Preached at Wayside Friends Church
Sept. 17, 2025
The author of Hebrews wrote, “In order to know God, you need to believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.” I think it is possible that there are people who are unable to believe God exists. More likely, I think, people don’t want to believe God exists for some reason, often rooted in tragedy.
I have been unable to quit believing God exists. I have personal experiences for which God is the explanation and I look at the creative genius of our universe and can also find no other persuasive explanation.
If you are unable to believe God exists, but you’d like to, that desire itself is the beginning of belief, of faith. Go ahead and ask, seek, and knock.
I’m glad to have a chance to talk about this opening passage in the book by James, or Jacob, or Yakob, the brother of Jesus, or Joshua, or Yeshua. (I notice his humility in not claiming his famous brother.) In this passage, James has something to say not so much about this basic belief, but instead about what we believe about God, about who we think God is, about trusting God.
Our focus today will be on trust and doubt, and I’ll reorganize the verses in order to highlight that. As well, I’m going to drag in the book of Job, with its famous opening scene between the Accuser and God, in which God says, “Go ahead and test Job, but don’t kill him.” This is not an eyewitness report, perhaps I need to say, yet I’m not going to let God off the hook for what follows, any more than Job does.
So first, back to James. The First Nations version (and others) substitute trust for faith, and I think that makes everything clearer. I have had such a puzzle regarding the word faith, because it has seemed to be something with actual weight and volume, something one tries to have enough of, rather than something one chooses to do, which the word trust indicates. When we trust, we trust in something or someone. We trust a chair will hold us. Why? We understand the nature of wood and chairs.
When James talks of trust, he means trust in God. What does it mean to trust in God? It means that we understand the character of God as God relates to us. James says that God is light, that God doesn’t change, that God gives all good and perfect gifts. that God can neither be tempted to be evil, nor can God tempt others to be evil, and that God “chose to birth us into being by God’s word of truth [Jesus?] so that we would be truly what God made us to be.” God is the epitome of single-minded. As Jesus told us, “Fear not, little flock, it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom” (Luke 12:32). So we have this basis for trusting God.
Let’s look at Job now. Here’s a man who lost everything except his grief-stricken and angry wife, everything including his health. He sits on a manure pile and laments. Who wouldn’t? So the first thing we learn is that it is ok to weep over losses.
Second, he seems to have bought in to the idea that doing good and being good will result in prosperity and good health. So he is disappointed in God for not carrying out God’s side of the deal. We learn from this that it is not a fatal error to be disappointed in God.
Third, he tells God what he thinks. Here are some examples: “God has wronged me” (Job 19:6). “Why do the wicked still live, and …become very powerful?” (Job 21:7). “God has made my heart faint, and the Almighty has dismayed me” (Job 23:16). “Oh, that I knew where I might find Him…I would present my case before Him…I would learn the words He would answer…surely He would pay attention to me…and I would be delivered” (Job 23, passim).
We can see that Job has made a common mistake in understanding his relationship with God. It is not a “this for that” or “quid pro quo” deal. But we can also see that Job trusts God with honest complaint and lament and prayer.
So it is not a sign of doubt to be sad and disappointed when God does not act as we expected. It is not a sign of double-mindedness to wonder where God has hidden when God seems to be absent.
What is a sign of double-mindedness or doubt? Believing God is capable of evil. I know Christians who think magically about God—that if they pray a certain way, or if they follow a certain ritual, or if they observe the Sabbath carefully, God will not punish them. They blame any misfortune on not having enough faith or on breaking rules. They think God is rigid and self-centered, exacting the pound of flesh when it is owed.
This completely ignores what Jesus said about suffering and sadness. “In the world you will have trouble”… “if they treat the teacher with cruelty, you can expect the followers to be treated just the same” … “Run for the hills when you see trouble coming” (paraphrased).
Or as Job says, in his calmer moments:
“Shall we accept good from God and not accept adversity?” (Job 2:10)
And Job goes on to express his continued trust in God. “Though God slay me, yet will I trust in Him; but I will still argue my case to Him.” (Job 13:15)
“Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked I will return to the womb of the earth. The Lord gave and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord” (Job 1:21).
“I know that my redeemer lives and that he will stand at last upon the earth, and that though my skin is destroyed, yet I will in my body see God” (Job 19:25-26).
Now James has something to say about suffering and troubles. James says to count it all joy because we know the God in whom we trust. We know that testing will make us single-minded, just fire removes impurities from gold ore; we know that in our stubborn hanging on to the God we know, we will pass the test. Those who are poor can rejoice because this is a test they can pass, an honorable test and a test of their honor. Those who are rich can humbly recall that the same death comes to them as to everyone else and that their wealth can wither up like wildflowers. So if we’re undergoing a test, rejoice and trust; if we are comfy and “blessed,” take no credit and also trust.
James knows humans well enough to recognize and state that we are not yet whole. He’ll go on to say that we are fools if we forget that fact, like people who look in a mirror and see flaws, but walk away smug about their beauty. James warns that we have desires that will entice us to do wrong. James isn’t talking primarily about sexual desire, but about all desires that give an opening to temptation. I think about the desire for admiration, the desire for power, the desire for control, the desire for security, the desire for immortality, the desire for love—all these can motivate actions that are not in line with what James will call “the perfect law of love that sets people free.”
So let’s trust in the character of God as revealed by Jesus, as attested to by St. Paul and St. James, and Job, and let’s talk to God about our troubles with honesty and heartfelt sorrow, when we need to. I have personal experience of complaining bitterly to God about events that caused me suffering, and having God send me a vision of God’s eyes of love looking right into mine. I know this isn’t special treatment.
When we choose again and again to trust in the character of God, we will find that our true selves shine more brightly, and now and again, God will blow our socks off with presence.
