Faithful on Fridays Blog

Part Six

If you’ve read some of the New Testament you’ll see the apostle John’s prominence, but he had an older brother named James. Jesus called them ‘sons of thunder’ and yet we know very little about James. Their father, Zebedee, had a family-owned and operated fishing business incorporating both sons. That’s where Jesus spotted them working and called them to follow; they left the work and responsibility of the business to their father. That must’ve been hard on the whole family, but Jesus taught later,

“If you want to be My disciple, you must, by comparison, hate everyone else—your father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even your own life. Otherwise, you cannot be My disciple.”

Luke 14:26 NLT

We don’t really have a good answer why, but early Bible translators changed his Hebrew name Jacob, to James. Jacob means ‘he who puts his heel down following closely’ and ‘hides his feelings and intentions”, and yet Jesus saw the heart of a disciple in this ‘son of thunder’. James had a heart that would have a quiet battle cry and yet he was filled with energy and power (meaning of Boanerges, Mark 3:17) as he made following the Savior a priority, even over his family.

James was chosen to join the inner circle of the Elite Three: Peter, James, and John and yet he was never mentioned without his brother’s name included. This close, emotional bond between brothers shows us a lack of self-centeredness or pride from James as John grew closer to Jesus: that’s the heart of a disciple. But let’s talk about his mother: Salome.

I get a sense that these sons of Salome had her similar, thunderous personality filled with desire for her boys to sit in places of honor next to Jesus in His Kingdom (Matt. 20:20-22) and to boldly ask Him for it! Unfortunately for all three of them Jesus explained they didn’t yet understand that position included suffering … wait, what? Time to reevaluate my request.

Later in ministry James and John observed the Samaritans rejecting Jesus and suggested they call down fire from heaven to punish them: thunderous. However, Jesus rebuked them. It’s recorded several times that the disciples argued about who was the greatest, I’m guessing James was quiet on that one, Jesus explained they’d be great in the new world, just not in this present one (Matt. 19:28-30).

James had a short life of ministry, he was executed by the sword on command from Herod Agrippa I (Acts 12:2), who incidentally, was the son of Herod the Great. You remember him, he commanded all baby boys to be murdered in Bethlehem during his search for the infant Jesus. 

James followed Christ with a disciple’s heart privileged to be specifically chosen and yet died abruptly echoing a thunderous battle cry for the Church. Jacob/James’ death ignited Peter’s ministry and the Word of God increased and multiplied. Well done, James, good and faithful servant.