<p>1:21- see on Lk. 8:11.<br /><i>Wherefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted word which is able to save your souls</i>- The word of the gospel is &ldquo;implanted&rdquo;. It&rsquo;s not that we come to it by a process of correct intellectual study. As Paul points out in Romans, our calling is a matter of grace and even predestination. The call operates through the word, but that word is implanted in human hearts. God operates directly on human hearts. But it all depends how we &ldquo;receive&rdquo; that implanted word. Receiving the word so that it makes us &quot;slow to speak, slow to wrath&quot; is helped by laying apart &quot;filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness&quot;. The Greek phrase translated &quot;lay apart&quot; is elsewhere used always concerning forsaking the practical, specific characteristics of the flesh (Heb. 12:1; 1 Pet. 2:1; Eph. 4:25; Rom. 13:12). We have seen so far that James is emphasizing that it is through the new birth from the word that this can be achieved. 1 Pet. 2:1 also tells us to lay aside fleshly characteristics by being &quot;newborn babes, desire the sincere milk of the word&quot; (v.2). Similarly Eph. 4:23-25: &quot;Be renewed in the spirit of your mind... put on the new man (created by the word)... putting away lying&quot; (etc). Rom. 13:12,13 gives us the greatest motivation to make this effort to so apply the word: &quot;The night is far spent, the day (of the Kingdom) is at hand; let us therefore cast off (same word &quot;lay apart&quot;) the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. Let us walk honestly, as (if we are) in the day&quot; of the Kingdom. Thus we can therefore live now to some degree as we will in the Kingdom- by using the word to cast off the flesh and put on spiritual attributes, resulting in us walking (living in our day to day lives) as if we are in &quot;the day&quot; of the Kingdom.</p><p>The word acting on our minds should help us lay apart all &quot;superfluity of naughtiness&quot;. &quot;Superfluity&quot; is from the same word translated &quot;abundance&quot; in Mt. 12:34 &quot;Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh&quot;. It must have occurred to us all at some time that the command to bring &quot;into captivity <i>every</i> thought to the obedience of Christ&quot; (2 Cor. 10:5) seems impossible to achieve. There are so many thoughts which are necessary in our secular lives, they cannot all be brought around to Christ. However, the word &quot;abundance&quot; means 'that which is over and above the necessary'. The point of bringing our thoughts to Christ is so that our words will be Christ-like, and as our thoughts lead to our words, we must control them. The context of 2 Cor. 10:5 is Paul justifying the apparently hard words he was having to use to the Corinthians- he assured them that in practice he was bringing all his thoughts captive to Christ, therefore his words were not the outpouring of unspiritual bitterness. Thus only those thoughts which are &quot;of the <i>abundance</i>&quot; of the heart (the mind) control our words; those thoughts which are over and above our necessary ones. James is saying that this &quot;abundance&quot; or &quot;superfluity&quot; of wrong thinking (&quot;naughtiness&quot;) can be displaced by the word.</p><p>The Greek for 'implanted' means more literally 'something placed inside you which springs up'. This must have some reference to the sower parable- &quot;The seed is the word&quot;, and if we are to receive the word meekly, James must be likening us to the ground of the parable- in this case, 'meek' ground. Are we meek to the word- 'quiet, mild', as 'meek' implies? It is so true that a settled, quiet mind is vital if we are to let the word really act on us. There may also be a reference back to Romans 11, where Paul reasons that the Gentiles had been grafted into the Israelitish olive tree. Having a Jewish readership, James is maybe gently hinting that <i>all</i> men, including Jews, need the word grafted into them.</p><p>We have spoken in general terms about &quot;the word&quot; being the power of righteousness, which comes down from above and germinates spiritual life within us. This verse 21 gives us some hints as to a more precise definition. We have noted the clear allusion to the parable of the sower- the &quot;engrafted&quot;/ implanted word-seed. &quot;The word of truth&quot; of v.18 &quot;begat&quot; us, which the almost parallel passage in 1 Pet. 1:23 says is the seed-word of God. The word in the parable of the sower is defined as &quot;the word of the Kingdom&quot; (Mt.13:19)- i.e. the Gospel of the Kingdom. The sower parable shows the response of various people to the Gospel which they <i>initially hear</i>. James 1:21 continues by saying that this word is &quot;able to save your souls&quot;. This recalls a number of passages which say that it is the message of the basic Gospel which saves our souls:</p><p>&quot;To you is the word of this salvation sent&quot; (Acts 13:26).<br />&quot;The Gospel of Christ... is the power of God unto salvation&quot; (Rom.1:16)<br />&quot;I declare unto you the Gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received (cp. &quot;receive with meekness the engrafted word&quot;)... by which also ye are saved; if ye keep in memory what I preached unto you&quot; (1 Cor.15:1,2); this Gospel which would save them was centred around the basic truths of the resurrection and second coming of Christ which Paul goes on to reiterate in 1 Cor.15. There really <i>is</i> power in them, to save our souls.</p>