More on James 1:19-27

Reading through James 1:19-27, and thinking it through some more after class on Sunday, I found the following questions floating around my mind.  I thought it might be helpful (to me if nobody else) to try and work them out here.  Before I get to the questions, let me go ahead and post the text at hand:

[19] Know this, my beloved brothers: let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger; [20] for the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. [21] Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness and receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.


[22] But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. [23] For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. [24] For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like. [25] But the one who looks into the perfect law, the law of liberty, and perseveres, being no hearer who forgets but a doer who acts, he will be blessed in his doing.


[26] If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person's religion is worthless. [27] Religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.
(James 1:19-27 ESV)

Now, on to my questions:

1. Why does James seemingly start talking about speaking, listening, and anger out of nowhere?
2. Why would anybody think that man's anger produces the righteousness that God requires?
3. Why is there a "therefore" in verse 21?
4. How are speaking and anger (v.19) related to putting off filthiness and rampant wickedness (v.21)? (Assuming that being quick to hear is related to receiving the implanted word.)
5. How do you receive the "implanted" word?
6. How do you do the "word"? (James first calls it the "word of truth" in v.18, then the "implanted word" in v.21, then he goes on to exhort us to be doers of the word and not just hearers)
7. If James is talking about the gospel (i.e. "word of truth"/"implanted word"), why does he then talk about the law?  And why does he call it the law of "liberty"?

As opposed to my typical blog posts, which drag on & on, I'll attempt to be brief.  I think James introduces speaking and anger because that's often where we fall into temptation during trials.  When we face trials, such as losing a child or loved one, or being passed over for a promotion or losing a job, what do we tend to do by default?  How often do we lash out in anger, seeking to tear others down or justify ourselves?  We're attempting to declare, by our own (perceived) authority, that life isn't fair to us, or that we deserved to get the promotion or keep our job.  This attempt at self-justification, or self-righteousness, is ultimately a display of the filthiness and rampant wickedness in our hearts.  As Jesus said, out of the abundance, or overflow, of the heart, the mouth speaks.  (Matthew 12:34, Matthew 15:18, Luke 6:45)  That doesn't result in the righteousness that God requires.

So what does?  The "implanted word."  Rather than trying to attain this righteousness on our own, by our own standards or the standards or expectations of others, we receive the implanted word.  It is the gospel that reminds us that our standing does not depend on our own feeble attempts at righteousness.  For the righteousness that God requires is a much higher standard than we could ever set before ourselves - the standard of His holiness.  And the gospel reminds us that God has imputed this righteousness to us in Christ.  "For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God." (2 Corinthians 5:21 ESV)

How do you receive this implanted word?  How do you receive something you already have?  I'm thankful to John Piper for his illustration (found here) of this word as oxygen.  We have oxygen in our lungs, but none of us would say that we no longer need to breathe.  We need fresh oxygen to live.  Likewise, we need the word again & again to sustain the spiritual life that God brought forth in us.  The word of the gospel implanted in us drives us to the written word in the Bible.

As Christians, we stand on the gospel.  We are given new birth through the gospel, and are transformed by the gospel.  The good news of God's grace forgives us of our sins, and enables us to live lives of faith, to be "doers of the word" - the "obedience of faith" Paul talks about in the bookends of Romans (Romans 1:5; 16:26).  And when we fail once again, as we all do, God's grace remains, so that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ (Romans 8:1).  That's why James can call the law the "law of liberty" - it is only a law of liberty when bound up in the gospel.  Apart from God's grace, the law leads to enslavement, sin, and death.  But thanks be to God that "Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us..." (Galatians 3:13).

I pray that we would be people who breathe in deeply of the Word of God.  That He would continue to work in us by His Spirit and through His Word, so that we would be fruitful.  And that we might be blessed like the man in Psalm 1:

[1] Blessed is the man
who walks not in the counsel of the wicked,
nor stands in the way of sinners,
nor sits in the seat of scoffers;
[2] but his delight is in the law of the LORD,
and on his law he meditates day and night.
[3] He is like a tree
planted by streams of water
that yields its fruit in its season,
and its leaf does not wither.
In all that he does, he prospers.(Psalm 1:1-3 ESV)

So drink deeply from the Word.  Meditate on it. Consider the grace of God to free us from our slavery to sin and self.  Worship Him, be planted in Him, abide in Christ as the vine, and see the fruit that grows.  May we be able to say with the apostle Paul, "But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me." (1 Corinthians 15:10)