James 1:16-18 – The Good and Perfect Gift from Above

Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers.

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.

James 1:16-18

One of the first things you might notice about this week’s passage is that I’ve again included verse 16, “Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers.” Most translations place verse 16 with the verses following (17 and 18), but I think an argument could be made that James’s admonition to his readers in verse 16 fits equally well with the verses prior to it, 13-15. In verses 13-15, James doesn’t want his audience to be deceived about the source of temptations; they don’t come from God, they come from our own hearts. Then in verses 17-18 James also doesn’t want his readers to be deceived about the source of all good things; everything good comes from the Father. James states that the Father is a being with no variation or shadow due to change, which essentially means that no sin, no temptation, and no evil is found in the Father.

In addition to comparing that which resides in men (desires that lead to temptation) and that which doesn’t reside in God (sin, temptation, or evil), James also compares that which comes from men and that which comes from God. As we read in the previous passage, we know that sin and death come from human desires, but now he tells us that all good and perfect gifts come from God.

Let’s be honest here, we’ve all heard people say these verses mean that everything good happening to you comes from God; perhaps that’s true. Perhaps your new job came from God. Perhaps the cure to your disease came from God. Perhaps the food on your table, the car in your garage, the children you have…perhaps that all comes from God the Father. But I don’t believe those are the sort of gifts James had in mind when he wrote his letter. In fact, James does not leave the nature of the Father’s gifts to our imagination. James writes, “Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.” That is the gift of the Father and, if you have been paying attention, this is the third time James mentions this gift.

James opens his letter to the early first-century Jewish believers by writing that God’s will is that they would “be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing” (James 1:4). He continues addressing these people who have been persecuted and dispersed from their homeland by saying that God’s will is that they would “receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him” (James 1:12). And now, in James 1:18, he tells these same believers — those who are living far from the former center of their lives and the place that brought them meaning and purpose — that, “Of his own will [God] brought us forth by the word of truth that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.”

Three times in the first 18 verses James tells us God’s will. But James also mentions some things that could thwart God’s work. Trials come as a result of being a believer in Jesus, we have a tendency to rely on our own wisdom and wealth to overcome the trials, and our inclination is to desire those things that lead to sin and death. The odds are not ever in our favor. On our own, we could never become perfect, complete, lacking nothing; we could never hope to wear the crown of life; we could never become the firstfruits of God’s creatures. But that is where God comes in. James tells us that the Father is the one working in us to bring all of this about.

Let’s be perfectly clear here: James’s letter is not a mish-mash of wisdom sayings. James writes an orderly letter to the early Jewish believers with a specific purpose in mind. He is telling the followers of Jesus that God is working in their lives to produce perfect children. Certainly, we can take this week’s verses in isolation and think that James says that health, wealth, and prosperity — all good things — have come from God. But I think we would be missing his point.

But, so far James has only just begun to open the door on his subject. He has told us all about ourselves and the world in which we live, but now he reveals that to become a child of God — “a kind of firstfruits of his creation” — we need to realize that God works in us of his own will. God knows who we are and is not enticed by us nor does God wait for us to respond to him. God chooses to act in us of his own will.

James hints at this when he opens his letter to “the twelve tribes.” James is conveying something deeper than a mere genetic marker when he states he was writing to Jewish believers. The Jews were the descendants of Abraham, a man who was not very special on his own. But God chose him solely because it was his will. I know much is made about the term election in scripture, but we often miss the fact that election means that God chose us; election means that people are included, not excluded. This is why, I suggest, Paul places such a heavy emphasis on election in the book of Ephesians; he was writing to both Gentiles and Jews telling the Gentiles that they, like the Jews, were elect! They, the Gentiles, were also included in God’s plan, not excluded.

Additionally, James uses the words “in the Dispersion” to hint at God’s plan of redemption. The believers in James’s time were no longer living in Jerusalem; they had been forced away from their home. But it is not just them, none of us are living in our true home. The great human exile began in the Garden when Adam and Eve ate of the fruit; they were put out of their true home and ever since we, their children, have been wanting to return. And, while James doesn’t discuss our return, we have some of the most encouraging words in the entire Bible written by John about our return home. John writes that a loud voice came from the Father’s throne and it said, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away” (Rev 20:3-4). God dwelling with us restores us to our true home!

But we don’t often think about ourselves that way, do we? We might not have been displaced during our lifetime, or even in our parent’s lifetime, but we are in exile living far from the home we love. We live somewhere on the face of this fallen earth and we are not who we were meant to be. But James tells us that the Father, of his own will, brought us forth by his word of truth so that we would receive our inheritance as children of God and co-heirs with Jesus, our brother. And who are the us and we? Anyone who believes on the name of the Lord Jesus Christ; they are chosen by God, by his own will, to become a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.

This all sounds great, but doesn’t it seem like everything is out of our control? Our genealogy, our location, our trials, our status, they all come at the hands of others. Even God’s work comes at his hands, not ours, right? In fact, all that James attributes to us so far are the desires within us that lead to sin and death. I suppose it would be natural after hearing all of this for us to wonder if James intends that we sit idly by while God does his work. But I don’t believe James writes so that we would become passive. At this point, I believe James is just laying out the state of things, leading us toward the part of his letter containing our role. But we can’t get to our role unless we first begin by looking for help outside of ourselves.

James wrote, “he brought us forth by the word of truth,” but what does that mean? Well, God’s word of truth could mean the law — the Torah — something with which a Jewish believer would be quite familiar. But we might also read this as being the Bible as a whole, something with which we are familiar. It could also be, for those familiar with John’s gospel, that God’s word (logos) of truth is Jesus himself — “the word (logos) became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14). Or, perhaps, James intended for us to think back on how God spoke and all of creation was formed (Genesis 1).

So which one is it?

Is it too far out of the realm of possibility that James intended for us to think of all of these things? God’s word created this material realm and we were made in his image. But then we screwed it up. So God spoke again and gave his word — the Torah — to his chosen people the Israelites, but they didn’t fare too much better than Adam and Eve. So God gave his words of wisdom to David and Solomon, but their lives, as well as the kings to follow, were anything but perfect and complete. So God, once again, gave his word to his prophets, then he put his word in the cloak of flesh so that we might see the Father (John 14:8-9) and become like him. And finally, he gave his words to the apostles and then sent the Spirit who would guide us into all truth (John 16:13). God’s word of truth has been given by his own will so that we would become a kind of firstfruits of his creation.

But that still doesn’t answer our question about what we do, does it? Well, just as James 1:16 is a transition between who we are and who God is — between what we produce and what God produces — so also is James’s promise that we would become a firstfruits of God’s creation. James begins by describing the reality of our situation — what God has done and who we are — before discussing what we are to do in response to God’s work; but for that, we must wait until next week.