A trusted, old friend is very special -someone who knows you really well yet still loves you; someone who you can rant and rave at, who takes it and then makes sense of what ever it was that wound you up in the first place... Can books be old, trusted friends? I'd like to think they can.
The book - or letter - of James is one my favouritest (most favourite) parts of the Bible, and I like to think it's an old friend. It talks an awful lot of sense, has its own humour and if the traditional assertion that Jesus' kid brother wrote it is right, well then it must be pretty darned fine. And, as it's a good friend, I got cross with it last night.
My Bible notes had just led me through a very disappointing exploration of Genesis 1-11 and I was really looking forward to spending some time with my old friend James.
Then he said this...
My brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of any kind, consider it nothing but joy, because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance; and let endurance have its full effect, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing.
And I was not amused. For some of my congregation life is frankly, 'pants' at the moment. In fact, it is worse than 'pants' it is more like 'excrement' though they are showing remarkable decorum in how they deal with it. "Consider it nothing but joy" my foot! I certainly had a good rant about that one.
Calmly James waited, and then said,
If any of you is lacking in wisdom, ask God, who gives to all generously and ungrudgingly, and it will be given you. But ask in faith, never doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind.
It seemed as if he was saying, 'Catriona, this is pants, you are quite right, but what you need here is Godly wisdom, so ask for it, and trust that God will give it to you.'
Too often I have heard passages like this one used to bludgeon people whose prayers for healing or deliverance from trial appear to go unanswered, but that isn't what James says, he says we must trust when we ask for wisdom within the situation. As I calmed down a bit, other verses surfaced in my mind, verses that speak of joy and sorrow, of God present in the hard places not lifting people out of them, of the kind of solid, sensible, real theology I associate with this trusted old friend.
To read what James says when life is going well is one thing, to read it when things get tough is another. I'm not sure I'll ever view 'suffering' or 'trials' as 'nothing but pure joy' but the potential to grow in wisdom and grace within such circumstances is a helpful perspective. I'm hoping we won't have another set to tonight, but then as a true friend, I guess James will just shrug and let me rant a bit...
Comments
In all my time at D+1 I never dared preach on tribulation worketh patience, or on considering it all joy, or on the story of Job.
I felt I would have been teaching my collective grandparents how to feel about sucking eggs.
The year we started January with the words of the Covenant service - put me to what you will, etc. one family soon afterwards lost their oldest daughter to cancer. Theodicy didn't seem appropriate. But I think we all lost out by my reluctance to engage honestly with the Biblical resources. We just ended up talking about stuff that didn't really matter instead.
Hi Andy,
Maybe that's why they never invite me to preach?! I'm just t-o-o- scary.
Btw at risk of instructing you in the noble art of egg-sucking I'm told that 'put me to suffering' is one of those misunderstood things where words have changed their meanings...
As Jesus said (according to King, not saint, James) 'suffer little children to come unto me' so we lay ourselves open to that possibility... that of 'allowing' or 'permitting' (juxtaposed with 'doing') - not unlike the 'employed, laid aside' balance.
Of course Mr Wesley and his pals may have had something totally different in mind but time has eroded/distorted that memory! ;-)
I wonder in what sense Mr Wesley ever felt himself to have been set aside for that sort of suffering?
If he could only have written in 21st Century English, we'd have known what he meant, innit!
Don't know where else to put this, and it's nothing to do with Trusted Old Friends, but found it stimulating and wanted to share it with others.
Simon Rattle on Desert Island Discs, heard over a late breakfast, talking about his work with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. A friend of his described them as the Real Madrid of the classical music world. Big talents, big personalities, strong views on musical interpretation and where everyone else should be going.
Rattle has to help them hold all these views together and draw out the very best by helping them to negotiate their differences together and realise their joint potential. Somebody said to him after a few months in the job: "I said it would be great. I didn't say it would be easy!" Strength for the day.
Also, when Rattle came in for press criticism in a patchy spell for the orchestra, the players told the critics. "Don't give the conductor a hard time... That's our job!"
May we grow in grace and wisdom.