Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Those who listen to the word but do not do what it says are like people who look at their faces in a mirror and, after looking at themselves, go away and immediately forgot what they look like. 25Those who look intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continue in it, not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do.
James 1:22-25
It’s so silly really. To see yourself and then walk away and forget what you look like. But how many times has that happened to you? You’ve heard the word of God and as you sat there face to face with it you could see yourself clearly and you saw something in yourself that you had never seen before. Maybe it was something that was not pretty at all, like spinach in your teeth or maybe your fly was open. And there as you looked into the word of God there was a moment where you could see clearly your reflection had flaws. But as soon as the service was over you walked out of the sanctuary and you got busy and you changed nothing and continued to walk around with spinach in your teeth and your fly unzipped. And so the question is, “What good was mirror if the revelation didn’t manifest itself in action?”According to the scriptures there is little benefit from instruction that doesn’t move into action.
Can I be honest? I have found that Christians love conviction. We love those moments of revelation where we can see clearly and feel deeply but we so rarely take our conviction and move it into conversion. Conviction is merely the moment you see the spinach. Conversion is the move you make to get it out of your teeth and both are critical if we are to walk boldly out into our community. The first comes as gift, the second is your work to do.
There was a time in my life when I was surrounded by a surplus of naughtiness and because of the fact that everyone was doing it....I was doing it too, much to the displeasure of many of the people around me. I was an undergrad here at North Park and during that time I had a work study job over at the seminary building. I was asked by the woman I worked for if I would go with her to work at a conference. The conference was called CHIC and it was a youth gathering for the Covenant Church. I was a chic, so I decided I would go.
Although I was only there for work, my boss invited me to go to the speaker sessions with her. On one particular evening a woman spoke about purity, about honoring your body and about treasuring the temple. I must admit that I was convicted. So convicted that I went back to the hotel room that night and threw out my birth control pills. But four days later I was back in Chicago and surrounded again by a surplus of naughtiness and in close proximity to my boyfriend and I soon learned there is a big difference between conviction and conversion.
What happens at the moment of conviction is invisible to almost everyone around you and it is why it is so difficult to hold people accountable to their convictions. But conversion should be evident to everyone who sees you or interacts with you. There should be evidence of what you’ve seen in the mirror, because the point of standing face to face with the word of God is not conviction, the point is conversion, a physical manifestation of our spiritual revelations...
25Those who look intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continue in it, not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do.
The scripture is clear. We will not influenced by a passing glance in the mirror. It is those who look intently and diligently, who look long and deliberately into the perfect law that gives freedom that will not only find revelation but a change of direction in their lives. We need to stand before God’s word and look at our reflection in it and see if there something for us to see, something that God wants to reveal to us.
Perhaps it will be an example he wants you to follow or command for you to obey. There might be an error for you to avoid or a sin for you to renounce. Maybe there is a new promise for you to claim or a new revelation about God for you to know. But you’ll never know unless you take more than a passing glance.
