James, The Lord's Brother

Paul writes in Galatians 1:19 that The only other apostle I met at that time was James, the Lord's brother.

Yet, James says of himself, in James 1:1, This letter is from James, a slave of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.

James grew up as the younger brother of Jesus, the first son of Joseph and Mary. We know there were three other brothers, Joseph (also called Joses), Simon, and Judas (Jude). They also had sisters, we don't know how many, but they are "all His sisters." (See Matthew 13:55-56 and Mark 6:3. The Greek is very precise; if they were His cousins a different word would have been used here.)

Jesus' brothers did not believe in Him before His death and Resurrection. At one point during His public ministry, they concluded that He must be "out of His mind" and went to take Him home. I deal with this event on my April 6, 2017 blog entry, "Jesus' Brothers And Sisters And Mother."

But then on Easter Sunday, Resurrection Day, the angel at the tomb told the women to go tell His disciples to keep the appointment He made with them in Galilee. Then when Jesus meets them on the way, He tells them to also tell His brothers to go to the meeting, too. Evidently they did, because James became the Church Leader (Pastor) in Jerusalem and wrote his epistle, and Judas gave us his letter, the Epistle of Jude.

Can you imagine having a big Brother who never did anything wrong? You would get in trouble for things, but He never did. How frustrating! No wonder they thought He was losing His mind when He started to teach the crowds that He was God's Son, and did outrageous stuff called miracles!

But then, seeing Him alive in Galilee after He was publicly Crucified to death only days earlier, convinced them that Jesus really was Who He said He was all along. They realized that He died in their place, as their personal sacrifice recorded in Leviticus chapter one, the perfect Lamb of God Whose Blood doesn't just cover, but takes away sins. Eyewitness proof is what they had, and they gave us their witness, so that we can believe and fully put our trust in Him, too.

Even so, come, Lord Jesus!