Commitment is incomplete, shallow, and insincere at best when it is not accompanied by action. If someone says they care for the poor but goes a lifetime without doing anything at all to help them, how sincere is their concern? If someone says they love Jesus but pretend like they are fulfilling their obligations by simply being superficially kind to random people instead of pursuing justice (John 14:15 and Matthew 5:19-21), how honest or self-aware are they?
Even if one reasons out what their Biblical obligations are on their own and comes to a perfect understanding of the concepts therein, this is not enough to be righteous. One must do that which is right instead of simply knowing what one's obligations are. Indeed, a being could know its moral obligations with absolute certainty and refuse to carry them out--or simply have no interest in doing that which it should do.
Intelligence and philosophical knowledge are certainly worth celebrating, but it requires a unique form of ignorance or apathy to think that one does not need to do anything more than do one's best to learn how one should live. The very nature of moral duties is that one should act in accordance with them, and moral perfection is the Biblical goal of Christian life (Romans 6:1-2, Matthew 5:48).
Addressing the issue of insincere "committment," James 1:22 demands that people act in accordance with the moral obligations detailed in the Bible rather than merely listen to or read them. To listen alone is incomplete; to understand without acting is itself worthy of condemnation. Committment without deeds, as James 2:26 puts it, is just as lifeless as a corpse that is devoid of the consciousness that once animated it.
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