March 29 Daily Devotional

Scripture for Day 88—James 5:1–6

¹ Come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. ² Your riches have rotted and your garments are moth-eaten. ³ Your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days. ⁴ Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts. ⁵ You have lived on the earth in luxury and in self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter. ⁶ You have condemned; you have murdered the righteous person. He does not resist you.

Devotional:

The key to this warning is found in verse 3b—"You have laid up treasure in the last days." The last days are the final chapter of human history in what Galatians 1:3 calls "this present evil age." They are a time for God’s redeemed children to commit themselves to be pilgrims and exiles, a time for them to be Christian soldiers. In these last days, our Lord Jesus calls you to a pilgrim lifestyle. In light of your setting, he calls you to take risks in your generosity for the Kingdom of God:

* Matthew 6:33— "Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you"

* Matthew 13:44— "The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field"

* Mark 10:21— "One thing you lack: go and sell all you possess and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me."

* Luke 6:20— "Blessed are you poor, for yours is the kingdom of heaven… Woe to you rich, for you have received your consolation."

* Luke 9:58— "Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head … Follow me."

* Luke 12:15— "A person's life does not consist in the possessions that he has."

* Luke 12:20-21— "But God said to [the man who built even bigger barns], 'Fool! This night your soul is required of you, and the things you have prepared, whose will they be?' So is the one who lays up treasure for himself and is not rich toward God."

* Luke 12:33— "Sell your possessions and give alms; provide yourselves with purses in heaven."

* Luke 14:33— "Whoever does not renounce all that he has cannot be my disciple."

* Luke 18:25— "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of God."

* Luke 21:1— Jesus "saw a poor widow put in two small copper coins. And he said, 'Truly, I tell you, this poor widow has put in more than all of them.'"

Again and again, our Lord Jesus insists on his radical call to an eternal perspective, to a pilgrim lifestyle, and to open-handed generosity—the poor widow "put in all that she had."

Only once does our Lord mention the Old Testament minimum of giving a tenth of your income — a tithe. And he endorses it. But then he immediately calls for a way of looking at life and money way much more radical than the mere tithe. "He said to the Pharisees, 'you tithe mint and dill and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done, without neglecting the others'" (Matthew 23:23). In other words, "You tithe even your spices. That's right. You should tithe. But you should do much more."

Click here for background on the author of Are You For Real?: Meditations in the Epistle of James for Secret or Family Worship.