Henry Krabbendam - James - World Evangelical Alliance

lievers, filled with the Spirit, surrendered their possessions and money (Keddie,
159, with reference to Acts 4:34-35)!
At any rate, the rich James addresses would rather let their accumulated
wealth (Lk. 12:18) decay and go to waste, than use it as good stewards. Their
hoarding of wealth “has brought its own nemesis ... Food has gone bad;
clothes have become riddled with moth holes; the much vaunted treasure of
gold has become tarnished, and lost its sheen” (Martin, 173). The triad of
rotted food that look like putrefying sores, moth-eaten clothes that resemble
rags (Ps. 39:12; Job 13:28; Is. 51:8), and rusted gold that seems to be scrap
metal, presents a vivid, grim, telling and compelling picture of the state of
things (Dibelius, 236). Note the perfect, which indicates a situation that is
both real in the past, figurative in the present and prophetic for the future.
Surplus perishables are already in a state of advanced decay. Both unused
food and unused clothes already had to be thrown out with regularity.
At the same time both the replacement perishables, such as food and
clothes, and the so-called imperishables, such as silver and gold, are of “no
spiritual benefit in the present” (Moo, 1985, 161), and are already “gone”
from a prophetic perspective, even if not in “illusory” reality. It is basically
over already! To the spiritual observer with a divine x-ray vision, their riches
have already rotted away. Both moth holes and rust or corrosion are already
in clear evidence. The moth holes have already covered the garments that
they have stored away and the corrosion the precious metals that they have
stockpiled in their vaults. They are already history! Did they per chance “circle
the wagons” for a “rainy day?” Or possibly as security blanket? From the
prophetic perspective the grounds for their impending judgment are already a
“done deal.” 349
This is hardly surprising, since people, fellow members of the Church, if
not fellow believers, walk around in tatters for lack of clothes, and succumb
to hunger for lack of food. We already caught a twofold glimpse of this in an
earlier context. Bad enough as it was, in retrospect it proves to be only a
glimpse. Now James returns to this theme with a vengeance and presents the
larger picture. The cold indifference in James 2:3b and the even colder neglect
of James 2:15-16 are the forerunners of the brutal treatment and deadly
force portrayed in the present context (Jam. 5:4, 6). If these forerunners, when
left unchecked, “inevitably” lead to such conduct, it is time for all of us to
hasten back to them and “set our house in order” at that point. At any rate,
here the riches-poverty theme reaches its exhaustive culmination point in the
349 Brosend, 132, points out that James 5:2-3 uses three perfect and two future tenses. Wealth
has rotted, garments have become moth-eaten, and gold and silver have rusted. Therefore,
their rust will witness against you, and will eat your flesh like fire!
738