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Finishing the first Chapter of James.
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Finishing the first Chapter of James.
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The speaker invites the audience to stand for the reading of Scripture from the book of James. The main focus is on verses 19-27, which emphasize the importance of listening, speaking with caution, and controlling anger. The message also emphasizes the need to live out the teachings of the Bible, rather than just listening to them. The text highlights the role of the Word of God in guiding and transforming the lives of believers. The speaker acknowledges personal struggles with following the teachings, but encourages continued growth and obedience. The authority of the Bible is emphasized, and the importance of relying on it for guidance and avoiding deception is highlighted. Overall, the message urges the audience to take note of the teachings of the Bible and live them out in their lives. I invite you to stand, please, for the reading of Scripture. We continue our series in James, and we're wrapping up chapter 1 of James' letter. So today we're in chapter 1, verses 19 through 27 of the letter of James. Thanks again to Sandy, who comes in each week and puts the bookmarks in the right spots for us. Thank you, Sandy, for doing that. James, chapter 1, verses 19 through 27. This is God's Word. My dear brothers, take note of this. Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry. For man's anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent, and humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you. Do not merely listen to the word, and so to deceive yourselves, do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word, but does not do what it says, is like a man who looks at his face in a mirror, and after looking at it himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But the man who looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues to do this, not forgetting what he has heard, but doing it, he will be blessed in what he does. If anyone considers himself religious, and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself, and his religion is worthless. Religion that God the Father accepts as pure and faultless is this, to look after orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. The word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Please be seated. Well, if we haven't felt any conviction from James yet, we get it today. Well, maybe I don't know about you, but I certainly do. It's a tricky thing. I've heard the criticism before that Christians are all hypocrites, and pastors are all hypocrites, and I say, yep, absolutely. I'm preaching a very text, and I'm repeating commands that I admittedly myself do not follow, cannot follow, try it as best as I can. I'd like to say this is me. I trust that someday it will be. I know in glory it will be. Nevertheless, I confess, I am not one who has followed this text. My mom knows that. My wife knows that. My son knows that. Anybody who's been around me on the golf course knows that. I admit that I can't follow this text. But nevertheless, we push forward in John's lesson. Today the message is titled, The Word of Life Given to Us. And here's how we're going to study this portion of the text. Verses 19 and 20, it's God's Word proclaimed to us. Verse 21, God's Word accepted by us. Verses 22 through 25, it's God's Word obeyed by us. And then verses 26 and 27, God's Word lived through us. Obviously this portion of the text relies heavily on and focuses on the importance of knowing and understanding and living the Word of God. There should be no doubt among the followers of the Lord Jesus Christ that James the Apostle has composed a text which displays throughout a zeal and an immediacy in the communication of His message. Recall these words and phrases that keep popping up throughout James. So James 1.16, he says, Don't be deceived, my dear brothers. And then in chapter 2 verse 5, he says, Listen, my dear brothers. And then in chapter 1 verse 19, he says, My dear brothers, take note of this. Later on in James chapter 4 verse 4, talking about believers, he says, You adulterous people. And then again in chapter 4 verse 8, talking about believers, you double-minded people. And then again in chapter 5 verse 1, talking about believers, now listen, you rich people. Man, he's really hammering home here on the believers on this day. James has a message that must be communicated, and it must be communicated now. And so it is James' desire that he get our attention. And I think if you focused at all or read it all along with us as we read chapter 1 and this portion of it, James has gotten our attention. He certainly wants us to remember who we are in Christ. And so we saw last Sunday in the previous passage, James makes certain to affirm this about us. We are indeed believers in Christ. We are indeed the children of God. Nothing changes that. Nothing takes that away. But the apostle doesn't stop there. And so James moves forward to remind us that because we are in Christ, we are now partakers of a new life. And that new life will be characterized by growth and maturity, growing in grace, growing in obedience, growing in knowledge, growing in holiness. Now we recall that our study of one week ago brought us to James 1, verse 18, and remember we saw that the Word says, He chose to give us birth through the Word of Truth. How did God make known His plan and His will? There in the verse, through the Word of Truth. The Word of Truth is a claim that Scripture writers use to identify the Bible's authority and the Bible's power. And James is not, of course, he's not the first Bible writer, nor the only Bible writer to use this description. The apostle Paul also uses it. In Ephesians chapter 1, verse 13, Paul writes, and you also were included in Christ when you heard the Word of Truth, which then Paul identifies as the gospel of your salvation. So the believers in Jesus, the Christ followers, are those who have heard the gospel, and they're those who have responded to the gospel. We have not received the gospel as merely a thought or an idea, or by something that's kind of floating in the air somewhere. No, the Word of God communicates to us the good news, and the gospel is revealed to us by God through the Scriptures. And we know Jesus, and we profess faith in Jesus, and we do so as a response to the communication of the Word of Truth. And so the simple instruction at the beginning of the phrase, verse 19, acts as a wake-up call to the believers to then continue to rely on the Word of Truth, which is the Word of Life given to us. A lot of what James says, he says, my dear sisters and brothers, take note of this. James's logic here is that we rely on the revelation of Scripture to affirm our salvation, and we're also going to rely on the revelation of Scripture to encourage our maturity as believers. So let's think about that one for a minute. The Bible tells us that God loves us. The Bible tells us that Jesus died for our sins. The Bible tells us that we have God's Holy Spirit as our constant companion and guide. And we say that we believe this. We believe all this is true because we say that we believe in the Bible. So if we're going to say that we believe in the Bible and the message of salvation presented in the Bible, then we must also say that we believe in the Bible as the instruction manual for our lives, that it calls us to obedience, and that we're committed to live in obedience. Now, of course, all Scripture is God-breathed, as Paul told Timothy, and all of it is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work. The call that goes out to the world is also the call that continues to draw us back to the revelation of God. So my dear sisters and brothers, take note of this. Receive this Word. Take note of the Gospel. It is this Word which has saved you. This Word describes the salvation you now enjoy, and this Word now will also direct your lives. Now before we move into the details of today's text, let's pause to consider one more measure of truth presented here, important for the study of all of James' letter. By what authority does James write? Notice the references here that James makes in the text. Verse 18 talks about the Word of Truth. In verse 21, he talks about the Word planted in you which can save you. In verse 22, he says, do not merely listen to the Word, do what it says. And then verse 25, he's talking about the perfect law that gives freedom. Now there are a number of ways that we might expect James to exert authority. For example, James could have said at the beginning of his letter, or somewhere in the beginning of the chapter, he could have said something like, I am an apostle, everyone. Hello, here I am, and therefore what I declare must be true because I am an apostle. But nowhere in his letter does James play the apostle card. In fact, James never mentions in his letter that he holds the office of an apostle. The other apostles might. Paul tended to throw it around a little bit. James never mentions it in his letter. Even today, a large portion of the church is governed by one person who is said to hold such authority, apostolic authority, one who supposedly declares with infallibility. But James never makes such a declaration. Also, we never hear James say something to the effect of, God told me this. As you all know, and we've talked about this before, whenever I hear such a claim, my skeptical radar is always going to be activated. We would do well to filter such claims with a heavy skepticism. The word of God, my friends, is clear and available to all. Romans chapter 1, verse 19 says, for what may be known about God is plain because God has made it plain. We read that Jude writes, and he urges us to contend to the faith that was once for all entrusted to the saints. Not one saint here, another saint there, but all of the saints. How has faith been entrusted to us, to the saints? By the word of God. Not by private revelation, not by experience, even in the last days, deception, as we know, will run rampant even in the church. And for this, we must be on guard always. And we can look back to something that we can agree on and that we can share together and understand together, and that is the word of God. And just to clarify, yes, the word of truth is available to all. James' audience here described as my dear brothers, he uses that language, but the word James here is in the masculine gender, and so that's why brothers is used, that's why it's technically correct. But the word James uses that the NIV renders as brothers is most often referenced to the crowd or the body of people, regardless of gender. So we're right here in reading this verse to say that James is saying my dear brothers and sisters, or my dear sisters and brothers, he means that when he says it. James has made this abundantly clear, he does hold the office of an apostle, but his words must be in conformity to the word of God. It's one of the ways that a book got in the Bible. How did we teach? How did we gather the things that are in the Bible? What was the test? Well, one of the tests was that all worked together. There's nothing in the Bible that's contradictory, there's nothing that's hanging out there that doesn't fit. The argument's made this is so, but we know by our study of the word that this is not the case. The words of James are in conformity to the word of God. So in our passage today, James doesn't offer any declaration of his apostolic authority, but James says here that by the authority by which I write, the authority is the word of God. And with this, James is then licensed by the Holy Spirit to say, my dear sisters and my dear brothers, take note of this. And here's how the word will accomplish this. Verses 19 and 20 instruct us as to the hearing of God's word. Notice our text. Three principles that James communicates to us concerning our study of God's word. Now certainly there are more principles to follow when we study the things of God. You and I could add other warnings to the list, so James' list here is not exclusive, but these are the three things that James makes reference to. Notice the verse. He says, everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry. Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to become angry. To receive and to walk in the word of truth, believers are first to be quick to listen. Now the word quick, of course, throws us off a little bit. So let's do a little homework here to figure out how we can rightly handle the command. Because this is a command. It's written in the imperative, it appears in that way. So we would do well to give the verse its due consideration. And yes, the use of the word quick seems a bit odd. We don't use the word quick in this way in our language any longer. Last Sunday, of course, recall we recited the Apostles' Creed. And if you're like me and you grew up in church and you grew up saying the Apostles' Creed, you used to say that you believe in the quick and the dead. That was the language of the Apostles' Creed in the day. Now we don't say the quick and the dead, we say the living and the dead, but you remember that was used in the Apostles' Creed back in the day. Now, looking around the room, none of us are as quick as we used to be, physically speaking. And we know there's something up as how would one be quick to listen? It just doesn't seem to make sense. The process of listening requires no mobility whatsoever. In fact, we could argue that the best listeners are those who would stop to listen. Have you ever tried to listen to somebody and keep doing what you're doing, and then you realize, okay, I've just heard what you've said, but I really didn't listen, so I don't know what you've said. Listening while listening is a form of multitasking, but we would certainly do well to consider whether multitasking compromises efficiency of comprehension. The word quick, so the word quick here connotes readiness and availability and attentiveness of spirit and sufficiency of comprehension. Is your heart and is my heart and is your mind and my mind ready now to receive that which God has prepared for us, which is the very word of God? Yes, we have heard the word of God. The gospel has been proclaimed before us, and those of us who believe it have received it, and we will go forward in this life as those who are ready to continue to hear the word of God. The gospel continues to be proclaimed before us, and it resonates with us, and we will continue to receive it. That's what it means to be quick. That's what the Bible is saying here when we are to be quick to listen. One of the privileges we enjoy is to come to worship on Sunday mornings, and as we fellowship and as we worship together, we hear the proclamation of the word of God. We sit under the declaration of the word. We feed on the truth of the scriptures announced. That's why it's important for us just to hear the word of God proclaimed, whether it's the call to worship in the beginning, whether it's the benediction at the end, whether it's various verses and passages throughout the service. We come to feed off of the word of God proclaimed to us, and for 60 years now, I've heard repeated the words of the 23rd Psalm or John 3.16 or any of the other glorious passages of scriptures, and I'm so very thankful that none of it has ever gotten old or stale or routine because God's word means more to me now than it ever has before. Maybe God's word is finally penetrating this thick skull of mine. That could very well be the case. Perhaps now God has more sufficiently softened my heart to fully receive his word. To hear God's word proclaimed is truly indeed a blessing from our Heavenly Father. It's like a spigot that you open up all the way and rip the knob off. That's what it means to rest and rely and receive the word of God proclaimed. And this church, for seven years, has permitted me to stand in this pulpit and preach the good news of Christ, to proclaim the word of God, a glorious gift which God has seen fit to give me to exercise. Here James teaches that everyone should be quick to listen. Second, the children of God not only be quick to listen, but they are to be slow to speak. Now as the command follows that of our listening, the command to be slow to speak references speaking in response to what we have heard, and when we do respond, James here holds that we must be careful and considerate with that response. It is not a prohibition against responding, rather is it a reminder that we would do well to go forth in obedience to God and in patience for others when we do respond. And we must also remember that when we respond, we do not do so as some independent agent. Because believers in Jesus, we now of course work for the kingdom. It's like you're wearing a big badge on the front of your shirt and you can't get away from it. You're driving down the highway with the Jesus bumper sticker. So when you speed or when you blow through the stop sign or the red light, and then you feel a conviction, well you should, because you're wearing the Jesus bumper sticker on the back of the car. Who do you work for? Who do you serve? Well this is the problem that we face, so this is why James calls us to be slow to speak. It's not a prohibition against responding, but it's a reminder that we would do well to go forth in obedience to God and in patience for others when we do respond. Believers in Jesus, we work for the kingdom. The Apostle Paul calls us the ambassadors for Christ. And our words must be in alignment with God's word. And we cannot be careless with this. Third, tied to the command to be slow to speak, believers must also be slow to become angry. There's a test here, no doubt about it. Try driving down the bypass and get cut off and see if you're able to be slow to become angry. I know it's a problem for me, absolutely. Now certainly there is a holy anger and we know that God possesses it and God wields it, so anger is an emotion and emotions are created by God and when God expresses an emotion, His emotions are always expressed correctly. God's emotive expressions are always perfectly aligned with His will. And so God's expressions are always right and so God's expressions of anger are always right. And contrary to popular belief, God can and does certainly express anger and He has every right to do so because He's God and He knows what's right and He's created the emotions and He created so He knows what He's doing. He does it rightly. And the Bible is full of examples of this. To say that God is never angry is not consistent with God's Word. He has every right to be angry. Now none of this means that Christians are not to be angry, that we're not to express anger. We look at our world today and we see all the things of this world that are utterly sinful, things that are totally inconsistent with the Word of God, and not only are we told that we must accept them, but our politically correct culture insists that we enthusiastically endorse them. So the Christ follower is right to be angry when we consider the modern day slavery that is promoted by the laziness of society to which even our nation now contributes. And the Christ follower is right to be angry over a culture that now mainstreams physical mutilation and especially disgusting being the physical mutilation of children. This world continues to find new ways to sacrifice children to Moloch. It is detestable and it is an abhorrence and Christ followers are right to be angry about it. But even here in our anger, James counsels us to be careful, because when we express anger, or any emotion for that matter, we must confess that we yet remain sinful. God expresses anger rightly. God expresses his emotions rightly. We're working with the filter that's kind of messed up and broken a little bit, so therefore when we express emotions, we don't always do it in the right way. The Irish Bible scholar John Alexander Motier here humbly and correctly offers that most of us would have to confess that holy anger belongs in a state of sanctification to which we have not yet attained. I think that's fair to say. Anger is an instrument that you and I are not completely trained or licensed to handle. And we know this is true because James confirms it. Notice verse 20. He says, For man's anger does not bring about the righteous life that God desires. So James' words here serve as a reminder, as wise counsel, but it's also a holy admonishment, is it not? For the plan of God is that there is a righteous life that is being born, that is growing and expanding with each believer, and it's the righteous life that is the plan and the will of the Father. So let us all each be quick to listen to God's word proclaimed to us. So how do we live the righteous life that God desires? Well, we all have these ideas in our head of what that looks like, nothing wrong with that, but we ask that question. How do we live the righteous life that God desires? And we come to verse 21, and James offers us the wisest of instruction with regard to that question. And there's a lot within this verse. If you notice, James here teaches, Therefore, first we would clear the decks, we were prepared to receive God's word, so James says to get rid of all moral filth and evil. We're to continue to work on the sin which does remain in our own hearts, which does continue to taint our lives, and it continues to hamper our spiritual maturity. Next, James reminds us in the text, in verse 21, of the reality of sin that is so prevalent. Sin does not exist in the abstract. Sin is real, it is present throughout this world, it continues to affect us all. Then James counsels us in verse 21. He counsels us to humbly accept the ongoing sanctifying work that God has before each of us. God continues to work on us, and thank God He continues to work on us. The opposite would be not good. Okay, I mixed up my language there, I apologize for that. Any English teachers, I'm terribly sorry. But what I mean is that if God stops working on you or me, if God stops convicting us of our sin, if God stops pointing out things that need to be worked on, that's a bad scene. That means that He stopped working on us, and you and I aren't ready for glory. If He stopped working, then He has stopped working, and we don't want that. So as difficult as it is, we need correction from God, we need admonishment from the Holy Spirit, we need direction from Him. So let us be those who would humbly accept the ongoing sanctifying work that God has before each of us. And further here in verse 21, the Apostle points us to the immediacy of the Scriptures and the nearness of them. He describes it here as the Word planted in you. So the Word of God is planted in you and in me and in the mind and heart of every believer, and the attitude toward the Scriptures to be more than just an acknowledgment of them, but rather a subscription to them. We subscribe to the Bible when we say we believe the Bible. We mean that we have declared and determined that it is the truth. The Bible is our only rule for faith and practice. We have subscribed to it in that way, because it is the Word that is planted in us. Now if these points constituted the sum total of the wisdom of verse 21, we would read it, and we would receive it, and we'd act on it, and we'd be grateful to God for it. But to this, James offers one more item, and notice again verse 21, and it's at the end of the verse. He says, Therefore, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent, and humbly accept the Word planted in you, and then notice the last phrase, which can save you. The Word which can save you. So what is the goal of our obedience? James offers that the goal of our obedience is salvation, and so the Word of God stands at that which indeed enables salvation and facilitates salvation. Now to us, this seems a little odd, because of course, aren't we already saved? If you believe in Jesus, aren't you already saved? Don't you already enjoy salvation? And further, because of that, and we're being good Presbyterians, aren't we eternally assured of our salvation? To this we answer in the affirmative. Salvation is assured for everyone, for the Christ follower, everyone who believes in Jesus, but Scripture clearly is more specific than that, isn't it? The Bible teaches about salvation all throughout, and as we've noticed before, the Bible teaches that we are saved, that's our justification. The Bible teaches that we are being saved, that's our sanctification, the ongoing work of the life of the believer, and that we will be saved, that there is a final glorification that awaits all the children of God. So when we think of salvation, it is right and biblical for us to think that we have been saved, we are being saved, and that we will be saved. That is correct to think of it in that way. And we know that all this is true, and so because of it we trust in Christ for our salvation. Because we do this because we know that he can save us. Think about that one for a minute. How do we know that we're saved? Well, one of the ways we know that we're saved is because we know that Jesus can save. Can Jesus save you? Is the cross sufficient? Is His shed blood the work that was necessary to pay the price for our sins? Did Jesus die once for all to receive the sins, and did the Father look at His sacrifice and say, yep, that's the sufficient sacrifice? So can Jesus save? We say, yes, He saves, and yes, He saved me. We say that because we know that He can. He can save. And we know that He can save us because the Word of God has told us so. Scripture therefore must be God's Word accepted, accepted by us. Can't just sit on a shelf collecting dust. We can't just kind of acknowledge it and say, yep, there it is. We have to subscribe to it, we have to take it in, it has to be accepted by us. Now we come to verses 22 through 25, and here James carefully but firmly moves us along in the wisdom of God. Notice verse 22. Do not merely listen to the Word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Well, isn't this interesting? James here says that it's possible for a believer in Jesus to hear the Word of God and yet be deceived. Now that's a tricky one, right? This isn't just for anybody that's out there anywhere. James has written this letter for my dear brothers and sisters. He says, take note of this, my dear ones. And James says here that it is possible for a believer in Jesus to hear the Word and yet be deceived. Now we might want to push back a little bit. I might want to say something like, but here I am, I'm a good Presbyterian, I'm here most every Sunday and I'm sitting under the proclamation of the Word of God, isn't that enough? And of course the answer is no, it's not enough to hear God's Word proclaimed. The Word proclaimed to us will elicit a response. And what will that response be? What would it look like? What would it sound like? Well, there's two responses and James contrasts them here. The first response of the man in the mirror, verses 23 and 24, the one whose attention is fixed on himself or herself, taking a quick glance at the reflection, but then walking away, getting back to the life of one who would not believe and subsequently live in As if, and it is as if he or she can't even recognize true faith and true obedience. James here offers the contrast of the one who looks not upon his own image, upon the self, but rather into God's Word, here described as the perfect law that gives freedom. This one looks intently at God's Word, continues to do so, perseveres in the promise of God's Word and then acts according to it. In this world, this is an interesting phrase that James uses here, the perfect law that gives freedom, because in this world we tend to think that law and freedom are not the same, that they're disconnected. How can you have law and freedom in the same sense? But James here argues that the two are, in fact, connected. The Word of God is the foundation for us to truly live as we were designed. We were to be free to do so. Without God's Word as foundation for our lives, we will never achieve that which God has purposed for us. If we think that we can function without God's Word, then are we not truly deceived? So let us not be deceived, my friends, because we are the children of God, God's Word does call us to obedience. Yes, we admit that it is easier said than done. Yes, we admit that we fall short of God's commands. Nevertheless, we move forward in faith with James' counsel concerning God's Word obeyed by us. So when he says, do not merely listen to the Word, and so deceive yourselves, do what it says. So let's come to verse 26 and 27, and here James pushes his do what it says teaching to the limit. So let's consider the devout worshiper. Let's consider the good Presbyterian who shows up every Sunday morning. Let's consider the devout worshiper. Here in verses 26 and 27, the words of the New International Version renders as religious or religion, there in the text, offers specific reference to worship. So here described the person who in James' day might demonstrate a dynamic, very visible outward faith in worship, knows the liturgy, knows the ceremony, knows the tradition, knows the hymns backwards and forwards. And certainly this religious practice continues even today. And this religious practice is not just in what remains of the historic traditional church, but we also find it in the contemporary church. It's just there that drums and the band has taken the place of the organ and the choir. And the light show presents the imagery in the way that stained glass windows once did. But let's make no mistake, the contemporary church is every bit as religious as the traditional church. And what was true in the past continues to be true today. Religion is still religion and the religious person will still fall for the religious trappings if that religious person is not paying attention. James speaks the truth concerning the religious person. Verse 26, if anyone considers himself religious, even a good Presbyterian, if anyone considers himself religious and does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless. In chapter one, James is introducing us to a theme which he will return to throughout his letter. For now he offers this clear indicator of a person's faithfulness. If a person claims to be a faithful worshiper and yet displays carelessness and disobedience with his words, James says that that person has been self-deceived so that when that person then goes to worship, that person's worship is worthless. Now when we think of this critique, it's easy to regard it as standing against vulgarity or profanity. We think about those things and we say, yes, that's right, that's what James has in mind, no doubt about that, but is it not certainly more than that? So it's the way we use our words to wound or to inflict or to damage or to mischaracterize or to slander or to sow seeds of doubt or disregard or demand what we want or to impose our will. Aren't those uses of the words as well that would demonstrate a faithlessness? All too often I have used my words in these ways. My prideful boasting has proven to be the evidence that I have deceived myself and thus I would devalue any pronouncements of faith I've made in the worship of God. Devalued, James would argue, even to the point of worthlessness. That's how important this is. So to counter religion that is deceiving and worthless, James holds that there is also a true religion, a religious practice that is not deceiving and it is not worthless, but rather it is what? Pure and faultless, known as verse 27. Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this, to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. Here James describes the outward ministries of the true and the faithful believer. Now he's picked a couple of them here, one not being polluted by the world and the other taking after orphans and widows in their distress, and we would say that these stand as meaning something bigger. They're not just those things, those are important, they're right characteristics, but they mean something bigger. So to keep oneself from being polluted by a world is the display of the believer's love for God, while looking after orphans and widows in their distress is indicative of the believer's love for others. Well, we've heard that before. Here's the first command, love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind and all your strength, and the second is like the first, love your neighbor as yourself. James is tracking right along with Jesus' words. My friends, here's the truth, James leaves us no room for a compromised faith, and we cannot willingly subscribe to a hyphenated religion. The gospel has changed us, and it has made us new, and we now belong to Jesus, and the gospel must continually change us, because we all know there is work yet to be done. It's work of renewal, the work of the gospel, the renewal of our hearts and our minds must continue. God's word lived through us. God by His Holy Spirit has brought us far from where we once were, no doubt about that, but we also must see there is much work which yet remains within each of us. Much work yet to be done, and that's okay, because God's in charge of the process. He sent us His Son to guarantee our salvation, both that salvation that we would know then, salvation that's happening now, and salvation that we receive in the future. You and I are very much like the man whose son was delivered by Jesus, and this man upon Jesus' delivering of his son, declared these words, and these words are they not also our words as well, when he said to Jesus, I believe, help my unbelief. Let's bow our heads and pray, shall we? Heavenly Father, James has been used by you to give us a heavy load, for he reminds us what we know to be true. We are not deceived. We are yet a people who remain sinful. Sin no longer reigns over us, but it remains within us, and we are thankful nevertheless that even though you have called us to be holy, and we know you have not watered down that command, yet you are gently and compassionately and graciously and mercifully working in each one who would be a believer, and you are making us more like Jesus, and you are bringing us closer to a point where we are seeing less and less sin and more and more righteousness live within us, and you're bringing us to that point where we will one day stand before the throne, and we will stand there ready, not ready because of our work or ready because of our own cleverness or ready because of our own achievement. No, it's because you are readying us and fitting us for glory, and we're going to lean and rely upon what you're doing, sending us through your Holy Spirit, being our counselor and comforter and guide and director. Thank you, Father, for not abandoning your children. Thank you, Father, for never failing or forsaking your children. Thank you, Father, that we can be a people who know we are still in great need, and yet thank you that you give us the assurance of your love for us which never fails. And so we thank you for Jane's words, harsh words of instruction, yet gracious words and merciful because they are issued from the very throne of God, and for this we're thankful. For this we praise you and we give you glory. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Let's stand for our final song this morning. Let's sing together, before the throne of God.
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