Vertical and Horizontal

James 2:17, “Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself.”

I had an interesting phone conversation the other night with a gentleman by the name of Marcus. Seems that Marcus has become an avid follower of this blog thanks to my Dad introducing it to him. Not only that, he has met Dave Anderson and subsequently Jim Spivey as well because of information he read here. And in this conversation somehow Marcus made the statement to me that, ‘James’ saying “faith without works is dead” (James 2:26) is nothing more than what the cross symbolized in that we have to have the vertical faith in relationship to God, but also the horizontal faith in relationship to our fellow man.”

And how true a perspective that we should all keep our focus on. There is within faith a balance of natural and supernatural. There is a walking in faith as aliens in a strange land and connecting to the kingdom of heaven simultaneously. I don’t find this paradoxical at all, but rather we as simple minded often focus too much in one direction when faith is at the very least two dimensional.

Likewise I don’t believe there is room for judgment or advice for those that are temporarily focused in one direction or the other. Life does not seem to be a retreat where we spend 24/7 in prayer and meditation, and neither is it a 24/7 effort of feeding the poor, helping the widow and orphan, or praying for the sick. We should accept those that operate primarily in the realm of works just as we should accept those that operate primarily in the area of faith.

But as for us individually I think we need to seek that balance, and until we can operate in perfect obedience, constantly connected to the vertical like Christ was connected to the Father all the while loving those around Him perfectly, then we need to enjoy those times when our faith is all work, and enjoy those time when our faith is all retreat. At the very least we should allow the image of the cross to remind us faith is both horizontal and vertical.