What action is to be taken concerning believers who, as James puts it, wander from the truth? Though James and Paul each approach the matter in different ways, they both indicate unequivocally similar actions. The wanderer (per James), the man caught in transgression (per Paul) should be turned around (James) or restored (Paul).
James 5:19-20
My brothers, if someone from among you wanders from the truth and someone turns him around, know that whoever turns around a sinner from the wandering of his ways will save his soul from death and will cover plenty sins.
James addresses his “brothers.” The “tribes of the diaspora” remain James’ readership (1:1). It is in their assembly (or synagogue) that events take place which James addresses (2:2). These are people for whom Jesus is Lord (2:1), those whom God has intended as heirs of his kingdom (2:5), who would receive the promised crown of life (1:12). If one of these Christian believers, i.e., someone from “among you” (5:19), wanders from the truth, then action must be taken so as to save his soul from death. This action will result in covering a lot of sins.
We note that by James’ accounting, a Christian who sins may be considered a “sinner,” despite previously having received Christ as Lord, having been birthed by the word of truth, and having enjoyed being a first fruit of God’s creation (1:18). In some significant manner this Christian sinner stands in danger of losing his soul in death, from which death salvation needs to take place.
James does not explicitly indicate the nature of wandering “from the truth” or of the sins in question. The immediate context implies sins that should be confessed to secure forgiveness (5:15) and healing (5:16). These sins may include breaking one’s word (5:12), cheating people out of money (5:4), criticizing others (5:9).
“Wandering from the truth” in a larger Jacobean context implies holding goofy notions about God’s character. James’ theology warns of deceptions such as: doubt that God gives generously to all askers and without scolding (1:5-8), God causes temptation (1:13), any good thing has a source other than God (1:16), God’s righteousness works like human anger (1:19), God is unreliable (1:17). Wandering from the truth (“this is not the faith of Christ”) includes discrimination against believers for their low social status (2:1), speaking against human beings (3:9; 4:11-12; 5:9) in envy and ambition (3:14), exaltation of oneself before God (4:7-10), mindlessness concerning God’s will (4:15-17). Wandering implies disregard for the Lord appearing soon (5:7-9). In short, wandering denies the truth that God is very compassionate and merciful (5:11).
That larger context would include sin as falling short of true religion by not holding one’s tongue, by not attending to the needs of the disenfranchised, by not keeping morally straight (1:26-27). And so forth.
James does not indicate who should be turning around the wanderer, other than that it is someone “from among you.” Perhaps he has in mind the elders of the church whom he had just mentioned (5:14) within the context of prayer for healing and forgiveness of sins (5:15); whom he further seems to connect with confession of sins (5:16a). In any case, James assures that whoever these persons are, they are just like Elijah whose prayers were remarkably effective (5:17-18), and likewise their prayers would be as effective (5:16b).
James advocates, consequently, in favor of turning around an errant Christian as a worthy endeavor. Indeed, whoever turns around that sinner saves that soul from death.
Galatians 6:1
Brothers, and if a man is caught in some transgression, you, the spiritual ones, should restore such a one in a spirit of gentleness, looking to yourself lest also you be tempted.
Paul gives clear directive concerning one caught in a transgression. He directs the “spiritual ones” to restore that person. He connects this restoration action with fulfilling the “law of Christ” (6:2).
Paul, as does James, addresses the “brothers.” They comprise the membership of the churches of Galatia (1:2), they receive grace and peace from God and the Lord Jesus Christ (1:3), they are those for whose sins Christ gave himself so as to deliver them from the present evil age (1:4).
Paul does not say explicitly what type of “man” the transgressor may be, but implied in the injunction to “restore” we reasonably understand the transgressor to be a Christian. Paul uses the more inclusive generic term for “man” (anthropos) than the exclusive term for a male (andros*), so the transgressor could refer easily to either gender of human beings. The Christians of Galatia were both Jew and gentile, but it seems the vastly greater number to be gentile, since it is the uncircumsion (gentiles) who form the focus of Paul’s mission (2:9) and they bear the greater burden for Paul’s perplexity (4:20).
The transgressor has left a former status whatever it was, a status that needs now to be restored. Paul does not here indicate the outcome of the unrestored individual, nor what advantage the restored one might enjoy.
Nor does Paul indicate the nature of the transgression. He simply writes “some transgression” or, perhaps, “any transgression.” More critical than the transgression itself is being “caught” in the thing. The notion seems not so much that a person has been discovered flagrantly in the act, but that the transgression has the quality of trapping the person in its rut, from which rut the Christian despairs of release.
Context from the immediately preceding paragraphs would indicate the transgression to relate to works of the flesh listed there, among which are sexual immorality or drunkenness or ambition or envy (5:19-26). Or, it may refer to a Christian’s wholesale neglect to walk by the Spirit. A larger Galatian context would have transgressions to include leaving God to follow “another gospel, which is not another gospel” (1:6-7); receiving circumcision among males (2:3); observing various holy days (4:10); generally, seeking to keep the law as a means for justification (5:4).
Could the transgression refer to someone teaching against faith and grace in favor of law-keeping, which teaching Paul finds so offensive to the truth of the gospel? It seems that such anti-gospel teaching is of a different category of wrongdoing than the rest. While Paul trusts the Galatian churches to return to right thinking (5:10a), he is as persuaded that whoever perpetrates the anti-gospel teaching will bear judgment for it (5:10b), indeed, remains accursed (1:8-9).
The persons charged with restoring, namely, the “spiritual ones,” are not explicitly identified beyond that phrase. In light of the context, we understand these spiritual persons are those who, having been made alive by the Spirit, now also walk by the Spirit (5:25). They show the fruit of the Spirit in their lives (5:22-23), and do not fulfill the desires of the flesh (5:16). Humbly aware of their own weakness to temptation, they restore in gentleness, and not out of conceit (5:26), attentive that they themselves do not fall (6:2).
These spiritual ones fulfill the law of Christ by helping to bear the burden of the transgressor in his restoration. The law of Christ reasonably would be to “love one’s neighbor as oneself,” mentioned earlier in the letter (5:14), which law would be exemplified in helping the brother or sister return to a way of life consistent with the Spirit’s guidance (5:16, 18).
So, Paul and James both describe the work of Christ’s disciples to include restoration or turning around brothers who have wandered off from the way of the Lord. As Paul has it, spiritual brothers should restore the brother caught in some transgression.
*genitive form of aner, man (i.e., male human being)
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