James 1:17-27

Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows. He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first fruits of all he created.

My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires. Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.

 Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it- not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it- they will be blessed in what they do. 

Those who consider themselves religious and yet do not keep a tight rein on their tongues deceive themselves, and their religion is worthless. 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.

Let us pray,

May the words of my mouth, and the meditations of all of our hearts, be pleasing and acceptable to you, our rock and our redeemer…

Our Scripture reading for this morning comes from the book of James. James is an epistle (letter) of the New Testament. But it’s probably more helpful to think of it as wisdom literature. Because the purpose of this letter is to teach Christians how to apply Jesus’ teachings to their daily lives.

The portion of the letter we read for this morning introduces perhaps the most famous theme in James: the importance of taming the tongue. For James, how we speak to one another matters because our words say a lot about the God we worship. We are to be slow to speak. And when we do speak, we are to keep a tight rein on our tongues. So that we don’t create a stumbling block for those who want to know Jesus. 

Another reason it’s important for us to hold our tongues and manage our anger. Is so that we can do what God wants us to do. Rather than walk in the ways of the world unknowingly. Another theme we see throughout this letter is tension between the ways of God and the ways of the world. James is firmly on the side of the ways of God are always better than the ways of the world. And if we aren’t careful. We’ll end up adopting practices that are harmful to us and to our communities without realizing it.

One practice (that we probably all do) is make assumptions about why other people act the way that they do. It is impossible to know what a person is thinking. Unless we ask them, and they share their thoughts with us. But even if they share their thoughts with us. We all interpret their thoughts through the lens of our own experiences. Which means sometimes we assign judgements to other people’s thoughts that are not necessarily true.

This week I learned a hard lesson in the danger of assumptions. Of talking before listening. When a group of us from my gym headed to First Presbyterian Church of Duquesne to participate in a service project at their community garden. Before we began our project of staining a shed and a ramp, Farmer Scott gathered us together for a tour of the garden.

Farmer Scott began the tour by pointing to a building across the road from the church. The windows to the building were boarded up and there was a for sale sign in the front parking lot. “This building was a Family Dollar Store.” Farmer Scott told us. They had to close because people kept stealing and they couldn’t afford to stay in business. This Family Dollar closing was devastating to the community. Because it was the only place people in Duquesne could buy food at without a car. Duquesne is now considered a “food desert.” Meaning residents do not have access to reliable food supply in their neighborhood.

In the winter of 2018, First Pres had a Session meeting to discuss an important issue. Grass Cutting. For the last 10 years a crew of church elders rotated amongst themselves grass cutting responsibilities. But none of them are spring chickens anymore. And it was becoming cumbersome to cut an acre and a half of land once a week that the church used twice a year. Once for a chili cook-off. And once for Vacation Bible School.

Their pastor, Pastor Judy, wondered what if we put in a garden on that acre of land that the community could use to grow their own food? That way the church elders won’t have so much grass to cut. And the community could use the land more than twice a year. If we manage to grow anything, let’s give it away to our neighbors she said.

Like most good ideas this one quickly took on a life of its own. But spring 2019, First Pres had seed money from Grow Pittsburgh to start their garden. They even found a graduate student, Farmer Scott, willing to lead the project while he finished his studies. 

But before they planted anything, Pastor Judy insisted that they spend some time in the neighborhood asking what their neighbors wanted from a community garden. What they found surprised them. Residents wanted education. They wanted to know how to garden and how to cook the food they grew. They also wanted access. Many of the residents have sore hips and backs and knees. They would need raised gardening beds to tend to their produce. Other people weren’t interested in growing produce at all. They wanted a chance to plant flowers and bring a little beauty and color into the world.

Visiting the community garden at First Pres reminded me of the importance of listening to people before you assume you know what’s best for them. Had Pastor Judy and her team of gardeners not listened to their neighbors, no one from their neighborhood would use the garden. Sure, it is more time consuming to listen before you act. When you listen you will discover things about the world around you that will challenge your assumptions about how it operates. But the final product will always be worth it.

Another thing I learned from my visit to the community garden is the importance of turning listening into action. If you are someone who has a lot of great ideas about how to make the world a better place. It’s easy to get stuck in the hoping and the dreaming phase of planning. And never quite get to the getting out there, taking a leap of faith, and breaking ground. Scripture compels us to listen. But then Scripture compels us to take what we learned in our listening and turn it into concrete action in our neighborhoods. 

A final think I learned from my visit to the community garden is that we’re going to have to get creative in how we care for our widows and our orphans in this vaccinated phase of the pandemic. Part of the reason the garden is so popular is because it is a safe activity to participate in during a global pandemic. It is outdoors. The flower beds are about six feet long. The garden can only have a certain number of people in it at a time.

I am certain that Pastor Judy did not plan the garden to be a socially distanced activity. None of us in positions of leadership. Whether we’re pastors or whether we’re community farmers. Know what it means to live with the coronavirus long-term. We’re all fumbling around in the dark until we accidentally stumble upon what God is up to in our midst. And we try our best to follow God into the unknown. Generally if something is drawing people into a deeper relationship with Jesus and their neighbors, it’s a God thing not an us thing.

Friends, while our world looks very different than the world James inhabited, I think we can take some lessons from today’s text and apply it to our lives today. The first question we need to ask ourselves is what is one thing happening in my neighborhood that I want to make better? It can be as simple as baking cookies for the Fire Department’s annual fundraiser. It can be as complicated as running to serve on the board of your school district.

Once you’ve identified the thing you want to make better, you have to listen to how your neighbors feel about the change you’re proposing. Do some of your neighbors have a nut allergy? Maybe you decide to make a nut free cookie for the bake sale. If you want to serve on your local school board, you have to know what challenges parents in your community face. Before you adopt policies aimed at making school better for more kids.

Friends however you decide to listen, and whatever you decide to do know that none of this is possible without God. Without God there is nothing else to say. Because people can only give what they’ve first received from God. Oftentimes when we set out to make our communities better for the next generation, we’re really just getting in on what God is already doing. If we believe that God is always active in our lives and in our communities. Then our job isn’t to lead as much as it is to follow. Knowing that God goes out ahead of us, patiently waiting for us to catch up. 

As followers of Jesus. It is not up to us to fix everything that is wrong with the world. That is God’s job. And that will only happen when Jesus returns. Until that time we will see glimpses of the kingdom of God unfolding in our midst. And when we do, we do what we can to hasten the day of God’s kingdom come. 

Thanks be to God,

In Jesus’ name, 

Amen.