“Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you.” – James 1:21
For all the time we wrongly understand the Word of God. We think that the Word of God only resides in the Bible and nothing else. There are many times that we just need to understand the power of the Word of God. The Word of God is alive and active, and it is sharper than any double-edged sword. Well, although we have to understand too that what our verse is saying right now is that the Word of God is implanted inside us.
However, before James mentioned in His book that we must humbly accept the Word planted in us, we must get rid of all our moral filth and evil deeds that are so prevalent. What God means by this is that we must turn away from all our evil deeds. We all know that we are in a sinful world. All the time, we will always be tempted to do horrible things. It is part of our nature to do immoral and filthy stuff, but we must also understand that as we are in Christ now, we must stop sinning.
Stop sinning means focusing on Christ alone, and focusing on Christ alone means the second part of the verse which is for us to humbly accept the Word that is implanted in us. Now, the great thing about this is that we know that the Word is already in us. Although it’s very different if we claim that it is like one of our organs implanted in us because as we can observe, James specifically said that “accept the Word that is implanted on us”. Meaning that it is already in use, but we continue to receive it all the time.
If we treat or understand it as something like an organ inside us, we cannot just continue to receive it, right? However, it is like breathing. Although we already have oxygen inside us, we need to continue receiving it so we can breathe. Thus, as we reflect on this verse since we already know that Christ is equated as the Word, for He is the living Word, James is literally telling us to stop sinning and humbly accept Christ that is already inside us. Since Christ is already inside us, we must continue to accept His ministry in our lives and we continue to accept Him as our Lord and Savior.
It also makes sense because if we just stop learning and accepting Christ, we will only claim to be in Christ and have Him but not really in Him. If we are truly in Christ, then we have the desire to always accept Him and always crave to seek Him. Therefore, this verse is such a very nice reminder for us Christians. Let us always remember to stop sinning and to accept Christ that is implanted in us already. May we always seek Him through His Word and continue to follow Him all the days of our life.
