"Be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his natural face in a mirror; for he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it, and is not a forgetful hearer but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does." ~James 1:22-25.
You would say it is foolish for a man to die of hunger with bread in his hands. You might also say that a man with tools in his hands doing no wok, is also foolish. Yet how many times in life are we ourselves like that man? We learn of so much scripture knowledge, yet do not apply it. We pick up the tools often, but do no work. What good is scripture if we do not apply it to our lives? It is like a man who looks face to face with his very own being in the mirror, then walks away, forgetting what he looked like. He looks and he leaves, and eventually forgets what he saw. If you do not do something that needs to be done when you see it, it may never get done at all. Often a sermon is gone on a monday. It is sad, yet true. On Sunday we go to the mirror, but when Monday comes our way, we walk away from the mirror; forgetting what we saw. You see...The mirror shows our spiritual blemishes. It shows of the imperfections and ugliness in our lives, and that ugliness is sin. The mirror exposes our sins. Some choose to fix the problem immediately, others run from it. It is not complete when we walk away from the mirror prematurely. Picture a man shaving in front of the mirror, then he gets distracted by something else, and ends up running his errands with half of his beard on one side, and the other half left bare. It would look; incomplete. At that point it would have been better if he had avoided shaving altogether. The point is this, we must come to the mirror (or the word of God) with an attitude that says; "Lord expose my ugliness and make me beautiful." When you look into the word of God and keep looking with perserverance you will benefit from it. Often we think that if we listen to a sermon, we are doing our "spiritual duty." The blessing is not in the hearing, but in the doing. Satan could care less if we memorize verses. He cares when we live them out. Obedience longs with the depths of the heart to do what is right. Some have been content to hear and not apply, but as Christians, we choose to examine ourselves in the mirror and let God expose our imperfections so that He can cure us and shape us, and make us more like Him. The application of truth transforms a life!
So the real question is this...what are YOU going to do about it? When you hear the word of God, are you going to let it change you?
With swift feet, let us run to put His word into action!
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