A Little Brother Believes

My brother, Mike, had a tough life growing up. I was almost five years older than him, and people knew him as John Paul’s little brother. So there were some mighty high expectations for him from others. For instance, teachers at our school looked forward to having Mike in class because they thought he would be well behaved and studious like I was. But Mike did not quite follow in my footsteps, especially when it came to being well behaved. There was one of my former teachers who when talking to my mother would tell her how much she liked me, and that she was looking so forward to having my little brother in her class. She was always glad to see my mother. When Mike finally reached the age to be in her class this teacher, who had already put him on a pedestal, after having him in class for about a week was ready to retire. She was shell shocked. From then on she did not want to have much to do with my mother.

Yes, it was hard for my little brother to live up to the example that I had set for him, but there was another little brother who had an impossible climb to reach the expectations of his big brother. We read about him in the Bible. His name was James the little brother of Jesus. I wonder how many times James got in trouble because he failed to behave as well as Jesus. Can’t you hear Mary or Joseph saying to him, “James, clean up this mess you made! Why can’t you be like your big brother, Jesus?”

We don’t know what kind of childhood relationship James had with his brother. We do know that after Jesus began his ministry James was not one of his followers. James did not believe that Jesus was the Messiah. Jesus was most likely an embarrassment to James. James and some of his siblings tried to take Jesus home one day because they thought he was crazy. Sure James knew Jesus was different, and that he had done some amazing things, but he didn’t believe he was the Son of God. “Jesus, you are our daddy’s son! Joseph is your dad,” is probably what James said to Jesus.

It wasn’t until after Jesus death that James believed his little brother, that he was and is the Messiah. What was it that convinced him? The Resurrection? James saw his brother after he had risen from the grave. He talked to Jesus. In fact, James, who became the leader of the church in Jerusalem, wrote the book of James. He began his book by introducing himself as, James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was saying, “I know now that Jesus is much more than my big brother. He is the Messiah, and he is my Lord.

I think that after James believed Jesus was who he said he was he did begin to be like his big brother. I’m sure that God used James to clean up a lot of messes in this world. If we truly belong to Jesus we will or should be like Him more and more each day. God is in the process of cleaning up the messes in our lives so that he can use us to help others become like Jesus.