When you first wake up in the morning, you glance at yourself in the bathroom mirror on your way to do “other things” and maybe don’t look at yourself too hard. Maybe you aren’t even wearing your glasses yet and can’t see yourself very well. By the time you are getting ready for work, school, or your day-to-day stuff, however, you look more closely. It’s time to put on your contacts, brush your teeth, deal with the mess of your hair, button that shirt, tie that tie. Mirrors are how we see where the lost contact lens went, whether our faces are clean or not, whether our part is crooked, whether we have missed a button or our zip is undone. Mirrors—very important!
Reading the Bible and applying what we read is the mirror for our soul. No matter how many times you have heard or read James 1: 23-24, if you don’t pay attention to what it says, you are still not applying it.
“Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.”
James 1: 23-24
There is a way in which we fool ourselves—or to be kind, we are fooled by familiarity—into thinking, “Oh, I know that verse about mirrors and I have that down. I am a good Christian who knows that verse and lots of verses, so I don’t need to think about that.” That sort of thinking (or non-thinking) goes on all the time and is why we often appear hypocritical to people around us, maybe our children, our parents, neighbors, co-workers, friends, fellow church friends, strangers. We can think we are one way, but those who look at us see us differently—the way we really are.
It certainly can be scary to be willing to take a look at ourselves the way other people see us, but isn’t it for the best? It certainly is Jesus’ best for us. Which is why this verse appears in James, who by the way, tradition tells us, was Jesus’ brother from none other than the family of Joseph and Mary. Just think of that! The man who lived and grew up in the same home as Jesus, wrote this about self-examination through the word of God. Examine yourselves and apply His words to your life! I wonder what that meant to James, who would have grown up hearing Jesus’ words. Even James, Jesus’ brother, had to deal with the idea that we often think we are applying the words of Jesus, but aren’t. Doesn’t that make it clear how important it is for us, we who didn’t have that experience of personally hearing those words, to take the care and time to apply them to our lives?
It’s back to our Hear. Read. Study. Meditate. Memorize. Apply.
