“Orphans and Widows” – James 1:27

Now, we all know that money can’t buy happiness but who among us has never wondered what it might be like to be a millionaire?  There’s nothing wrong with thinking about it every now and then.  Just don’t let it become something that you dwell on until it starts to motivate you to do something unwise.  Don’t let it get in the way of your relationship with the Lord.

So, I want to ask you, what would you buy if you suddenly became a millionaire? Yea, yea, yea, we know you would tithe and then you would give to charity and pay off bills. Sure, whatever. But I want to know what you would buy for yourself. Do you ever think about it? Sure you do. We all do.

That’s a question I love to ask because it tells me a lot about a person. I have asked that and had the person tell me that they would buy all these new shoes and purses and makeup and outfits. That told me something about them and I had to say, “Troy, do you really think you need all that?”

Then I have asked it to others and have them truthfully tell me that they don’t need or even want anything. They are perfectly content with just what they have. Again, that tells me a lot about a person.

Now, what’s interesting is this:  How much of that million dollars are you going to be able to take into eternity?  When you die and go to Heaven, to spend life without end forever and ever and ever, how much money are you going to need?  None, of course. 

Can you imagine dying and waking up looking at Jesus and He says, “Well done my good and faithful servant!  Now let’s look at your bank account and figure out where you are going to live”?  That would be bad news for most of us.  Thankfully and by God’s great grace we don’t have to worry about that.  But did you know that not everybody’s Heaven is going to be the same? 

While salvation is a gift, there are rewards given for faithfulness in the Christian life as well as the loss of rewards for unfaithfulness.  So, when I talk about BOOCOD – the benefits of obedience and the consequences of disobedience – many times these are eternal.  In Revelation 22:12 Jesus says, “Look! I am coming soon, and my reward is with me to pay each one according to what he has done!”

Don’t you want to know what to do and where to invest for eternity?  This life is a wisp of smoke compared to eternity which lasts forever and ever so let’s make sure we invest our time, talent and treasure in things that will last for eternity.  If you want to know where to invest your money on this earth to become wealthy, you can ask my friend Scott Parrish, who is my money go-to man but if you want to know where to invest for eternity, then I suggest we look at what the Bible says.

Let’s continue our look at the New Testament book of James.  James is between Hebrews and 1 Peter and is one of my favorite books because although it is a small book, it is packed full of great little nuggets of wisdom.  Turn to James chapter 1 and let’s look at just one verse, verse 27, to see where we should invest to make an eternal difference.

“Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.”

I have heard it said that some people have just enough religion to make themselves miserable.  (Harry Emerson Fosdick) Do you know anybody like that?  Most of the time, I would say that is exactly what religion is good for.  In fact, I don’t usually have much interest in religion at all.  Neither does the Bible.  Does that sound funny to you?  It’s true.  This word “religion” is only used in five verses of the whole Bible and when it is used it always talks about the outward trappings of worship.

If someone considers themselves to be religious, most of the time it is because they go to church occasionally or maybe they say a prayer sometimes.  But did you know that if all you do is go to church; if all you do is walk through the door, sit in the pew and then check the box “went to church” when it is over then it does you no good?  If all you do is mouth the words of a prayer but you don’t mean them then it is a worthless waste of time.

James says that the only outward expression of religion that is worth a flip; the only outward thing that God says is pure and faultless is when you look after widows and orphans. Everything else has to do with your where your heart is and what your motivation is.  That’s why we don’t normally refer to Christianity as a religion but instead we know it to be a relationship between us and the Father through His Son Jesus.

1 Corinthians 2:11 says, “For who knows a person's thoughts except their own spirit within them?”  You can go to church every Sunday and stand up and sit down at all the right times and you may even say a great prayer and put some cash in the plate but if you don’t have a relationship with the Lord then all those outward expressions of religion don’t mean a thing.

But when you truly have a relationship with God and have the Holy Spirit living inside of you guiding you and helping you then your religion will be lived out and shown for what it is because you will want to help the helpless and you will, in fact, do more than just want to help.  You will help those who need help.

James says that this is “pure and faultless”.  Do you know why this is pure and faultless?  Because it reflects the attributes of God Himself.  Deuteronomy 10 says, “18 God defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing.”

I will say it again.  More than anything else; above your comfort or your happiness, God wants you to be more like Him and when you look after the helpless, you are never more like Him.  The psalmist says in Psalm 107, “They were hungry and thirsty,
    and their lives ebbed away. 6 Then they cried out to the Lord in their trouble,
    and He delivered them from their distress.”  It says so in verses 6, 13, 16, and 28.  God looks after the helpless in their distress.  So should we.

You know, I hear all the time about how Islam is a religion of peace.  To me that makes as much sense as a football bat but let’s put aside the fact that that religion, while saying they are for peace, actually seem to be doing the opposite so many times.  Let’s put that aside and think about where people go when they need help.  Is a non-Muslim going to go to a mosque when they are hungry and ask for food?  Do you hear about the Muslim community or the Buddhist community or the Hindus coming together to repair houses or feed the hungry or start coat drives?

That’s the difference between a religion and a relationship.  Jesus died on the cross to be the sacrifice that we could never be because of God’s grace and forgiveness and all we have to do is believe.  Because of that belief; because we have a life-changing relationship with Him, part of that life-change means helping others, especially the helpless who will probably never be able to repay us.  We can never repay Jesus for what he did for us and that inward love for Him spills over into our outward generosity to others.

Now, I get asked all the time when we talk about our food pantry here at the church about how we handle people who might take advantage of our generosity.  It’s a natural question to ask. When does it go from help to enabling when we know somebody has been using drugs or getting drunk and then they come to us to ask for food?

1 Timothy 5 teaches that people who are in need should be helped by their families first of all and that they shouldn’t be lazy.  They should be people who do good deeds and should be busy and not idle.  They should be.  But if they aren’t, that is on them.  That is wrong for them but nowhere does it say in James 1:27 that we should look after the helpless if they meet all the requirements and to refuse them is on us.  That is wrong for us.

Now, when it says to look after those people (and the King James says to visit them but it means more than just make a social call).  It means that we should do what is best for them which means to meet not just their physical, bodily needs but to also meet their other needs as well.  In the very next chapter James says, “If one of you says to them, "Go in peace; keep warm and well fed," but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?”  (James 2:16)

When James says we should look after or visit them it means we should do what is best for them in every way.  I have figured out that while we have been called to minister to the poor, the addicted and the incarcerated, we can’t help everybody.  We can’t meet every need.  We don’t have the resources for that nor do I feel that we are meant to meet every need.  Nobody can do that.

But we can help them get to a better place.  Maybe that place is a spiritual place and we can definitely help there.  Maybe that place is to the hospital or the rehab center.  Maybe that better place is a better frame of mind or a better place to live.  Maybe they need to go to Fort Worth or Dallas where they can find a job.  Maybe that better place…is my house.  Maybe it is your house.

On our website and in our bylaws we have written our statement of purpose.  It says that we exist as a church to do whatever it takes to lead people to a life-changing relationship with Jesus Christ.  I’m sure that there are things that our church could do better.  We may disagree on some minor points of doctrine.  Maybe we even need to come up with a couple of rules to go by around here – probably not.

But one thing we do right; one thing we do well and we do it to the glory of God and by His grace is we care for widows, orphans, the poor, the addicted and the incarcerated around here.  I see y’all all the time doing things for people who will never be able to repay you and you do it because you want to.  I see you give to the food pantry and the food pantry always needs to be resupplied, by the way, but we never run out.

I see you giving rides to people who don’t have any other way to get around.  I see you comforting those who are hurting.  I see you doing whatever it takes to meet people’s needs so that we can do whatever it takes to lead people to a life-changing relationship with Jesus Christ.

The world’s system of values says that, yes, we should help people.  We should help people when we have plenty of time and when we have plenty of money and when we know that they can pay us back soon and only if they are helping themselves and only when enough people see us so that we can get plenty of credit for it and then be able to write it off our taxes at the end of the year.

The American industrialist, Henry Ford, was once asked to donate money for the construction of a new medical facility. The billionaire pledged to donate $5,000. The next day in the newspaper, the headline read, "Henry Ford contributes $50,000 to the local hospital." The irate Ford was on the phone immediately to complain to the fund-raiser that he had been misunderstood. The fund-raiser replied that they would print a retraction in the paper the following day to read, "Henry Ford reduces his donation by $45,000." Realizing the poor publicity that would result, the industrialist agreed to the $50,000 contribution in return for the following: That above the entrance to the hospital was to be carved the biblical inscription: "I came to you and you took me in."  Bits & Pieces, March 3, 1994, pp. 1-2.

James didn’t say we are to look after the helpless when it benefits us or makes us look good. That’s how the world looks at it and that’s how the world gives, when they give. James says at the end of verse 27 that we are to keep ourselves from being polluted by the world.  Isn’t that a good word to use for the world’s system of values-pollution?  If our church; if you; if I don’t look after the helpless in our community, then then who is?  The world?  The world, with their polluted system of values, who only help when it doesn’t cost them too much and have no regard for the spiritual needs of people?

I can’t allow that when I have been given so much from our generous Heavenly Father.  The bonus on top of all the blessings we have been given and the blessings we receive here on earth when we help the helpless is that it is storing up treasures in Heaven (Matt. 6:20) that will last for eternity.  That’s a good investment.

Let me close with a story I heard about an old widow lady who lived way back in the sticks of Tennessee.  A deacon in a local church heard about her and just went to check on her to see if she needed anything and found her to be in desperate need.  She had no money, no food, no way to get anywhere and she was very sick.

The deacon asked if she had any family around and the woman said that she had a son in New York who was well-off but never helped her.  She said he was nice enough to write every month but all he ever did was send a piece of paper with some guy’s picture on it.  The deacon looked at one of the letters and found the green piece of paper and the picture to be of Ben Franklin ($100 bill).

My dear family, we are surrounded by people just like that lady.  I don’t mean they are back-woods widows.  I mean they have no idea that the help they need is just waiting on them to accept it and use it.  They have no idea that they have much greater needs than just their food and the light bill.  They don’t even realize that without that relationship with Jesus they have no hope, not just in this life, but in the next life for eternity.  All they have to do is accept it but how will they hear without someone to tell them and how can we tell them if we don’t meet their physical needs?

How are you going to help anybody if you don’t have that relationship with God through His Son Jesus?  As we bow our heads and close our eyes I want you to think back to the time in your life when you asked Jesus to be Lord of your life; when you repented of your sins - turned away from those sins and asked for forgiveness.  If you don’t remember a certain day or time in your life when you did that, then I would love to talk with you more about what that means.

Come down right now as the music plays.  Don’t wait another minute.

Invitation / Prayer

Tonight at 6 pm we will discuss what to do when the widow is mean and the orphan is a 16 year old drug addict.