“Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down form the Father of heavenly lights…”

Sometimes I want to chuckle.  Sometimes I want to scream.  I’m talking about people who want to blame God for everything wrong in the world.  You know, the ones who say, “I can’t believe God is good and all-powerful because of all the evil and pain in the world.  If he were good, he wouldn’t let the evil and pain continue.  If he were all-powerful, he could stop it.  But the evil and pain continue, so I guess he’s either powerless or bad, or maybe both.”  Sometimes I want to ask them, “OK, are you happy with your conclusion?  Does that make you feel better?  God is powerless to stop evil, and even if he were good, he’s not good enough to want to stop it.  Does that help you sleep at night?”  Where does God go to get a break?

But that’s part of it: God doesn’t need to “go” anywhere, because God doesn’t “need” a break.  He’s been around a whole lot longer than any of us.  Did it ever occur to these poor “lite” philosophers that their “solution” solves nothing?  Proves nothing?  Helps nothing?  Nope.  That’s how blindness works.  Of course, heavy-duty philosophers take this conclusion and make a religion out of it.  Try eastern pantheism, particularly Buddhism.  Let’s use the yin-yang symbol as an object lesson.  It is composed of two inversely corresponding curved teardrops that form a circle.  One teardrop is white, the other black.  “Seeds” of the opposite are in the round head of each drop.  The white color represents good, male, light, etc.  The black represents bad, female, darkness, etc.  There is no total good or ultimate evil because the seeds of the opposite inhabit each drop.  Moreover, if you spin this symbol like a pinwheel, all of the opposite features, including colors, shapes and distinctions disappear, showing two things: (1) a perfect balance of opposites makes the world go round, and (2) the ultimate outcome is the grayish, nondescript nirvana.  Here you have man’s “wisdom” at its finest: “balancing” God’s goodness with man’s evil.  What foolishness!  Actually, it’s pretty creative and clever if that’s the way reality really is.  Happily it’s not.  And there is a far better answer.

James began his only book making a link with those who were facing trials (1:3).  He then makes the case for the impossibility of God being “tempted by evil” (v. 13), which means he tempts no one.  The only other possibility to explain temptation to evil is man himself: “when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed” (v. 14).  Ultimately it eventuates with “death” (v. 15), the inevitable crash-and-burn result from the downward spiral of fallen man.  No one is exempt.  No other outcome is possible.

With that the story changes when we keep God where he rightfully belongs: above the fray of life.  That’s why James says (v. 16), “Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers,” i.e., don’t buy in to pagan thinking.  “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows” (v. 17).  If you want good and perfect gifts, they must come from a good and perfect God who will not be compared to anything in this universe (Psalm 89:6; Isaiah 40:18, 46:5).  He is the Father — the originator or creator — of heavenly lights, such as the sun, moon and stars.  What is the purpose of those lights?  To dispel the darkness, not “balance” it.  Light brings visibility, not just a contrast with darkness.  Light defeats darkness.  And whereas these lights come and go — the light of the sun is blocked by clouds and the earth — God, in bold and deliberate contrast, “does not change” like shadows.

Now, of all the possible “good and perfect” gifts, which one does God begin with?  Salvation: “He chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all he created” (v. 18).  This is the biggest and best gift, securing our eternal destiny and fixing a broken relationship with him.  This becomes the basis for everything else in life.  It also becomes the basis for the rest of the book of James.  Read through the rest of it.  All of the commands, all of the reasons, the rationale, are based on this foundation.  It is nowhere else.

Firstfruits was the Jewish feast of the harvest, where farmers would bring in the early portions of their harvest and give it to God.  They did this in faith that the rest of the harvest would come. Similarly, we are the first part of a redeemed and restored universe (Romans 8:19-23).  Change will come to the rest of the cosmos following our lead.  We anticipate that later “harvest” also by faith.  But it all starts with the Father of lights, our constant Northern Star.  Are you looking for light in all the right places?