Sinclair B. Ferguson

And by the way he words things, to James, then to all the apostles,

I think he's probably indicating that this James was not one of the original apostles.

So, not James the brother of John.

That James had been killed by Herod, you remember.

And the Corinthians would have heard of him as a martyr rather than as a contemporary.

So, this James was still alive.

And he was well enough known for Paul to assume the Corinthians knew who he was.

To get to the point, I think he was, almost certainly, James the half-brother of the Lord Jesus, and probably the eldest of his half-brothers.

But why a special appearance to him?

Now, the New Testament doesn't directly tell us, but there seems to be a common thread running through our Lord's appearance to individuals.

Mary Magdalene, Simon Peter, James, Saul of Tarsus.

We could put it this way.

Each of them had a past.

I suppose each of them may have felt themselves, to use Paul's words, the foremost of sinners.

Perhaps then the explanation for this special appearance to James is found in John 7, verse 5.

Not even his brothers believed in him.

And perhaps, since James was the eldest of the brothers, they all took their lead from him.

I have the impression from the rest of the New Testament that, humanly speaking, he was a very impressive and indeed powerful and persuasive individual.

So it may well be that if James was to find his place in Christ's purposes, the Lord needed to meet and speak to him personally and privately, as he did with Mary, and with Peter, and actually with Saul of Tarsus too.

But quite apart from that, there's something here that's very moving.