James 1:19-24 The Message (MSG)

^19-21 Post this at all the intersections, dear friends: Lead with your ears, follow up with your tongue, and let anger straggle along in the rear. God’s righteousness doesn’t grow from human anger. So throw all spoiled virtue and cancerous evil in the garbage. In simple humility, let our gardener, God, landscape you with the Word, making a salvation-garden of your life.

^22-24 Don’t fool yourself into thinking that you are a listener when you are anything but, letting the Word go in one ear and out the other. Act on what you hear! Those who hear and don’t act are like those who glance in the mirror, walk away, and two minutes later have no idea who they are, what they look like.

God has given us specific instructions in the first chapter of James, and it is such good medicine for any deficits we might experience in life. Let’s start off with the very first thing that He tells us in this extremely insightful passage. He tells us to lead with our ears. Talk about a lesson for single Christians; this is it! It can’t be lost on us that Heavenly Father is teaching about the practice of listening. In today’s culture, it is quickly becoming a lost art. The practice of listening is more than just hearing, it’s being so attentive that we digest what is being communicated. Not only is this practice important to maintain our relationship with our future spouses, it is a must when it comes to our relationship with God.

There are quite a few single Christian sisters that can quote scriptures backwards and forwards. They have heard the Word, but haven’t allowed it to sink into their souls and transform their vulnerable places. They love God, but they are also walking around with such deep pain and hurt inside. They have been wounded from their previous relationships, and this pain is often manifested as anger. We’ve learned to cloak it very well. In a new relationship, the brother doesn’t have a clue about the powder keg that’s about to blow until the day it finally does. He’s completely caught off guard, and is left wondering what the heck just happened.

We go off sometimes, and it can be about the craziest or simplest thing—something that is completely unsuspecting, and it is because we haven’t put that anger in check. God tells us to throw all that stuff in the garbage. He tells us to do this because He knows that it will cause damage to our relationships in the future.

For many of us, there was a time in our lives when our hearts were humble like little children before God. Some of us have allowed this to slip away. It was a time when we enjoyed our fellowship with God immensely and would not allow anything to interfere with it. Regarding our spiritual lives, adding a new man to the mix will also add another layer of responsibility, and some of us haven’t realized it. We are obligated to adjust by learning to be a blessing to the new person in our lives, but never allowing it to impede or take away from our relationship with God through the Lord Jesus Christ.

It’s also important for us to recognize that it is very easy for anger to creep in when we haven’t sufficiently kept that connection with God strong. Keeping our connection to God strong means that we are committed to ensuring our relationship with Him remains in the number-one priority spot. We betray our spirits when it slips to second, and the imbalance causes us to lash out.

James 1:21 (MSG) says, “In simple humility, let our gardener, God, landscape you with the Word, making a salvation-garden of your life.” God wants to prune us, to cut off attitudes and behaviors that are incapable of producing good fruit, so that our lives can flourish. He does this as we spend time with Him, and learn what He requires of us. In Matthew 11:28-30, Jesus Christ told us that when we start to notice heaviness pulling us down, it’s time to unload and leave it with him. When we unload, we don’t go back to life empty handed. He tells us to learn about him. This is where the importance of the art of listening comes in.

James 1:22-24(MSG) tells us, “Don’t fool yourself into thinking that you are a listener when you are anything but, letting the Word go in one ear and out the other. Act on what you hear!” This is a lesson in how we approach God, because sometimes we forget to do so with the reverence and honor He so richly deserves. God is saying, “HEAR ME!” What an important message, because you see, God is always communicating with us. We have a responsibility to tune out the outside noises so that we can hear and receive from Him.

Coming to God with not only an intent to hear from Him, but the faith that it is impossible to leave Him without having received what we needed, this is what pleases God. Sometimes it will take us a few days, maybe even a few weeks to perceive the message He’s delivered, but we’ll always hear it if we’re paying attention.

It is an offense to hear from Him, and then behave as if we never heard anything at all. So many of us do this. God tells us that it’s like we’re looking into a mirror, seeing our reflection staring back at us, then two minutes later we’ve forgotten who we are and what we look like. When you forget your identity in Christ, you will continue to make the same mistakes repeatedly. You’ll allow anger to sprout up and kill your relationships because you will have forgotten that Christ has crucified it, and it’s not who you are any more.

You and I cannot do for our relationships what God in Christ will do for them. Some of us have insecurities about our ability to make it work, and we’re afraid that he’ll leave, or that we’re not enough to make him want to stay. The man that God has ordained for us stays because the love of God is a magnet that keeps him wanting more of the Christ within you. If you think that it’s anything other than this, you’re dangerously mistaken. God will hold our relationships together beautifully if we will trust and honor Him, keep our connection with Him tight, and never forget we are the reflection of Christ.■

Scripture taken from The Message. Copyright © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002. Used by permission of NavPress Publishing Group.

 “Don’t Forget What You Look Like”, written by Kim Times, edited by Reverend Fran Mack for Sundie Morning Sistas ©2017.  All rights reserved. All done to the glory of God through Jesus Christ, our Lord! SMS is dedicated to inspiring and encouraging Christian Women through the Word of God.