Front matter
SEVEN LETTERS:
Lessons from the General Epistles
By R. Herbert
2019, Living Belief Books – an imprint of LivingWithFaith.org & TacticalChristianity.org
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Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION® NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by International Bible Society.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide. In a few cases, the ESV (English Standard Version ©) and NKJV (New King James Version ©) are cited, and these translations are also gratefully acknowledged.
ISBN 978-1-64516-920-8
This book is not to be sold. It is made available without charge by the publisher and free copies can be downloaded from: LivingWithFaith.org or TacticalChristianity.org.
About the Author: The author served as an ordained minister and church pastor for a number of years and holds an earned Ph.D. degree in the languages, cultures and archaeology of the ancient Near East and biblical world. He writes for a number of Christian publications and for the websites www.LivingWithFaith.org and www.TacticalChristianity.org. His other e-books are available for free download from those websites. Cover: Base image © by Milosh Kojadinovich
CONTENTS Introduction PART ONE: JAMES – FAITH, WISDOM, LOVE 1. Why James Doesn't Mention Jesus 2. Faith in Difficult Times 3. Asking for Wisdom – Wisely 4. How Love Works PART TWO: 1, 2 PETER – HOPE, KNOWLEDGE, LOVE 5. A Living Hope 6. A Lesson about Knowledge 7. A Powerful Message 8. A Lesson Learned about Love PART THREE: 1, 2, 3 JOHN – TRUTH, OBEDIENCE, LOVE 9. Lessons in Fellowship 10. Hearts Set at Rest 11. A Letter about Love and Truth 12. What is the Apostle John's "New Commandment"? PART FOUR: JUDE – MERCY, PEACE, LOVE 13. Who Was Jude? 14. Triplets in Jude 15. Learning from Bad Examples 16. Mercy, Peace, and Love About Our Books
INTRODUCTION As a Christian who may study the Scriptures regularly, what are the New Testament books that you read least often? Chances are, they are the mysterious book of Revelation and the seven letters that come directly before it – James, First and Second Peter, First, Second, and Third John, and Jude. If that is the case, you are not alone – and that is why this book is for you. Seven Letters The "General Epistles" – so-called because they are not usually thought to have been written to specific individuals or groups (though this is not exactly the case, as we will see below) – are among the least well-known books of the New Testament. Many Christians focus on the Gospels, Acts, and the epistles of Paul and tend to avoid the letters of James, Peter, John, and Jude with what appears to be their focus on false teachers, wrong doctrines and Christian persecution.
Yet the relatively short General Epistles (combined they account for less than ten percent of the total New Testament) are of immense importance to Christianity and to you personally. They were composed by the leading apostles of the early Church and significantly affect our understanding of Christian doctrine as well as being filled with a great deal of practical advice in Christian living. They also provide important background for better understanding the epistles of Paul, so there are many good reasons to study these epistles carefully.
Although it is often regarded as a General Epistle, the letter to the Hebrews is not discussed in this book. Unlike the seven letters of James through Jude, Hebrews is far more like the epistles of Paul in its approach and needs to be studied in that context.
Additionally, the content of Hebrews is quite different from the kind of material found in the other letters we refer to as the General Epistles. For this reason, biblical scholars sometimes refer to "Hebrews and the General Epistles," and this book focuses only on the seven letters that have a great many characteristics in common.
In most modern translations these seven letters are found between the book of Hebrews and the book of Revelation. But that was not their original placement in the New Testament. When the Christian Bible was first organized, the General Epistles were placed immediately after the book of Acts and before the Epistles of Paul. There was good reason for this. To be properly understood, the writings of Paul often require a doctrinal context that the General Epistles help provide. Modern Bible translators have rearranged this original order to accomplish a chronological sequence for the New Testament books. The Authors While the Pauline Epistles and the book of Hebrews are titled in our Bibles according to their audiences, the General Epistles are titled according to the names of their authors. As far as we can tell, they are the work of the apostles James (the brother of Jesus – Galatians 1:19), Peter (Matthew 4:18-20), John (Galatians 2:9), and Jude (another brother of Jesus and of James – Jude 1:1).
There is much scholarly debate regarding the authorship of a few of these epistles – especially 2 Peter and some of the other shorter letters, but there are no overwhelmingly compelling reasons to believe that they were not all written by the apostles to which they are linked in these books and by tradition. For example, a few scholars of the early Church expressed uncertainty about the authenticity of 2 Peter, but it is known that false teachers of that time circulated a number of letters as though written by the apostle, so the Church was understandably cautious under these circumstances. Nevertheless, the fact that 2 Peter was accepted into the New Testament writings in spite of that caution argues strongly for its authenticity.
The order of the General Epistles in our Bibles follows that in which the apostle Paul listed the chief apostles when he met them in Jerusalem: "James, Cephas [Peter] and John, those esteemed as pillars, gave me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship when they recognized the grace given to me. They agreed that we should go to the Gentiles, and they to the circumcised" (Galatians 2:9).
Paul's statement regarding the agreed areas of missionary work also gives us a substantial clue as to the intended audience of the General Epistles.
The Audiences Although the seven General Epistles are traditionally said not to have been written to specific audiences and are thus "general" in terms of their readership, this is not exactly the case. The opening verse of the first letter – the book of James – clearly states to whom the letter was sent: "James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, To the twelve tribes scattered among the nations …" (James 1:1). This audience may have been scattered, but it is clearly composed of the members of the Church in Jerusalem that was scattered when persecution occurred, as we are told in Acts 8:1.
The apostle Peter writes to this same audience in specific locations: "Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To God's elect, exiles scattered throughout the provinces of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia" (1 Peter 1:1). Second Peter was written to this same audience (2 Peter 3:1).
The first epistle of John is addressed only generally to "My dear children" (1 John 2:1), but it seems clear that John knew his audience and they knew him. Second John is written to the "elect lady," a title which could apply to an individual such as one of the women who supported Christ's ministry, and possibly even Mary the mother of Jesus who was entrusted to John's care. Alternatively, the title may be used metaphorically of the Church in a specific area. Third John is clearly addressed to a specific individual: "Gaius."
So most of the General Epistles do name specific audiences, though these may sometimes have been broader than single congregations – as was the case with some of Paul's epistles (Colossians 4:16). Many of the original readers of these letters seem to have been Christians converted from Judaism, although some probably were not of Jewish origin.
The Background The General Epistles reflect a difficult time in the history of early Christianity. The Church was threatened from the outside by social problems and persecution and on the inside by divisions and false teachings. Each letter reflects a slightly different situation within this background framework – though some, like 2 Peter and Jude, address nearly identical problems.
While the epistle of James was written in a time when many Christians faced problems such as widespread economic abuse by the rich and powerful, Peter, writing later, speaks more of problems associated with religious persecution. Mistreatment and execution of Christians occurred in Rome starting with the persecutions carried out by the emperor, Nero, around AD 64, but persecution had already begun to occur elsewhere in New Testament times as we see in the book of Acts (Acts 5:17-42).
Much of what Peter, John and Jude wrote about is also in relation to erroneous teachings that were beginning to influence Christianity. The Greco-Roman world in which Christianity was born contained a number of "mystery religions" which claimed to impart "truth" and "light" or hidden knowledge to their followers. Many of these religions – such as the Gnosticism which became widespread after New Testament times – taught the concept of dualism which claimed that matter was evil and only spiritual things were good and that matter and spirit were entirely separate.
These teachings affected many who were weak in Christianity and who accepted the idea that what was done in the body could not affect the spirit. As a result, sexual immorality and other sins were accepted as being purely of the flesh and not affecting the spiritual life of the individual. According to this view, all that mattered was for the believer to come to know the "light" of secret knowledge which would bring salvation.
These and similar errors were addressed by the writers of the General Epistles. For example, John repeatedly stresses the importance of the light and truth of God as opposed to false "truth." Jude speaks of "people who pervert the grace of our God into a license for immorality…" (Jude 1:4) and the importance of maintaining "the faith once delivered" (Jude 1:3 ESV). Peter attacks a number of the pagan-originated doctrines directly. In 2 Peter the apostle contrasts the darkness of false knowledge with the light of God's truth in the first chapter and then continues in the second chapter to denounce the heresies and immorality of the false teachers who were affecting Christianity. Jude goes a step further by actually quoting (Jude 1:9, 14-15) two non-biblical books that were popular among the false teachers and skillfully using these quotes to condemn the false teachers themselves. The Themes As is the case with many books of the Bible, the General Epistles exhibit clear themes. In addition to the themes of combating oppression, persecution, and false doctrines, the epistles of James, Peter, and John are often said to respectively stress the themes of faith, hope, and love. But while this idea is true to a point, it also misses many of the other major themes in each of the apostles' letters.
When we look at the epistles of Peter, for example, we do find verses dealing with hope, which is mentioned a total of five times in the apostle's two letters. By contrast, "hope" appears only once in each of John's three epistles, and not at all in the epistle of James.
But while hope is certainly a theme in Peter's letters, it is not the only theme or even the most important one. If we look at other words regularly appearing in 1 and 2 Peter, we find an even greater emphasis on love (which is mentioned some twelve times – more than twice as often as hope). Love is mentioned nine times in Peter's first epistle alone – significantly, in every one of the letter's chapters.
Such basic "statistics" show some general tendencies in the writings of the different apostles and allow us to see important themes that the individual authors dwelt on. The following chapters of this book look at the three most significant themes found in the writings of each of the apostles James, Peter, John and Jude. Interestingly, although each apostle develops one or two unique themes, all of them develop the theme of love. But each of these authors looks at a different aspect of love, and so the following chapters explore not only the most important unique themes of the writers of the General Epistles, but also the unique way in which each of them preached the universal doctrine of Christian love.
PART ONE:
JAMES –
FAITH, WISDOM, LOVE