“It’s A Choice” - James Chapter 1: 1-25 - Special Guest, Jay Miller

You know, when Steve asked me if I would participate in this service, I was thinking holiday weekend,

sure, nobody's gonna be around, it's gonna be awful empty, and yet, here all of you are.

You must have been real bad this week, otherwise I can't imagine why you'd be here listening

to me.

So my name is Jay Miller, as Steve said, and I usually reside right over here in this area

with my beautiful wife Selena, my children Evelyn and Wyatt, my folks and my grandmother

also usually join us on Sundays, so we participate and we're here pretty regularly.

I'm excited and honestly just incredibly humbled to even stand here before you and share in

the Word of God today, I'm just, I'm overjoyed, really.

I'm also a part of a group, a handful of guys in here, part of a group called Man Time,

and I'm gonna take just a couple of seconds to plug that while I have the microphone and

can do so.

So we meet on Monday nights, and it's a fellowship for men, as iron sharpens iron, so the Proverbs

say, so do one man sharpen another, and that's what we do, we talk about life, we talk about

issues, we talk about things that we're facing as men, the struggles and the battles, so

if you fit the biblical prerequisite of being a man and not the worldly prerequisite of

being a man, I encourage you to join us, I would love to have you there, it truly would

mean a lot to us, so please come join us, Monday nights, 7 o'clock, we meet at Guns

and Gear, but please note, tomorrow, Monday night, we will not be there for the holiday,

but next Monday we will pick up on that.

So today I'm gonna be in the book of James, and James 1 verse 1, and I thought it was

James 1:1

important to talk a little bit about the book itself and the author, right, so it's a self-titled

epistle, James being the oldest half-brother of Jesus, and you know, he wasn't always a

believer, he didn't always, you know, we know from the Gospel of John that him and his brothers

didn't always believe in Jesus, and you know, the book was written to fellow believers at

the time of insane violence, with the first early church, and so they estimate between

44 and 49 AD, which makes it the earliest canon, earliest epistle and earliest writings

of the New Testament canon.

We also know that James was a very significant leader, according to the book of Acts, and

in Galatians he was even described as a pillar of the early church.

I can't imagine life as, you know, Jesus being your older brother, right?

Could you imagine the realness of that?

And so it's easy for me to understand why he would be maybe rebellious, or he might

push away this idea of who Jesus truly was, but then something changed, and his belief

changed, and not only did his belief change, but he chose to become a servant of the church.

He chose to become a significant leader of the church during a time that it probably

wasn't real comfortable to do so, and I'm assuming that this happened after he saw the

risen Christ, right?

I don't know, but that's my assumption, and he made a choice to live a certain way, and

we're going to talk a lot about this idea of choice today.

It's going to be pretty thematic through the entirety of what we talk about.

So from the book of Acts, we know that the early church, and this is what struck me about

the, what to speak on in general, we know that the early church faced a lot of persecution,

and we know that they faced a lot of trials, and as I look around in the world today, I'm

starting to see more and more trials that are being placed upon the church, and I think

it's important that we as believers, as fellow Christians, we take note of that, we think

about it, and we be mindful of those things, because I think where we've been as believers

is one place, but where we are going is a very different place, and we have to be ready

for what those trials are going to look at, or look like for us.

I mean, we have people being arrested for praying over abortion clinics, right?

We have Catholic priests whose doors are getting kicked in, and FBI raids, and so these are

things that we have to be conscious of, and be ready whenever the difficult times arise,

in addition to the normal difficulties that we face in an everyday life.

So James can typically be organized in a lot of ways, but the way that I organized it today

for the first chapter is we're going to talk about the test of perseverance and suffering,

we're going to talk about the test of blame through temptation, and then the test of response

to the world.

Those are the three sections, and before we dive in, we better pray over the word.

Father God, we're just so grateful to be here before you, Lord.

I pray that your Spirit would fill this place, that you would lift up each one of your believers,

and that you would give them strength, you would give them courage, you would give them

guidance, and Father, any trials that we might be facing as a church, or as a congregation,

or as an individual, Lord, we know that there is but one solid answer, and that you are

it, and I pray that somebody would be lifted through this idea, Lord, and we just, we thank

you so much for your love, we thank you for your grace, and we thank you for your son

Jesus, it's in his name we pray, amen.

So kicking off in verse 1, James 1,1, "James, a bondservant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ,

to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad.

Greetings."

This first line sticks out to me, it struck me, because both James and Paul use it.

The word for bondservant, the Greek word is doulos, which ultimately means slave, but

in the Hebrew it's often elevated to be a willing slave, right?

So a willing slave to the Lord, and both of these men, James and Paul, were incredibly

valuable, they were incredibly important to the early church, and yet, they chose to use

this title, right?

Bondservant, slave, willing slave.

I'm willing to bet that in today's culture, if we looked at their LinkedIn profile, we

might see something like Executive Vice President of the First Church of Jesus Christ, or something

crazy because that's what we do on LinkedIn, we give these elaborate fancy titles, and

as the world, we love our titles, but these guys didn't care.

They ultimately knew that our salvation and our eternal lives were bought with a price,

and they had, since they've been bought, they were slaves.

I know that if I'm to honor the debt as a believer, that I should be willing to make

sacrifices for God's glory.

In Romans 6, 17 and 18, it says this, "But God be thanked that though you were slaves

of sin, yet you obeyed from the heart in that form of doctrine to which you were delivered,

and having been set free from sin, you became slaves of righteousness."

Having been set free by the blood of Christ, I should take it upon myself to become a slave

to righteousness.

What does it mean to be a servant of Jesus?

It isn't just a church attendance, although that's important, please don't stop coming

to church.

It isn't just the volunteer and how much we volunteer.

It literally should permeate every single space in our lives.

Everything we do should be to the glory of God, and that's not always an easy thing to

do, but our lives should reflect an obedience in all situations, and this especially goes

for the difficult ones of trial, which we're about to talk about.

So picking up in verse 2, it says, "My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various

trials."

James is speaking to the brethren.

This is the fellow Jewish believers at the time, and I would argue in today's culture,

this is us.

This is fellow believers.

He's speaking to fellow believers.

"My fellow believers, count."

This word for count can also be translated as consider.

So my fellow believers, consider it all joy when we fall into various trials.

Trial being a difficulty.

The word here is a disruption of our pattern of peace, right?

So this is something that's disrupting our life, and it's creating havoc, and it's disrupting

what we do on a day-to-day basis.

So what is our response to be?

Well, I know what our natural response has a tendency to be, and it's typically not joy,

right?

When I'm blessed, and I get my furnace, and I replace that because it was really, really

old 20 years, and I get out with a pretty good deal on it, and then I'm like, "Cool,

I'm going to replace the fence too because my back fence is falling down."

And then three weeks later, my AC decides it's going to die.

I did not respond with joy.

It turns out I failed the test.

It was something that I had an opportunity, but I didn't do it.

So we have to be really important, or excuse me, we have to be really mindful of that.

And as a fellow believer, whom this letter is written to, we must make a conscious commitment

to face difficulties in our lives with a positive attitude.

This is a choice, right?

And again, you're going to hear this a lot today.

So it's difficult, and it's not an easy thing to do to face it with joy, but there is good

reason to do so.

And he gives it to us in verse three, "Knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience."

We need to remember that trial provides an opportunity for us to be tested in our walk

and in our faith.

One way I've heard it stated is the proving of our faith, right?

Through these trials and through these difficulties, we have an opportunity to prove our faith.

These tests will produce patience, which can also be translated as endurance or perseverance.

And continuing in verse four, "But let patience have its perfect work that you may be perfect

and complete, lacking nothing."

So let endurance or perseverance have its perfect work.

This doesn't mean that we're going to walk away from a trial and be perfect by any means,

right?

Every one of us, certainly myself, falls pretty short of the idea of being perfect.

But what it does mean is that we may be brought into spiritual maturity.

It's this idea that through each testing, our faith can grow, our spiritual maturity

can grow, and we can grow with God.

God will use our trials to shape us into exactly who He wants us to be.

This testing or having to endure difficult situations requires us as believers to make

a choice.

We either will or we won't follow God.

And it produces the kind of character that God wants us to have.

I often say that I believe in God, right?

But so do the demons, right?

What and how will we show, how will we prove our belief?

And I really believe strongly that it comes in the testing of these faiths.

In the testing of our faith through difficulty, in Romans 5 and verses 3 through 5, Paul says

it like this, "And not only that, but we also glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation

produces perseverance, and perseverance character, and character hope."

Now hope does not disappoint because the love of God has been poured out in our hearts by

the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

So even in our most difficult moments of trial, if we persevere, if we maintain endurance

and we grow through them, God will pour His love out on us through the Holy Spirit.

If we're reading and we're studying in the faith, shouldn't we be ready?

I mean, really, if we're walking it out every day, shouldn't we be ready?

I liken it to an athlete in some senses, and I know the Olympics was, whoa.

But when you think about the Olympics and you think about these athletes, and I'm not

talking about men beating up women, I'm talking about real athletes that show up day in, day

out, and they are literally giving it everything that they have.

They're pushing their bodies in a way that is just incomprehensible in some senses.

They're pushing their mind, and then all of a sudden they get this chance, they have this

opportunity on a world stage to show what they can do.

It's a lot like that, or the violinist that literally practices until her fingers bleed,

and then all of a sudden she has that opportunity to stand on stage, and it's a test to show

all of the work that's been done.

I think it's much the same for us as believers.

If we're walking in the faith and we're doing what we're supposed to be doing, it's an opportunity

for us to show that we have the love and the Word of God that's rooted deep within us.

So we should take comfort in moments of trial.

We always have an answer, and the answer is Jesus.

Now I'm guessing, I'm just going to go out on a limb here, that there are folks in this

room that are going through a very serious trial right now, things that are far more

important than my AC unit dying or an Olympic athlete.

And I never want to minimize anybody's pain or struggle, so please don't take me on that

level.

I pray that you find God and you seek Him if you're going through something really hard,

because I know from personal experience that He will meet you there.

He'll find you in that place.

And when we lean on God in these difficult moments, His love will be poured out and it

will overflow upon us.

I've seen it.

Even in the most difficult moments, we can be made more complete through each trial.

So picking up in verse 5, James 5, "If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who

gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him."

Now notice that it didn't say, "If you lack wisdom, just run a quick Google search and

find the easiest and most effective five things to make me feel better today."

Notice it didn't say that.

The world will very quickly give you its wisdom, but we really shouldn't seek that.

So what is wisdom then?

It's used often, the word is used often in the Bible, but I decided that I would go to

somebody who was infinitely more wise than I.

And in the book of Proverbs, it says, "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom

and the knowledge of the Holy One is understanding."

The fear of the Lord, submission to the Lord.

Submission is a choice.

We have to choose to submit to the Lord.

This is important.

Now, if we do, there is reward and in Proverbs it tells us again, "Happy is the man who finds

wisdom and the man who gains understanding, for her proceeds are better than the profits

of silver and her gain more fine than gold.

She is more precious than rubies and all the things you may desire cannot compare with

her."

My wife routinely likes to remind me that it is referenced as a her-men, just so you

know.

If you're struggling with that, come talk to us in man time.

We talk about it every single week.

I think she has a point, husbands.

So if you're lacking, excuse me, if you're facing a trial and you lack the wisdom, you

don't know what to do, what should you do?

Go to God, pray, fall on your face and pray.

Get in the word, find the word and find the wisdom because He will show us what it is.

Each trial should drive us into a deeper connection with Him.

Each trial that we face, every time we go through something difficult, we should grow

with Him and grow dependence upon Him and realize that we must have this.

Wisdom in its true nature from God, it'll enable us to find joy and remain submissive

even in the most difficult trials that life can throw our way.

But we have to make the choice to go to God for His wisdom.

Let him ask in faith, picking up in verse six, "With no doubting, for he who doubts

is like a wave of the sea driven and tossed by the wind."

If we believe that God is our source of wisdom and all of His ways are good, we cannot doubt.

We can't doubt.

Even when we don't like something that He's telling us.

Now I find this to happen and I've experienced it in my own life where God's telling us something

and most of the time we want to rebel because He's asking us to either get rid of something

that we don't want to get rid of or He's maybe pushing us in a direction that we're not really

sure that we want to go.

It doesn't matter, right?

It's uncomfortable and we must follow God.

Perhaps we see His will but it's adverse to our own.

Meaning if we continue to doubt, we will be like Peter, right?

Man is literally walking on water with Jesus and then he begins to doubt and when he doubts,

he begins to sink.

When we're sinking, if we're doubting, reach up, find God.

He will help us.

Being a boat in the midst of the waves is a dangerous place to be when we have no rudder.

It will knock us around.

I don't know if anybody's been in the ocean but when the wave slams you into the ground,

it hurts.

I've experienced that once or twice.

So picking up in verse 7, "For let not that man suppose that he will receive anything

from the Lord."

So when we're doubting, we won't receive things from the Lord.

I had a funny experience personally, I don't know, maybe a month or two ago and I was sharing

with a friend of mine that I didn't feel like God was talking to me.

I didn't feel like I could hear God and in fact, I even went to a sermon and I was listening

to the sermon and in the sermon it said, "If you feel like God's not talking to you, maybe

it's because the last time he did talk to you, you didn't listen."

And when I heard it, I went, "Uh-oh."

And I told my friend about it and he's like, "See, dummy?"

So if you're doubting God and you're not listening to his word when he is listening, he may stop

talking to you and that's a dangerous place to be.

Picking up in 8, "He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways."

And what James means by this, he references it a few other times in the book of James,

but he's talking about a man that's divided between the world and God.

A man that confesses that he is a Christian but holds on to the things of this world when

we really shouldn't do that.

And I want to note that resisting the world in its temptation is not an easy thing.

It's not an easy thing.

It's incredibly difficult to do because the world has a powerful way to draw us in, sometimes

in my opinion even disguising itself as things of God when it's not.

And we have to be mindful.

We must be prayerful in each of those moments and we must make a choice to set ourselves

up on a firm foundation.

In 2 Timothy 2.19, Paul writes it like this, "Nevertheless, the solid foundation of

God stands, having this seal.

The Lord knows who are his, and let everyone who names the name of Christ depart from iniquity."

If you've named the name of Christ, depart from iniquity.

Put the stuff down.

Get rid of it out of your lives.

We're called to care less about what's important to the world and care more about the pursuit

of holiness.

And he continues with this in verse 9, "Let the lowly brother glory in his exaltation,

but the rich in his humiliation, because as a flower of the field he will pass away.

For no sooner has the sun risen with a burning heat than it withers with the grass.

Its flower falls and its beautiful appearance perishes, so the rich man also will fade away

in his pursuits."

We should take comfort in this scripture because it doesn't matter what your place in life

is, you are going to encounter and face trials.

Everyone of us is going to face trials, no matter whether you're rich or poor.

And in reality, when you think about it on a worldly scale, just about everybody in this

room is pretty much on the qualified of rich, right?

And that's not to minimize the struggles, believe me.

Grocery bill's painful at my house too.

But when you consider it, the poor, while they're going through their battles, they

can rely on the Lord in those battles.

And then the rich, the trials in this life for all of us, they should remind us that

the glory in the riches of this world are not what we are to be seeking, right?

We don't find genuine happiness in anything that we can buy.

There's nothing that will give us God's happiness from an earthly wealth standpoint.

And if we focus only on that, James reminds us how quickly things will change in that

department.

The reference that he made was from Isaiah, but Peter says it like this, "All flesh is

as grass and the glory of man as the flower of the grass.

The grass withers and its flower falls away, but the word of the Lord lives forever."

Scotty says it regularly, "It's all firewood."

And I love that sentence.

I love that statement because it is, everything here is firewood.

That's how we should treat it.

Now, I would like to note on that because I've recently had conversations and I think

it's important to note, there's absolutely nothing wrong with being blessed in this life.

There's nothing wrong.

It is okay to be blessed.

It's okay to grow and grow wealth and those kinds of things, but we cannot worship God

and money at the same time.

We must be mindful.

If you are in a position where you have been blessed, you need to be thinking about what's

my primary focus?

What is the first thing?

Is it God or is it something else?

Because if it's not God, we got to be careful.

True blessing comes from the Lord, not from the world.

And wow, would you look at that?

James is going to touch on that right here in verse 12.

He wraps up the test of trial really nicely here.

He says, "Blessed is the man who endures temptation, trial.

For when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised

to those who love him."

So when we succeed in enduring the trials, when we persevere through the difficulties

that come our way, there is a victorious outcome.

If we look back in the Beatitudes, Mark chapter five, Jesus gives a list of those who are

blessed.

This word blessed that he uses stuck out to me.

It's not the people we would normally think of.

It's those who recognize their dependence upon God.

They recognize that they have to depend upon God in order to be successful in this life.

Blessed are the poor in spirit.

Blessed are the meek.

Blessed are those persecuted for righteousness.

And what is their reward?

It's kingdom of heaven.

It's the kingdom of heaven.

So if we stand in obedience in our trials and temptations, we win the crown.

If we make the choice to follow God, we win the crown.

We get to be brought into spiritual maturity.

Persevering through a trial is an opportunity to walk out our faith or not.

But what happens if we make the wrong choice?

Because that does happen.

And James touches on it here.

He talks about what happens if we make the wrong choice, picking up in verse 13.

"Let no one say when he is tempted that I am tempted by God, for God cannot be tempted

by evil, nor does he himself tempt anyone."

When we're in a difficult position, when we're in a difficult spot, we're uncomfortable,

hurting, in pain, it becomes real easy to make bad decisions.

Becomes real easy to make bad decisions.

And once we make bad decisions, it sometimes becomes easy to blame God for those mistakes

that we might make in our lives.

And we have to be really, really cautious of this.

"Well, if God hadn't put that thing in front of me, I wouldn't have done it."

Come on, that's not how that works.

God will allow us to face difficulty.

He will.

But he does not tempt us.

He doesn't offer the temptation.

We shouldn't make the mistake of blaming God for our sin.

God's holy.

God is sinless.

When the trial comes, it's okay to get angry with God in that brief moment.

He can handle your frustration.

What I like to call for me is what I call my internal temper tantrums.

When I'm mad about something and I'm having that internal temper tantrum, God's okay with

that.

Turns out he's the creator of the universe.

He can handle it.

What happens though is it's not okay for us to make the bad decision.

It's not okay for us to blame God when we do.

That is not okay.

So then who do we blame?

Let's find out.

Verse 14.

"But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed.

Then when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and sin, when it is full grown, brings

forth death.

Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren, my fellow believers."

Don't be deceived.

Sin doesn't just miraculously appear.

It's not like it's some magic thing.

It's a process.

It starts with a seed.

It's usually a seed within our own heart.

We were born sinners.

So that seed, if we let it linger too long, fully develops and it grows into something

else.

That's what we have to avoid because when we let it grow and it turns into something

else, that's what leads to a broken life.

That's when the pain starts to hit.

I've personally found that in moments of trial and temptation, there's this really small

moment of time before a response or decision is made.

This is what we have to be cautious of.

In that small moment of time, we can go one of two directions.

We could choose our natural tendencies, drawn away by whatever desire we have, that shiny

lure, right?

As the fish in the water, you got that shiny little lure and it's like, "Oh, that looks

really nice.

That's great."

I just want anything that will take away the discomfort for a moment.

And once we let that thought sink in, what happens?

We have an enemy.

He's good.

He's good at what he does and he'll start shouting at you.

It's okay.

You deserve to feel better.

You deserve to be happy, right?

These are things that he will shout.

Watching that thing on your phone's not really going to hurt anybody, is it?

Pouring that drink isn't going to be a big deal, is it?

And he'll start telling you these things.

We have to make a different choice, right?

Each of us has different desires, but when we fool ourselves and allow the shouts of

devil to have a place in our lives, it never ends well.

The other option in that brief moment, right?

So you have your trial, you have your moment, is to look to the Savior.

Use the Spirit.

My suggestion, and this is what I do for myself, is have some scripture in hand.

Have some scripture on the top of your mind.

Know something, right?

You know what your bend is.

Everybody in here has a bend towards sin of some flavor.

So whatever it is, have that scripture in mind.

Have that heart.

Have a game plan when it pops up, right?

That's how we avoid it and know how you're going to respond no matter what the situation

is.

Know what your response pattern is going to be.

That will help us.

Sin is a choice.

We were born sinners, but we do not have to participate in sin.

Likewise, we have to choose His peace and joy.

It's a choice.

He will not make us participate.

We have to choose Him and allow Him into our lives.

And it turns out we have this thing called free will, and it doesn't matter because in

either situation, He does not abandon us.

First Corinthians, Sens 13 says this, "No temptation has overtaken you, except such

as is common to man.

But God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but

with the temptation will also make the way of escape that you may be able to bear it."

Now I've heard this paraphrased at times that God will not give you more than you can handle.

I disagree.

I disagree.

I think God will give you more than you can handle, right?

He will put you in situations that are beyond our own handling, right?

That goes back to the meek or the poor in spirit.

We have a dependence and a reliance upon God.

That's what He wants for us.

But He will never leave you in a position where you can't escape the temptation.

He's here.

He will guide you.

He will make a way of escape.

If you fall down in moments of trial, and believe me, I have fallen down, surrender,

repent, ask for forgiveness.

Ask for forgiveness, and it will be forgiven.

God has already forgiven you.

There may be consequences for your sin if you fall into sin, but you are forgiven.

Jesus already died for that sin.

He's already done it.

There's a guy that I listen to.

His name is Chip Ingram, and he says that our feelings often follow our focus.

Where's our focus?

If I'm focused inward, it is not on God.

If I'm focused upward, and if I'm focused outward and serving others, it becomes more

difficult for me to find the boo-hoo moments when I want to focus inward.

And James reminds us where we are to put our focus here in 17.

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above and comes down from the Father

of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning.

Of his own will, he brought us forth by the word of truth that we might be a kind of first

fruits of his creatures.

All good and bad are for the glory of God.

He is the Father of light, constant, never changing.

Never changing.

He's always good, even when we can't see it.

Now in my own life, I've been through some trials, big trials.

I've had trials that have tested my marriage, and I've had trials that have tested my finances.

I remember one time I looked at my wife, and thank God for my wife.

I looked at my wife, I was like, "Babe, I don't think we could tithe anymore.

Like we're struggling."

And she's like, "Mm, well, we're tithing."

That's when we're going to tithe, right?

And thank goodness for her that she was encouraging in that moment because it all was okay.

It didn't feel like it, but it was always okay.

And most importantly, I have had trials that have 100% broke my pride.

And thank you, Jesus, for that.

Now in the moment, none of it felt good.

I didn't enjoy the trials.

I wasn't happy at those.

I did not respond with joy.

But when I look back now, and I'm like looking over my life and where it has led, every single

one of these trials was shaping me for the better.

Every single one of them made me a better human being, and it was molding me into the

man that God wants me to be, which is ultimately the most important thing that I can care about.

Who am I for the Lord?

And now I know that in future trials that our God is constant.

He is always there.

He is always good, and He graciously offered me a relationship that I never deserved.

God might have you in a trial right now.

It might be incredibly difficult.

And if He does, I would consider whether or not He's trying to realign your focus.

Is it upward?

Is it outward?

Or is it inward?

If you're in that trial right now, consider that, because God might be trying to get you

back in line with Him.

I know that was a big part of the large trials in my life.

So I love the book of James because of its practicality.

In the next section here, James gives us some really practical application in how we can

respond in the moments of trials.

He gives us some ways to have an upward focus and outward focus, and we can have the inward

focus sit in the back seat where it belongs.

So picking up in verse 19, "So then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear,

slow to speak, and slow to wrath, for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness

of God."

Swift to hear.

Talk about an undervalued thing these days.

Hearing.

Listening is an undervalued skill, and I'm in sales for a living, and we talk about it

all the time.

Too many times we like to talk and talk and talk.

We don't listen.

Listen.

I say it with my kids all the time, right?

You've heard the old adage.

We have two of these and one of these, so we should listen twice as much as we talk,

right?

They love that.

They're probably shaking their head over there right now.

But what are you to hear?

This verse can be applied in a few ways, but as it pertains to the context of the text,

I go back to the previous verse in 18, and that says, "He," being God, "brought us forth

by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures."

So in our moments of trial and difficulty, we need to hear the word of God, the sword

of truth.

That's what we need to hear, God's word.

And then we need to be slow to speak.

I'm confident that none of the godly believers and followers in this room have ever popped

off at the mouth and gotten themselves in trouble.

However, I personally have been known to do that once in a while.

I can be quick, and I can be sharp, and I can cut.

And oftentimes when we do that, we end up hurting the ones that we love the most.

And more often than not, it's not only the ones we love the most, but it's the ones that

love us the most.

I mean, how silly is that?

How do we do that?

And we have to be mindful of the things that we say.

We have to be slow to speak.

James says later in the chapter, "If you do not bridle the tongue and think you're religious,

you deceive your own heart."

So bridling that tongue is critically important.

Our words have a power.

They can cut people.

I have ran an example, I really should, my wife and I, mostly my wife, have done this

example with our children.

I don't know if you guys have ever done this with your kids, where you get two big giant

things of toothpaste, and you put paper down, and then you tell them, "Okay, here's what

I want you to do."

You get the toothpaste and you squeeze out the toothpaste as fast as humanly possible.

And they're all excited to do it.

And then you're like, "Cool, put it all back."

And the kids kind of look at you, they're like, "What?

That's not possible."

Your words are the same.

Your words are the same.

You can't put it back once you say it.

Once it comes out, it cannot go back in the tube.

Be careful.

Be careful of what you say.

Be slow to speak, our brother James says.

Proverbs speaks of this quite a few times, but the two verses I found in preparation

that I really liked go like this.

Proverbs 18, 21, "Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it

will eat of the fruit of it."

Powerful words.

The chapter before in 1727 in Proverbs, "He who has knowledge spares his words, and a

man of understanding is of calm spirit."

Right?

So speaking to that calm and anger and that wrath, and then we get into the wrath.

Slow to wrath is the final piece of advice there.

In Ecclesiastes 7, 9, it's said this way, "Do not hasten in your spirit to be angry,

for anger rests in the bosom of fools."

So when the trial hits, slow down.

Listen, don't speak.

Right?

Control our anger, for anger does not produce the righteousness of God.

We must practice the last of the fruits, the last of the listed fruits in terms of the

fruits of the spirit, right?

This is a moment of self-control.

We must make a choice to live in self-control.

Kids are driving you crazy.

One more thing breaks.

Chronic pain is too much to bear.

Sky cuts you off.

It's a choice.

It's a choice that we have to make.

There are ways that we can make it easier on ourselves, and he talks to this in verse

21.

"Therefore, lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the

implanted word which is able to save your souls."

It's so much easier to survive the adversity of trials when we're setting ourselves up

and getting rid of some of the things that are going to, I guess, compound the trials

for us, right?

If we do a good job getting rid of the yuck, it's going to be an important thing.

So we got to get rid of filthiness and overflow of wickedness, lust, greed, gossip, slander,

rage, pride, covetousness, which is the lack of gratitude ultimately for what we have.

I'm sorry to say this, but friends or activities or habits that maybe encourage us in these

areas or encourage us in these behaviors, we should consider tossing them.

Not always easy.

That's one of those moments where God's asking you to do something, and you're like, "Whoa,

whoa, whoa, whoa.

I don't know.

I don't know about that."

Abide in God, and he will guide you through them.

As a point, I am a runner, and I've run some ultra races.

In these ultra races, what happens is, and this one I ran, it was called the Putts, and

you go through about six, seven creek crossings throughout the course of 30 miles.

So you basically would have this route.

Your feet would be dry, and then they'd be wet, and then they'd be muddy, and then they'd

get dry and sweaty, and then they'd be wet and muddy, so on, right?

Six, seven times throughout the course of the race.

Well, through this race, I never changed my socks, because they were these compression

sleeve socks, and I was entirely too tired to take them off at that point.

At the end of the race, these things were gross, and I threw them in the bed of my buddy's

truck because I didn't want them in the cab of his truck.

They were that bad, and we got back, and he's like, "Do you want these?"

I was like, "No.

No.

Toss them.

They're filthy.

They're disgusting.

Toss the filthiness and the wickedness and get rid of it from your life."

That's what we have to do.

So that in meekness, in reliance on the Lord, we might receive the implanted word, right?

Once we receive the implanted word, then we have the real truth, the word of God.

That's where we should be focusing, the gospel, which will save our soul.

In James' final instruction for practical application, he picks up in verse 22 here,

"But be doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.

For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man observing his

natural face in a mirror.

For he observes himself, goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was.

But he who looks into the perfect law of liberty and continues in it and is not a forgetful

hearer, but a doer of the work, this one will be blessed in what he does."

We should strive to live out God's word every day.

We should strive to be a doer and make the choice of God, make the choice that God wants

us to have.

I've been challenging myself lately a little bit.

The challenge to myself is, if somebody walked away from you on a personal interaction, doesn't

matter what it is, whether it be business, professional, personal, I met you somewhere,

whatever it is, would that person walk away and have a firm belief that I am a believer?

Would they know that I am in love with the Lord?

Technically, would they know that I'm a Jesus freak?

That's kind of the question.

Now I'm not advocating that we go bumping people over the head with the Bible.

That's not what I'm talking about here.

But just the love that we have and how we show up in our presence and the things that

we say and the way that we live our lives, if they're seeing that, would they know that

I was a believer?

And that's something that is really important to me.

I challenge all of you to think the same way.

Jesus puts it this way in Luke 6 46, and I'm going to paraphrase a bit here.

"But why do you call me Lord, Lord, and do not do the things which I say?

Whoever comes to me and hears my sayings and does them, I will show you whom he is like.

He is like a man building a house who dug deep and laid the foundation on the rock.

But the one who hears and does nothing is like a man who builds the house without a

foundation."

So we know what happens to the house without the foundation, right?

I mean, it's clear.

The storms of life show up, they beat it down, and it cannot survive.

But when we have the foundation and we have a genuine foundation, which is the Word of

God, we will survive the storms, the trials, the difficulties, temptation.

We can survive all of these things if we have the right foundation.

So often our decisions are made in a moment of temptation that we make in a moment of

temptation lead to more difficult situations or trials because of something that we've

already done.

Like I said, we compound upon itself.

We have to get rid of the yuck.

We have to be a doer.

A doer for me means the choice.

It's a choice between being obedient to God's written Word or what the world wants us to

do.

If I'm to have obedience, then I must know God's written Word.

And if I need to know it, then that means I need to spend more time in it.

And if I'm to spend time in it, it can't just be once a week here at church, although again,

keep coming to church.

It's important.

Have the church family.

But it has to be every day.

We've got to meditate on it, listen to other sermons and teachings on it throughout the

week.

God's Word says that we are to trust Him with all of our heart.

Lean not on our own understanding and submit to Him and He will make our paths straight.

This means that when I think I know the answer to something, I'm feeling pretty good or I'm

confident about it.

Oh, gut check.

Gut check.

Have I prayed about it?

Have I sought advice from the Word?

Because that's where I need to be.

Obedience to God's Word is important in all of the big things.

It's important in your relationships, your marriage, your friendships, right?

It's important in your parenting.

It's important in the way that you manage your finances.

All of the big decisions are important.

But I would argue that it's equally, if not more important for us to think about the small

decisions.

All the little seemingly insignificant things that we think nobody's looking and we do or

don't do.

We have that little moment that arises when we can make a choice.

We can follow the Spirit or we can follow the flesh.

That's where every, right, that's the foundation.

That's the bedrock of who we are when nobody is paying attention.

I once heard that a video, or it was a podcast rather, but one of the things that the guy

was talking about, he's like, "I envision myself having a 24/7 video of my life, all

day every day, no matter what I'm doing or where I am.

At the end of my life, that video gets shown to my kids.

Would I be proud?"

Right?

Now we know that Jesus sees everything that we do, right?

That's not, but would I be proud of who I was in all of the decisions when nobody was

looking, right?

Someone's in the car and somebody cuts you off.

All right, we'll see how Christian you are then, huh?

Fail, this guy.

So did I covet my neighbor's new truck?

That was another one I wrote down in my notes here.

Guilty.

I like my new trucks.

These are the things that we have to make the good decisions in.

This is the space where we need to spend time in the Word.

These small details that sometimes seem insignificant, well, as they say, right?

The devil is in the details and we have to be conscious of that.

So to summarize real quick, and we're going to close up, in the first chapter of James,

he gives us the following wisdom.

Test, trials, temptations.

These are an opportunity for us to demonstrate our obedience and our faith.

Everyone, no matter who you are, is going to face them.

If we lack wisdom, we must seek it in God's Word and prayer.

And the more we are in that moment of temptation, we must decide.

We must pre-decide.

We have to pre-decide our path, knowing that the adversary is always trying to get us off

of the path that we should be on.

If we fail, we must not blame God.

We must surrender, repent, ask for forgiveness, both from God and maybe those that we have

hurt.

And while we are forgiven from God, we must remember that there are consequences for our

actions.

And sometimes those consequences won't be immediately resolved.

And we have to be patient through that.

We have to be honest with ourselves.

To succeed in perseverance, we must be quick to hear.

We must be slow to speak.

We must be slow to wrath.

We must embrace self-control here.

And most important with our obedience, being doers of the Word, walking out a life that

is pleasing to God, which is a very different response than what the world would have you

do.

And when we do that, we will earn the crown of life, which has been promised.

God is good, and God is holy, and He wants to walk out every single situation with you

in deep, deep relationship.

I want to encourage the folks, if you're going through a difficult time right now, three

things here.

If you're going through a difficult time, there is always this group of people that

stand right over here after every single service, and they would love to pray for you.

If you were recently baptized, I know there was a handful of folks that were baptized

just a couple of weeks ago, I want to encourage you because once you get baptized, you're

on the radar.

Satan knows who you are, and he's coming for you.

And if you're feeling that stress, if you're feeling that pressure right now, I want to

encourage you.

Come talk to these folks over here.

They want to pray for you.

And as Steve said at the opening of service, if you have not surrendered your life to Jesus,

if you're on the fence or you're unsure for one reason or another, even if you're not

ready to make that commitment right this minute, but you just want to talk to somebody honestly

and openly about it, I encourage you.

I encourage you.

These folks would love to talk to you.

They would love to pray over you and help guide you through those moments of difficulty

that you might be facing.

You have a network here.

You have people who care about you, you have people who love you, and I think that that's

important.

So to close, I want to close this, I figure I could pray, but it turns out that the words

of the Bible are way better than mine, so I'm going to read from Ephesians here, and

that's going to be our closing prayer here.

This is my reading from Ephesians.

So it's chapter 3 verse 16, I might add.

I pray that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened

with might through His Spirit in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts

through faith, that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend

with all the saints what is the width and length and depth and height, to know the love

of Christ which passes knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Now to Him who is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think, according

to the power that works in us, to Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations,

forever and ever.

Amen.

Thank you so much.

I hope you all have a blessed Sunday and a wonderful rest of your weekend.

[APPLAUSE]

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