James | Faith That Works (June 16th, 2019) - Mike Armstrong

Alright, well, if you would get your Bibles open right now with me to the book of James, James chapter two.

We're gonna be in the kind of the last half of this chapter here today as we work our way uh through this great little book from now until uh the end of the summer.

And so as you're getting turned uh over there, uh one of the funniest stories, I think, that um that I've really ever heard uh was from a friend of mine uh who had worked at, he's quite a bit older than me, he had worked at a nursing home for uh decades.

He worked there for a long time.

So he was very experienced, okay, in matters of life and particularly uh death, meaning that he had seen uh quite a bit of that, as you can imagine.

Okay, well, one Sunday he was at church, he was in a service just like this, and he was with his wife and his uh his mother-in-law, uh, who was quite elderly.

Okay, and at one point, you know, one of the pastors gets you know up to the front and starts praying, and so just kind of imagine that happening, you know, here.

John just prayed, you got your heads you know bowed and eyes closed, and as the pastor is praying, he kind of senses a commotion, and his mother-in-law uh just went down.

Okay?

I'm glad you didn't laugh.

That's not the funny part.

Okay.

He starts because he was so experienced in these kinds of things, he actually kind of kind of takes a look over during the prayer, mind you, and notices her like kind of grayish coloring, and he thinks, she's gone.

Okay, and so he's actually like, it's in the middle of the prayer.

He's like, you know what?

There's really nothing that we can do for her at this point, and so I don't want to interrupt the prayer.

And so he's like, you know what?

And he's like his wife, of course, is like, like, what is happening here?

And he's like, hang on.

And so the pastor's going on and on and and praying, and his mother-in-law is just there.

And uh, towards the end of the prayer, uh, right at the end, all of a sudden, she revives.

You're not laughing.

I thought this was way funnier than that.

Maybe I'm just too twisted.

But she uh she revives and he's like, ooh, like, might have, might have read that wrong, right?

And so that you know the prayer ends and they kind of like figure out how to move her on.

But anyways, I thought that was funny.

Maybe, maybe you not.

Now you kind of know how my humor works.

But, anyways, the point is, okay, even for those who are very experienced, okay, in matters of death, apparently it can be hard to tell sometimes, right?

It really can.

Now, all of that aside, okay, our passage today talks about faith.

Okay, it talks about faith that is dead versus faith that is alive, right?

Faith that is genuine, faith that is real.

Now, can you tell the difference?

Can you tell?

Right?

Can you tell the difference between those two very important realities?

Okay, can you, you know, looking at your own life here, can you tell if your faith, if your salvation is the real deal?

Right?

Can you spot the signs?

Can you spot the signs that suggest that it is, or perhaps that it is not?

Now we've already seen that James has urged us in the first chapter to be doers of the word and not hearers only.

Well, today he like he kicks it up a notch, right?

He he he steps it up a bit when he says that faith by itself, if it does not have works, dead.

It's dead.

He says that in chapter 2, verse 17.

See, James is very much concerned with the genuineness, the legitimacy of our salvation.

It's either dead or it's alive.

Either we have it or we don't.

And the way that we can know, the way that we can have legitimate confidence in our salvation is when our faith produces good works that are in line with God's will.

Okay, so a question for you to think about here as we work our way through all of this is do you know where your faith stands?

Do you know where it stands?

Is it alive?

Is it living?

Is there like no question in your mind about that?

Or might it be dead?

Now listen, I understand these are strong terms, right?

They they really are.

It's a stark contrast here, but but it's intended to kind of snap us to attention a little bit here, right?

And get us to carefully consider where we're at when it comes to salvation.

Now, just a kind of a quick, I guess, word of caution, if you will, before uh we get into prayer and then dive into this, I would really urge you uh to think about yourself here.

Okay, because sometimes what happens is, you know, you start to look at a passage like this and you're considering these great questions, you're like, I know somebody that needs to hear this.

Maybe it's the person sitting next to you.

Maybe it's somebody that you tried to drag here today and they're at home wanting no part of it.

Listen, pray for that person, absolutely.

But really, this is intended.

James is writing this to readers, not so that they would, you know, get somebody else to listen to the podcast, right?

But so that they would consider where they were at in all of these things.

And so, with that, we'll get into it here.

But first of all, why don't you join me as I pray?

Lord, we come before you here today, and as we think about um faith that is alive versus faith that is dead, there's nothing more foundational to um to what it means to know you.

And so, Lord, I pray that your spirit would move, I pray that your spirit would work in power.

Lord, I pray that if there is anyone in here who's feeling mighty comfortable and thinking that they're a follower of Jesus Christ, but perhaps they are not, Lord, I pray that you would make that really clear.

Lord, I pray that you would bring conviction where necessary.

Lord, I pray that you would illuminate the eyes.

Father, I pray that we would consider the good works, the things that we have committed our lives to, Lord.

And Lord, I pray that you would continue to turn us and transform us into a church that loves you and loves to do the things that you call us to do.

And so, Lord, as we work through these verses, give us wisdom, give us insight, give us clarity, light us, Lord, on fire, if you will, to go and live all of this out.

We pray all this in Christ's name.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, here we go.

We're asking a question here today, and uh, it's really this is my faith dead or is it alive?

Okay, well, here's the first thing of two, okay, two points.

It's dead if it produces only empty words and inadequate belief.

All right, well, why don't you take a look with me here at verse uh 14 as we work our way through uh this uh well-known and uh sometimes seen as controversial uh passage in the New Testament?

But here's what it says starting in verse 14.

This is James again.

He says, What good is it, my brothers, if someone says that he has faith but does not have works?

Alright, so this is uh a hypothetical question that he's asking.

He's like, Well, what possible good is it if a person claims to be a Christian?

Okay, they claim to have faith, but there are no works, there are no deeds, there are no actions produced in that person's life to give validity to his faith claim.

What's the good of that?

Okay, well, the obvious intended answer here to that question is uh, yeah, it's no good.

Right?

No good uh whatsoever.

And then he follows it out up and he asks, can that faith or that kind of faith save him?

He just asks that question.

It's intended to provoke us to consider that for ourselves.

And what he does here is he gives an illustration to kind of illuminate what he means for us so that we know where he's going with it.

Verse 15, take a look.

It says, If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food.

So you remember how even just last week we looked at you know the sin of partiality and favoritism, and and how God has, you know, has gives special attention and heart to those who are lacking, those who are poor in the world.

He made rich in faith.

And so he he James is very concerned that we would watch out for folks like this in our gathering.

And so he asks, you know, if a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in food, and one of you says to them, Go in peace, be warmed and filled.

Right?

If you say that without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?

An answer?

No good, right?

No, no good at all.

Right?

It's nothing more than empty words and you know, no action.

It's it's useless.

Okay, and then he links that to faith.

He says, keep going.

So also, faith by itself, so detached from any evidence, if it does not have works, is dead.

Okay, that kind of faith, that words only, no evidence of good fruit kind of faith, is inherently broken, right?

It is it's defective.

It's again, it's dead.

Now, verse 18, he kind of introduces an imaginary discussion, if you will, or debate.

He says, But but someone will say, You have faith, it's good for you, I got works.

And he says, Show me, so he means by that, prove to me or or or make visible, demonstrate your faith apart from works.

Again, you can't, right?

It's just words, but you don't have any evidence of that.

You can't prove really anything, right?

He says, Prove it, and I will show you, I will prove to you my faith by my works.

And then he says this you believe that God is one.

You believe, you believe that God is one.

And in that he is referring to Deuteronomy 6, verse 4, which says, Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one.

Deuteronomy 6:4

And so he said, That's that's great.

You you believe that, you say that you believe that.

That was called the Shema.

That was something that Jews would pray on a daily basis to remind themselves of who their God was.

He said, You believe that, that's that's amazing.

He continues, he says, uh, even the demons believe.

The demons believe that and they shudder.

It's amazing to think that even demons believe that God is one.

You ever thought about that before?

How demons, they've, they're like master theologians.

Right?

They've got their doctrine locked down here.

You know, but but the reality is it doesn't, it doesn't help them possess saving faith.

They don't have that.

And so James is is telling the his listeners here, just like demons, if you believe the right things, but those beliefs don't lead to good works, that belief that that faith is inadequate.

Right?

It's ineffectual, it's powerless, it's useless when it comes to it being real, saving faith.

You could also look at what James is saying here as his way of really saying at least the demons have some kind of response.

Right?

They shudder.

They they shudder at the fear of God and at the judgment that is to come.

He's like, you're not even doing that.

Right?

You're like, I'm a Christian, and now I'm just gonna like shove this transmission into neutral and and coast.

Right?

I'm not gonna do anything.

And it's like James is saying, you you should, you should fear.

Right?

You should, you know, because think about the judgment and what is to come, because your faith does not appear to be alive at all.

It doesn't appear to be real.

It kind of seems like it's like it's dead.

And I think this is a really good thing for you and I here today to be like smacked with.

I think it is.

You know, especially considering the fact that we're, you know, we're all North Americans.

You know, we all live in Canada and you know, all across this continent, you know, the US for sure, and us as well.

We are in real danger of this type of dead faith that James warns us about.

Right?

A couple of examples to that.

I mean, you've heard of like, you know, the Bible belt, right?

You've heard of that, Bible belt, you know, cultural Christianity.

Maybe your mind immediately drifts towards, you know, the southern US and Texas and how you know just going to church and you know, is as common as you know, carrying a gun, and it's as common as you know, eating meals three times a day.

Like it's just it's it's something that we do.

It's kind of weaved and built right into our culture, but it hasn't really impacted us, it hasn't transformed us.

I know we've got some you know, Bible belt kind of area out in uh out in BC to make that hit a little bit more close to home.

But listen, that whole mentality, that kind of cultural Christianity, where it's more about tradition than it is about life change, it's about real salvation, that can infiltrate any of us, right?

Any of our churches, any of our, you know, families.

And maybe, you know, that is you.

And we've talked about this kind of thing before where, you know, Sunday morning is tradition.

Like we just we kind of get up and go, but I don't think much about it.

I'm not preparing my heart for entering into this room.

I'm I don't even bring a Bible, I don't have a Bible, I know I'm not gonna read, and I do that, and you know, every evening before my kids go to bed, we kneel down and we say the same prayer, or it's cultural Christianity is that's danger.

How about kind of that comfortable country club vibe that churches can easily become?

You know, I don't know about you, but I would love to have like our own building someday.

Expect Eric, you must be on the setup team.

Yes.

Right?

Like I think I think I would love that.

I uh you know there would be some things that are so great about that.

My heart in that would be so that it makes us, you know, able to do more in terms of ministry and to reach more people and to have a home base and all of that.

But honestly, what o often happens when churches get buildings is that mission starts to change.

And pretty soon the building becomes the mission.

And how are we gonna pay for this now?

And you know, we better make sure that it's not just sitting empty most of the week, and so we better, you know, overextend ourselves in a bunch of you know, ministries or programs or all of that kind of thing, and pretty soon it becomes all about the building, and really it just becomes kind of this this comfort thing, and the building becomes our you know, this sort of status symbol for us as a church.

And look what we have have achieved, and we're kind of like them, or we're better than them now, and our building is better.

Again, it's just this like stuffy kind of inward focus, it's all about us and what we have, vibe, the mission to go to be disciples, to grow as disciples, to make disciples, all of that starts to kind of leak away.

Honestly, if you are into the country club vibe, go join Cardinal.

Right?

Go play golf on Sunday mornings.

Honestly, it's easier and sometimes more enjoyable than what we're trying to create here.

Honestly, this is way more work.

Right, but it's to the glory of God.

Comfortable country club vibe.

How about easy believism?

We see that in North America as well.

You know, where churches and and so-called believers, you know, we we don't want to hear the hard truth.

We don't want to hear the word of God proclaimed, you know, every single verse, its entire council.

We want to hear the stuff that makes us feel good.

We want to fluff it up a little bit.

We want to round the the hardened the hard edges of it and make it more palatable.

And we stop maybe talking about the you know sin and and and judgment and hell and God's wrath.

We don't want to talk about those things because it makes me feel not so you know happy, slappy inside.

And so that that form of you know easy believism, Christianity, so to speak, is is where you know we talk about how you know life, you know, maybe that's a little bit hard and you know, all of that.

Well, you should add Jesus to your life, you know, and that's what it becomes about.

And it's it's not uh about you know changing and transforming to the glory of God, it's really adding him to what you're already doing, and then just kind of keep doing what you're already doing.

Right?

Is that that's that's dead faith.

How about this one?

It's kind of the other end of the spectrum of that.

But how about the whole all-knowledge little application mentality?

Right?

That produces dead faith as well.

You know, where it's all about truth and truth, and you know, slam the pulpit more times, Pastor, and you know, bring it to me, and I'm you know, I'm thinking intellectually, and you know, I'm thinking with my mind, I'm worshiping with my mind, you know, like this during the songs, and it's all super cerebral, and you know, I want to know, no, no, learn, learn, learn, read, read, read.

But you haven't changed.

You're you're a hearer, you're not a you're not a doer.

In all these examples, what they do is they produce and create uh a dangerous environment that can foster dead faith.

Right, where we actually do believe some of the right things, right?

That we might believe that God exists, we're deists, right?

But it's inadequate, it's demon-like, because it hasn't gone beyond that.

It hasn't become saving faith, where we've accepted who God is and what he says about me through the gospel.

We've we have we've trusted in Christ's redeeming work and become renewed and transformed people as a result.

So listen, it's it's gut check time here.

You know, as you look at the evidence of your life and what it's producing and what it's churning out, listen, does it suggest that your faith is a dead faith?

Maybe you've embraced one or more of you know the examples I just kind of gave.

Maybe you just want life to be comfortable and country club, and everyone, let's just kind of get along.

And maybe for you it's all about knowledge, but you're not applying what you do know.

And you get you're getting more and more distant and more and more cold when it comes to the Lord.

Again, look at your fruit.

What's the fruit of your life?

If you're not sure what that is, ask your spouse.

They'll lay it on you thick.

Is my faith dead or is it alive?

Well, how do we know that it's alive?

How do we know that it's real?

Well, I mean, we've been touching on this kind of all along here, but here it is, second thing.

It's alive if it produces evidence of genuinely good works.

Right?

Verse 20.

Look what James says.

He says, Do you want to be shown, you foolish persons?

I mean, he's not holding back, right?

It's like if you if you have like demon-esque belief, that's that's foolish.

Right?

And so he's saying that we don't think that he's you know speaking to someone specifically, but these kinds of dead faith attitudes are were present in the churches that he was writing to.

He says, Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless?

Useless literally means it's not working, right?

It's it's futile.

And so what he does now is he's gonna be giving his defense for for why works are so important as we consider the legitimacy of our salvation.

Look what he says in verse 21.

He says, Was not Abraham, our father, justified by works?

Now, you know, when you when you read that or you hear me say that, you know, kind of at face value, do you kind of sense like your your spider sense tingling?

Maybe just a little bit?

Because like pretty sure Paul said like the exact opposite.

Didn't he?

Right?

I I I think he did.

Okay, sure enough, Galatians 2, verse 16.

Galatians 2:16

Here's what the apostle Paul has to say.

He says, by works of the law, no one will be justified.

Huh?

Romans 3 28, Paul again.

For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law.

All right?

Now, Paul even refers to Abraham here as James does, but here's what Paul says about Abraham.

He says, Romans 4 verse 2, for if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God.

Romans 4:2

Meaning that Abraham has no reason to boast, because he was justified by grace through faith, not by works.

Right?

And in this moment there, and in Romans 4, verse 2, he's referring to Abraham's salvation, which we read about in Genesis 15, verse 6.

Romans 4:2 Genesis 15:6

Here's what that has to say.

It says, and he, this is Abraham, and he believed, okay, he had faith in the Lord, and he, that's God, counted it to him as righteousness.

All right, so Abraham believed in God's promise to give him an heir.

Remember, God promised that to him, I'm gonna make your descendants as numerous as the sand on the seashore.

And the foundation of that promise was his first son, right?

Isaac.

Right?

And so Abraham, he took God at his word.

He believed him, he had faith in God's promise, and that faith was credited to him as though it was righteousness.

Okay, so no doubt about it.

Paul believed that salvation was by grace alone through faith, not by works.

Right?

That's what Ephesians chapter 2, verse 8 and 9 tells us.

Ephesians 2:8

I mean, he even uses Abraham as the example to prove this.

Right?

So what's up with James?

Right?

Like, where is this guy going, right?

Is he has he gone rogue here?

Is he contradicting Paul?

Right?

You can see why this has been a bit of a uh, you know, contradictory type topic, and it's created controversy uh for uh believers over centuries.

Martin Luther himself, the great reformer, had like no time for the book of James.

Right?

He he didn't.

It's because he he had a hard time with what James was saying here, and he so loved what Paul said, and what Paul said so fit with Martin Luther's context.

And so this has provided challenges for Christians.

Again, is he is he contradicting Paul?

Have we just discovered an error in the Bible?

Have we done that?

Well, I think what's helpful for us to understand here, at least I pray that it is, is that Paul and James use the word justified differently.

Okay, does that make sense?

When I think about this, I I actually often think about the English word uh rock.

Okay, I think about that that word and how we can it means different things depending on the context.

We've got a couple of pictures here.

Where's the first one?

We want to throw that out?

Okay, we often think of this, right?

It's a rock.

All right, it's a stone that you have in your shoe, and you gotta take your shoe off and and empty it out.

Rock.

Rock means stone.

Okay, how about this next one?

You rock.

Right, do you really just use a Garfield reference?

That's pretty 80s, bold.

Yeah, that's all I found on Google Images, okay?

Give me a break.

Okay, you rock means great job.

You did a great job.

It means something entirely different than stone.

Okay, you rock.

How about this one?

Next one.

Rock andor roll.

This might be you know the kind of music that you like or don't like, right?

Rock music means something entirely different from the first two examples.

How about this guy?

Dwayne Johnson, right?

The rock.

Right?

So again, depending on the context, depending on what you're talking about, you can get rid of that picture.

That's intimidating, okay?

It can mean different things.

And so with Paul and James here, their uses of the word justified are actually complementary, not contradictory.

All right, we'll explain this.

When when Paul uses the word justified, he means it in the way that we often use it, the way that I would often preach about it.

You've heard me talk about this uh many, many times, right?

It means to be made right, to be made right, to to be declared righteous or innocent or or blameless, right?

It's it's the very thing that God pronounces you and I to be the moment that we trust in Christ's substitutionary death.

Okay, so being justified, it means that we've been, God has pronounced us spiritually clean.

Right?

We are holy, we are, we are now good, and all of that through Jesus Christ.

Justified in this sense is the core, the crux of the gospel.

Right?

When we say that, hey, you know what, it's so super exciting day.

We had a we had a child down at Harvest Kids or an adult here.

We had we had somebody get saved at church, right?

This is what we mean.

Right?

This is what we mean.

They were justified by grace through faith.

They received salvation that that God has offered them.

They didn't earn it, right?

They certainly don't deserve it.

They're sinners.

We all are.

It's a gift.

Right again, this is how Paul uses the word in all those verses that we just read.

Okay, when James uses the word justified, again, he uses it differently.

For him, it carries the meaning of being vindicated, okay?

Being acquitted, or even there's a degree here in the ultimate sense, in the judgment being vindicated.

Okay, vindicated means shown to be or or proven to be righteous based on evidence.

All right, it's it's another it's another legal term.

Referring to how when a judge acquits or vindicates a person on trial because they were shown to be, it was proven to be innocent of the charges brought against them because of the clear evidence that mounted up.

Make sense?

And James also, again, he has he has in mind the final judgment where a believer is ultimately acquitted, vindicated, he uses the word justified by God based on the evidence of his or her life, right?

They're they're genuinely righteous works produced by their saving faith through the through the Holy Spirit.

Now, this meaning of the word justified, it's not unique to James, right?

He's not the only guy that that used this word in this way in the scriptures.

Matthew actually does as well.

In a few cases, and in chapter 12, verse 36 and 37, we see it.

He says this I tell you, on the day of judgment, people will give account for every careless word they speak.

For by your words, okay, for by your words, by the evidence of your good works, you will be justified.

Or vindicated.

You will be, it will be demonstrated that you are in the right, you are in the cleared because of Jesus and because of your fruits.

Okay, and so being vindicated, acquitted in the judgment, fits really well in James' context.

He's already been kind of barking up this tree in what we've read just last week in verse 12, we saw that Christians will be judged under the law of liberty, right?

Pointing, again, ahead to the final judgment, where we'll be judged by God based on our Christian obedience, based on the work that was produced, and of course, through the lens of Christ's finished work and what he has accomplished on our behalf.

Okay, so given James's use of the word justified, let's kind of look through the rest of these verses here and try to understand and get a sense of where he's going with this.

Verse 21 again.

It says, Was not Abraham, our father, justified by works?

Okay, we read that.

When?

That's a really key word.

You might want to highlight or underline, circle, however you want to do it.

Okay, key word.

Okay, and so he's he's starting to think through, or and we need to think through like kind of a timeline here or sequence of events.

So he was, Abraham was justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar.

Okay, now when did that happen?

Well, that happened in Genesis chapter 22.

Genesis 22 · chapter mention

Remember how Paul had referred to Genesis 15.

In Genesis 22, verse 9 and 10, here's what it says.

Genesis 22:9

Then Abraham, this is all in response to God's command, then Abraham reached out his hand and took the knife to slaughter his son, it says.

Okay, so there's again, there's Abraham's obedience to God's directive.

Okay, so think about this.

James says that Abraham was justified by works years after he first believed, Genesis 15, and his belief, his faith was counted as righteous.

Okay, which is again exactly what Paul refers to.

And knowing that when James uses the word justified, he means vindicated.

What he's really getting at here is what Douglas Mu explains.

We've used him quite a bit in this series so far.

Here's what he says.

We've got this quote for you.

It says that the ultimate vindication of a believer in the judgment is based on, or at least takes into account, the things that the person has done.

So justify in Paul refers to how a person gets into a relationship with God, while in James it connotes what a relationship must ultimately look like to receive God's final approval.

Okay, let me put it this way.

You could say that Abraham was justified in two different ways.

All right, first of all, he was declared righteous by God when he had faith in the Lord's promise to make him a great nation, right?

That's Genesis 15.

That's how Paul uses the word justified.

But then, secondly, Abraham was justified in the ultimately vindicated, acquitted sense, when his faith was proven to be genuine based on the evidence of good works, right?

His obedience to God, which we see clearly when he placed his son Isaac on the altar.

He was trusting the Lord through that whole entire process.

Genesis chapter 22.

Genesis 22 · chapter mention

This is how James uses the word justified.

Now I'm not trying to belabor any of this, but can you tell this is like so important that we understand this?

We we need to get this.

Okay, so again, hopefully as simply as I can put it, Paul's use of justified means declared righteous.

Right?

Something that God does by his grace.

When we put our faith in his son, right?

James's use of justified means shown or proven to be righteous.

Something, again, that God does as he works in us by his grace through his Holy Spirit and produces these genuine good works which become evidence that we are in fact saved, that our faith is alive, that our faith is real.

So now I think you know, you can start to see how Paul and James, they're not like this, right?

They're like this, they complement each other.

Both uses are crucial to understanding what real and living faith looks like.

Okay, Abraham's faith was not a dead faith because it produced genuine works of obedience, which validated Abraham's earlier faith claim.

Okay, now keep going here.

Verse 22.

James continues.

He says, You see that faith was active along with his works.

Okay, so his faith was not like the demons, where he merely kind of agreed mentally to some truth, or or even just verbally professed something, but his heart was detached from all of it.

No, that's not it at all.

His faith was active along with, or or cooperated with, was step by step with, okay, his works.

It says that faith was completed or brought to maturity by his works.

Now, verse 23.

And the scripture was fulfilled, or you could say brought to fruition that says Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness, and he was called a friend of God.

Okay, so right there, James shows that he actually agrees with Paul's use of the word.

He's using it differently, he's using it as Paul uses it there.

Right?

His scripture was fulfilled when it says that Abraham believed God.

Pretty awesome.

Okay, so first Abraham was justified as Paul uses it, and then he was justified as James uses it.

Again, James is just thinking sequence of events here, right?

Now, verse 24.

He says there that you see that a person is justified, again, ultimately vindicated by works and not faith alone.

For James, faith alone means that that fake faith, right?

That that non-saving sham faith, demon-like faith, quote unquote.

Verse 25.

And in the same way, he gives another example here, not just Abraham, he says, in the same way, was not also Rahab the prostitute justified by works, so ultimately vindicated, when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way.

Okay, so her original faith claim that happened earlier was proven valid by her genuine obedience to God, by her works.

Right?

When she, of course, helped the spies.

Remember that story in you know the book of Joshua, in Joshua 2, and in chapter 6, and it's you know, she lives in in Jericho, and she was in a room there, right in the wall, and she let the spies out, helped them escape there before the walls fell down.

And then James kind of finishes this chapter off here with one final illustration.

He just says, For as the body, verse 26, for as the body apart from the spirit is dead, okay, that makes sense, so also faith apart from works is dead.

You don't have evidence of good works in your life.

Listen, you don't have faith.

You don't have saving faith.

As I mentioned kind of near the beginning of our time this morning, James writes this passage here to, again, to snap us out of you know, to snap us to attention, really, right?

To wake up sleepy Christians, as Tim Keller puts it.

He's boldly telling us that listen, guys, you're you're either saved or you're not.

There's no middled ground here, right?

And you can tell, of course, by the evidence that your life produces.

Are you producing nothing more than what amounts to just you know empty words and inadequate belief?

Is your faith dead or is your faith alive?

Is it is it genuine?

Is it real?

You know, where you can you can tell because your life is radically different now than than what it was before I came to Christ.

And you know this, right?

When you when you got saved and you know it's genuine, it's because you like everything changes for you.

Right?

Not just your circumstances necessarily, they may not actually change, but but your your desires, the way you look at the world, the way that you interact with people, your your values, your your love, all of it begins to just like go through the blender, right?

And the Lord is redeeming that and and transforming you and and producing good works in you and through you in all of that.

If your faith is alive, you'll know because you're you're clearly heading down a different path and producing good works according to the glory of God.

So listen, what is the evidence or the or the fruit in your life that leads you to believe about your faith claim if you in fact do claim to be a Christ follower?

Do you see genuine fruit?

Do you see good works?

Where, like, man, I I obey God now, right?

Even when it's hard, even when it's it's brutally hard.

Because the gospel compels me.

The gospel is is motivating me and driving me to do that.

Now I want to like actually love people and invest in them and not just be a disciple, but pour that out and and disciple other people, even when it's inconvenient and it's exhausting and sometimes when it's disappointing.

Because the gospel, again, it's compelling me to love God and love my neighbor.

Do you see that in your life?

Or do you see something else?

Something less.

Something that could suggest that your faith might in fact be dead.

If you're sitting here and you're you know really kind of chewing on this, that's a good thing.

That's a really good thing.

If you're you know sensing conviction, and maybe your eyes have been opened, the Holy Spirit does that.

You need to know that all of that dead faith that you've been living for a long time, that can all change in the blink of an eye.

It can change right now.

It can change as you confess your sin to the Lord.

Confess your rebellion against him, your pride against him, and believe that when Jesus went to the cross and he shed his blood and his body was broken, that was for you.

That was to pay pay your debt that you owed to God.

Incredible.

Listen, if you believe that and you act upon that and come to the Lord in that way, you will be saved.

Your faith will be alive.

And as God moves in you and pours out grace and gives you his Holy Spirit, you will produce good works.

And it'll be awesome.