By Rev. Richard Wynia, referenced in Spring 2011
The religion that God our Father accepts as pure and undefiled is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress (James 1:26).
James is warning us to test our religion, our “acts of righteousness,” to make sure that our religion is pure, undefiled, and acceptable to God. He tells us that it’s not only a question of what we do in church, or in our devotions. The religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is to look after orphans and widows in their distress.
Why does James mention just looking after orphans and widows in their distress? God mentions these things again and again in His law. His people had to make sure that they looked after the orphan and the widow. Orphans and widows were vulnerable in those ancient cultures; they had no husband or father to provide or stand up for them. There was no social safety net, no life insurance or widows’ pension or welfare. So God stood up for them; God provided for them.
And that tells us what God is like. God reveals His nature and character in His concern for these people who had no one to look after them. God is telling us that He is a gracious and compassionate God.
Notice that James reminds us here that He is our Father. He had just pointed out, in verse 18, that “He chose to give us birth, through the Word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of all He created.”  Do you think about your relationship to God this way? That He is your Father, that He brought you to life? That you were born of God, and you have His life in you?
This is why it’s so important to God that we look after orphans and widows in their distress: because that what God’s children do. That action is their nature; that is their character. Those who have been born of God, those who have God's life in them, are compassionate, and kind, and thoughtful, and generous, with their time and their money and their possessions, because that’s what their Father is like. Like Father, like sons.
So that is the religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless. Religion is not only going to church twice and all the rest. In fact, if that's all there is to our religion, if our acts of piety are not fulfilled by actions that express our compassion, and generosity, and kindness toward those who are vulnerable and in need, our religion is worthless. All of our churchgoing is a waste of time. But God rejoices when He sees our love and thanksgiving expressed, worked out, and displayed, in looking after orphans and widows in their distress. Because then the Father sees Himself in His children.
Rev. Richard Wynia is the pastor of the Vineyard Canadian Reformed Church of Lincoln, Ontario.