James Study Notes Continued/1:2

Remember, James is writing to Jewish Christians at this time. There is a very good reason that he led off with “…a bond servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.” James was making sure to keep Jesus Christ closely associated with the divinity of God the Father. For most of the Jewish people this was a radically new concept that Jesus was sent from the Father to be as it were the “Face of God.” Jesus is God with skin on Him, and James is making sure they understand that Jesus was fully man and fully God. James goes on to address his letter “To the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad.” This is the reason that scholars believe that the Gentile (non-Jewish people) believers for the most part were not yet a major outbreak in the newly formed religion. Or at least, James being the overseer of the church at Jerusalem wasn’t thinking that this letter would reach many of them since Paul and Peter were ministering the things of God primarily to the Gentiles.

What does he mean “scattered abroad?” Well the scholars have evidence to believe that God had scattered many of the Jews much earlier as a form of punishment for their continual breaking of the covenant with God. But there was still a great multitude by now back in Jerusalem and with their business, social, and religious networks in place from where they had been scattered they were all over the region. This was considered a gift of mercy that God did not allow them to sin their way out of existence, but instead put them in various places to be under hardship so they would turn back to Him in repentance and obedience. That is just the recent geographical history though. As James is writing this letter it is heating up in Jerusalem for Christians. One of the rulers of Rome actually had Jerusalem burned to the ground, and then blamed it on the new sect called “Christianity.” Now imagine what kind of backlash there was against the Christians then. They were hated and despised by most everyone, but this too was God doing for them what they couldn’t do for themselves. They were actually told by Jesus to go into the entire world and preach the gospel, but they had evidently started a “Holy Huddle” and become the “Frozen Chosen” so God sent calamity among them to pressure them out so they could fulfill their assignment to preach Jesus to the ends of the earth. Thus the reason James starts off with verse 2-3 as, “My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience (endurance or perseverance).

More to come soon...