Pure and undefiled religion before God the Father is this: to care for orphans and widows in their misfortune and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

Listen, my dear brothers and sisters! Did not God choose the poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom that he promised to those who love him?

What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but does not have works? Can this kind of faith save him?

So also faith, if it does not have works, is dead being by itself.

But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.” Show me your faith without works and I will show you faith by my works.

But would you like evidence, you empty fellow, that faith without works is useless?

Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered Isaac his son on the altar?

You see that his faith was working together with his works and his faith was perfected by works.

You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone.

And similarly, was not Rahab the prostitute also justified by works when she welcomed the messengers and sent them out by another way?

For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.

And the tongue is a fire! The tongue represents the world of wrongdoing among the parts of our bodies. It pollutes the entire body and sets fire to the course of human existence – and is set on fire by hell.

Who is wise and understanding among you? By his good conduct he should show his works done in the gentleness that wisdom brings.

Adulterers, do you not know that friendship with the world means hostility toward God? So whoever decides to be the world’s friend makes himself God’s enemy.

Look, the pay you have held back from the workers who mowed your fields cries out against you, and the cries of the reapers have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts.

From James, a slave of God and the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes dispersed abroad. Greetings!

because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance.

And let endurance have its perfect effect, so that you will be perfect and complete, not deficient in anything.

But if anyone is deficient in wisdom, he should ask God, who gives to all generously and without reprimand, and it will be given to him.

By his sovereign plan he gave us birth through the message of truth, that we would be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.