Are We There Yet?

Welcome to the Awakening Church podcast.

We exist to awaken this generation to new life in Christ.

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If we haven't met yet, my name's Chris, and I'm one of the pastors here, and I just am excited to welcome you to this end of this series.

And I want us to look at James chapter five.

But before we get there, I just want to tell you there's a thought that he's going to close with.

I want to give you kind of a sneak peek here.

And the thought he's going to close with is moving from the question, like now what?

What we've been looking at.

What do we do now if we don't know our future, if we don't know the future of our finances, stuff we've looked at in the past in this series?

He's now going to give an answer.

And that answer to the question, now what might be a little strange for you to hear, but I think it's what we need to hear.

You see, at the end of this letter, James moves from the question, you know, now what?

To this answer.

Well, now you wait.

Now what?

Now wait.

Are you there right now?

Are you there realizing that you're going to maybe have to wait through something?

Because we are waiting right now, aren't we?

Um you've been waiting maybe for to hear about your kids' school, if it's going to open or what's going to happen with everything, your job, something personal, but we're also just waiting on an international level, are we not?

We're waiting for justice in racial reconciliation.

We're waiting for this global pandemic to come to an end.

We are waiting for economic stability.

And so James' answer to now what being now wait might be a little depressing at first because you might be like, well, I am waiting.

So that leads me to tell you that James doesn't leave us with just that simple sentence, actually.

He gives us this closing passage where he says, this is how you wait well.

Because I think that might be a question for us today.

How do we wait well when we're given all these different timelines?

Because truthfully, there's no clear understanding for the length of these things we are waiting for.

It's like the days before GPS.

Do you remember them?

Some of you don't.

It's sad.

But before GPS, all we knew was on a map where we were and where we're going, and we kind of guessed how long it might take us.

And that led uh many of us in our younger years to be in the backseat of various vehicles as our parents drove to an unknown destination to ask the question they despised.

Are we there yet?

Do you remember asking that?

Are we there yet?

Maybe you parents remember your kids asking that over and over again.

You see, now with GPS, you have the estimated time of arrival always waiting, always knowing how long you have to wait.

But you see, before we lacked the resources to know exactly how long a trip would take.

And that's where we're at today.

Today, we lack the resources to know how long it's going to take us to get to these various destinations we're waiting for.

A destination of justice, a destination of healing, a destination of economic stability.

These are all things we don't know.

And James is gonna give us two words, two words today.

How do we wait well?

We wait with patience and we wait with participation.

So look with me at James chapter five.

I'm gonna slowly walk through a lot of the text.

James 5, verse 7.

James 5:7

If you got a Bible, open it up.

Um, if you're on your phone, open it up there.

If you're on our church online platform, there's a Bible tab you can get to.

But let's just open up James chapter 5 and start in verse 7 here.

James 5 · chapter mention

Says this Be patient, therefore, brothers and sisters, until the coming of the Lord.

See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it until it receives the early and late rains.

You also be patient.

You'll notice, because I underlined and bolded it here on the screen.

Uh, James uses the word patient three times in two verses.

And this is where I'm getting my first point is that we must wait with patience.

What is patience?

Patience is the interior capacity to withstand delay or trouble.

To be patient in the biblical sense, what James is talking about here is not what we talk about with patience in the daily inconveniences of struggling to be patient.

It's actually this whole overarching picture of your life.

You are living a patient life.

You are not either patient or not patient, but you have a capacity to develop patience throughout your life.

It's not like when you're hangry and you're waiting in line or something like that.

That's not the patience in the biblical sense.

Patience is a lifelong thing that we grow in, our capacity to withstand delay or trouble.

That's why he likens it actually to a farmer.

He says this in the verse we just looked at, right?

See, patience is like a farmer.

He says, until the earth receives its early and late rains, James's reference to the farmer is one who's waiting for harvest time, for the autumn and the spring rains.

You see, in the Mediterranean area, there are two seasons rain is normal and necessary for a successful crop.

And the farmer lived with this kind of patience to help understand his himself understand the daily grind of farming, that there would be two major seasons where rain would come.

The farmer must wait through the ups and downs of kind of the daily weather, understanding the seasonal changes of weather are coming or going.

You see, he lived a patient life because he understood the larger determining factor on his farm was not the daily weather so much as the seasonal shifts of the weather.

So farmers don't panic when there's no rain for maybe a day or two because they know what season they are in.

See, likewise, as Christians, we wade through many seasons of life with daily weather changes, knowing the seasonal weather changes that are happening.

Well, what are those seasonal weather changes in the life of a Christian?

James mentions twice something called the coming of the Lord.

And you see, one thing we know as Christians is we live in two ages, right?

In the middle of two ages.

The age where Christ has come, he came and died on the cross, rose again in victory.

But we also await the day he will come again.

And our life is in between these two seasons.

And we wait with patience because we understand there are two large determining factors, like the farmer was waiting for the autumn and the spring rains.

The Christian knows Christ has come and Christ will come again.

And we sit in that in-between, developing a patient life like a farmer because we know something else is going on.

There's a larger thing happening.

You see, patience, it's actually all about perspective.

Patience is all about perspective.

You and I are inundated with information.

And then people interpreting that information from forming opinions and hot takes and recommending the latest docuseries you need to watch.

But who's helping you sift through the information inside the larger context of the history and sovereignty of God?

See, a terrible downpour of news is possible to take when you are able to understand that you as a human being live within larger determining seasons of Christ's once and future coming.

Often older people will help you understand this.

Older people have gone through many, many seasons, and they know maybe what it was like to live through the threat of nuclear war in the 50s or the civil unrest in the 1960s and the war in Vietnam and government corruption in the 70s.

They have lived through decades where they have seen the ups and the downs.

They have a larger purview on history so as to live a more wise life within it.

And I wonder, uh, do we have that?

You see, in our youth, we have trouble developing that kind of patience.

That's why James says to actually look at some older people, not necessarily old in age, but some older people in the faith.

He points to the prophets and to Job.

Look at this, James 5, verse 10.

James 5:10

He says that as an example of suffering and patience, there's that word again, as an example of patience.

Take the prophets, like look at them who spoke in the name of the Lord.

Behold, we consider those blessed who remain steadfast.

And you've heard the steadfastness of Job and have seen the purposes of the Lord, how the Lord is compassionate and merciful.

You see, James says, look at your Old Testament to understand how to live a patient life.

The Old Testament has Job and the prophets.

Do you remember Job?

Job was the one who was righteous, who God loved and yet lost it all, lost his health, lost his housing, lost his family, and went through terrible, tremendous suffering.

And then at the end, through his faithfulness, found restoration in his life with God and his life with others.

At the end, actually, of the Job story, after he goes through tremendous suffering, he says, Therefore I have uttered what I don't understand, things too wonderful for me.

When God shows up to Job in the midst of his suffering and God reveals himself to Job, Job says, I didn't get it, I didn't see.

But now I have the perspective, and therefore I will gain the patience.

The thing Job gains at the end of the story is not an answer to why bad things happen.

We would love that in the book, but it doesn't happen.

Instead, he gets a perspective for how to view his existence as a human being when bad things happen.

So it's not so much why do bad things happen, but when bad things happen, how do I view my life?

And so, how do we wait well?

Well, we wait with the perspective of farmers and the character of Job and the prophets.

The prophets were the ones who spoke the word of God during the most chaotic times.

We wait with a perspective of farmers, but the character of Job and the prophets.

The perspective of farmers, again, life has daily weather changes, but we understand the seasonal ones.

The character of the Old Testament characters means that we live in life that is a small life in the midst of God's larger wisdom that can be trusted.

James already promised us at the beginning of the ver of the whole book, which I told you about when we were way back in that series of holy contradiction, James chapter 1, verses 2 through 5, he says, Count it all joy when you endure trials of various kinds, because you will gain steadfastness.

James 1:2–5

See, the book is book-ended itself with this message that if we remain faithful, we will develop in us a kind of character and patience in our whole of life.

But James doesn't leave us to just sit and wait and receive character development.

Biblical waiting is not passive.

Biblical waiting is active.

And so the first word is patience.

But the second word is participation.

We will wait with participation.

How do you wait?

Well, you wait with a participation, which is the ability to join God's activity.

You can join what God is doing because God is at work.

While we wait, God is working.

And so you can also join his work while you wait.

That's the offering that James gives us.

Look at this, James 5, 13.

Is anyone among you suffering?

Let him pray.

Is anyone cheerful?

Let him sing praise.

Is anyone sick?

Let him call the elders of the church and let him pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord.

And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up.

That doesn't necessarily mean that they will be healed physically in that moment, but that the Lord would save and raise them, whether in this life or the next.

And if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.

Verse 16.

Therefore, confess your sins to one another and pray for one another that you might be healed.

The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working.

Do you see all the verbs in this passage?

Let me just read them back to you real fast.

Pray, sing praise, call the elders of the church, pray, anoint, confess, pray.

I just circled, when I was studying this, I just looked through my Bible, I circled the different verbs, and there's they're all over.

Because James is saying, while patience is being developed in you, there's work to do, there's things you can practice.

So what can I do in the meantime?

What do I do when I'm asking God, are we there yet?

They're very simple things that Christians have always done.

The first things he mentions is, can you praise?

Praise is the first thing he mentions.

Praise is rejoicing and singing in response to God's goodness.

Are you singing?

You know, when Gabe and Jess lead us or Taylor and Rachel lead us, like and you're at home, are you singing?

There's something that happens to us when we sing, our countenance changes.

Some of you know, nine months ago, my wife and I welcomed little baby Jude, our son.

And uh, I'm gonna throw up a picture of him now just to get you to pay attention again, because in case you've drifted off into your phone, come on back.

Yeah, there's my cute baby.

When he'll wake up in the morning, you know, this was maybe when he was a little bit younger or something like that.

Um, but yeah, here he is.

Yeah, I know.

I'm just trying to get your attention back.

So, you know, this is my cute son.

And when he was, you know, having trouble, and even when he still has trouble, when I put him down, I sing worship songs to him.

And um, you know, sometimes I'll sing like an old soul song or an oldies song, but I try in the mornings especially to sing a lot of worship to him.

And I've realized, you know, by the way, I'm singing the classics.

I'm like back in the 2000s, late 90s, I'm going delirious, you know, I'm I'm going audio adrenaline, I'm going Michael W.

Smith, like, and because that's the stuff that stood the test of time, people.

But as I've sung those songs, you guys, I've realized when I praise in the morning and I sing, my countenance changes.

Like my habit of mind, my habit of heart seems to reorient itself.

And I'm not saying like there's any magic in this other than that's why God's people praise.

God's people praise because while we wait, it can get discouraging.

And so I don't, I don't have a good voice.

You don't need a good voice, but praise is about singing to God in response to his goodness.

Are you are you practicing that?

Are you participating in that while you wait?

What about the other thing James mess mentions?

He mentions confession.

He mentions confession.

That's vulnerable sharing of sin and weakness in Christian community.

And this is why we have virtual groups, by the way.

Why you need to be a part of a virtual group.

I'll tell you how to get connected in just one second, but I want to just ask you quite frankly and quite clearly, are you in a group?

Are you in a virtual group?

This stuff, vulnerable sharing of sin and weakness, is very, very important in the Christian life.

It connects us to others, it connects us to God when we do that.

Are you confessing your sin?

It doesn't require a priest, it doesn't require me or any pastor, it requires another Christian to share life with and to say, I'm struggling.

Do you know that while you wait, you can talk about how hard it is to wait?

James says, that's perfectly okay.

Can you say, I'm struggling to trust God?

Yes, that is participating in the activity of God right now.

The third thing he says is about care.

He says, if anyone's sick or anyone needs help, call the elders of the church and anoint oil.

And that's not only was a spiritual practice, then it was actually a medicinal practice in the Mediterranean area in the Middle East.

And this is important for us to remember care is about giving and receiving support from the body of Christ.

We have this texting number that I want to put on the screen right now because I want you, if you're in the middle of this confession or care, like you want to be a part of a group or you need help, or you want to give help to somebody else, this number is on the screen for you to enter into your phone right now, for you to take a screenshot, take a picture of it, or just put it in your phone right now to help you know that we are here.

You text this number, it's not a robot.

Someone on the other end is telling you uh live right away, they'll get back to you to say, we'll get you a part of a group, we'll help you with whatever we can right now.

Right now, our leadership council has set aside a good number of dollars to help those who are in need during this time.

And this church, we always have some resources that God has given us.

And that's why it's so important for us to contribute to the church because we're able to receive these texts and go, we will do what we can, how we can, to help you.

One thing you can do is care in the midst of waiting.

Fourth is prayer.

You know, did you notice prayer was repeated three times in the chunk I read you?

There's a ton of prayer.

We might not notice this, but this is the primary way we will participate when we wait.

As we're waiting, as we're saying, are we there yet?

How do you wait well?

You wait by praying because that's what Christians do.

There's no such thing as a Christian who doesn't pray.

You might not think you're good at it, you might not think that you're passionate about it, but it doesn't matter.

At the end of the day, we just need to pray, which is talk and listen to God.

We have an amazing prayer team that would love to pray for you if you don't feel like praying, if you're having trouble praying.

Again, get in touch with us.

There's prayer available if you're on the church online platform, but any way you can get in touch with us, we would love to pray for you.

Our prayer team would love to pray for you.

Because look at what James says.

He says, the prayer of a righteous person has great power because it's working.

And then in verse 17, he says this Elijah was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain.

Then he prayed again, and heaven gave rain, and the earth bore its fruit.

I love he brings back the rain analogy with the farmer that he was talking about earlier.

If you're struggling to wait for the next season and you're having trouble with the perspective that seasons will change, like I was talking about earlier, do you know you can ask God for the seasons to change?

You can ask God for rain.

You can ask God to make it stop raining.

I'm not talking about actual weather, I'm talking about the seasons of your life.

Are you praying to God about the seasons of life and who is praying for you?

You see, Elijah was just a man, it says.

He was a man with a nature like ours, and he prayed fervently that it might not rain.

Like he was just a guy.

I love that.

Elijah, this amazing prophet of God from the Old Testament.

If you don't know his story, he had incredible faith, incredible moments.

And James just goes, he's just like us.

He he's there's nothing different about him than you.

The only thing, he prayed fervently.

I wonder, are we praying fervently?

Are we praying the way that Elijah prayed?

Because it seems like if we do, we can pray and watch the seasons change.

The final thing James is going to invite us into, and these are the closing lines of his whole letter, he's gonna invite us into mission.

Mission is proclaiming Jesus to all people.

And he closes his letter like this, James 5, 19.

My brothers, if anyone among you wanders from the truth and someone brings him back, let him know that whoever brings back a sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.

If you bring somebody back from wandering, you will join Jesus in his mission.

Because you notice it says that the person who brings somebody back is the one who receives the salvation.

It's because when we wait, you guys, life is not on pause.

We wait, but God is working.

And so while we wait, should we and could we join God's work?

We absolutely can.

You see, we join the mission of Jesus and we are reminded of the activity of Jesus.

When we don't give up on our neighbor, we realize God has never given up on the neighbor.

When we don't give up in the fight for injustice, we realize God has not given up in the fight against injustice, right?

We realize that God is bringing about his kingdom.

And when we join with that mission, we are filled with excitement and energized by the his work and not necessarily ours.

We realize Jesus is coming into this world and people are meeting him.

You share your faith with your neighbor, you talk to somebody about Jesus, you join in the fight against injustice, you care for people who are sick.

You will realize Jesus has been active this whole time doing his work.

And it's with him that we partner and receive the hope of salvation.

Once we do that, we realize man, God is so good and God has been at work.

You see, we also realize what we're actually waiting for.

You're waiting for justice.

Are you waiting for healing?

Are you waiting for provision?

You're actually waiting for Jesus.

You realize this, right?

See, you're not really waiting for justice and healing and provision.

You are.

But Jesus brings justice.

Jesus brings healing.

Jesus brings provision.

And so you're actually waiting on Jesus.

You see, here we are in the backseat of the car of life saying, Are we there yet?

Are we there yet?

And that question is suddenly silenced by the realization of who's driving the car.

It's God Himself, the orchestrator of history, driving history and your life to its inevitable destination.

Him.

His life.

You see, we ask, are we there yet?

And Jesus replies, I am here and I will come again.

I have arrived and I will arrive again.

I have brought justice through my cross and I will consummate that justice in my second coming.

I have brought healing in my cross, and I will bring healing when I come again in fullness.

This is the kingdom of God to live in between, to live in between Christ's once and future coming.

And we wait with that inevitable hope.

You know, many years ago I was driving my nephew.

He's now 18, but he was like five or six at the time.

And I was driving him around, and upon arriving at our destination, I began looking for parking, circling the block.

And as I'm circling the block, my five-year-old nephew at the time says, Uncle Chris, do you know where you're going?

Do I know where I'm going?

I was laughing and amused at his question.

I wanted to say, Do you know where you're going?

I actually, I remember, I turned back to him, I said, You're six, or however old he was.

I can't remember.

I just said his age.

I was like, bro, you don't even know what a stick shift is.

You don't even know how to drive a car.

Okay, and you're asking me where I'm going?

Like, chill.

I will find a spot.

We're good.

Do we not do this with God all the time?

He's driving the car of our life and history forward to its conclusion.

And we say, God, do you know where you're going?

God, are we there yet?

And God more kindly and gently replies to us, Do you know who I am?

Do you know my nature and my character?

I am the one who has come and will come again.

I am the one who will bring the things you're waiting for.

I will do it.

Trust me.

You wait well when you wait with the awareness of the presence of Jesus Christ in your life.

Perhaps it's best here at the end to change my metaphor.

Away from the car, because Christianity may be less like that, less individual.

Not like a car, but maybe more like a battleship.

With Christ as our captain, we all play these various roles to keep the ship moving.

But he makes the commands and has given us autonomy and trust for us to navigate the different roles we play on the battleship, all under the guide of his direction.

As we await the great and final destination of his victory, we develop patience like a farmer, like the Old Testament prophets, and we participate through all of the various ways he's invited us to be on his team.

We're not left to sit.

Instead, we take our role on this battleship.

We await patiently the certainty of his victory, joining the battle cry the church has had for generations and generations.

Come, Lord Jesus, come.

Can I pray for us?

Heavenly Father, we ask you to come.

We ask you to come near to us now through the power of your Holy Spirit.

And we ask you to come again and make this world right.

In the meantime, as we ask the questions, are we there yet?

We ask you to be the one who can silence us and calm us the way that a parent can silence and calm a child.

Father, we trust you in and recognize we are in your arms and help us, God, as we participate and as we develop the patience we need through these difficult days.

In Christ's name.