James 2:20 Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless?
Some people require proof that faith requires obedience to be genuine faith. Such people have a fundamental misunderstanding of salvation. They misinterpret Paul’s teaching that we are saved by grace and not by works. We are indeed saved by God’s grace and not what we do on our own power. But obedience is the proof of faith. This is true from the first pages of the Bible until the last. We cannot say we believe and continue to live in sin. We may fool ourselves and say that we are not living in sin because we have been forgiven. We are saved and secure in Jesus. Sin is not part of our lives because Jesus has taken it away. God told Cain in Genesis 4:7, “If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at thedoor. Its desire is contrary to you, but you must rule over it.” Sin is ever ready to ruin our lives. Sin is overcome through obedience. Our good living, holiness, and godliness require obedience to the commands of God, particularly the law of love which encompasses all other commands. The foolish person has deceived him or herself into thinking that a confession of faith is enough. If I go to church on Sunday, give a confession, take communion, listen to a sermon, become a church member, pay my due, I will be ok and make it to heaven. But on Monday, there is no spiritual life, no evidence of faith. This does not necessarily need to be with big sins but with neglect. Neglect is one of the key points of James in this chapter. He is writing to Christians. They are not into the big sins of immorality and idolatry like in other letters of New Testament. Their problem is not in caring for the poor, widowed, orphaned, and those in need. It is difficult to read through these chapters of James without feeling conviction.
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