[0:00] So we're in James, jumping into it, and I sent out a link to some of the people about an audio that guy from the Bible school that I went through.
[0:13] ! I did the whole book of James in song, James Version, word for word. It's pretty cool. Super cool. You play this enough around your kids, your kids will memorize the book of James. Super cool opportunity. I've been working for years, and I'm a little less mind-elasticity than kids, but I'm getting it.
[0:33] A lot of fun. So that was in the New King James. He also did Psalm 119, which is pretty awesome. The longest chapter of the Bible. It's longer than a lot of books of the Bible.
[0:46] So those are two awesome resources for you guys. I'm going to read through the whole passage in the New King James, just because that's what I'm working with today, specifically with James.
[0:57] And then we're going to go through verse by verse. James, a bondservant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greetings.
[1:10] My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.
[1:21] But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.
[1:40] But let him ask in faith with no doubting. For he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord.
[1:54] He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. Let the lowly brother glory in his exaltation, but the rich in his humiliation.
[2:07] Because as a flower of the field, he will pass away. For no sooner has the sun risen with a burning heat than it withers the grass. Its flower falls, and its beautiful appearance perishes.
[2:22] So the rich man also will fade away in his pursuits. Blessed is the man who endures temptation. For when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to those who love him.
[2:38] Okay. I think Chris is going to take up with verse 13 next week. So that's James 1, 1 through 12. So he starts off, James, a bondservant of God.
[2:54] And so the word for bondservant is doulos. And it typically depends on who's translating it and when they're translating it. It means slave.
[3:05] And it's a little different in Bible times. Slavery was a little different in Bible times than it was in America's slavery. There was a Sabbath year. Flames would get free every seven years.
[3:18] And then the 50th year, sevens, they'd be freed every 50th year as well. The year of Jubilee. And it wasn't, it was more of an indentured servitude like they had in Kingsland among some of the lower classes back in feudal, feudal times.
[3:36] And there were lots of rules about how to worry about that. Okay. Welcome to the remote. So James identifies himself as the slave of Christ.
[4:01] And as I was doing my research this week, I saw a book that was titled, Christ's slave, a New Testament metaphor for total devotion to Christ.
[4:13] That's pretty cool. I didn't read the book, but I read the title. It was in one of the references, one of the footnotes. But yeah, just this idea of a single devotion, single minded devotion to Christ and what he says goes.
[4:29] And there's no self autonomy to it. It's his will, his way or the highway. You don't get to decide how to, you don't get to pick and choose what commands you like, what words you like, what dispositions you like about.
[4:49] The master who owns you, who controls you. And James called himself a bondservant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ. And you could have said, James, the brother of Jesus.
[5:03] You know, you got to tell him some quick street cred that way. Paul in Galatians calls James, and it's almost certainly the same James.
[5:14] He said, I saw none of the other apostles except James, the Lord's brother. Paul talking about the leader, the head, chief elder of Jerusalem at the time that Paul was living.
[5:29] And he called him James, the Lord's brother. And you know that Jesus had brothers who didn't believe in him during his lifetime. But once he got resurrected, that does something to change your mind about your brother.
[5:41] And James became a leader in the New Testament church. So, James, instead of identifying himself with this honorific that he could have used to get himself some street cred to bolster, maybe the power, seeing the power of his words.
[5:59] James, the brother of Jesus, listen to me. Or even the exalted apostle, you know. Or head of the church in Jerusalem. He says, James, a bondservant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.
[6:14] I thought that was pretty cool. He values that bond as a servant of Christ, as a slave of God, as more valuable than whatever else people might put their emphasis on.
[6:31] Okay. I got a little note about servanthood, slavery in the Old Testament times, too. It said, in the ancient world, slaves often wielded the authority of their masters and were considered part of their family.
[6:44] So that could happen back then. And sometimes when that year of Jubilee came or the Sabbath year came, they would say, where am I going to go? Like, I want to stay here.
[6:55] Like, oh, we're family. And they would stay in there in a special way that they could mark themselves. They'd taken all sharp, pointing things, they'd took their beard to the doorpost, tying them to the house.
[7:09] Symbolically and literally. As a symbol. I'm sure they took it out pretty quickly. But yeah, it was, it's not like we think of when we think of slavery, typically in America.
[7:28] All right. James, a bondservant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ. So, he's calling Jesus Lord here. And Lord was the Old Testament way of talking about Yahweh, God, his name.
[7:44] So when he's talking about Jesus, he's describing to his half-brother by marriage. Obviously, Joseph, James didn't have God himself as the Father, as the incarnate Son.
[8:00] So we call him a half-brother when we're being specific about it. But, elsewhere in the Bible, like, we see the divinity of Christ explicitly.
[8:11] So John 20, verse 28. It says, My Lord and my God to Jesus. And then in 1 Corinthians 8, 6. There's one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things.
[8:23] This idea of Jesus, the instrument through which the world was created. 2 Peter 1, 1. By the righteousness of our God and Savior, Jesus Christ. Okay. So James, the bondservant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.
[8:36] This is counting up. I shouldn't be counting up. I better fix that. Hmm.
[8:47] I can't figure that out. Does somebody want to give you a hint of that? It'll be in about 40 minutes.
[8:59] Yep. Wait. Okay. To the 12 tribes. So James is writing, To the 12 tribes which are scattered abroad. Greetings. So, whose sons were the 12 tribes?
[9:11] Any kids know? Who is the father of the 12 tribes? The tribes of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Yep. Jacob is later called Israel.
[9:24] And it's the tribe of Israel. And we're going to be learning about them because they're all going to get born here. And we're going through Genesis. Probably, depends if we take a break for Christmas.
[9:35] But in the next couple of readings in Genesis, we're going to hear about all the children of Israel. And there were certain. What did I call them?
[9:46] I didn't call them conditions of the covenant. There were stipulations of the covenant. So, the covenant wasn't conditional in the sense that they could ever get out of the covenant. They're in the covenant.
[9:57] But either they, as the people of Israel, would receive the blessings of the covenant. Or they would receive the curses of the covenant. So, there was blessings for obedience. And God was very explicit about this.
[10:09] He spelled it out over and over again. We see it in Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28 are probably the two most condensed versions of them. You can see it all throughout the prophets too.
[10:21] When they obey, they get blessings. And none can stand before them. And their enemies, when they rise up against them, God helps them just slay them. Scatter them seven ways.
[10:33] And they have an everlasting inheritance in their own land that God gave to their forefathers as long as they're obedient. And they're not obedient, by and large.
[10:47] And they haven't been. They're like you and me. They're a fraudulently wayward people. And they're kind of the macrocosm of the human heart, writ large as a nation, that God deals with like he deals with us.
[11:05] But they were scattered. To the 12 tribes which are scattered abroad, greetings. And so, there's promises about them being scattered. And they did get scattered. The northern tribes got scattered in the 700s BC.
[11:20] And then Judah and the southern tribes got scattered about 200 years later in the 500s. And they were still in dispersion. Or they call it diaspora.
[11:31] They're spread abroad throughout the nations as one of the curses of the covenant. But those scatterings promised as a stipulation of the covenant had it so that in James' day, the tribes weren't all assembled.
[11:52] And he was preaching. He preached to Thessalonica. And not him. But the church. There was a circular letter. It made its rounds throughout the churches.
[12:03] And that's how it came. Got into our Bible. And Paul would preach to the different churches in Philippine. And they were in the greater Mediterranean. And some in Egypt and some in Rome.
[12:18] They were scattered. They weren't all living in their promised land, Canaan. And James is greeting them as the head of the church in Jerusalem. He says, My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials.
[12:34] This is verse 2. James 1-2. Count it all joy when you fall into various trials. And I don't think we should think about this joy as kind of an effervescence, bubbliness, you know, happy-go-lucky, skippity-doo.
[12:48] It's something that we can be sorrowful, Paul says, but always rejoicing. There's a depth to it. There's an anchor balanced to it that makes it unshakable.
[13:01] And you're not, I mean, certainly we can be effervescent. You know, with love and joy. But it's not always evident right there.
[13:12] A lot of times, like John 1620, talks about sorrow turned to joy. And even like, you know, sorrow of birth, like women, when you have a baby, it's painful.
[13:24] But if you keep your eye on what you're getting out of it, it's a no brainer. Like, it's worth it. Like, you get a baby at the end. I mean, a new human, you know, part of your family, something of you that you get to hold at the end.
[13:37] So also, you have sorrow now. And then there's promises that no one will be able to take your joy there in John 16. 1 Corinthians 4.1 talks about in all of our afflictions, I'm overflowing with joy.
[13:53] So Paul links these two because it's kind of counterintuitive. It doesn't make sense. Like we would naturally, the natural mind would think about sufferings as opposed to joy.
[14:05] Or despite joy. But I think James here is wanting us to cue in on the linkage that if we're mindful of that linkage between sorrow and joy, between trials and temptations and maturity and eternal reward, it makes it not only bearable, but we could say like Judas, when he was facing his greatest trial on earth, said for the joy set before him, he was facing his shame.
[14:39] But there was a joy because he was purchasing something for the father that he was going to get to inherit and get to enjoy eternally. So there's a light momentary affliction or even heavy momentary affliction.
[14:51] Time wise, it's light because it's momentary. But that contrasts with an eternal weight of eternal glory that you get on the other side.
[15:02] On the other side, and if we can bend our brains and our hearts and our minds to that. It just changes the whole experience of the trials that we, that we face. And when you're in the midst of a trial, it's not always.
[15:17] That helpful to have somebody come in. Effervescence. Tell you to keep stiff upper lip. No.
[15:28] I don't know. Put on a heavy face. Put on your church, your church face. But when we're not suffering, I think that's the time to drill down and get these truths to our hearts.
[15:43] The value of the trials and what God's wanting to produce. The kind of gold that he's wanting to produce in our hearts. In the hardest things that can make us see the outcome of those things, which we'll get to.
[15:57] What verses? Okay. Hebrews 10, 34 says, You joyfully accepted the plundering of your property since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one.
[16:15] So, even if we lost all of our stuff, our house, our goods, our car, if you knew that you had a better possession than that and an abiding one that you couldn't lose, it puts it into perspective.
[16:29] It allows you to weather the storms with grace and dignity and hope and faith. And without a doubt. So, my brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials.
[16:44] That fall into various trials, it's the same word that they used in Luke 10, 30, the parable of the Samaritans. It's on the road to Jericho and fell among Roberts. Okay?
[16:55] So, something's coming at you, you know? And it's not you just bringing cause and effect things on yourself that he's talking about here.
[17:07] It's, we live in a world with an enemy. Yeah. And he loves to undo us. When he threatens to undo us, we can be thankful that God has willed his truth to triumph through us.
[17:22] And the, how did all joy? So, in my mind, before looking into it, I thought it was consider all things joy.
[17:36] And it has a little different emphasis in the Greek. So, the all is attached to joy. So, consider it pure joy. Consider it complete, unalloyed, unmixed joy.
[17:51] Only joy will be trials. So, like, there's other things we could consider. And there's the natural thing that we will consider it, but he's asking us, commanding us, to count it all joy.
[18:07] Consider it all joy. Reckon it all joy. And it's a mental shift that you've got to do. Like, it's not going to do, it's not going to happen for you. You've got to ask God for help.
[18:19] And it takes the spirit to do that, but it's an act of the volition. It's an act of the will to be counting it joy. And when we put down these stones of remembrance in times when we're not going through it, when it's not, the waves aren't crashing, and we're not on life support, that's the time to be setting up these Ebenezer stones to look back on and point back to them.
[18:45] You know what I felt when I set that up, and I trust it. And it's the same God the day that it was then. And he doesn't change, though I change, though my circumstances change, though storms come and beat, the rock doesn't change.
[19:04] So set up those reminders in your own heart. We've got a little poem from William Cooper. I love this guy. I might have another one at the end.
[19:15] I'm sure there's not going to be time, so don't worry about that. It's called the Welcome Cross. And it is framing things in this counting things joy because of what we get out of them.
[19:27] The Welcome Cross. Tis my happiness below, not to live without the cross, but the Savior's power to know, sanctifying every loss.
[19:38] This is happiness to me.
[19:51] God in Israel sows the seeds of affliction, pain, and toil.
[20:04] These spring up and choke the weeds which would else or spread the soil. Trials make the promise sweet. Trials give new life to prayer.
[20:17] Trials bring me to his feet. Lay me low and keep me there. Trials drink. Trials drink. by the way, might I not with reason fear I should prove cast away if we face no trials?
[20:33] Bastards may escape the rod, sunk in earthly vain light, but the true born child of God must not, would not, even if he might. So, like, there's a rod of discipline that shows your son. And you can embrace the rod of chastisement if you have that internalized. And it just changes the whole orientation, the whole framing. Framing is so huge, the way you frame things can educate the way you feel about them. And he's giving us some really good framing inventions here. Okay, so why can we count it all joy? Like, think of some of your own trials, like, Katie, you're going through it. Like, the winds are beating, like the waves are crashing. And how can we count that all joy? Like, it's hard. It's not automatic. We're tempted when we face trials. We've all faced trials. Things that would drown a person naturally. And, but how can we count it all joy? Verse 3 says, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience.
[21:51] Hebrews 12, 11. Let's turn there real quick. For the moment, all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant. But later, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. Okay? So there's a training to be had in painful discipline for trials. And if we will be trained by it, there's a fruitful harvest to be reaped from that. And we can miss out on it. If you're not, if you won't be trained by it. If you won't let it have its perfect, perfect way in you. We'll do that in verse 4.
[22:44] So knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. There's a kind of patience. There's a couple of different words used in the Bible to translate to our English patience. And this is not the one about unhurried tranquility while waiting. Just all. He's very patient. He has. Like, like, you can resist that marshmallow marshmallow test. He's good. He's good at waiting rooms. Um, there's another kind of patience that has more of a connotation of ability to bear up under difficulty or endurance, fortitude, steadfastness, perseverance, patience, endurance.
[23:27] Um, and that's the one that's being used here. So knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. And endurance, uh, one commentator said is faith stretched out. So, well, that language, but stretched out for all to see like faith externalized, making its way outside, not, not kept under wraps, uh, closeted, but stretched out for all to see, making its way outside.
[23:56] Part of the heart and mind. Um, providing positive proof. But what was inside, um, faith does certain things. And James is really good about this. He's got a lot of different, um, categories of faith.
[24:14] Most of which aren't faith. Most of which aren't faith. He talks about dead faith later. He talks about demon faith. Like demons believe. They shudder. They don't, they don't love the truth that they know is true. Like that doesn't help. That kind of faith doesn't help anybody. Um, so it's not just a mental ascent. Demons can do that. Um, but there's a kind of faith that works. Faith actually does work. Or else it's a non-working faith. Like, it should be obvious, but faith works.
[24:43] Um, and we're not talking about the faith and works is a different conversation, but faith actually does work. And there's no question about that. And that's James's point is the proof, proving of faith. Knowing that the proving of your faith, the testing of your faith, you test a metal to prove that it's, um, that it's pure. You burn away the dross. And what you come out with is, is more, is more, it's a refined, it's a refined, um, product after going through the refining fire. And that's what we're talking about here. Is that kind of endurance, that kind of a testing.
[25:24] So, Revelation 13, 10, here's a call for the endurance and faith of the saints. Hebrews 12, 1, let us run with endurance the race that is set before us. That's this word that they're using.
[25:37] Romans 5, 3 to 4 says, And then just one verse to kind of overarch everything we're talking about.
[26:07] Um, God works all things together for good for those who love him. You've been called according to his purposes. So, Romans 8, 28, I think. Just have that as a backdrop here.
[26:18] All right, let's look at verse 4. But, so we saw, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience, but let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.
[26:34] So, James describes this work, there's a Blomberg quote, he's a commentator. James describes this work as perfect or complete, and the word for that, for perfect here is teleon.
[26:45] Teleon. So, um, the telos is a Greek word. It's, it's a really weighty word in both Greek philosophy and in, um, Christian theology.
[26:56] It, it does a lot of work. And it fundamentally means end or completion or goal or purpose, orientation towards the end.
[27:07] So, think of a, we're talking about telos, think of a telescope. Okay? What does that help you do? Helps you to see the end. Like, we can see as far as, even with your human eye unaided by a telescope.
[27:21] Um, I read something in astronomy where it said, we have an infinite, um, field of vision. I was like, what? I'm just, there's, there's no natural limit to how far we can see. If there's a light strong enough to make it here, um, or like a galaxy big enough.
[27:39] Like, it doesn't matter how far away it is. We can see it. Um, which is just mind-blowing. Cause like, when you look at the Milky Way, um, each, it looks like a bunch of pixels, you know? Like, and you can't even distinguish them apart. Cause they're so not close together. They're so far away that they're making an unpixelated cream of Milky, Milky light in the sky.
[28:05] And each one of those, which is a star, probably as big as our star is the sun. And probably as far away from the next star as our sun is to the next galaxy, the next solar system.
[28:19] It's mind-blowing that we can see that far away that the stars are undifferentiated like the pixels in our iPhone screen. That's wild. Okay?
[28:29] Anyway, a telescope helps us to see that far, helps us to see the end all the way to the completion, to the end. Um, so telos can also have, I mean, something about a termination or conclusion.
[28:49] So when God's doing things, he has a teleological, he has a telos, uh, he has an end in mind for us. When all his work is done, we're going to bear the image of his son for all those who are in Christ.
[29:02] We're going to look more like Jesus and we're going to be in him. We're going to be with him in glory. That's the telos of the Christian. Um, and that's, that's perfect.
[29:12] So when we think about perfect, what comes to my mind first is Christian perfection. And it's this thing that I just, that ate my lunch for years growing up. And, uh, this idea that I had to be perfect late or else late going to hell.
[29:27] And, and it's true. You do have to be perfect, but you can't be perfect. But Christ was perfect. And so if I'm in Christ, I get his perfection, um, credited to my account. And, um, so.
[29:42] But let patience have its perfect work that you may be perfect and complete. So this perfect doesn't have the Christian perfection. Connotation to it. It has more of a, that you may be in concert with your created order, your end. Um, and that's, that's a perfect, that's a type of perfection, but it's not the sinless perfection that, that we think of in this verse.
[30:11] But let patience have its perfect work that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. And then he goes on to, well, Ask, uh, the guys around the fire last night, two minutes ago.
[30:31] Um, oh wow. Like, does it, any of you guys not lack wisdom? There's somebody that doesn't lack wisdom. Michael played along. Like, uh, no, I'm good. You know, Like, just acting the hope. You know, like, like that you don't need to ask for wisdom. That you don't lack wisdom. Like, How thick would you have to be? How dull would you have to be to think you didn't need wisdom? To think you didn't lack wisdom?
[30:56] He was joking. So everybody knows. He made it obvious that he was joking. But this idea that, um, we could be perfect and complete, lacking nothing.
[31:07] So there's a lacking nothing. Um, In 2 Peter 1-3, It talks about, We, us having everything we need. So his divine power has granted to us all things that pertain to life and godliness.
[31:20] We're not lacking anything. He's granted to us all that we need for life and godliness. Through the knowledge of him who comes, who called us to his own glory and excellence. So, there is a sense in which we're lacking nothing, but still, we're lacking wisdom.
[31:35] We're lacking the end, the final perfection of wisdom that we're going for. Um, the telos of wisdom. We're lacking that, at least.
[31:46] Uh, we haven't arrived there yet. Um, so, if any of you, and all of you do, um, lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.
[32:02] This God who gives, let him ask of God, then I have a comma in my translation, who gives to all liberally without reproach. But the words in the Greek is, didontos theus, the giving God.
[32:16] Ask the giving God. Which I thought was just a cool way of framing it. You know, like, ask, if you lack, you could ask the giving God. And he loves to give.
[32:27] And how does he love to give? He gives liberally, generously, lavishly, and without reproach. He's not annoyed at us, that we don't already have it, that we have to keep asking, that we have to always keep asking.
[32:39] Um, he didn't create us. Like, even Adam had to grow in wisdom. Um, and he didn't. He didn't. And so, here we are. And we needed a second Adam.
[32:50] Um, but it's not a sin to be finite. It's not a sin to be created. It's not subpar that we're human and that we're not God himself. Um, and that we have to keep asking for wisdom.
[33:04] Um, but he loves to give when they ask for wisdom. And even when we are lacking nothing, even when we have everything we need for life and Godliness. We still need it for wisdom.
[33:16] And he loves, loves, loves to give it. And he loves to give it not stingily, not begrudgingly. Um, he loves to give liberally.
[33:27] Generously. And without reproach. He's not annoying. He's not annoyed at us. We're not putting, not being feeling put out that we have to keep asking. From his supply.
[33:38] It's him. He's. He has the supply where we have the need. He has the supply and he loves to give. Um, and he has a trustworthy disposition to give generously.
[33:51] Christian perfection and the man who has no need to ask for wisdom. Yeah. So. That Christian perfectionism. If any of you lacks wisdom, I just, I just can't imagine the person arriving this time for day.
[34:08] Don't. Lack wisdom or he would be as big of an oaf as my. As my most. For day to be like. Nah, dude, I'm good. You know, like. It's. It's just idiocy.
[34:19] It's pure idiocy that. Somebody would think that they'd arrived in a point where we don't need to ask for wisdom. Um. The more, you know, about yourself, the more, you know, about God's and how.
[34:30] Holy is a perfect perfection is. Um. When I says went into the throne room of God and be held him in his glory. It's just the train of his road building the temple. What did he say?
[34:43] So, what was I'm done? I'm a man of unclean lips. I dwell among the people unclean lips. Um. It, it unraveled him. It almost disintegrated. It almost fragmented him in a thousand pieces.
[35:00] Almost came apart at the seams. So, if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask the giving God who gives to all liberally and without reproach and it will be given to him.
[35:12] But, there's a certain way we gotta ask. It's not asking willy nilly. It's not asking in a double minded way. Let him ask in faith with no doubting. For he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind.
[35:28] So, there was something that happened in our, in my generation growing up. Um. I think it was a reaction against some of the earlier fundamentalism where youths were encouraged to doubt.
[35:44] We're encouraged to feed our doubt. And like, hey, how can you handle it? You know? Like, you, you go doubt. And when you come out of it, your faith is going to be stronger. Doubt was a faith maker. And this is not the way that the Bible talks about doubt. Doubt is your enemy. It's, it's a killer. It's poison.
[36:01] And you don't drink poison. And you don't drink poison just so you appreciate health after. It will not work for most people. Like, just because you can survive, just because God did save some from that, it wasn't because of their doubt.
[36:14] Despite, um, them feeding in their. Here. Hebrews 3, 2, 12 says it. Take care brothers, lest there be in any of you, take care lest there be in any of you, an evil, unbelieving heart.
[36:27] Leading you to fall away from the living God. Unbelief is dangerous. It's. It's a heinous arrogance against your creator.
[36:38] Um. Yeah. As though a bird should curse the air, you know, or, uh, the hyperpalm. Not gonna remember it. Um, or if fish compare the ocean to a grave, the mighty, the ant lifting his mighty voice and ranking against the earth with pride obsessed.
[36:59] Infants rail against the breast. This idea of a creature. Casting aspersions on its creator. It's an offense against the Holy God.
[37:12] And it's not safe. It's not wise. It's not humble. And I think, I think it was kind of framing. It was framed as humility because we've gotten the attack from the ascended atheists who say, oh, this Christianity, this is what I'm saying.
[37:28] Oh, this Christianity is so exclusive. It's so, it's so presumptuous. Like, who are you to presume that your love's right? All the thousands of gods, you know, that yours is right. And we go, oh, let's, let's use reason.
[37:40] Now we kind of reverted to, to reason. And, and doubt is in the realm. Okay. Asking while doubting.
[37:51] If we ask in faith. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith with no doubting.
[38:02] For he who doubts is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. So asking while doubting, it's a subtle smear against God. We don't think about it that way. We think of it as maybe intellectual honesty.
[38:13] That's how I framed it. College years, you know, if I, if I really believe it, it, it could probably stand up to the screws, you know, and it can't. But there's a way of holding ourselves above God to assess him and putting God in the dock as the witness and us being the judge that God resists the proud.
[38:37] And he only gives grace to the humble. He doesn't give grace to the one pointing their bony finger of accusation at him. Doesn't work. Not how he dispenses grace.
[38:48] And asking while doubting is this two minded idea. It's a subtle smear against God. It's an accusation that either he's not generous or that he's not capable.
[39:01] Maybe even that he doesn't exist. So it's not intellectual honesty. It's not this liberal idea of no partiality in the marketplace of it.
[39:17] So I remember like parents being told that don't push Christianity on your kid. Christian parents being told not to push Christianity on your kids because it would like they have to, they have to get it for themselves.
[39:29] And. And the way that. Families work and that cultures work and that. Faith works is. Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of God.
[39:42] And. Yeah. If they're not hearing. It's not going to work. And. So. Smear.
[39:53] Like it's. Saying lies about God. And believing lies about God. And it's acting as though God is not trustworthy and capable and willing to be good to his children.
[40:07] believing lies about God, and it's acting as though God is not trustworthy and capable and willing to be good to his children. But let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord. Yeah, God hates that kind of pride. He opposes the proud, gives grace to the humble, James 4, 6. We'll see that in a few weeks. So God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.
[40:35] Submit yourselves, therefore, to God. Resist the devil. He will flee from you. So there's two masters, and when we are double-minded, we are playing with both masters, and that does not work.
[40:52] You cannot serve two masters. No man can serve two masters. You will love the one and meet the other and be devoted to one, despite the Lord. You can't serve God and money. You can't serve God and the devil, obviously. Okay, let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord.
[41:10] He is a double-minded man. This is a thought. This double-mindedness shows up again and again through James. It's a really helpful category to have. The Greek word for double-minded is di-sukkos. So, sight means two souls, two-minded. So, psuche can mean soul, life, self, mind, heart, inner being. It's a divided self. It's a divided mind. It's a two-faced and two-minded about things.
[41:43] And that's an unstable way to be. One foot on reality and one foot on air is, it's gonna move you from that foot on reality. That instability will be like, it'll be driven and tossed by the winds.
[42:01] So, deep-sukkos is a divided spirit or divided mind, double-minded. And contrast that with a single-minded devotion that James was talking about as a servant of Christ. Like, he has one master and he lives to do his will. And there's a single unified devotion to Christ and there's no division. There's no two-facedness or two-mindedness about it. So, let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord. He's a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. Yeah, Matthew 6 24 says, no one can serve two masters. Luke 9 54 to 55. And when the disciples, James and John saw it, they said, Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume them? People were not accepting Jesus in Samaria, I think it was. And then some manuscripts add that Jesus said, you do not know what manner of spirit you are of. So, these were his disciples, but they had another spirit that they were of.
[43:09] And that's possible. Remember, oh, this is cool. I never saw this connection here. So, Revelation 13 13, it's talking about the beast and then there's a second beast that comes. I forget if he's the false prophet or the antichrist or what. But the second beast performs great signs in Revelation 13 13, even making fire down from heaven to earth. So, to consume people in front of people. And by the signs that he is allowed to work in the presence of the beast, it deceives those who dwell on earth.
[43:41] So, there's something about the enemy. Like, there's an enemy power at work. James and John, these are two of the inner circles. Jesus, three dominants. And they were of another spirit, you know, at that moment. And so, that kind of double-mindedness can unstabilize a person.
[43:59] And Jesus was kind enough to call it out. He rebuked them. He's a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. We're going to see this in a couple different spots here as we go. Okay. Now, we get to a section about the, let the lowly brother glory in his exaltation and the rich in his humiliation. So, we see a going down and a coming up.
[44:26] And it's, thinking about it in gospel terms, the lowly brother can glory in his exaltation. And he's encouraged, like, don't identify yourself as poor. Do you have Christ?
[44:43] Then you are rich indeed. Don't divide yourself that way. As the you and then the you without Christ. The you in Christ and the you without Christ.
[44:55] You can't divide yourself two ways like that. You're either in Christ and it's a you in Christ, or it's a you without Christ. There's no two you's anymore. You're a new man when you're in Christ.
[45:08] And there is no old man as your core identity. We still drag him around. We still got flesh. We still live in the world. But we're, that's not who we are at our deepest. And we have this dyed suitcase, this double-minded schizophrenia that we fall into and we forget. Every morning we forget.
[45:31] And we got to put that thing to death. We need to, we need to consider ourselves alive to God and dead to self. And it doesn't happen automatically. It takes a reckoning. It takes the act of the will to put that thing to death.
[45:47] And it says, don't identify yourself as poor. Do you have Christ? Don't divide yourself that way. You without Christ does not exist anymore. You are seated with Christ in the heavenly places. Do you know who you are, child of God? Like, let the lowly brother glory in his exaltation. There's a way in which we're all lowly. I mean, that's, that's how most people probably self-devantaged. If you ask somebody, if they're rich, like few, even rich. Yeah. Right. No, like, but then on the other hand, like zoom out any amount of time in world, world history with the richest people you've ever met. Like, you never said two cars. I'm counting the number of television in your house, like television, consuming 12 bar. Tell us. Sorry. Um, the, we are rich Ephesians two, four through nine, but God being rich in mercy because of the great love with which he loved us, even when we were dead in trespasses, made us alive together with Christ by grace. You have been saved and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. We're in Christ. We're with him, where he is. That's father's right hand. We're in him. Like what Jesus gets, we get. We're, if we're in him, like there's, there's no, when he looks at us, he doesn't see Adam without Christ. That person doesn't exist anymore. It's Adam in Christ. And he looks at Christ and he imputes all of Christ's righteousness to me, takes all of my sin, says paid by my son's blood.
[47:29] You're in him. You're flowing through his veins. I don't know if that's right. Strike that maybe. Um, metaphorically possible. So verse seven, Ephesians two, seven, so that in the coming ages, he might show the immeasurable riches of his grace and kindness towards us in Christ.
[47:49] There's an us in Christ. And if you look carefully, it's always an us in Christ. If there's any good for by grace, you have been saved through faith. This is not your own doing.
[48:01] It is the gift of God, not a result of works so that no one may boast. Okay. And God really, really hates boasting. And James really hates boasting. And Paul really hates boasting. Everybody who has the mind of Christ should hate boasting. Um, so we got this idea of the poor glory in his exaltation, but there's also a flip side to that, but the rich in his humiliation, because as a flower of the field, he's going to pass away. Like, like we're a vapor. Um, James 4, 14. Um, what is your life?
[48:36] It's a vapor that appears for a little time and it vanishes away. So don't even say, um, today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city. If you're there, buy, sell, make profit. You don't even know what tomorrow. What could happen tomorrow? What's your life? You're a vapor. You're a vapor. Zoom out at all in history with the Lord a thousand years. It's like a game. It's like, it's, it's nothing like our lives in retrospect from eternity, looking at us. It's a vapor. It vanishes. It's a breath.
[49:13] How fast does the breath despertage on a cold day? Your vapor. For no sooner has the sun risen with its burning heat than it withers the grass, its flower falls, and it's a beautiful appearance perishes. So the rich man also will fade away in his pursuit.
[49:32] So I think as a flip side to the poor, exalting in his exaltation or glorying in his exaltation, the rich man's also allowed to glory in his humiliation. Um, oh great, you're rich. Are you poor in spirit? Like is your richness keeping you from realizing how poor you really are? Um, and you might miss out on the true riches of the kingdom of God and eternal richness that you can enjoy forever, richer than anything you've imagined. Um, Matthew 5, 3, the beatitude. Um, blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of God. What else could we have? What else could you ask for? Like the kingdom of God, God's kingdom. It's yours. It's yours in Christ.
[50:30] That's riches. Don't let your riches keep you from that. And that's what the rich man is told to glory in his humiliation. There's a going down. So the poor can't lift their eyes up to see what is theirs in Christ. Like that, that's the, that's the poor man's challenge. That's their temptation that they can't even lift up their eyes to see what's theirs in Christ. So they want to bring Christ down to their level. Um, and the rich can't see themselves debased to need the kind of grace that would send them down into an ignoble grave, the grave of the slain savior and be united with him in a death like his.
[51:07] Like that's, that's the rich man's temptation to not go down as far as we need to go down. And James was saying you up there, Christ be in Christ, be buried with him in death, go down.
[51:24] He's saying to the poor man who feels down, you come up into Christ. It's Christ. It's not you. Um, let's see Romans 10, six through eight. Oh, this is, this was interesting. I don't know that I have a ton of time to get into it, but I'm going to try. Do you not know? Oh, but the righteousness based on faith says, do not say in your heart who will ascend into heaven. That is to bring Christ down. I think that's the, that's the poor man's temptation is to say, what can I go up to heaven?
[52:00] Like, can I be as perfect as Christ? Can I be as rich as Christ? And then, so there's a temptation to bring Christ down and the righteousness based on faith says, do not say that in your heart.
[52:11] Or also don't say who descended into the abyss. And I think that's the rich man's temptation. That is to keep Christ out of the grave, um, um, from out of going down into death with Christ in him, being buried with him. Um, that's just a thought. So Romans six versus three to 11.
[52:38] Let's look at that. Okay. All right. I'm just going to wrap up. Um, yeah, this two mind, this idea of two mindedness, you'll see it over and over. You'll see it in James and John when they're trying to fall down fire on their enemies during Christ's years of ministry when he's with them. They ask if they can do that.
[53:10] I'm like, no, no, no. Um, and then like, uh, Peter is trying to keep Christ from going to the cross. He's got a natural mind about it. He's got, doesn't have the line of Christ. And Jesus says, get behind me, Satan, do not know what makes, what makes for peace.
[53:29] Hey, set your mind on the interest of God. And he didn't see what was going on. Didn't have the mind of Christ about even Christ and this crucifixion. So he had a better idea and he said, no, no, no. So there's two minds that work often and you get in trouble when that happens.
[53:48] It's a psychosis. It's a deep sukkos, the divided mind, divided heart, divided soul, um, that we've got to wage war against. And, uh, let's go to the very end here.
[54:03] Verse 12, blessed is the man who endures temptation. So this kind of wraps it all up. For when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to those who love him. So, you're blessed. This is a beatitude. So not only Matthew, not only Jesus does it in Matthew, but here we have a beatitude. Happy are you. Blessed are you. Um, blessed is the man who endures temptation for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to those who love him. And we get that by counting it all joy, face trials of various kinds, uh, knowing, knowing that the testing of our faith produces patience and letting patience have its perfect work, its intended end, its telos, its appropriate consummation goal that we may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing, having everything we need.
[55:01] But when we lack wisdom, if anybody lacks wisdom, we can ask boldly of God, knowing that he gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him because he's the giving God.
[55:13] But we've got to ask in faith and not have any room for doubting and put that to death. Um, it, it tells lies about God and it slanders his, his good, his good character. Um, for you doubts, it's like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind. And we can't afford it. And people will eat your lunch. Um, let not that man suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord. He is a double-minded man, divided soul, unstable in all his ways.
[55:49] And then let everybody rich and poor find themselves in Christ. That will have a exalting work and a lower work in each of us because we can each, we can each identify with each of those. I mean, you need both of those works to happen in us. Same time.
[56:06] And then let's talk about each of those work. And then let's talk about each of those work. And then let's talk about each of those work through each of those work through each of those work through each of us. And then let's talk about each of those work through each of those work through each of those work through each of us.
[56:17] And then let's talk about each of those work through each of those work through each of us.