Doers of the Word

There is a difference between knowing about God and actually knowing God. Jeremiah said it plainly to a king who surrounded himself with cedar and luxury while ignoring justice: "Did not your father eat and drink, and do justice and righteousness? Then it was well with him. He judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well. Was not this knowing Me? says the Lord." (Jer 22:15-16) Knowing the Lord is not a matter of information — it is a matter of doing. That is the thread James picks up in his first chapter, and it is a thread worth pulling on.

Receive the Implanted Word

James instructs us to "receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls." (Jas 1:21) The word able is important. God's word has the power. Isaiah reminds us it will not return void but will accomplish what God sends it to do (Isa 55:11). But receiving is more than reading. Think of a receiver in football — when the ball comes, he has to catch it and hold on. The word has to take root. It has to be grafted in. Just as a skilled grafter splices two plants until their vascular tissues grow together and they become one, hearing and doing together graft God's word into our very being. Hearing alone only means the graft did not take.

Be Doers, Not Hearers Only

"But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves." (Jas 1:22) James does not leave us with a vague warning — he gives us a picture. A man who hears the word but does not do it is like someone who glances in a mirror, walks away, and immediately forgets what he looks like. What good did it do to look? On the other hand, "he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does." (vs 25) The formula for blessing is not complicated: look into it, continue in it, do not forget it, and do it.

An atheist with a photographic memory could read through the entire Bible and walk away unchanged — not because the word failed, but because he never mixed it with faith. The Hebrew writer makes the same point about Israel wandering forty years in the wilderness: the gospel was preached to them, but "the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it." (Heb 4:2) Faith that profits is active and obedient faith.

The Fruit That Proves We Know Him

Galatians 5 draws a stark contrast between those walking according to the flesh and those walking by the Spirit. "Walk in the Spirit, and you shall not fulfill the lust of the flesh." (Gal 5:16) And the fruit of the Spirit — love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness — these are not just fine ideals. They are the visible result of a word that has been implanted, believed, and lived. That fruit is what Jeremiah was pointing to when God said, "Was not this knowing Me?" And it is what Jesus meant when He said that not everyone who cries "Lord, Lord" will enter the kingdom, but he who does the will of the Father (Matt 7:21).

We can claim to know the Lord. We can fill in every answer on a Bible class worksheet. But if we are not being the person He calls us to be, we are, as James says, deceiving ourselves.

In Closing

Being here on the Lord's day is a great sign — the Hebrew writer tells us not to forsake the assembling of ourselves together (Heb 10:25). But our light has to stay on when we walk out the door. The question is not only whether we heard the word this morning, but whether we will do it this afternoon, this week, and every day that follows. Be a doer. That is knowing the Lord.