James: Authentic Faith - Week 10: I Can't Control Everything, But I Can Control Some Things | James 4:13-17

Hi, Professor Jonathan.

Thanks for downloading the FBC El Dorado German podcast.

In this week's message, we can continue our study of James as we examine James chapter 4, verses 13 through 17.

James 4:13–17

In these verses, James reminds us that I can't control everything, but I can control something.

I hope this week's message is an encouragement to you.

Eugene Pauly earned 18 patents.

Now, among all of those 18 patents, one of them stands out among all the rest.

In 1955, Eugene Pauly gave the world its very first wireless remote control.

They called it the Flashmatic.

It looks very much like the Jetsons when you look at the ad, doesn't it?

Did anybody have a flashmatic when you were growing up?

No one in the room?

Well, you learned something new today, didn't you?

So the first thing I noticed about the flashmatic is that it more resembles a very small hairdryer than it does a modern remote control.

Nonetheless, the flashmatic does what our remote controls do.

It allows you to sit across the room from your television and to control it.

From the comfort of your couch, from your favorite chair, you can uh turn the television on or off.

You can change the channels, you can have the volume go up or go down.

It's been 65 years since the flashmatic was uh first introduced.

And over those 65 years, remote controls have undergone some very significant changes.

Um, more buttons have been added, the shape has been transformed, and now remote controls they've really like cemented their place in every American home.

A recent study says that the average American living room, not American home, the average American living room has four remote controls.

So I think about the remote controls in my living room.

There's a remote control, you know, for the television, a remote control for the Blu-ray player, there's a remote control for the streaming device, like the Roku player or whatever you have to watch Netflix on your TV, or uh have a remote control then for the soundbar, so you have better sound than uh what is like installed in the TV itself.

So one reason I think that we have so many remote controls is because each one has a unique function.

I need each of the remote controls I listed for you because each one of them controls a specific device in my home.

But I also think there's another reason that so many remote controls fill our houses.

It's actually, I think, a more foundational reason.

Remote controls communicate a universal desire.

In other words, the prevalence of remote controls reveals something fundamental about what it means to be human.

So many remote controls in your home and in my home, they point us to a constant, persistent yearning of the human heart.

I desire to be in control.

A reminder, like I want to control my environment, I want to control my world, I want to control what happens within these four walls, what happens in my heart, what happens in my mind, what happens when I see it happen on TV.

But of course, control is a desire that most of us want to deny is even present, right?

Nobody wants to be known as controlling.

No one wants their children to call them a control freak.

But listen, control isn't all that bad.

Control, in fact, it's one way that we um express personal responsibility in the world.

You express control by doing that action, performing it.

No one controlled you, no one compelled you to do it.

You are responsible for how you acted, for how you behaved, for what you said.

Or think of it this way: control is one way that we assign significance and meaning to our actions in the world.

Here's an example.

Uh last weekend, I drove Evelyn from El Dorado to Birmingham.

Uh, my sister lives in Birmingham, and Evelyn was going to spend the week with them.

So, on the way from El Dorado to Birmingham, we passed the lunch hour, and so we stopped at a Zaxby's and we had some chicken and fries.

That's what you have at Zaxby's.

With Zaxby's sauce, right?

If you've ever been to one.

So we eat our meal together.

Um, we're we're preparing to throw it into the trash can and get back on the road, and Evelyn just says to me, she looks at me and she says, Dad, thanks so much for this food.

And in that moment, realize this.

Evelyn had full control of her words as a nine-year-old.

No one compelled her to say that statement.

Like she didn't have Lauren beside her saying, You should thank your dad for the food.

I wasn't fishing for a compliment.

I didn't say, Evelyn, did you like what I got you for lunch?

No, like we were just sitting and having a meal and we were packing it up and gonna put it in the trash, and you said, Dad, thanks so much for the food.

She just said it.

And as her dad, that's why it meant so much to me.

She was expressing control in that moment.

It brought significance and meaning to her words.

So, control isn't a bad thing necessarily.

It's actually just a very human thing.

So we shouldn't deny that desire.

But here's the thing: we do need to rightly define that desire.

We need to rightly understand this desire to be in control.

We need to give parameters around the control that we desire to express out of our hearts.

And here's the reason why.

If we rightly define control, if we give it the proper boundaries within which to operate in our life, we have this opportunity to experience actually some peace and some purpose in life when we exercise control rightly.

But the opposite is just as true.

When we define control wrongly, when we don't give it the proper boundaries or parameters to operate within, that's when our life so often is overwhelmed by fear and insecurity and anxiety and uncertainty.

So today, as we continue our series called Authentic Faith, this journey through the book of James, James, this half-brother of Jesus, he's gonna help us rightly define, put some parameters around this universal human desire.

Here's the reason why.

James doesn't want you to live with fear, he doesn't want you to live with anxiety, he doesn't want you to live with uncertainty.

He wants you to live a life that is filled with a true gospel purpose, that is um inundated with a true gospel peace.

And so I think this is the parameter James sets up for my desire and your desire to be in control.

Here's the parameter I can't control everything, but I can control some things.

I can't control everything.

So he says there's limits to control.

Like you have to put a parameter around it, you have to put a fence around it.

Because there are some things outside of your control.

That's the first thing he wants us to realize.

But the second thing is this so often when we realize there's a parameter around what I can control, we decide, well, there must be nothing I can control at all.

I'm just gonna sit on the sideline.

I'm just gonna let life happen to me.

I'm gonna act as if my life has no significance.

It can't have meaning, it can't have purpose.

Everything just happens to me.

James says, no, no, no, no.

There are still some things you can't control.

And it's learning to live with that tension of what I can't control everything, but I can control some things.

When we realize that and live within that tension, we put the proper boundaries around this desire to be in control, that's just one more step toward living out this authentic, actionable faith that we've been talking about for so many weeks.

Listen to what James says, chapter 4, verses 13 through 16.

He says, Now listen, you who say, Today or tomorrow, we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business, and make money.

Why?

You do not even know what will happen tomorrow.

What is your life?

You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.

Instead, you ought to say, if it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that.

As it is, you boast in your arrogant schemes.

All such boasting is evil.

In verses thirteen through sixteen, James teaches us that one of the things in life that we so often attempt to control is actually something that is outside of our control.

We cannot predict what is going to happen.

You and I, we can't control the future.

So to make that point, James describes a merchant.

This merchant, he has plans to start a business.

He's identified a city that has a market vacancy.

And so he wants to go and establish his business in that city.

He sees it as an opportunity to make uh extensive product or profit.

So when I think about this merchant, you can't help but kind of put it into 2021, right?

Begin to contextualize the illustration.

So as I read about this brief description of a merchant, I have to wonder things like has he worked in the industry before?

Has he been mentored by an industry leader?

Is he already familiar with the playbook of how to be successful in this business venture?

Has he run that playbook many times, but all the profits have gone to the other owner?

And now he's just ready to step out on his own and make profits for himself, to be his own boss.

And then I imagine maybe he needs some investors, or maybe he needs a loan from the bank.

So what's he do?

He prepares a presentation.

He gets this really well thought out, well laid out plan.

He's got spreadsheets, he's got charts, he's got graphs.

And he goes to this meeting, his presentation is flawless.

He knows exactly what to say.

He's thought about every variable that could emerge.

He talks to them about uh startup expenses, he talks to them about projected profits and projected um expenses for the year.

He gives them a plan for when he'll actually begin to turn a profit.

And he's really got this really aggressive plan.

Like he knows the playbook frontwards and back.

He's run it so many times in the past.

He's like, I'm just gonna be here for one year.

One year.

Then I maybe will go to another city, to another market.

I'll turn over this business to a manager.

It'll go seamlessly, and I'll move to the another market and I'll open a new office and start a new franchise.

Maybe he's in a room with scowling faces.

Like, this is a tough crowd.

Tough crowd in that room.

But he's able to answer all their questions.

He's seemingly thought about everything.

The investors agree, or the the bank agrees to give the loan.

Approval.

Yeah, go forward with that plan.

That'll work.

And with that illustration, here's what James wants to point out to us.

We often presume that we can control the future by developing a really well-thought out plan.

That there's a point when we can control the future if we come up with a foolproof, can't fail plan.

If we can think of every variable that we've ever seen and include it in that plan, then no matter what happens, we will be successful.

But listen, here's the thing.

Like James says, hold your horses for a minute.

Just think about that.

You don't know what tomorrow's gonna bring.

He's not suggesting that a plan isn't important.

Elsewhere Scripture tells us, Proverbs 21, 5, that the plans of the diligent lead to profit, as surely as haste leads to poverty.

Listen, a plan isn't bad, but you have to keep the plan in perspective.

Because whether or not your plan comes to fruition is ultimately outside of your control.

Now, I want you to bring those words of James in chapter 4, verses 13 through 16.

I want you to bring those words into the events of the last 18 months.

Last 20 months.

And I think if James were to be walking the streets in 2020 and 2021 in the United States, and he were to walk down Main Street of El Dorado or another downtown area, he would say this, he would say this.

Listen, you had a great plan when you opened your business, but no amount of good management or perfect marketing can necessarily overcome what tomorrow will bring.

You see those hundreds of thousands of small business owners who shuttered their shops during the pandemic.

Most of them have not read James, but they 100% agree with James.

They see the wisdom in his words.

They know I can't control everything.

I can't predict the future.

Here's what occurs, though.

When a business owner, or when your family, or when you in your personal life, or when you with your college dreams, listen, when you have this well-thought-out plan and you've thought through every single variable, you think you can control and determine your future.

When that plan falls apart, that's when life begins to feel like it's spinning out of control.

A few weeks ago, I started watching a series on Netflix that was a documentary that chronicles the race circuit of Formula One racing.

It's called Drive to Survive.

So a Formula One race car can go zero to 60 in like 2.6 seconds.

And those cars can go upwards of 220 miles per hour.

So there's about 10, 11 teams on the Formula One circuit, and every one of those teams invests somewhere between like a quarter of a billion dollars to half a billion dollars in the research and development of their car every single year.

A quarter of a billion to half a billion dollars in their car.

And so they hire these drivers, like literally, you know, men who I don't think their brains have fully developed to realize the risk at which they are putting their lives at, to drive a car in Monaco or London or Fort Worth, like they're driving these races at 220 miles an hour through hairpin turns.

And when those drivers are hired, you know what they're expected to always be?

They're expected to always be in control.

That's a half a billion dollar investment you're sitting in.

You better always be in control.

Yet without fail, without fail, multiple times in every single race, drivers lose control.

They could be as a result of a mechanical failure.

Or others, they careen out of control, they enter into one of those hairpin turns and they don't break soon enough.

Or others they spin out of control, someone's trying to pass them and they clip the front wing of their car.

As it turns out, these highly trained, highly compensated Formula One drivers, they can't control everything.

There are some things that are outside of their control.

And maybe that should just be a reminder to you and to me.

I can't control everything.

And one of the things that is outside of my control is the future.

You may have felt that loss of control when your future had been built around that dream job or getting an acceptance to that dream college.

Like that was your future.

And then you get the rejection letter.

Or maybe you receive and find and receive that dream job, or you are admitted to that dream college, but once you get there, that dream becomes a nightmare.

Like your future, it feels like it goes up in flames.

Or you may have felt like your life was careening out of control when seemingly overnight the person who is your best friend becomes your worst enemy.

Or a relationship ends unexpectedly.

It's just hard for you to imagine your future apart from that person.

Or it feels like life is spinning out of control when a family member dies, or when a sickness lingers, or when a depression sets in.

It's hard for you to imagine being able to endure that future.

And when life feels like it's out of control, when there feels like there are things, especially our future, is beyond our reach, we go to one of two extremes.

We try all the harder to control it.

Or we just throw up our hands in the air and say, I give up.

I'm done.

I can't do it anymore.

And you're probably aware that neither of those reactions works at all.

Neither of those reactions is healthy.

So what do we do?

Listen to what Psalm 46, verse 10 says.

Psalms 46:10

It says, let go of your concerns.

Then you will know that I am God.

I I rule the nations, I rule the earth.

Maybe you could paraphrase the message of Psalm 4610 this way: God controls what I cannot control, I won't be worried.

God controls what I cannot control.

I won't be worried.

You know, for some of us in this room, the reason our lives are filled with fear and anxiety and uncertainty, the reason we lash out at people is because we are trying to control things that are outside of the parameters of the human life.

Listen, you cannot control the future of your child or grandchild.

You cannot control the future of a community or a country.

Listen, you can try to influence it, but you still don't know what tomorrow will bring.

You cannot control it.

But this is the hallelujah moment.

This is like the hallelujah, praise God moment.

And some of you are just so worried.

Like, if I can't control my kid, if I can't control my grandkid, if I can't control where our country's going, if I can't control where my community's going, I'm I'm done.

This is the hallelujah moment.

God controls what I cannot control.

At least somebody's listening, I guess, right?

I won't be worried.

I can influence and try to be a part of the solution, but I have to realize at some point.

I can't control it.

Now listen, God, He demonstrates his control not by micromanaging the events of this world or micromanaging the events of your life.

Our King is also our Father.

And our Father, who is our King, wants to live in relationship with us.

And for a relationship to be authentic and real, He cannot manipulate every area of your life.

God gives us freedom, right?

God allows us to make choices.

He gives us free will.

But listen, God is still in control.

Here's how God shows that he's in control.

This is how God expresses his control.

God shows that he's in control by being concerned.

Like nothing occurs in your life, nothing occurs in the life of the world on all the continents without God knowing about it.

He's concerned about it.

He's never caught off guard with a turn of events.

He's in control.

God shows his control by offering comfort to us when we're hurting and compassion to those who are broken.

God shows and proves that he is in control because the Father sent Jesus Christ.

And it's all because of Jesus that we can say this.

In all things he works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.

It's because of Jesus that we look forward to a future when God will dwell with us and there will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain.

God controls what I cannot control.

I won't be worried.

Now listen, for the future God has planned.

Listen, it's gonna come to pass, and it's gonna be more spectacular than the future you could plan.

Than the future you could pull off.

And listen, I'm really glad the future's not in your hands, and I'm really glad the future's not in my hands, because if it were in your hands or my hands, or the hands in Washington, or the hands in Little Rock, or the hands somewhere else around the world of anyone throughout human history, if it were in their hands, when we got to the future, we'd all be disappointed.

It'd be like we walked into a five-year-old's birthday party, and the cake was already smashed, and the balloons were lying on the floor.

It would just be like, this is what we waited for?

This is what we're looking forward to.

But listen, you're not in control, and I'm not in control.

And the future God has planned for us.

We've sung about it this morning.

We read about it in Scripture.

I promise you it won't be a disappointment.

So I don't know about you, but I'm really happy to say this morning, I can't control everything.

I'm happy that God has released the burden, lifted the burden, the yoke off of my mind to think I have to control the future.

He's got it.

I don't have to be worried.

But until God's future becomes our present, you and I have a responsibility to accept.

I can control some things.

Listen to what James says next.

This is verse 17.

If anyone then knows the good they ought to do and doesn't do it, it is a sin for them.

After laying out something what we cannot control, we cannot control, we cannot predict the future.

James spins a single verse and he says, But listen, guys, you got to get off the sideline.

Listen, don't think that means your life is insignificant or unimportant, that it can't have purpose.

There are still some things you can control.

And it's summed up in that phrase, the good you ought to do.

That's what you can control, the good you ought to do.

You can control how you live in the here and now.

In fact, for the first four chapters of this epistle, uh, throughout the first four chapters of this letter, uh, James has given us numerous areas of our life over which we have control.

I want to read and remind you of just a few of them right now.

James chapter 1, verse 19.

James 1:19

Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry.

That's something you can control.

Next, James chapter 1, verse 22.

James 1:22

Do not merely listen to the word and so deceive yourselves.

Do what it says.

You can't control the future.

You can control that.

James chapter 3, verse 13.

James 3:13

Who is wise in understanding among you?

Let them show it by their good life, by deeds done in humility that comes from wisdom.

I can't predict the future, but I can control my attitude.

Next verse.

If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, love your neighbor as yourself.

You are doing right.

That's something we can control.

Together, those verses and so many others that James writes, they just remind me over and over.

Those are a few things you can control, Jonathan.

Isn't it so true, though, that we often live life focusing on what is outside of our grasp, focusing on what we cannot control, we cannot even influence.

Or maybe you think about this way, we focus on things that are above our pay grade.

And instead of focusing and living life like the middle management that we are, let God control the future, hold the future, make sure the future comes to pass, and focus on the life.

You can live in the present.

I can control if I apply God's word in the here and now.

I can control how I hear others speak and how I speak to others.

I can control the attitude that fills my heart.

I can control whether or not I love my neighbor.

Accept responsibility for the things you can control.

Right?

But we like to reverse it, right?

We want to accept responsibility for the things we definitely cannot control, and then we want to abdicate responsibility for the things we actually can control.

And instead of having an authentic faith, we have an impotent faith.

We have a faith that's not actionable because I can't, honestly, I can try to influence, but I cannot control the future.

I can't predict it.

But what I can control is how I live in the here and now.

So that through my actions and my attitudes and the words I speak from my mouth, I declare the truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ.

I can possess an authentic faith that lives within the parameters that God has established in the world.

I can't control everything, and that's okay.

Can't predict the future.

It's okay.

No reason to be worried.

God's got it under control.

But I can control some things, guys.

You can control some things.

You just have to accept the responsibility.

Accept the responsibility that there is good you ought to do in the present.

And often we ask, what's God's will for my life?

What's God's perfect and pleasing will?

Here it is for you.

Do the good you already know you need to do.

That's God's will for you.

Not some unopened door, not some path you've never discovered before.

Be faithful in the present.

That's his will.

For every one of us who've called on the name of Jesus Christ.

Let's pray.

For just a moment.

I want you to tell God that you trust Him with the future.

And if you struggle to say that, tell God why you struggle to say that.

Confess to God I can't control everything.

Jesus says, do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself.

Each day has enough trouble of its own.

And now accept the responsibility before God.

The responsibility of those things you can control.

The way you speak, the way you listen, the way you love, the way you live, the attitudes of your heart.

Jesus also says that we should seek first his kingdom and his righteousness.

That's something we can control.

The words of James this morning.

They remove some pressure from us.

And we are grateful.

We're grateful that we aren't in charge of the future.

That you are.

And we're going to trust you.

We're going to trust you because you are always good.

You're abounding in kindness and compassion.

And you're full of justice.

Holy Spirit, lift the burden of anxiety and fear, uncertainty.

Reminded when in the Gospels the man tells Jesus, Help me, I don't have faith.

Give us faith.

And now, God, we accept the responsibility.

We accept the responsibility to do the good we already know to do.

That we would live in the here and now as followers of Jesus.

Letting nothing distract us from your plan in this world.

In Christ's name we pray.

Amen.

And now we're gonna be led in a familiar hymn, Be Thou My Vision.

And when we have a clear vision of who our God is, it just re-emphasizes what I can't control everything.

But the God we see, what I don't control, He controls right now.

He's got it in his hand, he's got it under control.

But that God, he's also calling you and I.

He's calling us to accept the responsibility for the present of how we live our lives.

Would you stand and sing?