Wherefore lay apart all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the engrafted word, which is able to save your souls, James 1:21.
James starts this verse with a command predicated on the previous statement that; the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God, vs.20. We are to be something new in this world and we are to be; slow to speak, slow to wrath, vs.19. Those two admonitions are in themsleves good definitions of meekness. However, he didn't just tell us to be meek, he instructed us how to be meek.
Lay apart all filthiness. This is the first part of the command with which James instructs us. Already, if my readers are a random sampling of fundamental Christians of the 21st century, we have hit a stumbling block. In poll after poll, and with many samplings, the gross statistic that 72% of fundamental Christian men view pornography on a weekly basis keeps coming up.
30 years ago, Dr. James Dobson gave the troubling statistic than when polled, 50% of men attending Fundamental or Evangelical Churches admitted to having viewed pornography in the previous seven days. That was 30 years ago before the advent of smart phones, tablets and easy recourse to high speed internet. I listened to a home school seminar conducted by Michael Pearl over 20 years ago. In a message preached to the men who took the time to travel to such a seminar with their families, Brother Pearl preached against pornography. With heads bowed and eyes closed, he stated that over half of the men had raised their hands as having a real problem with it. Again, that was before the advent of the ubiquitous smart phone.
If you or someone you know is in that 72% of men trapped in filth, please watch the attached podcast by Pastor Jack Young of the Lighthouse Baptist Church of Webster, NY. (Click Here) There are a few excellent churches in the Greater Rochester area. Jack Young may not be the best pastor in the Greater Rochester Area and his church may not be the best, but I can assure you that there are none better.
In the next post, we will continue to deconstruct James 1:21. A note to those few Hyper Diaper Dispensationalists (not all dispensationalists, only those who can't figure out that both Paul and James hated filth) who may need to enter a safe room in order to read this, if you are troubled with filth, let down your guard and get some help. I hope that as we deconstruct James 1:21, the beauty and accuracy of your King James Bible will become more real to you.
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