James, 1 & 2 Peter

James

There are six Jameses in the New Testament, but the James who wrote this book was James the brother of Jesus. Imagine growing up with Jesus as your big brother! Did they squabble? I suspect not. We can read more about James's transformation in John 7:2-7 in which Jesus's brothers tease him about his ministry, Galatians 1:19 in which James is now and apostle, and Galatians 2:9 where he's described as a pillar of the church..

The epistle was written to Jewish Christians who were dispersed outside Palestine. It was accepted late into the canon of the New Testament, and there is no real agreement about when it was written but probably after Paul’s epistles. It is unusual in that it only mentions Jesus twice, almost in passing, and doesn’t talk about his nature as the son of God, his death, or his resurrection. 

James is a BIG DEAL for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints for several reasons:

1.  James 1:5 is the verse that started it all. Joseph Smith, struggling with conflicting information and wondering which church to join, read this verse and decided to "Ask of God", and thus was our church born. In class we unpacked that verse a little. It talks about "wisdom" which is not the same thing as knowledge. Joseph had the knowledge, what he needed was the wisdom to make a decision based on it.
   
   We also noted that God "giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not". In other words, Heavenly Father does not reproach us for our questions, and he will answer them. We also compared Moroni 10:4 which is also about asking for information. These verses tell us to "ask in faith, nothing wavering" and "ask with a sincere heart, with real intent, having faith in Christ" and they promise "it shall be given" and "he will manifest the truth of it unto you, by the power of the Holy Ghost."
   
   
2. The second BIG DEAL in James is contained mostly in the first two chapters, and summed up in 2:17, "faith without works is dead." We're a church which teaches the value of living our faith in good deeds, service, and adherence to commandments. Because of this other Christian denominations have accused us of believing in salvation by works - that it is what we do which will "fit us for heaven" (just throwing in a little festive reference there) rather than our faith in Christ as our saviour.
   
   They may have a point. There are those in society who believe that you get to heaven by being good; that enough casseroles and good deeds and attending church (maybe) and not stealing is how you end up in The Good Place. But let's be clear: this is not the gospel of Jesus Christ and never was. No one can ever do enough good works, or be perfect enough, as the Israelites pretty much demonstrated.The Bible is pretty clear on this, and there are numerous passages throughout saying things like "for by grace are ye saved through faith, not of works" (Ephesians 2:8-9).
   
   Of course, at the other end of the spectrum are those who believe that it doesn't matter what you do once you have accepted Christ as your saviour - rob, slander, lie - you are still saved and guaranteed a place in heaven. This isn't right either, so how do we resolve this?
   
   In class we felt there wasn't a contradiction. James was simply saying that faith is exhibited in works. "Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works: shew me thy faith without thy works, and I will shew thee my faith by my works" (James 2:18) and that faith which doesn't include good works isn't genuine. It's also worth noting that when Paul speaks of "works" he generally means rituals or practises associated with the Old Testament law - things like animal sacrifices and circumcision.
   
   Roderic read The Parable of the Bicycle to clarify the relationship between faith and works. It's from Stephen E. Robinson's superb book, Believing Christ. I highly recommend it.

The rest of James contains advice talks about bridling your tongue, learning patience, and practices in the church. It’s a good book to live by.

1 Peter
In the Petrine epistles the author quite blatantly announces himself as Peter the disciple of Christ, but there is debate among scholars about whether he actually was. Peter was the president of the church at the time and his name carried weight. The first verse in the KJV says that it was written to "the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia." Who are these stranges and why would Peter write to them? Other translations use “exiles” and “refugees”, so this shows us that they were strangers in the countries they were living in, but not strangers to Peter. His epistles offer them encouragement hat they are still part of to God’s kingdom and church, even though they are far from home.

The optimistic theme - that there is joy and hope even in trials – spans both letters, and Peter was in prison and about to be executed at the time he wrote them, so he should know.

The BIG DEAL in 1 Peter is found in 3:18-20 and 4:6 and relates to the uniquely LDS doctrine of salvation for  the dead. As I mentioned in class, I love this doctrine and it's one of the reasons I could never leave the church, because without it God is unfair and I can't believe that loving God would be unfair. But we don't have much in the Bible about this doctrine – just a few isolated verses including 2 Corinthians 15:29 – although there are also early non-canonical Christian writings, such as those of Hermas and Origen, which mention it.

Elder D. Todd Christofferson summed it up:

“Christian theologians have long wrestled with the question, What is the destiny of the countless billions who have lived and died with no knowledge of Jesus? With the Restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ has come the understanding of how the unbaptized dead are redeemed and how God can be ‘a perfect, just God, and a merciful God also’ [Alma 42:15].

“While yet in life, Jesus prophesied that He would also preach to the dead [see John 5:25]. Peter tells us this happened in the interval between the Saviour’s Crucifixion and Resurrection [see 1 Peter 3:18–19.

“Our anxiety to redeem the dead, and the time and resources we put behind that commitment, are, above all, an expression of our witness concerning Jesus Christ. It constitutes as powerful a statement as we can make concerning His divine character and mission. It testifies, first, of Christ’s Resurrection; second, of the infinite reach of His Atonement; third, that He is the sole source of salvation; fourth, that He has established the conditions for salvation; and, fifth, that He will come again” 

My father's favourite Bible verse was 1 Peter 3:15. What will your answer be?

2 Peter
It had been more than 30 years since Jesus' resurrection and there was no sign of His promised return. False teachers had started saying that Jesus wasn’t going to return and encouraging immorality. Peter likely learned about this via a letter from Jude – many parts in his letter are very similar to phrases from Jude, so as you read Jude next week see if you can spot the similarities, and think about how you’d have felt as Peter receiving this letter.

In order to counter these false teachings Peter bears a powerful testimony of the Transfiguration – 2 Peter 1:16-18. He was an eyewitness to it and the fact that his account is not embellished (as some later accounts were by this point) is more evidence that this letter really was written by Peter.

In chapter 3 Peter addresses those concerned about the delay to the second coming. Two thousand years later, I think that's us too, so what advice does Peter give?

• Verse 2 – "be mindful of the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and of the commandment of us the apostles". Maybe this means that we should remember that past prophecies have come to pass.
• Verses 3-7 – "there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and saying, Where is the promise of his coming?" Those who mock don’t understand the power of God.
• Verses 8-9 – "One day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day." God is not on our timescale.
•  Verse 9 – "The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." He wants everyone to be saved, so He's giving us time.
• Verse 10 – "the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night." It will happen, and when you least expect it.
• Verses 11-18 – "seeing that ye look for such things, be diligent that ye may be found of him in peace, without spot, and blameless." All these things being the case, be the best you can be!