One of the concerns for people as they age is whether they will have enough money in their retirement years. Financial planners all have different gauges to determine how much is enough, but maybe we are not thinking far enough into our future. How will God evaluate our financial portfolio? How will that impact our lives in eternity?
If financial planning is a part of our eternal plan, maybe we need to evaluate what we are or are not doing in this area of our lives. Are we living the kind of life that God has called us to? Are we ready for eternity? Being generous with our time and money does affect eternal outcomes.
Charles Dickens’ Christmas classic A Christmas Carol is a warning about how we live for this world’s riches, while disregarding people in their need. James challenges us regarding having the wrong priorities in regard to finances, both how we attain and then invest them, often taking advantage of others or simply living a self-gratifying life.
Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming on you. Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes. Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days. Look! The wages you failed to pay the workers who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty. You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened yourselves in the day of slaughter. You have condemned and murdered the innocent one, who was not opposing you.[i]
Is this simply a warning against ungodly people? Or is this a warning against the misuse of God’s resources that He has given us? Obviously, it is a warning against those who oppress others, but it is also a word to encourage those who are suffering as a result of financial inequality.
James is using a literary device known as “‘apostrophe’—speaking to people who are not present, for the benefit of those who are. This way James’ listeners will know the certainty of the coming demise of their oppressors.”[ii]
James is about to call for patient endurance under repressive economic conditions where some are benefiting at the expense of others. The analogy that James makes in chapter five is of a ripening harvest. Jesus’ return to judge is often spoken of metaphorically as a harvest of people. The harvest is divided between that which is of value, the righteous and those who will be judged for their sinful actions, the unrighteous.
James 5:1-6 deals with this economic oppression and serves as a warning to affluent Christians that we need to invest in the lives of others, particularly those who are unable to care for themselves.
You might wonder why, in a book addressed to Christians, James would spend time using such harsh language toward unbelievers. The answer is that he is reminding the Christians that the justice of God is coming. This reality should enable them to be patient. With that said, that doesn’t mean these verses don’t have any other application to Christians. James has already rebuked Christian brothers and sisters who were favoring the rich above the poor, so 5:1–6 serves as both a direct rebuke to rich nonbelievers who were oppressing the poor and a subtle, indirect warning to rich believers (Christians) who were ignoring the poor. Notice that James is not necessarily condemning wealth here; instead, he focuses on the sinful use of wealth. At the same time, for those of us who are part of a culture that is extremely wealthy compared to the rest of the world, we need to examine whether or not we are engaged in a sinful use of the resources God has given us.[iii]
There are four indictments against the abuse of riches that we need to be aware of especially as we live in one of the most affluent parts of the world.
THE FIRST INDICTMENT AGAINST THE ABUSE OF RICHES IS THAT WE ARE HOARDING WEALTH
We are immediately confronted with the tone of judgment that will befall those who have trusted in earthly riches and hoard them, rather than investing them into God’s agenda for the needs of the poor and advancing the gospel. We need a little context and background to understand what James is addressing. Douglas Moo explains who these rich people were that James was critiquing.
The ‘rich’ whom James attacks in the paragraph are wealthy landowners, as v. 4 reveals. This was a class of people frequently criticized in the OT, Jewish literature, and the wider Greco-Roman world for their greedy acquisition of land and their exploitation of those forced to work on the land for them. The socioeconomic conflict between these two classes was acute in the first-century world, and James accurately reflects the situation.[iv]
Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming on you. Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes. Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days.[v]
In Jewish wisdom literature there was a danger in acquiring treasure unrighteously or selfishly hoarding it. “Ill-gotten treasures have no lasting value, but righteousness delivers from death (Proverbs 10:2).
People curse the one who hoards grain, but they pray God’s blessing on the one who is willing to sell. Those who trust in their riches will fall, but the righteous will thrive like a green leaf.[vi]
Why would people hoard grain? To create shortages and drive-up values. The problem is that many people are suffering from lack. We notice the expression that they were hoarding their wealth in the ‘last days.’ We need to remember that the expression ‘the last days’ began on the day of Pentecost. This entire church age is called ‘the last days’, and the words of James have applied for the past two thousand years. It certainly is applicable today as we see the day of Christ approaching.
There is a place for savings and retirement planning, but we need to be equally diligent in our giving and investing in the lives of others. James focuses on the improper acquisition and selfish use of wealth, which not only has no value as security on the day of Judgment, but is described as rotted. Clothes in the first century were a sign of wealth and are here described as moth-eaten.
Moths are eating your clothes, and your gold is corroding. Some have pointed out that this is not possible because gold doesn’t corrode like iron does. But that’s the point: James is saying that even that which you think is the surest use of money in this world is wasting away. You have hoarded and built bigger barns for all of your excess, but a day is coming when it is all going to burn up in the fire, and you will burn up with it.[vii]
This verse presents a puzzling image, because technically gold does not rust. Many commentators assume James is referring to the common, impure mixtures of metals that could at least tarnish. But the image may be deliberately jarring and all the more powerful if it reflects the metaphorical meaning of becoming useless. In other words, not even the gold, which the rich think they can count on to save them and provide them with the security of wealth, will last to safeguard them.[viii]
Actually, this hoarding of wealth will be used as evidence against them on the day of Judgment. Luke Timothy Johnson explains James’ metaphors.
First, James uses it to establish another courtroom setting, which reverses that in 2:6 where the rich are dragging the poor into courts in order to oppress them; now the rich are the ones in the dock. Second, the very corruption (rust) of their wealth is personified in order to bear testimony against them.[ix]
Jesus warns us of making material things the aim and object of our lives.
Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.[x]
So, how do we store treasures in heaven? Our investment portfolio should have as a goal the use of earthly wealth to impact the lives of people toward God’s kingdom, not just the self-indulgent use that often leads us away from God’s interests. Is our goal simply to make our lives comfortable and secure on earth or are we investing the time and resources God is giving us as tools to advance His kingdom and bring glory to His name? Are we generous to those in need? Are we giving to advance the gospel to reach our community?
THE SECOND INDICTMENT AGAINST THE ABUSE OF RICHES IS THAT WE CHEAT WORKERS
Those who make a profit at the expense of those who are the producers or workers will be judged by God. Defrauding people of what they have labored for brings God as their advocate.
“Look! The wages you failed to pay the workers who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty (James 5:4).”
James is once again pointing out God’s wisdom in its relationship to wealth and how we attain it and use it. “Better a little with righteousness than much gain with injustice (Proverbs 16:8).”
Obviously, the law spoke out against such behavior.
Do not take advantage of a hired worker who is poor and needy, whether that worker is a fellow Israelite or a foreigner residing in one of your towns. Pay them their wages each day before sunset, because they are poor and are counting on it. Otherwise they may cry to the Lord against you, and you will be guilty of sin.[xi]
Dan McCartney argues that James is not speaking to a specific situation, but the idea of exploitation of the poor by the rich.
It is endemic to human behavior everywhere for the rich to oppress the poor, and the Greco-Roman world was no exception, and James’s condemnation applies to every manifestation of greed and the abuse of power, not just the withholding of wages.[xii]
In an article in the Toronto Star (Oct. 18, 2025), employees in Ontario, Canada were short-changed nearly 200 million dollars in unpaid wages, and the situation continues to worsen as government agency actions to collect them are becoming more ineffectual. One legal immigrant, who originated from Mexico, trying to help his mother’s cancer plight related, relayed that he was shocked that this kind of corruption could happen in a country like Canada.
THE THIRD INDICTMENT AGAINST THE ABUSE OF RICHES IS THAT WE HAVE LIVED SELF-INDULGENT LIVES
To add insult to injury, this exploitation of the poor was to simply further the enrichment of a self-indulgent lifestyle. “You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened yourselves in the day of slaughter (James 5:5).”
Do you see the imagery in verse 5? These rich people were like cattle gorging on food on the day of their slaughter. May God help us in our materialistic culture to see the warning in this imagery. May we not be like cows enjoying all our stuff, unaware that we’re about to be destroyed. We’re reminded of the description of Sodom and Gomorrah in Ezekiel 16:49, where the people had “pride, plenty of food, and comfortable security, but didn’t support the poor and needy” (Moo, James, 217). They were overfed and unconcerned. Is there any clearer imagery for a culture where wealth is so concentrated while literally thousands around the world die every day because they do not have food or water?[xiii]
Alec Motyer warns us of the dangers of a self-indulgent life because of the resources that are available to us.
When we allow such wealth as we possess to focus attention on ourselves and our satisfactions, we are ministering to that spirit of pleasure, desire and wanting for self which is the root of all unholiness and unfaithfulness to God (4:1–4).[xiv]
Jesus warns against this self-indulgent lifestyle that was totally indifferent to the needs of the people around us. Jesus tells us the story of the rich man and the beggar, Lazarus. Here was a man who thought because he was a part of the Jewish community that he was in a good relationship with God, but his actions certainly did not reflect God’s attitude toward the needy. The end result was a shocking revelation in his death.
There was a rich man who was dressed in purple and fine linen and lived in luxury every day. At his gate was laid a beggar named Lazarus, covered with sores and longing to eat what fell from the rich man’s table. Even the dogs came and licked his sores. The time came when the beggar died and the angels carried him to Abraham’s side. The rich man also died and was buried. In Hades, where he was in torment, he looked up and saw Abraham far away, with Lazarus by his side. So he called to him, ‘Father Abraham, have pity on me and send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and cool my tongue, because I am in agony in this fire.’ But Abraham replied, ‘Son, remember that in your lifetime you received your good things, while Lazarus received bad things, but now he is comforted here and you are in agony.’[xv]
Alec Motyer challenges us with this self-examination.
Finally, we must have it constantly before our minds that it was love of money that betrayed the Lord Jesus. … Would we be surprised if only we could remember how often the Lord Jesus Christ has taken second place to possessions, and has been much less than Lord of our financial arrangements? Worldly wealth is an area of high risk in the battle to walk humbly with God. It is hard to be rich and lowly at the same time. The use of money and the life of self-pleasing are never far apart.[xvi]
THE FOURTH INDICTMENT AGAINST THE ABUSE OF RICHES IS CONDEMNING THE POOR LEADING TO THEIR DEATH
Here the imagery may not mean literal death, but the diminishment of the person who is being taken advantage of. It could also mean that as a result of their poverty, their death was premature. “You have condemned and murdered the innocent one, who was not opposing you 9 James 5:6).”
We do, however, have such an example of the opulent lifestyle that had total disregard for the innocent person, and had them condemned and murdered. One of the incidents in the life of King Ahab of Israel is his wantoned desire for the vineyard that was close to the palace. Ahab was prepared to purchase it, but Naboth refused to sell it as it was his ancestral inheritance.
So Ahab went home, sullen and angry because Naboth the Jezreelite had said, ‘I will not give you the inheritance of my ancestors.’ He lay on his bed sulking and refused to eat. His wife Jezebel came in and asked him, ‘Why are you so sullen? Why won’t you eat?’ He answered her, ‘Because I said to Naboth the Jezreelite, “Sell me your vineyard; or if you prefer, I will give you another vineyard in its place.” But he said, “I will not give you my vineyard.”’ Jezebel his wife said, ‘Is this how you act as king over Israel? Get up and eat! Cheer up. I’ll get you the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite.’ So she wrote letters in Ahab’s name, placed his seal on them, and sent them to the elders and nobles who lived in Naboth’s city with him. In those letters she wrote: ‘Proclaim a day of fasting and seat Naboth in a prominent place among the people. But seat two scoundrels opposite him and have them bring charges that he has cursed both God and the king. Then take him out and stone him to death.’ So the elders and nobles who lived in Naboth’s city did as Jezebel directed in the letters she had written to them.[xvii]
When Ahab rode out to claim the property at the death of Naboth, he was confronted by God’s prophet, Elijah, who pronounced the death sentence for the murder of an innocent man.
Alec Motyer brings out some sobering conclusions regarding James’ words found in 5:1-6.
We must not shirk the implication of James’ harshness and directness. More than any of the areas of high risk, wealth threatens its possessors with coming misery (1). Its earthly cushioning dulls the sense of spiritual urgency (2–3) and of the reality of divine judgment (5). Affluence opens the door to commercial carelessness and insensitivity to what is both due and needful to others (4). It leads finally to setting aside the honour and dignity of the Lord Jesus Christ (6).[xviii]
Jesus will examine our financial portfolio one day and see how we invested for our earthly existence as well as for our future in eternity. Is our life lived primarily a life of self-indulgence or one in which we lived for God’s honor and glory? In Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, Ebenezer Scrooge was warned through the apparitions of his past, present, and future, which he responded to, repented and changed his behavior to begin caring for others and stopped living for selfish aims. Though James’ message is to encourage those poor who are being defrauded of wages, he appeals to patience in light of God’s eternal judgment against the perpetrators. May we apply these texts to evaluate our lives and see how we can live a more generous, kind, and caring life toward those who are not only poor in an economic sense, but also poor in a spiritual sense and desperately need the gospel to redeem their souls.
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[i] James 5:1-6, The New International Version of the Bible, Zondervan, 2011.
[ii] Craig Blomberg and Mariam Kamell, James: An Exegetical Commentary On The New Testament, (Zondervan Academic, 2008), 220.
[iii] David Platt, Exalting Jesus in James, (Holman Reference, 2014), 96-97.
[iv] Douglas Moo, The Letter of James, The Pillar New Testament Commentary, (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2000), 210.
[v] James 5:1-3.
[vi] Proverb 11:26, 28.
[vii] David Platt, Exalting Jesus in James, 97.
[viii] Craig Blomberg and Mariam Kamell, James: An Exegetical Commentary On The New Testament, 221.
[ix] Luke Timothy Johnson, The Letter of James, The Anchor Yale Bible, (New Haven, Yale University Press, 1995) 300.
[x] Matthew 6:19-21.
[xi] Deuteronomy 24:14-15.
[xii] Dan McCartney, James, Baker Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament, (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2009), 234.
[xiii] David Platt, Exalting Jesus in James, 98.
[xiv] Alec Motyer, The Message of James: The Tests of Faith, The Bible Speaks Today, (Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 1985), 171.
[xv] Luke 16:19-25.
[xvi] Alec Motyer, The Message of James: The Tests of Faith, 171.
[xvii] 1 Kings 21:4-11.
[xviii] Alec Motyer, The Message of James: The Tests of Faith, 170.
