The goal was to extract DNA and RNA from various stages of fresh peas and pea plants, and then compare the differences in the controlled environment of the lab. I would grind up fresh peas, for example, and gradually purify the DNA until it became long strands that I could wrap around a glass rod. Now it was pure, separated from all the messy pea stuff it had once intimately known. But it was also dead. But it was no longer living.
Faith is like that.
Separated from life and spun into the long strands of theological theory, it may represent true orthodoxy in its belief system, but it is sterile. Faith as James speaks about it is NOT a system of belief, but a way of life that consciously draws its sustenance from God and lives for God and is energized by God himself. James forces us to look at a practical example. Suppose a brother or sister is without clothes and daily food. Faith is active.