What a strange combination of words: “law” and “freedom”.
How can a law give us freedom? Don’t laws take away our freedom? Yet twice in
his letter James refers to the law of freedom: in 1v25, he even calls it the
perfect law: But the man who
looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do
this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it—he will be blessed in what
he does.
And in 2v12: Speak
and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom,
because judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been
merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment!
Earlier in 2v8 James calls it the royal law: If you really keep the royal law found
in Scripture, “Love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing right.
How does this law give us freedom? The answer is found in
the words of Jesus in Matt. 7v1,2: Do
not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you
will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
Jesus summed it
up in what we call the Golden Rule in Matt. 7v12: So in everything, do to
others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the
Prophets.
Jesus and James
both tell us that if we want to find freedom from judgment we should not judge.
If we want to be forgiven, we should forgive. If we want to be shown mercy, we
should show mercy. To put it simply: God will treat us in the way we treat
others.
The law of
freedom is so simple yet we often lose it under a pile of complicated do’s and
do nots. We know instinctively how we would like to be treated so we just need
to “Love our neighbor as ourselves”. That’s it!
Don’t miss the
next exciting episode of our series on the letter of James this coming weekend
entitled “Dealing with temptation”.
Graham Turner
All Bible quotations are from THE HOLY BIBLE: NEW
INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright International Bible Society.
