I cannot think of a harsher text to preach than James 5:1-6. Listen to how it begins! “Come, now, you rich people, weep and wail. . .” I cannot think of four words that more quickly alienate and divide people! And James doesn’t get any gentler. My paraphrase: “Weep and Wail. Miseries are coming on you. Your wealth has rotted, your clothes are moth-eaten. Your silver and gold are corroded, and stand as a witness against you, eating your flesh like fire.” This is textbook how to win friends and influence people! “You have stored up a gold chest of coins on the back of laborers you’ve defrauded. Their cries have reached the Lord of Armies. Meanwhile, you have lived a luxurious life, indulging yourselves. You are like a cow fattened for its day of slaughter. You have condemned and murdered… cheated good, righteous people… people who weren’t even resisting you.”
If ever there was a mirror to avoid, it’s James 5:1-6. Let’s call timeout a moment, and zoom out. Who is James writing to? James 1:1 tells us, it was written by “James, a servant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ… to the twelve tribes dispersed abroad.” These are most likely Jewish Christians, who fled Jerusalem after the stoning of Stephen—the first Christian martyr. There were former Jerusalemites “dispersed” all over the Roman Empire.
Interesting enough, Jerusalem consisted of an upper city, and a lower city. In the upper city, you had the “upper” class; and in the lower city, a “lower” class.
Lets begin with … A DAY ON THE LIFE OF ANANIAS. Ananias came of age in Jerusalem’s upper city. He lives in the Western Hills subdivision, overlooking the Temple. A member of the High Priestly family and a wealthy landowner. Every day, at sunrise, we wakes from his linen-covered couch, in room cooled by thick stone walls. A servant immediately brings him a warmed basin of water. After flushing the sleep out of his eyes, he hobbles across an intricately designed, mosaic floor—a tapestry of hand-cut red, black and white stones—and he hops in his private bath, to purify himself.
By 8 AM he’s sorted through his wardrobe and selected a tunic of fine, bleached Egyptian linen. His wife helps him choose jewelry. Today he will wear a heavy gold signet ring because he has contracts to sign and seal. Over his shoulders he drapes a mantle dyed with expensive Tyrian purple dye. At 10 AM, he enters the Temple, with other nobles, to discuss the Temple budget and management of his Galilean estates. One of his tenant farmers is behind on his wheat payment, so he instructs his steward to drag him into court, seize his land, and “send a message.” For lunch he attends a feast of luxury and indulgence. He enjoys choice beef (a rare luxury), imported olives, fresh cut fruit, and wine cooled by a stone cellar. He boasts of his plans… tomorrow this, tomorrow that… and next year its off to Alexandria for business, to make a killer profit. Fattened by his own sense of security, and caloric drunkenness, he passes out. After dark, Ananias heads off to a small gathering. As he enters the room, it grows quiet. As he’s ushered to the “good seat of honor”—an ornate chair, located at the front—some unkept woman, and her whiney children, are ushered aside.
A DAY IN THE LIFE OF JOEL. That same day, around 5 AM, Joel awakens in lower city. He’s overslept. He hustles off his straw mat, shakes out the dirt. He shares a single room with his wife and four children. The air is thick with the putrid smell of nearby tanneries and stench of smoldering trash heaps. As he races out the door, he grabs a small piece of barley bread—a.k.a. “poor man’s grain.” Every day he races to the marketplace, in filthy, moth-eaten rags, clothes stained with sweat and the grime of the lower city. He waits hours, hoping a steward from the Upper city will hire him to mow fields, fetch water, anything! By noon he’s lucky to be hired for a denarius, but the back-breaking work that day is brutal. The afternoon wind and sun leave him scorched, and thirsty. Nearby the deadly salt springs of the Dead Sea glisten, daring him to drink. He can’t stop. His family has no daily food. He’s learned to pray, “Lord give us today our daily bread.” After a long day, the landowner’s steward is dissatisfied, and refuses to pay Joel the full day’s wage. There’s no sense protesting. He doesn’t dare bite the hand that feeds his family. Besides, how do you sue a man who hobnobs with the citiy’s Judges? Exhausted, Joel returns home, covered in dust. He “barely” has enough to buy even a handful of “barley” for his next day’s work. He cries out to the God of Isaiah, “Lord of Armies, uphold my cause.” After dark, Joel slips into an assembly of believers, hoping to find comfort. As he enter the whispering begins. The leader grimaces at the sight of his rags and says, “why don’t you stand in back…” Joel feels just as invisible before God, as his people.
A DAY IN THE LIFE OF MIRRIAM. That same day, a young widow named Miriam awakes, in her mud-plastered room. The lines of her face reflect the great distress she feels. With no husband, no male protector, she feels terrifically vulnerable. As she rings the moisture out of her mat, she glances at the upper city, where her late husband’s debts were being collected. Even with a husband’s help she couldn’t make it—what hope did she have alone with a handful of children? A tiny kick in her stomach fills her with dread—another hungry mouth to feed may as well be a death sentence in the lower city. But still, she puts her trust in God.
By 9:00 AM she’s made her way to the Upper City to “beg” a judge to hear her case. Her life depends upon the pay withheld from her late husband. Please sir, hear my cause! But it’s the Upper City and she doesn’t belong there. Desperate for help, a person with kind eyes returns her gaze. She pours out her heart, only to hear those phony words, “Go now, I wish you to be warm and well fed.” All day and night she cries, as the hunger of her children burns. That night she slips into as assembly of believers. Spotting a comfortable spot, she takes a seat. But that seat is for another, and she’s directed to instead sit on the floor, next to a footstool.
So this past week Lara and I went to the movies. Date Night! We watched the Elvis Concert Biopic amidst a sea of silver-headed seniors! Preachers didn’t like Elvis. They felt the way he moved his hips and body was corrupting the youth. By every standard, Elvis was an exceptional performer. We old people (and old souls) watch Elvis to remember our stiff joints were once quite flexible! To some Elvis may as well been the devil. He lived an opulent life on Vegas strip. He was often asked about political issues and he’d deflect, “I’m just an entertainer…”
But part of Elvis’ amazing transformation is that he changed. First of all, he could sing hymns better than any church. But second of all, he learned to preach with Apostolic clarity and crispness. After Martin Luther King died, he sang that anthem, “If I Can Dream.” And he also sang that song written by Mac Davis…
As the snow flies… On a cold and gray Chicago mornin' … A poor little baby child is born In the ghetto (In the ghetto). And his mama cries… 'Cause if there's one thing that she don't need It's another hungry mouth to feed In the ghetto (In the ghetto)
[“Come, now, you rich people…”]
People, don't you understand? The child needs a helping hand! Or he'll grow to be an angry young man some day. Take a look at you and me. Are we too blind to see? Do we simply turn our heads and look the other way?
Well the world turns. And a hungry little boy with a runny nose… Plays in the street as the cold wind blows… In the ghetto (In the ghetto)
And his hunger burns. So he starts to roam the streets at night… And he learns how to steal… And he learns how to fight… In the ghetto (In the ghetto)
Then one night in desperation… A young man breaks away. He buys a gun, steals a car… Tries to run, but he don't get far… And his mama cries
As a crowd gathers 'round an angry young man… Face down on the street with a gun in his hand. In the ghetto (In the ghetto)
As her young man dies. On a cold and gray Chicago mornin'. Another little baby child is born. In the ghetto (In the ghetto)… And his mama cries.
Let me tell you what I think James is saying. “Come, Now, You Rich People.” You fled a city, rife with systemic evils and recurring tragedy. You fled a city split into upper-lower subdivisions, envy inducing upper versus lower classism. It’s a city full of people driven of selfish ambition, busyness, favoritism, indifference, apathy. Let’s not disperse such injustice all over Roman Empire! Let us be the people of God—a people whose faith works, whose religion is pure, whose love doesn’t discriminate, a people who don’t nod to the bling while dishonoring the poor, whose love doesn’t just talk. . . a people who use wealth and privilege to serve. . .
People, don't you understand? People need a helping hand! Or the world will grow colder and colder. Come on now you rich people. Take a look at you and me. Are we too blind to see? Do we simply turn our heads and look the other way? Well the world turns… but not the Church! Let’s us learn weep and wail with the least while it’s still today.. If Elvis got it…
James 4:13-18, “Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will travel to such and such a city and spend a year there and do business and make a profit.” Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring—what your life will be! For you are like vapor that appears for a little while, then vanishes. Instead, you should say, “If the Lord wills, we will live and do this or that.” But as it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. So it is sin to know the good and yet not do it.”
James 1:9–11: "Let the brother of humble circumstances boast in his exaltation, but let the rich boast in his humiliation because he will pass away like a flower of the field. For the sun rises with its scorching heat and dries up the grass; its flower falls off, and its beautiful appearance is destroyed. In the same way, the rich person will wither away while pursuing his activities."
James 1:26, "If anyone think he is religious. . . 27 pure and undefiled religion before God the Father is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and keep oneself unstained from the world.” James 2:1–4, "My brothers and sisters, do not show favoritism as you hold on to the faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ. For if someone comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and a poor person dressed in filthy clothes also comes in, if you look with favor on the one wearing the fine clothes and say, 'Sit here in a good place,' and yet you say to the poor person, 'Stand over there,' or 'Sit here on the floor by my footstool,' haven’t you made distinctions among yourselves and judges w/evil thoughts?"
James 2:5–7: "Listen, my dear brothers and sisters: Didn’t God choose the poor in this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom that he has promised to those who love him? But you have dishonored the poor. Don’t the rich oppress you and drag you into court? Don’t they blaspheme the good name that was invoked over you?" (CSB)
James 2:14–17: "What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but does not have works? Can such faith save him? If a brother or sister is without clothes and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, 'Go in peace, stay warm, and be well fed,' but you don’t give them what the body needs, what good is it? In the same way faith, if it does not have works, is dead by itself." (CSB)
James 4:1–3: "What is the source of wars and fights among you? Don’t they come from your passions that wage war within you? You desire and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and wage war. You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and don’t receive because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on pleasures."
James 5:1-6, “Come now, you rich people, weep and wail over the miseries that are coming on you. 2 Your wealth has rotted and your clothes are moth-eaten. 3 Your gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have stored up treasure in the last days. 4 Look! The pay that you withheld from the workers who mowed your fields cries out, and the outcry of the harvesters has reached the ears of the Lord of Armies. 5 You have lived luxuriously on the earth and have indulged yourselves. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. 6 You have condemned, you have murdered the righteous, who does not resist you”