03 Mar Recap | James | A Reversal of Fortunes

Circumstance is volatile and unpredictable, giving people both poverty and prosperity in unequal measures. Can real satisfaction and security be found in something that is ever-changing? James calls Christians to consider instead their future hope in the Gospel and to lay hold of it by faith in the midst of trials.

James addresses first the believer in poverty of any kind, the “lowly.” He is urged not to struggle and strive his way out of his poverty in order to improve the circumstances of his life but rather to boast in his exaltation. The future glory of all believers is in James’s view here.

James’s meaning of boasting may be slightly different than what comes to mind for us. While our understanding of boasting as proclaiming our pride in something is an aspect of his meaning, there is more to it; James’s boasting includes a preoccupation with, a delighting in– much like the way a mother, when making a decision, can be preoccupied with her children and how that decision will affect them. James is calling lowly believers to look past difficult circumstance to their future hope in the Gospel and to allow that hope to take hold of them instead of their hardship.

James also addresses the believer in prosperity, the “rich.” For this believer, James’s urge is also to boast, not in future glory but in future humiliation. Just as certainly as the lowly believer will be glorified in the end, the rich believer will have to lay down all of the worldly prosperity he has accrued. There is nothing inherently evil about wealth, but it is not something that is able to give life to a person.

James is not advocating for believers to live in denial or delusion from reality but rather to look past the nature of their circumstances to what is to come. What a person boasts in reveals their character and how they view the world – it reveals what they place their hope in.

There are two main aspects of a believer’s character that are revealed by their reaction to circumstance.

First, a person’s humility is revealed. The believer must understand and accept that he is the created, not the Creator, and that his circumstances are not meant to serve him but rather the One who ordained them. The fundamental truth is that there is a God, and I am not Him. Humility is required to not be enslaved or detached from circumstance and to humble oneself and commit one’s circumstances to the glory of God.

A person’s faith is also revealed by their reaction to circumstance. Faith is required both to release what is in one’s hand at the current moment and to lay hold of what is to come that cannot be seen. Jesus endured the cross not merely out of duty but “because of the joy awaiting him” (Hebrews 12:2) that he looked to and laid hold of by faith. By faith also will the lowly believer endure his own cross and the rich believer avoid becoming consumed by his temporal prosperity.

The believer’s hope is not just an abstract one either; the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus is a tangible event in history that gives the assurance needed to look past one’s circumstances. “Though he was rich, yet for your sakes he became poor, so that by his poverty he could make you rich.” (2 Corinthians 8:9). Only the God who has already given up unknowable wealth, joy, and splendor is able to ask us to follow His lead and entrust Him with our lives. Because we know that He has spent His own life on our behalf, we can trust that our lives are not wasted when they are spent for His purposes.

In James’s view, the one who is blessed by God is not the rich believer, but the one who patiently endures testing and temptation. This is the person who will receive the “crown of life” in the end (James 1:12). Both the lowly believer and the rich one are on trial; their circumstance is more so a test of their faithfulness than it is an indication of God’s grace toward them (or lack thereof). Though circumstances change for better and worse, the grace of God for all believers can be seen in the immutable redemption He has already brought and the ultimate consummation He has promised.

-Brian Barbee