April 15, 2026:

GOD’S WORD FOR TODAY:

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith  produces perseverance.  [Therefore,] let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.”

(James 1.2-3)

TODAY’S REFLECTION ON GOD’S WORD:

Notice that James speaks of facing trials of many kinds, he identifies it was a testing of your faith. How many of us see it that way in our own lives? Don’t we usually have the tendency to silo our “trials and tribulations” based more on the event and the resource challenged? If bills are stacking up, then it is a money problem. If patience is wearing thin, then it is the unruliness and lack of cooperation of others with us. If it is an unanswered prayer, then it is God’s inability to provide or a refusal to speak to us in that moment. I read recently a question posed concerning Job and God. The writer said, “Why would God let Job face terribly events and have his children killed to prove a point?” This is that kind of misunderstanding, which is easy to do at a surface level, that confuses people who hear God is a loving, kind and good God. It also creates friction between what some people see between the God of the Old Testament and the God of the New Testament. The friction becomes so great that they would believe it is two Gods. I wonder where they think the “other” God, the God of the New Testament came from? Chasing such siloed thoughts really can sap our mental, spiritual and physical energy. James knew this as well. He had suffered from such a condition in his own family, with his own brother- Jesus. In the end, it became a question of faith for James when he was able to accept the perspective of “walking by faith instead of by sight.” It was something he learned from the Apostle Paul who wrote the same to those in Corinth who had been challenged by temptations to be something other than the gospel of Jesus Christ.

James didn’t always believe in the ministry of Jesus. I am not even sure James or his brothers and sisters, actually understood what Jesus was all about. They could see He was an itinerate preacher with an extraordinary gift for miraculous things. Maybe James and the others were more like Ramses in the days of Moses who believed that his own “holy men” were as good a trickster as Moses’ God. I believe that is why we have the story of the serpent that was the staff of Moses not only appearing but devouring Pharaoh’s serpents. God one upped Ramses and his disbelief. Ultimately it would cost Ramses the life of his own son and the first born of all Egypt. Maybe James and his siblings were more likely to see Jesus as a “carnival” man trying to sell His goods to anyone who would believe it enough to buy in. Why would I say that? Well, it is just a suggestion because of human nature. Luke tells us that Mary kept things about Jesus, especially in the early years, in her heart. The intimation is that by keeping these things “in her heart,” she also never spoke of them to others; at least not until after Jesus dies on the cross, is raised from the dead and then spends forty more days on earth seemingly as if nothing happened before ascending into Heaven. Even now, I can hear the words of Jesus to Mary and Joseph when they found Him three days after they left sitting on the Temple porch engaging the teachers of the Law with the truths of God. He said, “Where else did you expect to find me but in My Father’s House.” Isn’t that where He is now? His death, His resurrection, His post-resurrection ministry culminating with the graduation ceremony of the disciples to become apostles and then ascending to Heaven validate the very fact that Jesus is again seated at the right hand of the Father in His Father’s House eternal in the heavens. It all was the result of faith. Such faith gave Mary the ability to withstand the test of not remaining silent. Such faith gave James, at least, and probably his siblings, the courage to not only be Jesus’ half-brothers and sisters but to be followers of “The Way.” James became the leader of the Church in Jerusalem. For him, it wasn’t about just seeing what Jesus could do but know He walked by faith and not by sight as well.

So, when trials and tribulations arose, and in the early days the conflicts arose internally and externally, James knew the only way to survive and overcome was to keep perspective by faith and not simply by sight, by spiritual reasoning and not merely human logic. What this did, and James learned it the hard way, was to move all “issues and conflicts” out of the various silos and put them into one. That one silo was putting faith in God as the ultimate and singular definer and determinator for confining the conflict and keeping it in proper perspective, preparing each person in the midst of the conflict for moving through it and ultimately bringing the person out the other side with the conflict or issue resolved. It may not be a resolution nor a process we were comfortable with nor expected. God certainly sees things from a different perspective and the means by which His will for each of us plays out. Keeping our focus on faith and trust in Him (as Solomon the Wise taught) “…and lean not on our own understanding,” becomes a source of strength and provider of confidence that not only sustains us but elevates us so that we “soar as with wings of eagles” lacking for nothing.

TODAY’S PRAYER OF THANKSGIVING:

Father, in these days we are finding the need to believe even more than ever before. We all have known trouble, some in greater ways than others, but You are offering us the assurance that we will not be consumed by it forever. Regardless of the “time” we are in and the “time” we have been given, we ask for Your Holy Spirit which Jesus asked You to share with us, to lead and guide and direct us in the paths we should go. Teach us what we still need to learn. Empower us to put that learning into action. Bless our actions not as a works righteousness but as righteous works of faith, hope and love in Jesus’ name. AMEN.