Introduction

When I first met my husband he belonged to a thing called a FOG group – any ideas? It stood for Friends of God. And this is the subject of this part of the letter of James. Are we friends of God, or are we friends of the world?

Don’t get me wrong – I am not about to spend a long time talking about renunciation and asceticism, giving things up, being misery-guts – but rather about how we can live as the people we have been created to be, filled with the Spirit of God and enjoying the grace of God. Do you want a life of peace and fulfilment? Step this way…

Wanting and getting then

James is Jesus’s brother. He’s a practical kind of guy, as I spose you would be if you’d been brought up in a carpenter’s workshop in Nazareth. His writing style is very different from someone like Paul. He just makes his points in order. So that’s the way I’d like to tackle them.

Let’s start with verses 1-3.

Those conflicts and disputes among you, where do they come from? Do they not come from your cravings that are at war within you? ² You want something and do not have it; so you commit murder. And you covet something and cannot obtain it; so you engage in disputes and conflicts. You do not have, because you do not ask. ³ You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, in order to spend what you get on your pleasures.

The nouns ‘conflicts and disputes’ were normally used to talk about national warfare. So chances are this isn’t about members of the congregation mugging one other for their iPODs, but about a general outlook on the world which they shared with the society in which they lived. James is writing to a bunch of Jewish Christians, living in a Roman world. He’s trying to help them climb outside the values they have been brought up in, and learn to live a different way, a way which will characterise them as an alternative Christian community. He wants to make them into friends of God.

So what was that society like?

Tacitus tells us. Tacitus was a Roman historian, born in about 56 AD. His Annals describe life in the Roman empire from the year 14 to the year 68. This letter was written some time between the 40s and the year 60, so to read Tacitus is to read about the direct context of the letter. What was the world like then? Let’s look at some examples.

· First, the rulers. The emperor’s son Germanicus was poisoned in Egypt. Examination of the floor and walls of his bedroom revealed the remains of human bodies, spells, curses, lead tablets inscribed with the patient’s name, charred and bloody ashes, and other malignant objects which are supposed to consign souls to the powers of the tomb. Germanicus was into killing people by witchcraft.

· What about the ordinary guys, the middle management types? A government official called Plautius Silvanus tired of his wife and threw her out of the window. His grandmother sent him a dagger as a hint; he failed to use it so someone else killed him with it.

· What about private enterprise? Roads in Italy were impassable because the contractors paid to build them had taken the money and not done the work; officials were too lazy to do anything about it (nothing new there, then!!). Local tax collectors on the northern borders had caused the starvation of a whole tribe by upgrading the tax requirement from ox hides to buffalo hides so they could pocket the difference. Corruption was normal.

· What about relationships between private individuals? This is what Tacitus says: ‘It was a horrible feature of the period that leading senators became informers even on trivial matters – some openly, many secretly. Friends and relatives were as suspect as strangers, old stories as damaging as new. In the forum, at a dinner-party, a remark on any subject might mean prosecution. Everyone competed for priority in marking down the victim. Sometimes this was self-defence, but mostly it was a sort of contagion, like an epidemic’.

This was the world the recipients of this letter had grown up in. it wasn’t a nice world. It was a me first world, a world in which everyone wanted money and power and everyone had to watch their backs. It’s hard to live in a society without sharing its values, and this is what James is worried about. The Christians are, internally at least, not much different from the people around them. They know what they want, what they think they need; and they are expecting God to provide them with it. So we get one of the most quoted verses in the letter: You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, in order to spend what you get on your pleasures. You are asking according to the values of the world, not according to the values of God.

Wanting and getting now

I think that’s a temptation we face too. I’ve just come back from Tanzania, and each time I come I land and get the chance to look at our society with their eyes. The thing you most notice is the adverts. The first one I saw said ‘Treat yourself’.

The second said ‘Express yourself’.

Both of them wanted me to spend money. That’s OK if you’ve got some money, isn’t it. As it happens I’m lucky, and I have. Last weekend I was in town with Katy, collecting our photos from Jessops. It’s freezing here – Ben told me he’s been sleeping under 2 duvets to keep warm. I hate shopping, but I thought I’d try and get some nice warm trousers. I did; and 2 shirts and a belt. Oooh, said the girl, are you treating yourself for Christmas? No, I thought, I’m trying to get warm. Then I thought about the guys from Triangle, and wondered how they feel when they walk past the ads saying treat yourself, express yourself. That’s the world we live in. It’s a world of instant gratification, a world which tells us what we should want and implies we won’t be truly happy unless we get it. Let me throw some random frustrations at you.

1. Nectar cards, Advantage cards – they wind me up. I remember coming back from Zambia for the first time, where children had rickets and people were so short of meat they said they roasted rats. In Sainsbury’s and Boots they want me to save points so I can treat myself to something I’ve already paid for and think it’s free. At the same time they get to keep all my personal data on file.

2. Flood defences. We’ve just been on holiday to Suffolk, where as in other places it’s been decided that to repair the flood defences is too expensive. They’re going to let the sea into the Blythe river. About 40 houses are at risk. Why is it that it’s too expensive to repair flood defences, when we are richer than we have ever been before? It’s because taxes have to be low. Why do they have to be low? Because we will only vote for the party who puts most money in our pocket. Why’s that? So we can treat ourselves, and express ourselves.

3. Next on my list is Airport expansion. We need to expand Heathrow. And Stansted. And put more runways on the Kent marshes. Why? Because otherwise we will lose the our place as Europe’s international hub to the Dutch. And then they will have more money than us.

4. I could go on. What about casinos and late night drinking licenses? What’s that all about? It’s hard to believe it’s about personal freedom and the wellbeing of the individual. Collectively, it’s about money. Individually, the Alpha advert says it all. It’s about escapism from a world that doesn’t work.

So. This is the world we live in. We aren’t poisoning each other, or stabbing each other, or defrauding each other. But we are nonetheless caught up in the values of our society. You think not? Then use verse 3 as a test. When you pray, do you receive what you have asked for? My experience is that sometimes I do, and sometimes I don’t. One possible explanation is that I am asking for the wrong things, because my mind is coloured by the values of the world I live in. My basic priority is in fact me. Am I a friend of God, or am I a friend of the world I have been brought up in?

Friends of God

So are we friends of God? James doesn’t think the recipients of his letter are. They are so not friends of God, so enticed by the values of their culture, that he says they are like adulterers. They are unfaithful to God. They are friends with the world, not friends with God. Let’s look at verse 4. Whoever wishes to be a friend of the world bcomes an enemy of God. And at verse 5. God is jealous, he’s the same jealous God we met in the Old Testament. He’s as jealous of our friendship with the world as a man or woman is jealous of their partner’s lover. God has made us, he has filled us with his spirit. We have something that is his, we have entered into a contract with him, and he wants us to keep it.

I’ve just come back from Tanzania. In Tanzania we met with 330 leaders. Most are not ordained or paid by the church. Half have been leading a Rooted in Jesus group for the last 4 years, and the other half have been appointed from those who have completed the course to serve as leaders in their turn. Most have no employment; fewer than 5% of people in this area of Tanzania have jobs. They are subsistence farmers, growing their own food and keeping animals to support their families. Most are unhealthy. Out of the 330, 124 reported to the nurse for treatment for illness. And yet they are willing to set aside the time to serve God by acting as a group leader, with all that involves.

And as we talked to them, what struck me, and what I want to tell you about, is how much they have changed since I last saw them 2 years ago, and even more since I first met them 4 years ago. We started by dividing them into 4 groups and asking them a whole load of questions, because it’s one thing to get encouraging reports with this story and that story, but I wanted to get a feel for the overall picture. 4 years ago we all stood together in a church in a place called Engusero. Nick led us in worship. They prayed their hearts out. And we had a prophecy. The prophecy was this. God said, if you seek me with all your heart, if you continue to praise and to pray as you are doing now, then I will bless you. Kiteto is not an important place. You are not important people. But to me it is a special place, and I have chosen you as my people. Walk with me and I will bless you.

And so we asked them. What’s it been like leading your group? What changes have you seen in the group members? What changes have you experienced yourself? Was it hard to get people to learn the memory verses? Did they manage to keep coming to the group? How do you feel about the future?

And then we listened. And I can honestly say, never have I seen a group of people so different. They have changed from being friends of the world to being friends of God.

· Germanicus was into witchcraft and so are many people in Tanzania. It’s a way of trying to take control of a world which won’t do as you want it to. So people go to the witchdoctor and spread the ‘medicines’ he gives them on the fields. They no longer do. They get bitten by snakes; there are few clinics, so they go to the witchdoctor for that too. One group member was bitten by a snake and decided to go to the group instead for prayer. The group prayed and she was healed.

· About 80% of the people of Kiteto are Masai. Now if ever there is a group which has refused to be part of a prevailing culture it’s the Masai. They still often refuse to send their children to school. They live far from water, and move their villages to follow the grazing needs of their animals. They circumcise both young men and young women. The men are organised into age sets, a kind of brotherhood of shared privilege and responsibility. Roles between men and women are strongly divided; women run the home, build houses, look after the animals at night, care for children. Men hunt, look after the animals during the day, and make all the decisions through a council of elders. They resist all attempts to get them to conform to the customs of the rest of Tanzania. And yet they have embraced Rooted in Jesus, because it is in Masai. The Masai, one explained to me, don’t like other people’s customs. But this book is in Masai. That means it belongs to us. It will be a Masai thing. So what’s happening now? Well, in one village the elders meet as before to make the decisions, but now they pray over them. About 20 women have been appointed as new group leaders, to lead not just women’s groups but mixed groups. Young men have been appointed so they can lead groups in their own age sets. People have renounced drunkenness and been healed of anger. Old men can recite memory verses. They are not being asked to make friends with the world, which is their fear; they are working out how to be friends of God and still be Masai.

· What about the group leaders themselves. Almost without exception they said that they now had great confidence in God, that he was with them and was powerful to work through them. These are people with at most primary education. One said ‘I have a sense of God being with me, empowering me; and I had constantly prayed for this, and continue to pray for it’. Another said ‘it has been an encouragement to me that God is with me as one of the first women leaders’. Many said they used to read the Bible like a newspaper of magazine, but now read it and pray over it daily and find that it speaks to them. Some said that they have lost their fear; that they feel power in preaching; that they feel a love for their group members. When we asked about the memory verses, one after another they rattled off the ones which had changed their lives. Several said their churches are now full; one said the whole village has changed dramatically.

· We asked about the group members. What has Rooted in Jesus done for them? One said that on the 4^th lesson, about who is Jesus, he had taught them the memory verse John 1.12, which says to all who received him he gave power to become children of God. He said they hadn’t known that. They were just churchgoers, and they’d not heard of the Holy Spirit or realised any act of commitment was necessary. He explained the verse and the whole group was filled with the Holy Spirit. Other leaders said their people had stopped worshipping the wrong God, had developed their own prayer life instead of just saying prayers in church, had been praying for the sick and seeking healings, had stopped using drugs and cigarettes. Some had been inspired to learn to read and write so they could read the Bible. Lives were changing. Prayer was becoming normal in the village. People were sharing their faith and others were coming to Christ. They were speaking out against witchcraft. Illiterate people are teaching others from the memory verses. One man used to do everything in the church but now can’t get a word in edgeways. A child who used to fall down all the time was prayed for until he was healed, with the result that the whole family came to Christ and joined the group. A woman with a very small voice was prayed for; she now sings in the choir.

The more we listened to them the more overwhelmed I was. Stephen Dinsmore, who is the new director of SOMA, came with us on the team. We introduced ourselves and they cheered us. Alison, he said. You have changed these people’s lives. I haven’t, have I. We haven’t – because it’s been perhaps one of the most collective things Trinity has ever done, it’s involved all of us in our different ways. But God has. These people, in one of the poorest parts of the world, are now friends of God. They are living by different values. I have never in my life seen a group of people who looked so much as if they had the bit between their teeth. I videod them worshipping and said I wanted to show it to you so we could learn to do things their way. What is their advice to new group leaders in other places, we asked? Depend on the Holy Spirit. Be committed to the Word of God. Keep to the agreed time and place. Get there early and be prepared. Buy a Bible. Encourage leaders that this is a call on their life, and that they should concentrate on this task. At the end of the conference each of them was given either £15 or £30 as a contribution to their family and to make it a bit easier for them to give their time to ministry. These are people who have no income, right? 180 people went and bought 87 books and Bibles from the college office. Because there are now going to be 330 groups where before there were 156, 5 new deanery coordinators have been appointed. They will receive no pay. They are raring to go. Their only request? If it were possible to provide them with a bicycle they won’t have to travel between parishes on foot. If you can spare £50, please let me know!

Submitting to God

How do I respond to all that? Well, I nearly cried several times, with gratitude and amazement that we are privileged to be part of such a thing when we so little deserve it, when our lives are so comfortable and these people outshine us in their love and commitment to God. Really there’s only one way we can respond. It’s in the next verse, verse 7. Let’s just look at this next bit together.

^{Jas 4:7} Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. ⁸ Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. ⁹ Lament and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy into dejection. ¹⁰ Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.

Submit yourselves to God. It’s not a hard choice, really. If they can do it in Tanzania where they have nothing, it ought to be so much easier here – if only we can disentangle the voice of God from the voice of the world we live in. And this is where the next bit comes in. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. We usually read that out of context, and think it’s talking about temptation or spiritual attack. But it strikes me now that that isn’t James’ primary meaning. He’s talking about a devil who is trying to influence our minds, speaking through the values of a world which is leading us astray from God. The devil wants us to commit adultery – not in this context with a member of the opposite sex, but by listening not to the Spirit of God which has been given to us through grace, but to the spirit of the world which wants us to conform to its ways of doing things. What’s your life all about? What prayers do you really want to see God answer? For me, they are the kinds of prayers I’ve seen answered in people who have turned their lives over to him. We heard last week from Lisa, who is as determined as anyone I’ve met to submit herself to God. Lisa thinks she makes an unlikely role model. But she’s got the key thing right – she wants to be a friend not of the world but of God.

So how do we do it? James gives a list of instructions, firing them thick and fast like bullets. You really want to know? Ok. Just do this:

· Draw near to God

· Cleanse your hands

· Purify your hearts

· Stop trying to have a nice time – start to lament, mourn, weep over your sins. It’s CHANGE time.

· Humble yourself before God.

· Speak well of one another, the law is not yours to apply

Friends of God

So what’s your life all about? What are your priorities? Let’s look again at James’ description of those who are friends not with God but with the world. Are there conflicts in your life? Are they about things which matter, or could you just let go of them? Are there things you want and don’t have? Do you need them, or have you just been conditioned to think you do? Are you asking for things and not getting them? Are you sure they are the right things? Have you learnt to seek first the kingdom of God, or are you trying to live a comfortable life in this comfortable world? it’s not that God wants you to have a bad time. Jesus said if a child asks his father for an egg, he doesn’t get given a snake, and it’s the same with God. God has given us his spirit. He gives us grace. He will exalt us. Nothing for a long time has made me happier than it made me to hear the stories of those Tanzanian group leaders. New trousers are nice. But they just don’t compare.

How about you? Have you got an Advantage card?