REFLECTIONS COLLECTION

A reminder to me of the importance of self examination - Am I living out the Word of God in my everyday life?

James 1 says that anyone who “is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man looking at his natural face in a mirror; for he sees himself, and goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. But he who looks into the perfect law of freedom and continues, not being a hearer who forgets but a doer of the work, this man will be blessed in what he does.” (James 1:23-25 WEB)

What is evident from this scripture is that we shouldn’t be only a hearer of the word of God (one who does nothing with the information). What good would it be to look in the mirror, finding out you have food stuck in between your teeth, but then go away and do nothing about it?

The word of God is the mirror, showing us what we look like (on the inside). Rather than hearing and then immediately forgetting what we have heard, we should be looking intently (having a desire to learn), and having heard, then put it into practice. After the sermon is preached, the scripture read and studied, something still remains to be done by the hearer in their daily living.

Jesus talked about the same point in Matthew 7:24-27. He said that the one who heard his words without doing it was like a man who built his house on the sand, and the one who heard AND did it was like a man whose house was built on a rock. When the rain came and the winds blew, only one of the houses were able to stand. Only the one who both heard and did God’s word could withstand the inevitable storms of life.

The doer, the one that desires to know God’s Word, the one who submits to God, remaining obedient, and the one who puts their faith in Christ into action, is one that will be blessed. My prayer for you and I, is that this is what we will be, all to the glory of God.