James 2 Part 8: A Death Blow to the Twice Dead

Someone seems to be rising to the occasion and joining voice with James amidst what appears to be a dramatization on the part of James to render a fully loaded question: Can you show me your faith without works? The indictment is simple, "You're all talk….."

Much like Talkative from Pilgrim's Progress, some men are like him, who though he is fervent in how he speaks of his faith, his witness before others is both deceptive and dangerous. Why? His life discredits the words he speaks. His hypocrisy leads to devastating consequences. His conduct causes many to stumble into thinking a believer can live comfortably with sin in his life while professing true things. Christian asserts, "he is the very stain, reproach, and shame of religion, to all that know him."

Jude's Epistle addresses several errors, many sins, one of which was a bankrupt profession made known by obvious hypocrisy, absent Christian graces, "turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness, ..."

False converts, Rebels, covetous, who do things their own way, low views of authority, high views of their own needs, wants, & desires, they defy the offices of God, the authorities of God, the governments of God, they speak out of turn, despise dominion, and speak evil of dignities, they accuse and disagree and rebuke.

If even the demons profess truth, and genuinely believe it, and even tremble in light of it, then what more is our verbal profession than theirs?

Faith without works is dead.