guest.  But there’s one thing we need to be clear on.  This implanted Word to which we must show hospitality is not in us by our own invitation, but because of the Father’s will, the Father’s desire for us.  So, we must welcome the Word even though it is in us as a guest uninvited. 

Have you ever had to show hospitality to an uninvited guest?  Imagine walking into your kitchen and there is someone sitting there and he says he’s going to be your guest for the rest of your life.  Try as you may you cannot get rid of him.  Then he starts to tell you the truth about yourself.  He knows you better than anyone.  Then he starts telling you how to live your life expecting that you will take his advice.  That would take a heck of a lot of trust on your part.  Yet, this is how the grace of God works in us.  God speaks and implants the Word into us.  We cannot get it through any other way.

Well, if I may push the limits here a little more; the rest of what James has to say here about being doers of the word rather than just hearers of it has been so entrapped in the Reformation’s over-preoccupation with the tension between works and faith that we don’t readily hear what James is saying, I think.  James’ hearer/doer image is simply his way of saying how we show hospitality to the Word God has implanted into us. 

He’s trying to say that it is not enough to welcome a truth-speaking guest into your life and all you do is give him lip and ear service.  It is rude to be simply a “hearer”.  The word for “hearer” James uses is for someone who sits in a place of public teaching like the synagogue or Sunday worship listening to what is said, taking in the ideas, but doing nothing with what they’ve heard.  To be simply a “hearer” is rude.  It’s treating the living Word as if it were another religious idea to be taken or left according to one’s own idea of what it is to be “spiritual”. 

The fact that in Christ Jesus by the engrafting of the Holy Spirit we each are a beloved child of God is not simply another religious idea that we can take or leave according to our own ideas of what it is to be “spiritual”.  We are in fact born anew, born from above children of God and we share a bound of being with Jesus himself because we share the Holy Spirit with him and this is the Father’s good and perfect gift.  According to Scripture this is the reality of our being not some religious idea.

The Christian walk is a living, communicative relationship with and in the Trinity.  Experientially speaking, this relationship is founded upon God the Father by the power of the Holy Spirit getting it through our thick ears and brutally deceived minds that we are his beloved children with and in Jesus the Son.  Our work when we hear that Word is simply to live accordingly realizing it ain’t that simple. 

Speaking personally, so much of the Christian walk for me is reminding myself and settling myself in that very Word, the implanted Word that I am a beloved child of God and it changes the way I am.  It changes the way I regard myself and the way I regard others.  It makes hospitality to God, to myself, and to other people possible.  Living in the implanted Word of Truth that we are God’s beloved children keeps us from deceiving ourselves and getting stained by the world.  Showing hospitality to God, receiving, welcoming the Word of Truth means doing the work of daily, hourly, and even moment to moment reminding ourselves that we are God’s beloved children.  It is difficult and quite similar to having to be hospitable to an uninvited guest. 

Nevertheless, let us be doers of the Word and not just hearers.  Let us not look at ourselves in a mirror and see that we are beloved children of God only to walk away from the mirror and forget what we look like, for indeed God is making us to look more and more like Jesus.  Welcome this Word.  Amen.

Welcoming the Implanted Word

Text: James 1:17-27

Being a Southerner I grew up rather insular in my ideas of hospitality.  When somebody mentioned hospitality, I rather thought that "we" Southerners were the inventors of it in much the same way as the Scots were the inventors of the modern world.  Since growing up and having seen a bit of the world, I've come to see that hospitality exists everywhere and every culture has its own way of showing it.  Living here just north of Brampton where immigration from India has been so thick it might do us some good to know something about the way they show hospitality. 

In the South our ideas about hospitality are rooted in the biblical idea of not turning away strangers for you might be entertaining angels unawares (Heb. 13:2).  For Hindu people hospitality also has religious roots.  They're main teaching about it is what they call Athithi devo bhava which means "the guest is God".  Treat your guests as if they were God, worshipfully.  Showing hospitality to a guest for them has five formalities to it that are derived from the way they worship.  First, there is fragrance.  While receiving guests the rooms must have a pleasant smell because odour is the first thing a person will notice and it sets the stage for the visit.  A pleasant fragrance will put a guest in good humour.  Down South fresh coffee and bacon can serve that purpose. Second, there must light.  A lamp is put between host and guest when at a table so that facial expressions and body language can be clearly seen.  Third, there must be fresh fruit and sweets made of milk; hence all the sweet shops in Hindi neighbourhoods.  The fourth formality involves rice which for them is a symbol of unity.  They make that red dot on the guest’s forehead and then stick rice grains to it.  In Hindu Indian families this is the highest form of welcome.  Finally, there must be flowers given to the guest when he leaves so that sweet memories may linger for several days. 

Welcoming a guest as if they were a god; we of the Christian faith should always pay attention to how welcoming we are to other people especially the vulnerable for it says a lot about who we are as persons; persons who know the truth that Jesus Christ is Lord.  Humility, meekness, honesty, patience and generosity are all expressions of the grace and kindness with which the Trinity has regarded each of us and are part of the attracting mechanism (if I may call it that) through which the Father in the power of the Holy Spirit draws people to Jesus and makes them able to believe.  These attracting qualities arise in us; I am inclined to say, in a way that resembles how we welcome Christ Jesus himself into our lives.  The hospitality we show to him results in his showing hospitality to others through us.  Let’s turn to James for a moment.

James wants us to know something profoundly transformative about ourselves.  God the Father of his own will and desire has made us to be born anew by means of the New Creation Word of Truth that he spoke and continues to speak in, through, and as Jesus in the power of the Holy Spirit.  The Father by his own choice (not ours) has spoken a new word of creation like the first one he spoke that brought the creation into being.  He spoke this Word in such a way as to implant it into us.  The salvation producing union of God the Son to human being and flesh in Jesus has been planted into us by the work of the Holy Spirit and it is changing us, healing us, making us to be more and more like Jesus as he shines forth through us in his resurrected and ascended glory.  We whom God has chosen to be in him are as James says “a kind of firstfruits of God’s creatures”.  The Light of Christ that the Trinity has implanted in us at his own choice shines through us as the result of this Word for all the world to see and to be attracted to like a moth to a flame. 

Therefore, James tells us to welcome the implanted word which has the power to save our souls, the entirety of who we are.  The depth of meaning there in that verse 21 doesn’t come over into English very well, but what James is telling us to do is to show hospitality to the implanted word of God in us.  The Hindu say that the guest is God.  Treat your guests as you would your god.  James, on the other hand is saying that Christian spirituality, the Christian walk, is based on welcoming the implanted Word of God into our lives as we would a guest.  And there’s more to it.  This implanted Word to which we must show hospitality is not in us by our own invitation, but because of the Father’s will, the Father’s desire for us.  So, we must welcome the Word even though it is in us as a guest uninvited.

James doesn’t leave us with just that he goes on to tell us how to show hospitality to this uninvited Guest.  He says “Be doers of the Word not only hearers, deceiving themselves.”  Imagine someone showing up at your house wanting to spend the night and they start telling you how to live your life expecting that you will take their advice.  That would take a heck of a lot of trust on our part.  According to James it is not enough to let a guest into your life and all you do is give them lip and ear service.  It is rude to be simply a “hearer”.  The word for “hearer” James uses is for someone who sits in a place public speaking listening to what is said, taking in the ideas, but doing nothing with what they’ve heard and thus treat the living Word if it were another religious idea to be taken or left according to one’s own idea of what it is to be “spiritual”. 

James says that people who are merely hearers and not doers are like people who look at themselves in a mirror and then walk away forgetting what they look like.  So it is when we walk away from the Word of Truth that God of his own free will and love has planted in us.  This word speaks the honest to God Truth to us about who we are as individual persons, but if we don’t listen to this Word and act on what it says to us about ourselves then we deceive ourselves.  To throw a little bit of Paul in here from Romans 8, this Word of Truth causes us to know that we are beloved children of God and causes us to lift up our hands in adoration and trust crying out “Abba! Father!”  He also says in Galatians 4:4-9  “But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.  And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, ‘Abba! Father!’  So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.” 

For the Christian, spirituality is a living, communicative relationship with the Trinity.  Experientially speaking, this relationship is founded upon God the Father getting it through our thick ears and brutally deceived minds by the power of the Holy Spirit that we are his beloved children with Jesus the Son.  Our work when we hear that Word is to live accordingly.  Speaking personally, so much of spirituality for me is reminding myself and settling myself in that very Word, that I am a beloved child of God and it changes the way I am.  It changes the way I regard myself and the way I regard others.  It makes hospitality to God, to myself, and to other people possible in such a way as it is God’s grace working through me and not just some religious duty that I feel I have to do to stay on God’s good side.  Living in the Word of Truth that we are God’s beloved children keeps us from deceiving ourselves and getting stained by the world.  Showing hospitality to God, receiving, welcoming the Word of Truth means doing the work of daily, hourly, and even moment to moment of reminding ourselves that we are God’s beloved children.  It is difficult and quite similar to having to be hospitable to an unwelcome guest.  So, be a doer of the Word and not just a hearer.  Don’t forget what you look like, because God is making you to look more and more like Jesus.  Amen.