This is part 2 in a 7-part series on the book of James. Below is a modified transcript of the audio lesson.

We are in a study in the book of James. How many of you have read The Purpose Driven Life? I was thinking of doing it next if not many of you have. Oh, lots of you have! I got to hear Paul Harvey the other day and as he was going through his news and points of interest he talked about an interesting phenomenon in the state of California. In a penitentiary system where the worst of the worst criminals go, last year they had something like 121 riots, over 100 lockdowns and the majority of inmates in solitary confinement at some point. This year when they did the statistics the lockdowns, the riots and the solitary confinements had been cut by two thirds. Now they still had some of those things but they had dramatically decreased. When they went back to see what had changed, the only thing that was different from the year before was that every inmate had been given a copy of The Purpose Driven Life by Pastor Rick Warren. Isn’t that something? The other day I was getting my haircut and I was watching Oprah on the television. Wynona Judd was on there talking about losing weight and do you know what she said? She said, I can get through the day, get my thoughts straight if I can just have my reading. That’s how she said it, my reading. Oprah said what reading is that? Wynona responded, I have my reading in The Purpose Driven Life to find out what my purpose is and why God made me. I just marveled. Here is a singing star to inmates in prison and then to FOCUS for women! We’re more like Wynona of course! Everybody wants to know there’s a purpose to life don’t they? There’s something about that book and that message that has really struck a chord with people. If you haven’t read that book and aren’t familiar with it, it’d be an excellent one to get. I was thinking along those lines because in the book of James last week, we talked about trials and today we’re going to talk about temptations. There is a purpose in those trials and temptations. God has something He is working within us when we have to go through those things.

If you remember when we read in verses 2 and 3, the beginning of chapter one, he said- Consider it all joy when you fall into trials and temptations. When you first read that you’re like of course that’s not joy, that’s terrible, that’s a problem or that’s sad or difficult. But he said the reason we could consider it joy is because it is producing something in us that nothing else could do. It produces patience and endurance in us and we are a better person for it. Can you not look at a serious trial or trouble you’ve been through and if you’ve walked through it with the Lord’s help, do you not look back and say, I’m a different person now? I do that in my life. There are so many things that have happened to me or my family and I hate to think that we had to go through that but I’m a different and better person for it. I am. You probably are too. You become a better person through your trials if you will let God lead you through them.

That brings us to our second point. It is wisdom. God’s wisdom gets us through those trials, making the right choices, knowing what advice to take, knowing how to persevere, knowing the right decisions to make and keeping the right attitude. Pray and seek the Lord. Do all of those things. God’s wisdom enables us to get through the trials.

Now in the book of James not everything is in chronological order. He frequently talks about wisdom, the tongue and favoritism. We have to go to different chapters of the book and in chapter 3 he talks about earthly and heavenly wisdom. He contrasts the two. He says, “If you are wise and understand God’s ways, live a life of steady goodness so that only good deeds will pour forth. And if you don’t brag about the good you do, you will truly be wise! But if you are bitterly jealous and there is selfish ambition in your hearts, don’t brag about being wise. That’s the worse kind of lie. For jealousy and selfishness are not God’s kind of wisdom. Such things are earthly, unspiritual and motivated by the devil. For wherever there is jealousy and selfish ambition, there you will find disorder and every kind of evil” (James 3:13-16).

I looked at this verse in one of my older bibles, another translation, and out to side I had written Washington, D.C.!

But the wisdom that comes from heaven is first of all pure. It is also peace loving, gentle at all times, and willing to yield to others. It shows no partiality and is always sincere. And those who are peacemakers will plant seeds of peace and reap a harvest of goodness (James 3:17-18). I love that last line- and reap a harvest of goodness. Wouldn’t you love to reap a harvest of goodness in you life? Good things happen to people you love, good things happen at work and good things happen in your family if you will ask God for heavenly wisdom that comes from above. He will give it to you and we will reap a harvest of goodness. Last week, remember, we said that God does not reproach us. He does not hold back. He doesn’t say well you finally decided that you need some help! No. He does not do that. He will not do that to you. You can ask and He will give it to you. So heavenly, godly wisdom enables us to walk through trials and temptations.

Now we come to the second part of chapter one starting in verse 12 where he talks about temptations or testing. Trials and temptations are very closely related because one can lead to the other. If you’re in a trial, you’re very often tempted to get out of it in the wrong way. Do you agree with that? Yes, of course you do! I can answer for you! Trials and temptations are very closely related. In fact they have the same root word. In Greek temptation is used as an adjective and trial is used more as a noun. “God blesses the people who patiently endure testing. Afterward they will receive the crown of life that God has promised to those who love Him. And remember, now one who wants to do wrong should never say, ”God is tempting me.” God is never tempted to do wrong, and he never tempts anyone else either. Temptation comes from the lure of our own evil desires. These evil desires lead to evil actions, and evil actions lead to death. So don’t be deceived my dear brothers and sisters” (James 1:12-16). This passage is so rich and full of truth on how we are to go through temptation.

Let’s look at the whole break down or the whole idea and nature of temptation. First of all in verse 13 he says that God does not tempt us. He says in here- No one should say God is tempting me. God is never tempted to do wrong and He never tempts anyone else to do wrong either (James 1:13). God does not want you to do wrong. God does not tempt you. Who tempts you? Satan, your enemy, tempts you. In Luke 4 you can read the account of Jesus being tempted in the wilderness. It says that the Spirit led Him into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. Now the Spirit may allow you to be in a position or place where temptation occurs. But neither God nor Jesus nor the Holy Spirit ever tempts anyone to do wrong. They want you to obey God and never do anything wrong. I want that to be clear. Satan tempts us.

Secondly, it is important to note here that temptation in itself is not a sin. It is not a sin to be tempted. In Hebrews 4 we are told that Jesus was tempted in all points as we are and yet He did not sin. So when you are tempted to do wrong, maybe at work to cook the books a little bit, to do something deceptive because it would be easier on you or a co-worker, when you’re tempted at home and you’re tempted to do something you know in your heart is not right that in itself is not a sin. That’s not the sin. The sin is when you act on it.

One of the best books, everyone who teaches a bible study should have this in their library, is The Myth of the Greener Grass by Eugene Peterson. He wrote it years ago. He is the same man that wrote The Message. It’s about the dangers couples face in sexual immorality. It’s the myth of the greener grass and why so many people fall for it. They fall into that temptation and that sin and find out it’s just not so great after all. This book is so full of truth and I wanted to read a couple of things because he says it so much better than I could. He says the temptation is one thing and our choice to obey the temptation is where sin comes in. That’s where the problem comes in. He draws the distinction in understanding the nature of temptation. He says you can’t stop temptations from coming but you can decide what you’re going to do with each one. You can’t stop the birds from flying in the sky but you can stop them from nesting in your hair. You can’t stop the devil from singing his bewitching songs in your ear but you don’t have to join him and sing a duet. You can’t stop the devil from displaying his wares in the shop window and urging you to buy but you don’t have to make a purchase. You can’t stop the devil from dropping his brats on your doorstep and beating incessantly on your door but you don’t have to open the door, take them in, warm them, clothe them and feed them. Now I think those illustrations succinctly tell us of the nature of temptation. Yes, we’re all very tempted but we don’t have to give in. That’s why we need the Holy Spirit who gives us the power and the strength to withstand the temptation and to obey God and to do what is right.

Trials and temptations are very closely related. An example of this would be the book of Job in the Old Testament. He was a very wealthy man who had everything. Now we are kind of given a glimpse into heaven where Satan came to God and said, your servant Job of course loves You. He has everything. Let me mess with him and we’ll just see what happens. Well, Job lost everything, his money, his family and wealth. The whole book, 41 chapters, is about Job’s struggles and his trying to make sense of God and why He had done this. Job was tempted in this great trial. Of course Job doesn’t know what is happening in the heavenly courts. He just knows that he was just minding his own business obeying God and then one day he lost everything. We know what’s going on because we’re given a view into heaven. Job was tempted. What was he tempted to do? He was tempted to blame God and give up. His counselors started out good by just sitting by his side and not saying anything. Which is the best way to comfort someone I think. They did very well until they tried to explain to Job why it all happened and how it was really all his fault. Don’t you love people, you know, who try to comfort you in your affliction and tell you that it’s your own fault! The whole book is about these men trying to explain everything and Job trying to reason through it and the famous line by Job’s wife! What if you were a great wife and one day you were in a bad mood and you said something you shouldn’t of said and that got put in the bible?! She could’ve been a great lady and was in a bad mood that day! Maybe she was just mean! You probably won’t hear that anywhere but here! But she said to Job, why don’t you just curse God and die? Just be done with it you know? Your life is so miserable and you’re making me miserable, let’s just finish this whole thing. And yet, Job withstood the temptation to do that. Just think if he had, the victory that would’ve given Satan. Satan could’ve said to God, “See, I told you.” Job didn’t do it and spoke some of the most profound words in scripture, “ I know that my Redeemer liveth. Though He slay me, yet I will still trust Him”(Job 19:25). Some of the great mountaintops of scripture are found in Job who was tempted to give up.

I mentioned to you that James was writing to Christians who had been dispersed throughout the world because of persecution in Jerusalem and all over the Roman Empire. Many of them were tempted to renounce their faith. It was too hard. The Jewish Christians were tempted to move back into Jewish life and not be a part of this new faith, this new walk of following after Christ. It was a huge temptation. We often read of the martyrs but there were many, many what we would call lapsed Christians. Many Christians under persecution renounced their faith. It was a big, big problem after Constantine declared the empire Christian. What do you do with lapsed Christians? Do you take them back or say sorry you rejected Christ, you’re not coming in. It was a big controversy. The church at the time of James’ writing was very tempted to just give up and give in because it was too hard to follow Christ. I think we can say the same thing today.

Secondly, God will provide a way of escape from temptations. If you have not memorized 1st Corinthians 10:13 you need to. If you have teenagers you must write this verse on huge freezer paper and put it on their wall! “Remember that the temptations that come into your life are no different from what others experience. God is faithful and He will keep the temptation from becoming so strong that you can’t stand up against it. When you are tempted He will show you a way out”(I Corinthians 10:13). God has promised you a way out. Now you need to take Him up on that promise. We all need it. In other words we can’t just say, I’m stuck here, I don’t have anything else I can do. God will provide a way out. Let’s look at a few examples. First, when Jesus was tempted in the Garden of Gethsemane by Satan to not go to the cross. I believe every demon of hell was unleashed against Christ. And when he sweat drops of blood it was literally blood vessels bursting in His head. I believe He was clawing the ground in agony, fighting off the demons of hell, He was tempted and He said if there’s another way, I’d like to take it. Let this cup pass from Me. Then He said, not my will but Thine be done. The book of Luke said that angels came and ministered to Him, to strengthen Him. Wouldn’t you love to know what happened? But God provided a way for Him to withstand temptation. Now I would like an angel to come to me when I’m in temptation. Wouldn’t you love that! But you know, a lot of times God does do that and we don’t even know it. But more often than not, God will provide a way out in a very simple and practical way. We can take another very famous story about temptation in the book of Genesis when Joseph was a handsome young man and had been taken into bondage in Egypt. He had shown his administrative abilities and had become very, very high in the Pharaoh’s court in the house of Potiphar who was like the vice president of Egypt. Joseph was extremely good-looking, wise, smart and powerful and Potiphar’s wife decided she would like to go to bed with him. She came on to him and he kept saying no, no and no. One day she finally threw herself at him and made her desires extremely well known. Joseph was obviously tempted. He was a man and she’s a woman etc… How did he withstand this temptation? God provided a door! There was a door in the room! Joseph ran and fled through the door. He was falsely accused by Potiphar’s wife and all that, but here is where he made such a classic statement. I could not sin against my Lord or master by doing that. He understood what was at stake here. He did not let his hormones get the best of him. God provided a door. Now listen, sometimes God provides a very practical thing to get you out of temptation especially when it comes to sexual immorality. Paul said to flee sexual immorality and I think that means literally as well as metaphorically! Sometimes God provides a very spiritual way- dreams, sermons, scripture, songs or brilliant bible studies like FOCUS! But so often He provides just a simple way to withstand the temptation right in front of your face if you will just see it.

What you have to ask yourself, though, is do I really want to overcome this temptation? Do you really want to overcome it? If you decide you’re on the path to obey God and walk with Him, that decision is already made. It’s like deciding to go on a diet. You don’t decide as you walk into El Phoenix on the special enchilada day. That’s not the time to decide. You know what you’re going to do! The time to decide that you are going to eat right that day is at 6:30 am when you’re standing over your little bowl of Special K. You have to decide beforehand that you are going to be true to God and ask Him to show you the way out of temptation in your life. You have a much better chance to overcome it than just waiting to see if it looks like a decent temptation or not and then decide. Most likely you‘re not going to overcome it that way.

Now James gets a little more specific and talks about the anatomy of temptation. Starting with verse 15- These evil desires lead to evil actions and evil actions lead to death. So don’t be deceived. Now the very thing he is saying here is, do not be deceived by temptations. Temptations deceive us, do they not? It promises us something that it cannot deliver. First of all he says temptation comes from the lure of our own evil desires. These evil desires lead to evil actions. The conception of sin , the cause of a temptation, is we are drawn away by our own desires, fleshly nature and appetites. I have heard many times people say they sinned or fell into temptation because Satan really got them. Or Satan set a trap and he won him over or he deceived them. More or less blaming a person’s failure on Satan. Now listen my friends, this is not biblical. This is not biblical. Satan cannot make you do anything. He couldn’t make Job sin. Believe me if anybody had the right and opportunity, it was Job. Satan couldn’t make him do it against his will. We simply cooperate with Satan when we give into temptation. I agree there is warfare. I know he can unleash all kinds of difficulties in our life. God can allow him to do that. But you cannot sin without agreeing to do it. OK. James says it right here. It is our own evil fleshly desires. The bible says in our flesh is no good thing. Right?

I was at a pregnancy center dinner, a pro-life event, when the speaker was asking for an offering. He said, “ People always say just let your heart lead you. I don’t know about you but my heart is deceitfully wicked, the bible tells me. When I ask my heart how much to give, it said I couldn’t afford it, move on. Don’t listen to your heart, listen to God and do what He tells you.” I think that man is right on track. He knows what he is talking about.

Secondly, James says the evil desire leads to evil actions. It leads to the development of sin and that brings the consequence. Sin when it is full grown brings death. That means spiritual death. That means separation from God. Now granted we can ask for forgiveness, we know that. But that’s kind of the way it falls out.

When I was a kid we would go to the lake in the summer. A couple of weeks in the summer we would spend the nights with my grandmother who rented a cabin on Lake Austin. She had a sister named Aunt Lois. She was very athletic. We would get up early in the morning and go out on the dock when the lake was so smooth and we’d fish. We had bamboo poles, little red and white sinkers, the big hook and white bread. We’d sit there real quiet and wait for the perch to come up and bite it. Of course once the perch would bite it, she’d jerk it out of the water. I would never touch something as nasty as a fish and so she would take it off the hook and throw it back in. This was a game. I remember sitting there seeing that perch come up to it and then it’d back off. It’d come up again and maybe take a little nibble. And you’re like come on, come on. You want it to bite the hook. That is the word picture I have in my mind when it comes to our evil desires. Satan lures us just like we used the fishing lures. Sometimes it could be a little perch he wants to catch. Sometimes it could be a big sailfish with a highly technological lure. He puts the bait out there. But he cannot make us bite anymore than I could’ve made that little fish in Lake Austin bite. That is that person or entity’s decision. When that happens there is a consequence. This is expressed, this whole pattern in 1 John 2 by the apostle John when he talks about the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life. This whole pattern is seen in Genesis 3. All these passages fall into this same pattern.

This is part 5 in a 7-part series on the book of James. Below is a modified transcript of the audio lesson.

Let me just back up and review for a few minutes what we have done. The theme if you remember of the book of James is to be a doer of the word. That real faith will result in real actions. In other words we won’t be phonies. We won’t be hypocrites. We will live what we proclaim or profess to believe. The James who wrote this was the half brother of Jesus. He wrote this early on in Christian history. It was probably one of the first books written in the New Testament. He wrote this book to persecuted Christians throughout the Roman Empire. Remember the Roman Empire was not originally friendly to Christians. They were under a great deal of persecution as they scattered from Jerusalem out. James wrote this letter to them. That’s why this letter is so intense. It’s a very intense book and has some things in it that are hard to hear because it was written in a hard time.

I think there are a lot of parallels today. Do you not? We live in a hard time. Whenever is it not a hard time? You know life is always full of difficulties and we live in a culture and time that challenges us when it comes to living out our faith. Not just saying we’re Christians and we’re followers of Christ but living it out, walking it out. Showing by the choices and the things that we do that we are truly believers and followers of Christ.

The first week we talked about trials and temptations in James 1. James talks about when you go through various trials and temptation to count it all joy. We talked about what that meant. We know that as we go through things in life that are difficult that if we turn to God and ask Him to give us the wisdom to walk through those trials and temptations He will produce endurance, patience and character in us that is pleasing to Him.

We talked about real faith showing up in our actions.

Last time we talked about the sin of favoritism and prejudice. That it is wrong. James came on so strong about the sin of showing favoritism, of being biased toward certain people as opposed to others, rich opposed to poor, racial prejudices, all of this and how totally unacceptable that is in God’s kingdom.

Now he turns a corner in chapter 2 starting with verse 14 and this is where we are going to be. Because he leaves the subject of favoritism which is really about unconditional love, learning to love and accept others unconditionally, and he turns it into a related subject which is really broader than that and it is the subject of faith versus works. Now a lot of people have felt that the book of James contradicts the whole bible! In our first little church, my husband, O.S., mentioned that he was going to be preaching on James. This woman came up to him and I’d just met her, her name was George, and I remember her shaking his hand and saying, “ Oh preacher, are you sure you want to do that?” People think this because of this passage but if you look at it closely you find, as is usual, the bible is in complete harmony. Nothing is said in this book that doesn’t fit and harmonize with the rest of scripture. Now remember this, as we talked about in here frequently, when you look at a passage of scripture, you have to look at the context of the times. What were things like when this was written? What was the setting? What was the historical condition? The Jews up until this time had lived by the law. The law was written and these were the things they were supposed to do to carry out the law. Now God gave His law and remember the Jewish leaders had added numerous other laws to it. This is what Jesus and the Pharisees had so much disagreement over. The law was given and the Jews, the followers of the Lord Jehovah, were to follow the law. Now when Jesus came, He said I am now instituting a new covenant and it’s the covenant of grace. The law, Paul said, came to show us we can never be good enough for God. Anyone in here ever obey just say all of the Ten Commandments? Of course not! If so, you will get up here and teach immediately and I will sit down because I certainly haven’t! None of us, none of us can obey all of the Ten Commandments. It’s not possible to obey the law and not have broken any of the commandments throughout our lives. The law was given to show us that we can never be good enough for God. Christ came and said now He is giving a new covenant. That’s what He said at the last supper, the Passover. He said the old covenant is gone. It doesn’t mean the law isn’t to be obeyed anymore. It means that it was for a time past and now the new covenant, which is grace, is here. It means believing in Christ, giving your heart and life to Him and receiving God’s grace. It’s interesting that when your heart changes you suddenly want to obey the law. Obeying, following and living in obedience to God is no longer a burden but it’s something you want to do.

The idea about the conflict between faith and works is very old. I think it’s important to understand it especially since more than half of a chapter in this short little book is given to understanding the difference. Today there is kind of a theological discussion on this. Some people say all you have to do to be a Christian is pray the sinner’s prayer. You know the sinner’s prayer where you pray to ask Christ to come into your heart and believe and that’s it. Others will say, no, that’s not it. You have to pray the prayer and invite Christ into your heart and all of that but there has to be works that follow to show that your salvation is real. Easy believism is what one is called and works salvation is what the other is called.

In biblical days, keeping the historical context in mind, people often assume that James disagrees with Paul who talks a lot about salvation by grace. Let’s remember this, James was speaking to people who had just discovered the grace of God. They, as so often happens, had swung to one side and they felt because they were saved and going to heaven, they no longer had to obey the law. You might call them Libertines. They wanted to be free from the constraints of the law. Paul on the other hand was speaking about this issue of salvation and grace to primarily the Judaizers. We talked about them before. These were Jewish Christians who believed that before a Gentile could become a Christian they had to become an observer of the Jewish law. So yes, you could become a Christian but you also had to be circumcised, eat kosher food and follow all of the Jewish laws. This then meant that you were a follower of Christ. Of course Paul’s whole message was that’s crazy. You don’t have a bunch of other works to do.

This has been for a long time a kind of conflict but for our purpose today I want to stick to one thing and it is this. We want our lives, as followers of Jesus, to exhibit fruit or works that show that our faith is genuine. Right? I am sure everyone in this room can think of some body in your life that has been a screaming hypocrite. Right? Any of you, if you’re in a church, I bet you know a few of those! I certainly have and I thought of them this week getting ready for this! I wish them well! If they weren’t in church and didn’t profess to be Christians, I sure would’ve been fooled! The world is full of those kinds of people. It’s very easy to become judgmental and point to them and say what about them? But you know our focus, as usual, as we try to do in here, is not worry about those people today. God has to take care of them. I cannot see a person’s heart nor can you. I better spend a little time looking at my own heart. How about you? I want to make sure my faith is genuine, true and real and that I am willing to let God work through my life in the same way. It’s interesting and depressing that the statistics in the church are the same as the world when it comes to divorce, child abuse, alcoholism, and all of these various negative things in our society. This is very depressing. This is very sad that there’s not that much difference. That tells us that there is a problem. Right? Maybe a lot of these people who profess to be Christians aren’t or there’s a breakdown between what we say we believe and what we do. I remember a few years ago Christianity Today, a leading magazine on current trends in Christianity, had a whole issue on Dallas, Texas. They called it the headquarters for the new evangelical world. They went through all the schools and seminaries that were here and the large worldwide ministries and the interaction between them. I was not the only person that was thinking when I read the editorials, if this is true and we have such a huge Christian population here and we have all these ministries, why do we have just as many problems as anybody else? Why do we have a huge rate of divorce? Why do we have poverty? Why do we have racism? Why do we have all these things everybody else has if we have so many Christians here? The answer is I have no idea! I don’t know! All I can surmise is to go back to our original statement that somewhere there is a breakdown between what we say we believe and how we act.

Let’s talk first of all about the nature of our salvation. Just a few more points as we move into this. Let’s talk about what James is saying here as we think about our own salvation, when Christ comes into our lives, changes our heart and we become a new creature and give our lives to Him. Now first of all, salvation is an act by which we give our hearts and lives to Christ. Sometimes it is through prayer. You may have been led in what they call the sinner’s prayer and you genuinely and sincerely meant it. I believe there are plenty of people who have prayed a prayer and had no idea what they were saying and never meant it and never thought about it again. So just saying some kind of prayer isn’t going to do it. It has to be a change of heart. Salvation is not a process. It’s not a journey. It’s not an I’ll do this and this and this and then some day I’ll get there. No. It’s an instantaneous act. Jesus said if you’re going to enter the kingdom of heaven and receive eternal life you must be born again. Just like a physical birth is an instantaneous act, so is the second birth or our salvation. It’s not a process where you do so many good works and then you reach a certain level where you can say, whew, I made it! It is not like that. It is not a process or a journey. Our Christian walk is a journey and that begins once we get on the road. We get on the road by accepting Christ into our life and giving our heart to Him. Now some how in our world Christianity has sent out the opposite message hasn’t it? If you were to ask most people on the street or in your case a person in the tunnel, I’m sure most of you came here today through the tunnel, what do you have to do to get to heaven? What would most people say? Well, if my good works outweigh my bad works, you know, if I’m a good person and all of that then I will get to heaven. Now some how we have not been very clear about the message because the bible tells us that if God wants to see good works in us we must first come to Christ and then we do these good works. They are an outflow of our faith and that is what James is going to talk about. Now let’s just explain this a bit further. Let’s say you do get to heaven by works. How are you going to know when you have enough? How are you going to know when your good ones outweigh your bad ones? In fact, do you think a person’s good works can outweigh their bad ones? Where are these scales? This is often what the Muslims believe. Allah weighs the good works and the bad works. It puts a heavy burden on a person.

I often go back to my favorite musical, Les Miserables, where Jean Valjean, the protagonist, stole a loaf of bread, broke the law, to feed his starving sister’s child. Now he was punished and sent to prison for breaking the law. Well, in God’s eyes which was more important? Was it to follow the law, which he did break, or to feed a starving child? Well now we would say of course to feed a starving child. But how would you know? That’s the dilemma. You’re thinking that’s what I would do so surely God would do the same thing. That’s not a good way to think! No, don’t do that! Rarely does that happen! I’ve been on that road and it does not work! Works salvation is very nebulous. It’s very vague. You know, maybe you’ll make it and maybe you won’t.

The bible is very clear and it tells us that good works are the result of a changed heart. No matter how much we do it can never be good enough when it comes to God’s standard of righteousness. We have all failed and fallen short of the glory of God. Good works are the result of a changed heart and when that happens we come to Christ, give our life to Him and then we begin to obey Him. We find our desires have changed. We want to read the bible. I look at all of you who left a desk probably in chaos in your office to come here on a Monday morning to hear a word of scripture and to have some Christian fellowship. This is a good work. You chose to be here. There’s something in you that said I want to hear something from God’s word. That’s the Holy Spirit working in you- working out good works.

This is what Jesus went round and round about with the Pharisees. We don’t have time to read all the verses on that but one of the illustrations Jesus uses is of a cup. Remember the Pharisees were the religious rulers of that day and they were filled with pride and arrogance about their righteousness. They obeyed every little tiny thing of the law. But Jesus said they were like a beautiful china cup. They looked so pretty and shiny and fine on the outside but when you looked at the inside it was a different story. The cup was filmy, gross and moldy (OK, Jesus didn’t say moldy but that’s what he meant!). Have you ever had a coffee cup that you had forgotten about and then after two weeks you find it? It’s contents look pretty disgusting! That’s what this word picture reminds me of. He told them inside their hearts were dirty. That’s what Jesus meant when the Pharisees were accusing the disciples of not keeping all of the laws and He told them, don’t you know it’s not the outward things that defile a man. It’s the inward things that defile- the condition of the heart. That is where sin originates. It’s very clear through scripture that our heart is the seat of everything. Everything flows from there.

The bible tells us that we have been made right with God be cause of what Christ has done for us. Galatians 3:26- “You are all children of God through faith in Jesus Christ’. Ephesians 2:8-9 says it perfectly- “For by grace you have been saved through faith and that not of yourselves. It is the gift of God not of works so that no one can boast”. Who would receive the glory if we went to heaven because of our good works? We would. For we are God’s workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works. So God first works in our hearts to change them and to make us new creatures and then our works flow out of that.

Now James is asking a question in chapter 2:14-29 “ My dear brothers and sisters, what is the use of saying you have faith if you don’t prove it by your actions? That kind of faith can’t save anyone. Suppose you see a brother or a sister who needs food or clothing, and you say, “Well, good-bye and God bless you; stay warm and eat well”- but don’t give that person any food or clothing. What good does that do?

So you see, it isn’t enough just to have faith. Faith that doesn’t show its self by good deeds is no faith at all-it is dead and useless.

Now someone may argue, “Some people have faith: others have good deeds.” I say “I can’t see your faith if you don’t have good deeds, but I will show you my faith through my good deeds.”

Do you think it’s enough just to believe that there is one God? Well, even the demons believe this, and they tremble in terror! Fool! When will you ever learn that faith that does not result in good deeds is useless?

Don’t you remember that our ancestor Abraham was declared right with God because of what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar? You see, he was trusting God so much that he was willing to do whatever God told him to do. His faith was made complete by what he did-by his actions. And so it happened just as the Scriptures say: “Abraham believed God, so God declared him to be righteous.” He was even called “the friend of God.” So you see, we are made right with God by what we do, not faith alone.

Rahab the prostitute is another example of this. She was made right with God by her actions- when she hid those messengers and sent them safely away by a different road. Just as the body is dead without a spirit, so also faith is dead without good deeds.” He is asking the question concerning what is the use of saying you have faith and you don’t prove it by your actions. That kind of faith can’t save anyone. He’s not saying faith doesn’t save. He’s saying that kind of faith, the kind of faith that says, “Oh, I’m a Christian but there’s nothing in my life that shows it. I don’t care about the things of God. I don’t do anything to work out my salvation as Paul talks about.” Nothing shows your faith. He is saying is that kind of faith really saving faith? That’s his question. That’s his challenge to his readers.

He gives a practical example of the person who is poor on the street. I just saw this happen the other day. We were with somebody and there was poor guy standing by a tree and he looked like he was about to fall over and our friend asked him if he was okay. The man said, “Yes”. My friend asked if he was hungry and did he need some money. The man said, “ No. I just left California Pizza Kitchen. Do I look like a bum?” I wanted to say, “Excuse me! Yes you do! At least wear a clean shirt to California Pizza Kitchen!” But I thought that was so nice of our friend to do that. What was I going to do? I was going to walk by and say, what a poor looking guy, he looks pitiful. The real Christian in our group stopped and asked if he could help. He wasn’t appreciated for that but that’s the point – to do something about it.

James is saying if you are really a follower of Christ you will want to do something that shows and proves and justifies your faith. It’s interesting here, he says in James 3:19-“Do you think it’s enough just to believe that there is one God? Well, even the demons believe this, and they tremble in terror!” This is a very succinct statement. He is saying it is not just an intellectual assent. Most people believe in God, some don’t but most do. That’s the starting point. You have to believe in God to walk down the path to eventually follow Christ. But he’s saying even the demons believe. Remember the gospels when Jesus would cast out a demon and the demon would speak to Him and say, I know You, You’re the Son of God. I just read through the book of Acts, some followers of Paul were trying to cast out demons and the demons said they knew Jesus and they knew Paul but who are you? So yes, they ‘re very involved in what is going on in this world but obviously they haven’t turned their life over to Christ. Here we see also the difference between just believing, giving intellectual assent to something, and turning your heart and life over to Christ as we have done.

Now two examples that James uses and it’s very, very interesting that he uses these when he talks about being justified by faith and turning our hearts and our lives over to Christ. I like the way Oswald Chambers says it in My Utmost For His Highest a great devotional book that I am sure many of you have read. He talks about when you come to Christ and you give your life over to Him, he says what you’re really doing is giving up your right to yourself. I love that. I think that says it so good. That yes, when we are born, God gives us the choice to chose Him or reject Him. We have the right to chose ourselves and go our own way just like Adam and Eve did in the garden, the very same thing. We can do that if we want to. But by turning our lives over to Christ means we give up our right to ourselves and we say, “Lord, it’s no longer what I want to do and what I want for my life but I want it to be what You want from me. I want to give my life to You and to do what You want”. James uses an example of two people whose faith was justified or shown by their actions. He uses Abraham, the father of the Jewish nation, and Rahab who was a prostitute. Could you pick two more different people? I don’t know! I think it’s kind of funny that he chose Rahab because when I was studying this, I wondered if he did that in reference to his little lesson he’d given them before on favoritism and not showing prejudice. He was talking to the Jews of the Jews and to them he uses the example of a Gentile prostitute! Well, welcome to the family of God! Everyone is on equal ground there.

We don’t have time to read all of Genesis 15 where God is speaking to Abraham but you may want to read it on your own. God tells Abraham that if he will follow Him, He would make him the father of many nations. God put His call on Abraham’s life and Abraham, the bible says, believed and it was credited to him as righteousness. Now that means he came to Christ in salvation. Old Testament people were saved the same as we are. They looked forward to Christ. We look back. They came by believing the same way we do. That simply means, some of these words sound really theological and complicated like justified and all that, but it’s really very simple. Justification means just as if I never sinned. In Genesis 15 where it says that it was credited to Abraham, God credited- it’s an accounting word. Let’s say you and I have a bank account and it’s totally deleted. Can anyone relate to that? Totally depleted! Suddenly we find out that someone has credited our account with this money. It was a gift to us. We didn’t earn it. We didn’t deserve it. Somebody just gave it to us. It’s the same way. Imagine or pretend I have a Macy’s bill that’s really high from buying outfits for babies. I dread opening the bill and seeing how much it is and I saw that someone had paid for all of that. Lord, send me that person! I didn’t ask them to. They just did it. It was credited to me. That’s what this word means. God’s righteousness was credited to Abraham. You know why? Because Abraham believed God and he said he would follow Him.

Now James goes on to the next part of the story that’s in Genesis 22. This is the story when God told Abraham to take his only son Isaac up on Mt. Mariah and sacrifice him. There’s all kind of symbolism in this story. We know it’s a type of Christ. God would provide the sacrifice as the story says and they went to the mountain. Abraham truly believed that God wanted him to sacrifice his own son. If you remember, he was prepared to do that. He turned around and there was a ram in the thicket. God provided the sacrifice, a picture of Christ, so that Isaac would not have to die. As you know there are multiple sermons and bible studies, lessons on that story. The bible tells us that Abraham was willing to do that. The book of Hebrews tells us that because he believed God’s promises are so true that if Isaac did die on the altar, God would raise him up. God uses Abraham’s faith. Abraham was declared right with God when he offered his son Isaac on the altar. He was trusting God so much that he was willing to do whatever God told him to do. His faith was made complete by what he did- by his actions. Abraham believed God and so God declared him to be righteous.

This is part 7 in a 7-part series on the book of James. Below is a modified transcript of the audio lesson.

We finish up our lesson today on the book of James. There are 5 chapters in James and honestly it’s almost funny to me that anyone would try to do the book of James in as short of time as we have done it because there is so much in it. I’m skipping a few things that I hate to skip but this could literally take us a year to go through. There are so many things that are practical. But today we are going to finish up by talking about three aspects of being a Christian that are so important in our Christian life. We’ve talked about how to get through trials and temptations. We talked about what a temptation looks like and how to get wisdom in our temptations. We talked about the sin of discrimination, showing favoritism, and that is one of James’ soapbox issues. He’s very, very strong on that. We talked about controlling our speech and how the words of our mouth can bring death or life, the power of the tongue. We talked about how we can influence others by our words. Today we are going to finish up by talking about three aspects or characteristics of a strong Christian life that are so important. They are humility, patience and prayer. Now if you think of all of the scriptures we’ve been talking about, all these principles, they all have to do with relationships. Now we know that principles are truth. They can work inside or outside of a church. Principles are truisms that can be applied in any culture at any stage of life and in any situation.

James is writing, if you remember when we first began this study, to Christians who were scattered throughout Asia and Asia Minor because of the persecution that came to them after Jerusalem fell in 70 A.D. This is probably the first book written in the New Testament. They were greatly persecuted by the Romans who believed that Christians had brought bad luck upon the Roman Empire because they just believed in and worshiped only one God instead of all these other gods. They were not well received either by the Jews and persecuted by them also. Christianity was no longer just a small little sect of strange people but had become a real force to deal with. James is writing to people to encourage them to stay strong in their faith and to endure. We talked about that too. James talks about endurance, patience and being a doer of the word. That’s another one of his themes. Don’t just say you’re a Christian, don’t just talk it you’re going to have to walk it! He called it being a doer of the word. We talked about faith and works. Your actions show your commitment to Christ is real and not just words from your mouth. He’s really talking about the word what we would call today community. Are you familiar with that word? That is such a popular word now inside and outside the church. Community means the people you are closest to, the people you live with more or less, not just your family but your friends, co-workers, neighbors and the like. This is your community. I know a lot of small groups in churches are called community groups. These are people that know you well that you work and serve with. Your community may include family members. Some people may say no family in my community, thank you! I’d rather not! But I remember reading an article in the paper that said in the past your community, your close circle of friends, was your neighbors. Well now we don’t know our neighbors, right? Very few of us know our neighbors. Now your community or your neighbors are your co-workers, the person in the cubicle next to you or on the floor above you, who ever you work with. That is your community more or less. James is writing about all these principles within the community of believers. He’s exhorting us, telling us what we need to do and what we need to watch out for and attitudes that we need to have.

We’ll start with humility. Now humility, you’ve probably heard this saying, is the one virtue that once you think you have it, you’ve lost it. Right? You can’t say, oh, I love my humility! I’m so humble! It doesn’t work that way. No. Watch those people that brag about their humility! James begins to address this in chapter 4:1-5, “ What is causing the quarrels and fights among you? Isn’t it the whole army of evil desires at war within you? You want what you don’t have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You are jealous for what others have, and you can’t possess it, so you fight and quarrel to take it away from them. And yet the reason you don’t have what you want is that you don’t ask God for it. And even when you do ask, you don’t get it because your whole motive is wrong- you want only what will give you pleasure.” James is saying what is the reason for so many of you quarreling and fighting? Now obviously there must’ve been people that had disagreements at this time in the church. I’m so glad we’re over that! He’s pointing out that obviously there was dissension within some of these groups as there always is, thank you to our human nature. He saying could it be that we all want our own way? Now have you ever been in a group like that? Somebody wants their way, somebody else wants their way and pretty soon it isn’t long until you have a conflict. Of course in church everyone feels like God told then that was the way to do it! Now that gets more complicated! Then you think what was God thinking when He told that person one thing and me something else and somebody else something different! Well, maybe God didn’t tell anybody anything! That might be the conclusion you have to come to! But James points out that the problem was the selfish desires. He’s saying you’re not thinking about the good of the body. You’re not thinking about the good of the whole. You’re thinking about your own selfish desires. You want your own way and that is why you are fighting and contending with each other. Now isn’t that usually the principle with any disagreement? We always want our own way. When we can’t have it or someone refuses to agree with us that our way is so incredibly brilliant it leads to disappointment or conflict. Then he says it’s not only that you want your own way and you can’t get it but that you don’t even think about praying. You don’t think about asking God for example to show you what to do about this situation. And when you do pray and you don’t get it, it makes you more angry and upset. But the reason you don’t get it is you don’t have pure motives. What is your motive? Your motive is that you will continue to get what you want. God is not a vending machine or a computer (that is a better example) where you put data in, you enter all this data, and you get a print out of exactly what you wanted. It’s not that way. He is a real living person. He is God and we have a relationship with Him. Your can’t just tag on some little phrase to a prayer and say it at a certain time of the day or do something like that and think that is particularly going to get God’s ear. You know what gets God’s ear? It is when our hearts and our motives are pure when we pray and we genuinely and truly want His will and way in our life.

It all goes back to wanting our own way. In Genesis 3, the creation account, when Satan came to Eve in the garden and he tempted her with the fruit, he said to her if you eat this fruit you can be like God. You will know evil from good and your eyes will be open. Well of course we all know that part of that came true. This is typical of a statement that is false, part of it is true and part of it is false. She did have her eyes opened. She did know at that time when she ate of the fruit, disobeyed God, the difference between good and evil but was she like God? No! No! She was not like God. In the bible it says Satan is a deceiver and Eve was deceived. In other words, she didn’t know better and was deceived. Adam himself knew the difference between right and wrong and intentionally ate the apple. Okay, we’ll talk about that at another time! Yes! But she was deceived. What did Satan say to her? Don’t you want to eat it? You mean there’s something you can’t have? Is this not human nature? The one thing you can’t have is the one thing you want. Anyone ever been around a toddler? They can do almost anything they want but the one thing they can’t touch is what they want. It’s our human nature now. Eve said but I want that and she wanted her own way and she got it. This is in essence our rebellion against God. I want my own way. When God pronounced judgment at the end of Genesis 3 on Adam and Eve, He did not curse them. He cursed the ground and He cursed the serpent. He did not curse them. But He made more or less a proclamation about the way things would be from now on. It’s interesting He didn’t go back and change anything in creation because remember what He had said? It is good. He said this is very good. He didn’t go back and change it just because Adam and Eve had messed it up. He left it the way it was but He said to Adam you would have to work the ground from now on. It will not cooperate with you and there will thorns and thistles. He said to Eve you will have pain in child bearing and your desire will be to rule over your husband. A lot of commentators will say that began the marital problems! Suddenly the whole idea of Adam and Eve living one for one and submitting one to another and living for the other wasn’t so pure any more. Adam decided he needed his own way and Eve decided she’d be getting her own way and let the games begin! There you go! From that time on we have all wanted our own way and choosing against God’s way. That is our human nature. Now that is interesting that it didn’t just come from nowhere.

It’s a mystery though of where evil first began. We will not be covering that in FOCUS. It’s not something we can figure out. But you know there is an insight in Isaiah 14. Isaiah, the Old Testament prophet, is speaking about the king of Babylon or the king of Tyre and this is a type, a picture more or less, a figurative language or picture of Satan. Many people have talked about how in fact Jesus quoted this scripture in the New Testament when He talks about Satan. Isaiah says this in chapter 14:12-14, “How you have fallen from heaven, O shining star, son of the morning! You have been thrown down to the earth, you who destroyed the nations of the world. For you said to yourself, ‘I will ascend to heaven and set my throne above God’s stars. I will preside on the mountain of the gods far away in the north. I will climb to the highest heavens and be like the Most High’.” Now most people believe and because of the passage Jesus speaks about in the New Testament that parallels this that there was a time in heaven when there was war and one of God’s chief angels, Satan, rebelled against God. He said I would be like the Most High. I will get my own way. Of course he was cast out of heaven and that was when evil and the forces of evil began. It all goes back to us wanting our own way.

The pride of life is what the bible talks about and James connects that with fighting and quarreling and he also connects it to unanswered prayer. I think it’s interesting that he says when you want something the reason you don’t have is you don’t even ask God for it. Sometimes we don’t even think about praying. Have you ever done that? I have. I’m ashamed to admit it. Something will happen and I won’t even think about praying until it gets real bad and I’m personally uncomfortable about something in some way. Then I’m on my face rolling around on the ground praying! You know! It’s amazing how many times as Christians it takes us time before we realize we need to pray. Paul said in Corinthians, pray about everything. Lift everything up to God no matter how insignificant it may be. I have often thought, you know, I just hate to pray about seemingly small insignificant things that I know God has given me enough sense to handle but then I always go back to that verse. He said to pray about everything. So I do. I try to and I ask God to help me remember for that to be my first inclination when something happens good or bad, to pray, my first reaction. I think the more you grow as a Christian and the stronger your prayer life becomes, the more you are inclined to do that. But these people were so far from Him and so filled with their own selfishness that they didn’t even think to pray. That’s something to check about your own heart. That’s the problem. What’s the solution?

Starting in James 4:6-10, “God gives us more and more strength to stand against such evil desires. As the Scriptures say, ‘God sets himself against the proud, but he shows favor to the humble.’ So humble yourselves before God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw close to God, and God will draw close to you. Wash your hands, you sinners; purify your hearts you hypocrites. Let there be sadness instead of laughter, and gloom instead of joy. When you bow down before the Lord and admit your dependence on him, he will lift you up and give you honor.” What James is saying here is that God resists the proud but gives grace to the humble. God is drawn toward those who will admit their own selfish desires and their own need for Him. This passage is a classic in the New Testament because a few imperatives tell us what we want to do. Do we want to know God? Do you want to get close to Him? Do you not want to be tormented by your own will, wanting your own way, conflicts, problems, unanswered prayer, and frustration in your Christian walk? What are you going to do? If you go to this passage you will find wonderful directions. The first thing that James is saying here is that God shows favor or is attracted to those who are humble. He’s drawn to those who have humility and a humble spirit. In Luke 18, I won’t take time to read it, but Jesus tells the story of a poor man and the Pharisees that were praying. Do you remember that story? He tells of the Pharisee, a religious leader, who stood on the platform and raved, raised his hands and prayed in a loud voice, thank you God that I’m not like these other sinners. The traditional Jewish prayer was thanks that I’m a man; I’m not a sinner and all of this. Then Jesus contrasts him with a poor man, a sinner, who was on his knees and was bowing toward God and he was saying over and over, God be merciful to me a sinner. Jesus was using this as a teaching tool to his disciples and He said, “ I tell you, this sinner, not the Pharisee, returned home justified before God. For the proud will be humbled, but the humble will be honored” (Luke 18:14). The poor man was justified not the Pharisee who raised his hands in his pride so proud of who he was and just amazed that God would be so lucky to have him. There are so many verses throughout Scripture that support this whole idea that God is drawn to those who humble themselves before Him. I want to tell you, you know this to be true, no matter how many situations you get into, confusion or not knowing what is right to do, knowing the will of God, let me tell you this, the safest place you can be is on your knees, humbling yourself before God. You’ll be saying, Lord I know nothing. I know nothing. I don’t know of anything that is more of a detriment to a person’s spiritual life than spiritual pride. Have you ever known anybody with spiritual pride? Hmmmm! They’re usually the ones as I talked about before that will tell you how humble they are. I have a friend who has a woman she’s mentoring. My friend was telling me that she really doesn’t know what to tell her as she is alarmed by some of the things she is telling her. She’s telling her that spiritually she’s right where she needs to be; I wish my husband would follow my example in reading the bible, God is answering my prayers, I’m so fine where I am. I am doing just fabulous! My friend is as old as I am and has been a Christian forever and we had to laugh because you know the older you get you know you don’t know anything. I know nothing! In fact that’s in the Psalms. The writer said, I know nothing. I know that feeling. It’s so interesting. I really believe the closer you come to Christ in your Christian walk the less you feel like you know. The more you feel like you need Him the more dependent on Him you’ll be. It’s interesting that those people who seem to think they have it all together and they’re right where they need to be, well I’m happy for them! But you know what? We’re in pretty good company if we feel like we know nothing. My friend and I started going through Scripture as we usually do. Paul said that he was the chief of all sinners. He said that at the end of his ministry. He started out in his letters about how he was the Hebrew of Hebrews, how he was so educated and he had so much of a pedigree and in the last book, I can’t remember which one, he said he was the worse blasphemer and sinner on the face of the earth. He said I am the chief of sinners. No one is a worse sinner than I am. Paul said that. Think of David, king David, who is admired as one of the greatest men in Scriptures. Read through the Psalms and talk about how he sees himself as so needy and so poor and so desperate for God to show up in his life. He’s so grateful and appreciative of God’s love and mercy. The great people in Scripture, you will see, the closer and the more used they are by God, the more they need Him and the more humble they become. That’s not an accident. Humility is part of a growing Christian’s make up and it is also a primary characteristic of somebody that God can use. So first James says to submit to God. That would be the first big hurtle. Submit to God and recognize you need for Him. That means going against desiring your own way. Submit yourselves to God. Then he says to resist evil. Now think of all these things that James has told us in this book which we should not do. We need to watch our speech. We need to not show favoritism. We need to watch the way we talk about people. We need not to be hypocrites. All these things he’s talked about in the previous chapters. He’s saying resist those things. Put them away, get rid of them if you want to submit yourself to God and you want to draw close to Him. I love that. Draw near to Him. When we become a Christian God is seeking us out. He takes the initiative doesn’t He? His Holy Spirit comes to us and draws us to Him. But I’m convinced that there are points along the way in your Christian life, latter on in life, when it is your move. You’re a believer, you’re a child of God, you’re His daughter, you’re in His family but I believe there are times when He challenges us. Do you want to go further? Do you want to go deeper? Will you seek Me? Will you come after Me? I’m convinced many Christians maybe don’t want to do that and say I’m fine where I am. And God in His mercy and love and care for you let’s you stay there. But there are others I’m convinced that He calls to move up, to draw near to Him, to make the extra effort to come after Him, to pursue Him, to want Him and to find Him. Bruce Wilkerson in his book, Secrets of the Vine, talks about that very thing. That step of drawing near to God. It’s excellent. That’s what James is talking about here and then he says to cleanse your hands. Do you know what that means? It means to make restitution. Remember the story of Zacchaeus and Jesus? Zacchaeus was a tax collector who came to Christ. He not only received God’s forgiveness but he repaid those that he had robbed back four-fold what he had taken from them. That’s what cleanse your hands means, restitution. Don’t only ask for forgiveness but apologize. Make restitution in some way. Go to that person and take the initiative to that situation and fix as much as you can. Then he says to purify your hearts. In 1 Peter 1:22 he says, “Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for your brothers, love one another deeply, from the heart.” You purify your soul by obeying the truth. How do you purify your soul? By obeying the truth that God has put before you. You purify your heart by obedience. Then he says lament and be sorry. If you took that verse out of context, you would wonder what he was talking about! But you need to take this seriously and connect it to the verses before about quarreling, fighting and not getting your own way. He says you need to take your own sins seriously and lament them. It reminds me of Matthew 5, the Sermon on the Mount, when Jesus said blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of God. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst after righteousness for they shall be filled. He’s talking about those who are humble. Those who are spiritually needy. Those who are not afraid to say they are dependent on God for everything that they have and everything they need. They recognize their own sinful state.

Then verse 10 summarizes this whole thing, “ When you humble yourself before the Lord, He will lift you up and give you honor.” I don’t know of a better example than this but Chuck Colson back in 1973, I think, was convicted in Watergate. I’m sure some of you have read about that in your history books, you’re so young you don’t remember! But I do! He was convicted of breaking the law of the land and he tells about it in his book, Born Again, written in the late 1970’s. He tells of his conversion experience. He was out on the driveway; sitting in a car after being in a bible study and suddenly the magnitude of his sin came upon him. He was sitting in that car weeping and weeping realizing that not only had he broken the law and had sinned against the American people but he had also sinned against God. He was a broken man. God began to make something of him. He went to prison. He served his time. It was in prison that he began to grow as a Christian. He began to understand what the word of God really meant. He wanted to totally conform his mind to God’s word and to His ways. We know that out of that prison experience he developed the most powerful and influential ministry toward prisoners in the world, Prison Fellowship. All this began when one man humbled himself before God. That’s what I think about when I read this verse. You humble yourself in a car, on a cold winter night, sit there and weep and weep and you mean it and begin to change, there’s no telling what God can do with you. That’s exactly what happened to him.

All right, we’ve run out of time but aren’t you glad because the next point is patience! Well, very quickly, God blesses the people who patiently endure testing. The next few verses talk about being patient in chapter 5:7-11, “Dear brothers and sisters, you must be patient as you wait for the Lord’s return. Consider the farmers who eagerly look for the rains in the fall and in the spring. They patiently wait for the precious harvest to ripen. You, too, must be patient. And take courage, for the coming of the Lord is near. Don’t grumble about each other, my brothers and sisters, or God will judge you. For look! The great Judge is coming. He is standing at the door! For examples of patience in suffering, dear brothers and sisters, look at the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord. We give great honor to those who endure under suffering. Job is an example of a man who endured patiently. From his experience we see how the Lord’s plan finally ended in good, for he is full of tenderness and mercy.” You know how we talked about the verse, James1: 12, in the first week when we looked at this book. God blesses the people who patiently endure testing. They will receive the crown of life. There are five crowns that will be given at the final judgment of believers and the crown of life is one of those. When I was here before, I shared the story about how when I went to China, three Chinese girls that our group prayed for came to Christ. Because they became believers, they were kicked out of their homes. One girl had a 5-year-old little boy that she was forbidden to see any more. There was a translator as we were praying and as they began to tell their story, what had happened to them, the translator began weeping, tears just dropping off her jaw onto her shirt and of course the rest of us were just sitting on the edge of our seat wanting to know what was happening. The translator began to tell us the story of these girls and how their husbands had kicked them out. Yet these girls had said, this is the path that God has called us to walk and we will walk it. They made a pact among themselves that they would visit village to village and teach, share and evangelize. They had won something like 65 women to Christ in the mountainous villages.

Abstract

This is one of the best loved hymns of all times, written by two sisters. The simplicity of this song expresses a great truth: Jesus loves us, and we can know this for certain.