You gotta serve somebody

If there truly are two ways of being as James depicts in 1:13–18, then one obeys either the law of sin and death or the word of truth that gives freedom. Obedience is a given; James only questions what one obeys; and so, like a forgetful person who fails to realize her nature has been gifted a transformation but continues in her prior patterns, those who continue to act according to their natural desires deceive themselves about the law they obey, and thereby bring forth death in themselves.—"Salvation in James: Saved by Gift to Become Merciful," by Mariam Kamell Kovalishyn in Reading the Epistle of James: A Resource for Students, ed. Eric F. Mason and Darian R. Lockett, forthcoming