Day 32: 40 Days Through The New Testament

Ishmael LaBiosa: Welcome to 40 Days through the New Testament. This podcast is led by Pastor Rusty Small at Liberty Baptist Church in Appomattox, Virginia. Listen as he guides you through all 27 books of the New Testament in preparation for Easter. Get your Bible ready, here's today's message. Well, we move to the book of James and this is often seen to be a very practical book. A lot of people in Bible studies love the book of James. I think they love it because of its practical wisdom style. Oftentimes when you read James, it sounds like the book of Proverbs in places. And so the application of James seems to be rather straightforward. I'd like to give you a little bit of context to maybe understand James somewhat in context. It seems so practical and so accessible that sometimes we might miss that there's actually somewhat of a situation in view. James, well, he is the half-brother of Jesus. He is not a follower of Jesus while Jesus is doing his earthly ministry, but only becomes a follower of Jesus after the resurrection. And then James becomes a major leader in the Jerusalem church. So James is pastoring the Jerusalem church and Well, they're experiencing some persecution, but the persecution that James seems to be noting is actually not persecution of like being beaten. The persecution is very likely, you ready for this, economic persecution. And I'll read it for you. James chapter five, this theme appears multiple times like in. Chapter one, it says, brother of humble circumstance should rejoice in his exaltation. Like there's a sense of like, well, if you're, you have very little, be okay. That's actually could be a spiritual benefit to you. But in James five, what do we, we hear a very straightforward statement. It says, James five four, look the pay that you withheld from the workers who mowed your fields cries out and the outcry of the harvesters has reached the ears. of the Lord of Hosts. So bottom line, it looks like that one of the situations that the Christians are facing here that's being addressed in the book of James is they're working and because of their Christianity, they're just not getting paid. Like the boss is saying, you're a Christian, I don't need to pay you. And well, that's creating some trials, some difficulties. I want to just... make note here, the focus of James. So James is like officially, officially, I said the writer of the book of Hebrews is sometimes listed among the general epistles, but James is indeed listed among the general epistles. And James, first, second, Peter, first, second, third, John, in this section of the general epistles, which was present in Hebrews, is the theme, listen carefully. of faithfulness, of faithfulness. James in James 2 is going to say, what shall we say if a man says he has faith, but he doesn't have works? Can that type of faith save him? With a rhetorical answer of no. See, James wants to focus in his book, he wants to focus on the fruit of faith. Real, genuine faith produces fruit. The fruit of faithfulness. This is sometimes something that I think has been missed in evangelicalism that we have focused a great deal on initial faith or a confession, but sometimes, listen carefully, Ladies and gentlemen, sometimes a mere confession saying, believe, isn't genuine. And one of the ways, per James, is to see if confession actually is real, that that initial faith is legitimate. One of the ways to note real faith from what I label fake faith, The way to get for it is fruit and faithfulness. Let some bad times come. let some difficulties arise and see if that initial trust in Jesus is developed into faithfulness. And throughout this letter, this book, we're going to see James talk about this. He's going to talk about James chapter one. He's going to talk about maturing through trials. James is going to make an audacious statement. Count it all joy, my brothers, when you fall into various trials. Not a soul likes a trial. And James says we don't rejoice in the trial per se, we rejoice in what the trial can do, what it can produce in us. And that James says stay in the trial long enough so that you can actually emerge on the other side of the trial more mature. Even here in chapter one, he's noticing, let the brother of humble circumstance boast in his exaltation, but the rich boast in their humiliation. He seems to be aware that maybe they're being persecuted economically. Their pay is being withheld. And James says, learn how to trust God even in this. Learn how to deepen maturity even in this. James is gonna talk about temptation. He's going to say, look, don't go blaming God when you are succumb to temptation. He says, that's not God leading you to do wrong. That's you leading you to do wrong. Maybe you need to grow in faithfulness. And James says, you ought to be careful that you don't just hear the word because there are plenty of people who can hear and then do nothing about it. He says a faithful person is not gonna be a mere hearer of the word, they're gonna be a doer of the word. By the way, James says, ⁓ by the way, faithfulness is also going to be seen in your lack of favoritism. He says, especially if you're being persecuted by folks who... have a lot and they're taking from you which seemed to be an unjust situation in James. He says and then you favoring certain people because they come into the church service wearing better clothes. He says repent of the sin of favoritism which then brings us to the heart I think of his argument which is in James 2 of which he says if you say you have faith but you don't have works is this type of fruitless faith? Real and genuine? James says no. Real faith produces faithfulness. And then he points out the duplicity that is found in the tongue and says that there should not be duplicity in the tongue, there should be consistency in the tongue. We shouldn't out of one place have fresh water and salt water using a natural analogy. He says likewise, in our speech. And he says, especially those who teach you. And James 3, 1, not many of you should be teachers, brothers, for you'll receive the stricter condemnation of all the people who should have control of their mouths with consistency of speech. James says, are the teachers in the church? James 4, he points out this idea of the source of wars and fights among you. Don't they come from your passions that wage war within you? Again, duplicity. He says adulterous people. Don't you know their friendship with the world is hostility with God? A faithful person is one who has a singular vision for God and Him alone. We get to chapter five where he addresses this apparent situation where people are experiencing this persecution in the church and then ends the book. regarding prayer. I just want to point out when you read James, understand that we should not minimize this theme of faithfulness and that if you're going to read one section more slowly in James, read James 2 when he talks about faith versus works and try to get to the depths of that, that it is possible to have a profession that is not real. And it is also possible to have a profession that goes heart deep, that produces fruit and faithfulness. And per James, that is real and genuine saving faith. Thank you for listening to this podcast, A Ministry of Liberty Baptist Church. We pray that this is an encouragement to study God's Word and that you will join us for the next episode.