The Trials of Poverty and Wealth

Laurel Bible Church

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I invite you to take your copy of God's Word and open to the book of James, James chapter 1.

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As I have opportunities to preach here from time to time, I've been working my way through the book of James, and we're not very far into it.

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James chapter 1. Our concentration this morning will be verses 9, 10, and 11, but to get the full context here,

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I would like us to begin in verse 1, and we will read through verse 11.

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So those of you who are able to do so, I invite you to stand with me as we read God's Word together.

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James chapter 1, beginning of verse 1. James, a slave of God and of the

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Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes who are in the dispersion, greetings. Consider it all joy, my brothers, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith brings about perseverance.

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And let perseverance have its perfect work, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

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But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him.

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But he must ask in faith, doubting nothing. For the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind.

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For that man ought not to expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, being a double -minded man, unstable in all his ways.

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But the brother of humble circumstances is to boast in his high position, and the rich man is to boast in his humiliation, because like flowering grass, he will pass away.

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For the sun rises with a scorching heat and withers the grass, and its flower falls off, and the beauty of its appearance is destroyed.

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So, too, the rich man, in the midst of his pursuits, will fade away. May God bless the reading of his word.

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You may be seated. The title of my message this morning is

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The Trials of Poverty and Wealth. The Trials of Poverty and Wealth.

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If you read verses 9 through 11 as standalone verses and isolate them from their context, it might not seem like, at first, that these verses, 9, 10, and 11, have anything to do with trials, as the title that I've chosen for this message seems to indicate.

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But I'm convinced that they do. The context seems to demand it. Looking back at the verses we just read, we saw that verses 2 through 4 deal with trials in general.

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Verses 5 through 8 deal with wisdom in trials. And then we have 9, 10, and 11.

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And then the next verse, verse 12, which, Lord willing, next time I preach, I'll be dealing with.

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But verse 12 picks up with trials again. So 9, 10, and 11 is sandwiched right in the midst of other verses that are speaking about trials.

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So I do believe the context here demands that we view these verses, 9, 10, and 11, as trials.

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The trials of poverty and the trials of wealth. Now, I think we can see easily enough how poverty can be a trial, right?

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But we often don't think of wealth as being a trial. But indeed, it is.

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Wealth is a trial. There was a book written back in 1905 by the name of Fiddler on the

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Roof. You've probably heard of that. It was a book first, and then it was turned into a play, and then it was made into a movie in 1971.

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Some of you may have seen that movie. The setting is in Russia, and there's one scene where two of the characters,

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Perchik and Tvei, Perchik and Tvei, are speaking with one another. And Perchik says this, quote, money is the world's curse.

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To which Tvei replies, may the Lord smite me with it, and may I never recover.

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So some of us think, wow, I wish I had some of those kind of trials, trials of wealth.

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Well, this passage does present to us a bit of an interpretive challenge.

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It's clear that the poor man is a brother, right, because it says it right there, the brother of humble circumstances.

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But what about the rich man? Is the rich man a brother, or is he an unbeliever?

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Each of these men is instructed by James to boast. So which is it?

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Is the rich man a believer, or is he an unbeliever? And there is some support for both of these positions.

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For those who would say the rich man is an unbeliever, they would say, well, see how James treats rich people in other places in his letter, and he does do that.

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In chapter 2, verses 1 through 6, James portrays the rich as those who oppress his readers.

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They drag them into court, and they even blaspheme the fair name of Jesus by which you have been called.

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Not exactly a glowing endorsement, is it? And then in chapter 5, he returns to the rich, and he's even stronger there.

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And James tells the rich to weep and howl for the miseries that were coming upon them.

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He accuses the rich of condemning believers and putting to death righteous people.

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Indeed, in the book of James, the rich are not portrayed in a good light, to say the least.

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So if the rich man is an unbeliever, then the way we would need to take verse 9 is basically with sarcasm and a view to the end times, a kind of eschatological in nature.

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So in other words, if the rich man is an unbeliever, we've got to take what

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James says here in his instructions to boast as basically like this. Okay, rich man, you want to boast?

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Go ahead and boast. The only thing that you'll have to boast about, though, is your upcoming destruction.

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It would have to be filled with sarcasm. Want to boast? Boast about your destruction because it's coming,

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Jack. That's how we would have to take verse 9. However, there is other evidence that I would seem to lean to that indicates that the rich man is, in fact, a believer.

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Most of James' audience, the recipients of this letter, were undoubtedly poor. We know that because in verse 1, he says, he writes to the 12 tribes who were in the dispersion, those who were scattered abroad.

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So these were believers who had been scattered from their home. Why were they scattered? They were scattered because of persecution.

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They had had their possessions, their wealth, their homes taken from them, and so they were scattered to flee persecution.

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So it's clear that the great majority of James' readers here were indeed poor.

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That said, though, there is some evidence in the book of James that at least a few of his readers did have some means, did have some financial wealth because he says in Chapter 4 of his letter, he says, "...Come

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now, you who say, today and tomorrow we will go to such and such a city and do business there and make a profit."

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And then he says, "...Instead, you ought to say, if the Lord wills, we will go and do this and do that."

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So in Chapter 4, he indicates that at least some of his readers did have some financial wealth.

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And the structure of the passage also would seem to indicate that the rich man is indeed a brother, he is a believer.

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So in other words, let the poor brother boast in his high position and let the rich brother boast in his low position, his humiliation.

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That's the most natural reading of the text. So the word is to apply, the word brother is to be applied both to the poor man and to the rich man as well.

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And it seems to me, too, that for us to take the rich man as an unbeliever, that would just seem to me to stretch the sarcasm and the irony that would be required for that position, to just stretch that too far.

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I don't think that's what James is saying. I am convinced that James is talking about believers.

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Both the poor man and the rich man are brothers. Most of his readers are poor, but some do have some wealth.

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Okay, so for that as context, let's go back to our text, verse 9. James says, the brother of humble circumstances is to boast in his high position.

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The poor man is to boast in his high position. Boasting, taking pride in oneself is generally frowned upon, right?

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God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble, 1 Peter 5 .5.

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Most of us know that verse. And Jesus himself directly states in Matthew 23, verse 12, whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.

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So, how do we square Jesus' words, warning not to exalt himself, with what

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James says here, that both the poor man and the rich man are to boast?

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How do we square that? Well, boasting in and of itself is not always wrong.

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Okay? Boasting in and of itself is not always wrong. The crucial element is not the boasting.

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The crucial element is the occasion for it, the object of our boasting.

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What are we boasting about? Who are we boasting in? Now, boasting in ourselves is utterly sinful, to be sure.

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If we boast in ourselves, that is clear -cut sin. Boasting in ourselves is nothing short of unadulterated pride.

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Proverbs 16, 18 through 19 says that, pride goes before what?

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Destruction, and a haughty spirit before stumbling. It is better to be humble in spirit with the lowly than to divide the spoil with the proud.

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Boasting in ourselves, pride in ourselves, reveals in us selfishness, it reveals in us arrogance, and the person whose life is marked by pride reveals himself or herself to be someone who does not know

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God. If your life is marked by boasting, if your life is marked by pride in yourself, then you have every reason to examine yourself to see if you're in the faith, because that should not be said of a believer.

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It cannot be said of a believer. Now, none of us is without pride.

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None of us is completely without it. And I would point you to 2 Corinthians Chapter 12 as a stark example of this, because the

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Apostle Paul himself admitted that he had pride. Remember, he had been caught up into the third heaven, and he heard words that are inexpressible that man is not permitted to speak.

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God had granted him this magnanimous privilege of being caught up into the third heaven, right?

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And then Paul said in verse 10, verse 11, he said, to keep me from exalting myself, there was given me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to keep me from exalting myself, to keep him humble.

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Paul had been granted this magnanimous privilege of being caught up into the third heaven. We don't know what he saw.

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We don't know what he heard. And Paul said, to keep him from exalting himself, God gave him a thorn in the flesh, a really scallops in the flesh, a stake in the flesh, to keep him humble.

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And dear friends, this was the Apostle Paul. If the Apostle Paul, the author of roughly a third of the New Testament, was not without pride, you and I will not be without pride.

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Okay? So none of us is without pride. But if your life is marked by continual pride, continual boasting, without any prick of conscience in yourself, you have every reason to examine yourself, to see if you're in the faith.

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It has been said that spiritual growth is a growth downward. It is only when we have a lower view of ourselves that we will have a higher view of God.

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There is an inverse relationship between how we view ourselves and how we view God. The more highly we think of ourselves, the more lowly we'll think of God.

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The more lowly we think of ourselves, the higher we will think of God.

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So the important thing here is not boasting in and of itself, but the occasion for boasting and the object of boasting.

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Boasting can be good. Boasting, in fact, is something that we should do as Christians as long as we are boasting in the right person, capital

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P. Jeremiah chapter 9, 23 through 24 says this,

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Thus says the Lord, let not a wise man boast of his wisdom, and let not the mighty man boast of his might.

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Let not a rich man boast of his riches, but let him who boasts boast of this, that he understands and knows me.

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That he understands and knows me. That I am the Lord who exercises loving kindness, justice, and righteousness on earth, for I delight in these things, declares the

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Lord. If we are to boast, and we should, we should boast in the fact that we understand and that we know

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God. Not in ourselves, but in him. As believers, we are to boast in our high position, as James says in verse 9.

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What is our high position? Our high position as Christians is that we are exalted in and with Christ.

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We are not to boast in our wealth. We are to boast in Christ, in him, in him alone.

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Most of James' recipients were poor, and indeed, most Christians throughout all of history have been poor.

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Throughout history and to this very day, Christians, true Christians, are looked down upon by the world.

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I want to read to you a few verses from 1 Corinthians 1, verses 26 through 29.

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1 Corinthians 1, 26 through 29. Paul writes, for consider your calling, brothers, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to shame the things which are strong, and the base things of the world, and the despised

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God has chosen, the things that are not, so that he may abolish the things that are, so that no flesh, no flesh may boast before God.

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Paul says that not many wise are chosen, not many mighty are chosen, not many noble are chosen.

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More often than not, God chooses the weak, he chooses the base, and he chooses the despised.

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And he does this, at least in part, so that no flesh could ever boast before him.

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No flesh could ever boast before God. So, poverty is a trial.

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It's not easy being poor. Being poor is not a life of comfort, it's not a life of ease.

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By God's grace, I have been able to travel around the world and preach in a lot of different countries.

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And I tell people, you really have to get out of the United States of America before you can have an appreciation for what we have here.

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You really do. A number of years ago, I was in Uganda and was there preaching in a number of different places with Pastor Bill Issa, I -S -S -A,

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Bill Issa. He and his family invited me and a friend of mine named Mike Miller to go over and we preached in a number of different...

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He organized kind of a preaching tour for us in Uganda. And one day, we were having lunch at Pastor Bill's house.

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And he does have a house. It is more than just a grass hut, which

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I saw a lot of that in Africa. At least it had solid walls. But they only had one spigot of water in the entire house, and that was in the kitchen.

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Just one little faucet of water, and that's all they had. You might be wondering, what about the bathroom?

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Their bathroom was a closet with a floor that slanted down to the outside wall in a hole at the lowest point of that floor.

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That was their bathroom. They would have to get a bucket, put it under that one spigot of water, carry the bucket into the, quote -unquote, bathroom, and wash out the waste.

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That's where they would dump water on themselves to take a shower. We can't even comprehend that kind of poverty.

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A few years after that, I was in India, and we were preaching at this...there was this pastor and his family, and they had a three -story house.

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Now, when I say a three -story house, you might think, wow. But the houses in this part of India, India is very crowded.

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Houses are very narrow, very narrow, and so they build up. They did have electricity, but there was no air conditioning.

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On the first floor of the house is where the family lived. The middle floor is where they took care of widows, elderly widows who were sick, very, very poor.

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And so there were like 10 or 12 widows that lived on the middle floor. And then the top floor is where they had worship services.

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And I was...so we made our way up to the third floor, and Mike preached, and I preached, and some of these widows were there.

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And there was one lady in particular, very, very old. I don't know exactly how old she was, but just looking at her, she had to be around 90.

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She was very sick, dying of cancer, and she couldn't even sit up. She was laying on a blanket on the floor.

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And it was right at 120 degrees, no

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AC. They had some little box fans, but no AC. And Mike preached, and I preached, and for most of the day.

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And when it was over, they were kind of clearing out, and the widows went down one floor to where they stayed, and they picked up this elderly woman who was dying, and they took her down.

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And then after a little while, it was time for us to leave, so we start making our way down.

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And as I get to the middle floor, I look over, and there's that elderly, dying woman, lying on a blanket on the floor, 120 degrees.

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And we made eye contact, and she just put her hands together kind of like in a...forgive

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me, my hands don't work, but in like a thank you position, and she just mouthed to me, thank you.

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Let the poor man boast in his exalted position.

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She had nothing, nothing, but she was grateful to hear the word of God preached.

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And that woman, that woman, because of her exalted position in Christ, she has far more wealth than Bill Gates, than Elon Musk, than Donald Trump, far more.

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She is in a far more exalted position because of her position in Christ.

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John MacArthur states in his commentary, he states, and I quote,

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The poor believer may be hungry, but he has the bread of life. He may be thirsty, but he has the water of life.

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He may be poor, but he has eternal riches. He may be cast aside by men, but he has been eternally received by God.

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He may have no home on earth, but he has a glorious abode in heaven.

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The poor believer, though he may have little or nothing on earth, he has been made a joint heir with Christ Jesus.

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Romans 8, 17, and if children, heirs also, heirs of God and fellow heirs, joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified in him, we can boast in our exalted position in Christ because we have been seated with Christ in the heavenly places and we have an eternal home.

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Dear friends, it does not matter how much or how little we have on this earth or how much we suffer, our sufferings are temporary.

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We have a home with Christ in heaven and we can boast in our exalted position.

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We can boast in that. Now, I would like to offer a word of caution for those of us who have a high view of God's sovereignty and salvation.

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And I don't really like the term, but it's just the term that's used. If you believe in the doctrine of election and predestination that God has chosen a people for himself from before the foundation of the world, for lack of a better term, it's called

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Calvinism, a Calvinist. John Calvin would not have even called himself a

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Calvinist, but that's the name that's kind of stuck. A word of caution for us. Some have said,

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I can't tell you how many times I've heard this, Calvinist or arrogant. Oh, you're a

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Calvinist, you're just arrogant. Dear friends, do not boast.

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None of us should ever boast that we have been chosen by God. We should not boast in that.

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We should boast in the one who has chosen us. An arrogant

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Calvinist should be a contradiction in terms. The doctrine of God's predestination, his election, that is and should be the most humbling doctrine there is because we have nothing to boast about.

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I don't boast that I have been chosen, I boast in the one who has chosen me because I'm nothing.

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None of us are anything. We have nothing to boast about. There is nothing that is more honorable, more valuable in us than anyone else.

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So why does God choose some and not others? Simply because it pleases him to do so for his own glory.

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But it has nothing to do with us. An arrogant Calvinist should be just as nonsensical as a square circle.

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We boast in the one who has chosen us, not that we've been chosen. Verse 10,

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James continues, he says, and the rich man is to boast in his humiliation because like flowering grass, he will pass away.

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So the poor man is to boast in his exaltation as his high position in Christ.

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The rich man is to boast in his humiliation. And you may be thinking, well, that doesn't apply to me because I'm not rich.

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Let's tap the brakes here a little bit. Don't assume too quickly that the rich does not include you.

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We may not think of ourselves as rich in the United States of America, but let me give you a few statistics looking more broadly at the world.

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Over one -third of the world's population, we have about 8 billion people on this planet, over one -third of them live on less than $3 a day.

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$3 a day. Eighty percent of the world's population lives on less than $10 a day.

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I think I'm safe in guessing that everyone in here, every family in here, makes more than $10 a day, $300 a month.

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So if you're over that threshold, you're living better than 80 % of the world's population.

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About one -quarter of the world's population does not even have water piped into their homes.

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So you don't have to be a multimillionaire to be rich. Every one of us in here, we are fabulously wealthy compared to most of the world.

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And so James says, the rich, which would include all of us by the world's standards, the rich is to boast in his humiliation.

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Humiliation. What is this humiliation? Even though rich, the genuine believer, the one who unashamedly proclaims fidelity to Christ and his word, will be looked down upon by the world.

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Okay? So if you are a true Christian, I'm not talking about some, you know, professing Christian, yeah, I'm a

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Christian, I don't really know what that means, but sure, why not? No, I'm talking about a real believer. If you truly stand for Christ, you have fidelity to him and to his word, you have been saved by grace through faith, the world will hate you.

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When God saved you, you joined the most despised, the most mocked, the most ridiculed, the most persecuted group of people on the planet.

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Congratulations. And we've seen this just in the last couple of days, haven't we? I think most of us by now have seen the grotesque images coming out from the

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Olympics and the opening ceremony, just stomach churning.

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And I can't help but be struck by the fact that France and most of Europe has been inundated, basically invaded and taken over by Muslims.

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They would never dare mock Muhammad, but they're perfectly fine with mocking

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Christ. They're perfectly fine with mocking Christians. That's okay. That's okay.

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They wouldn't dare do that with Islam, but it's okay to do it to Christians. Because Christians, true

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Christians, are the most despised, the most mocked, the most persecuted people on the planet.

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And we as believers should rejoice in this humiliation. We should rejoice in it.

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1 Peter 4, verse 14 says this, if you are reviled for the name of Christ, you are blessed because of the spirit of glory and of God rests on you.

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And then two verses later, Peter continues, but if anyone suffers as a Christian, he is not to be ashamed, but is to glorify

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God in this name. If we suffer as Christians, and we will, then we are not to be ashamed.

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In fact, we are to glorify God in the name of Christ. Being a Christian brings with it persecution and humiliation in the eyes of the world.

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But we have absolutely no reason to be ashamed of this. In fact, James says that we can boast in it.

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The words of the Apostle Paul in his letter to the Philippians helps us here, I think. In chapter 1, verse 29,

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Paul says, for to you it has been granted not only to believe in Christ, but to suffer for his sake.

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It has been granted to you. In other words, it is a privilege to believe in Christ.

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Your faith is not your own. It's not something you ginned up in yourself. It was given to you.

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It was given to me. So it has been granted to you. It is a privilege to believe in Christ, not only to believe in him, but to suffer for his sake.

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If you are a rich lost person, the world will love you. However, if you're a

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Christian, even those of us who are wealthy, and that would include all of us here by the world standards, even though we have wealth, that wealth will not purchase us any favor with the world.

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If you are a true Christian and you're wealthy, let's say you're wealthy even by our standards, that wealth will purchase you no favor with the world.

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Another note of caution. Please don't go around looking for persecution so that others will think well of you.

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Don't manufacture it. I've seen some people try to do that on social media. Oh, I'm so persecuted because, you know, they didn't treat me nice at the

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Dunkin' Donuts or something like that. No, don't manufacture persecution. It's a false humility.

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It's a false humility and God will not honor that. If you truly love Christ, dear ones, you don't have to find persecution.

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It will find you. James says, like the flowering grass, he will pass away.

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Humiliation for the rich man is also defined here as the transitory nature of material things.

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Both monetary riches and our own physical bodies will pass away. Riches pass away.

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Moth and rust destroy. And wealth brings with it a false sense of security.

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This is one of the ways in which wealth can be a trial to us because it brings about a false sense of security.

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Psalm 49, 16 through 17 says this, do not be amazed when a man becomes rich when the glory of his house is increased.

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For when he dies, he will carry nothing away. His splendor will not descend after him.

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It's a false sense of security. Many people feel secure because of their wealth. It's a false sense of security.

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It's a, as the psalmist says, it's a delusion. Our bodies will pass away.

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No matter how much you have, you cannot buy youth. Aging happens to all of us.

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And I'm sure you've seen people from time to time on TV, you see some of these celebrities that are getting older and older and older, and they're constantly having stuff done to themselves.

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And after a while, it's just garish looking, right? And it's sad. It's sad because of all their wealth, all their millions upon millions of dollars, all their fancy homes and nice cars and accolades and all this, they cannot buy youth.

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Aging happens to us all. It does not matter on which side of the track you were raised. Death is an appointment we will all one day meet.

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And I might add as well, the faith healers, they can't buy youth either.

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I've been studying the prosperity gospel, the word of faith movement for, I don't know, about 30 years or so.

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And as I watch these people like Benny Hinn and Kenneth Copeland, you know what?

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Every year, they look just a little bit older than they did the year before.

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And it's kind of ironic when you consider the health and wealth gospel. Just think about the name, the health and wealth gospel.

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We know from scripture and common sense that health does not last. Wealth does not last.

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So you're offering me a gospel named after two things that are transitory, two things that fade away?

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Thanks, but no thanks. I'll pass. There is no health and wealth gospel. There is no prosperity gospel.

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There is no social gospel. There are no adjectives when it comes to the gospel. There is only the gospel.

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Peter quotes Isaiah in 1 Peter 1, verse 24, where he says, all flesh is like grass, and all its glory like the flower of grass.

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The grass withers and the flower falls off, but the word of the Lord endures forever.

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Verse 11, James says, for the sun rises with a scorching heat and withers the grass, and its flower falls off and the beauty of its appearance is destroyed.

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So too, the rich man in the midst of his pursuits will fade away.

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Spring in Israel is known for its beauty. In February, in Israel, the flowers just come alive.

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And a year ago, last February, I was in Israel, and everywhere you look, beautiful flowers, bright, vibrant blues, violets, red, pink, yellow, white,

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I mean, just gorgeous flowers. It is a brilliant and beautiful display of beauty.

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But it's a very brief display of beauty because after a very short season of that, there's a wind that always picks up.

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It's called the Sirocco. It's a hot, dry east wind that blows incessantly in those beautiful, spectacular flowers wither practically overnight.

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It's a beautiful display, but it's a very brief display. It's fleeting. And note here,

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James says, when he talks about the scorching heat, the grass withers, the flower falls off, this is to be expected.

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This is a cyclical thing, right? Every spring, the flowers come, and they make a short appearance, and then they're gone.

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Happens like clockwork every single year. So it is expected, but notice that this withering is also sometimes unexpectedly sudden.

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He says, so too, the rich man, in the midst of his pursuits, will fade away.

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In the midst of his pursuits, life is very, very fragile.

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It is brief and it is fragile. Death is an appointment we will all one day meet, and dear friends, none of us knows when that appointment is coming.

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Sometimes, death can come at the most unexpected of times. When we're young, when we're healthy, you know, we think, oh, death, that's so far away.

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But sometimes, death will come to us in the most unexpected of times. None of us is promised tomorrow.

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I don't care if you're 90 or if you're 15. Sometimes, it comes very unexpectedly.

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So dear ones, remember that even if, as wealthy Christians, even if we are wealthy by U .S. standards, our identity is not in wealth, our identity is not in our possessions, our identity is only in Christ, and it is in him that we boast.

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So some lessons from our text this morning. Poverty is a trial.

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How so? The poor sometimes are prone to dishonor

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God. There are some specific temptations that come with being poor. There's the temptation for theft.

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If you're poor, there's a temptation to be a thief. You get something for nothing, right?

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There's a temptation for envy, coveting, wanting something that someone else has but you do not.

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To envy, to covet is to tell God that we are not really satisfied with his provision and his decree for our lives.

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To covet, to envy is to complain to the Alpha and Omega, to tell

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God that we are not really satisfied with your provision for us. And complaining is a sin, is a serious sin.

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Being poor, oftentimes if you're poor, you're hungry, you're lonely, you're tired, and these conditions just lend themselves to being dissatisfied, to complaining, and to dishonoring

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God. So there are innate temptations with being poor. There are also innate temptations to being wealthy.

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Wealth is also a trial. Wealth carries its own set of trials. The temptation, if you are wealthy, is there to be self -sufficient.

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When our bodies are healthy, when there's plenty of money in the bank, our wallets are full, human nature is that we just tend to forget about God.

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So wealth is a trial. It tends us to become self -sufficient. Proverbs 18 .11,

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a rich man's wealth is his strong city and like a high wall in his own delusion.

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I want to read that again. The rich man's wealth is his strong city. In other words, the rich man has confidence in his wealth, in his fortification.

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It's his strong city and like a high wall in his own delusion.

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In other words, the rich man who puts his confidence in wealth is deluded.

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There's a temptation of materialism and greed to be wealthy. Jesus said it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into heaven.

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And to return briefly to the prosperity gospel, that is a mystery to me too because why would you...I

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mean, Jesus said it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of heaven.

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Why would you preach a message, the prosperity gospel, that makes it harder than it already is?

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It doesn't even make any sense. So there's a temptation of materialism, temptation of greed.

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Being wealthy carries with it a temptation of pride. Look what I've done.

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Look what I've built. Look what I've accomplished. Wealth, it is very unusual to find a wealthy person who is truly humble.

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They do exist, but by and large, extreme wealth brings with it pride.

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The story is told of Muhammad Ali, years ago, of course. Muhammad Ali was kind of at the height of his career, height of his popularity, extremely wealthy.

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I mean, he was one of the most well -known people on the planet and the story is told of him that he was on an airplane flying.

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The airplane was going through some significant turbulence and the announcement came through the speakers, put on your seat belt, we're going through turbulence, and then the stewardesses were going up and down the aisle to make sure everyone had their seat belt on.

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And of course, Muhammad Ali is in first class and this stewardess looks at Muhammad Ali, did not have his seat belt on, and she said, sir, please put on your seat belt.

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And Muhammad Ali said, Superman don't need no seat belt. To which she replied,

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Superman don't need no airplane either. Wealth carries with it a temptation of pride.

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All of us, whether poor or rich, would do well to remember that if it were not for God upholding all things by the word of his power, our hearts could not take their next beat.

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We are completely dependent upon God. So there are inherent trials with being poor, there are inherent trials with being wealthy.

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And dear ones, there is nothing inherently honorable in being poor, there's nothing inherently wrong with being wealthy.

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You remember in Luke chapter 16, the rich man and Lazarus, this parable that Jesus taught, the rich man and Lazarus both died.

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Lazarus was poor, diseased, dying anyway on death's door anyway. So he died, it wasn't any surprise when he died, and he went to heaven.

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He went to Abraham's bosom, went to heaven. The rich man was living in splendor every day, as the text says.

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And he also died, and apparently died at about the same time the poor man,

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Lazarus, did. Poor man went to Abraham's bosom, the rich man went to the lake of fire. The rich man did not go to the lake of fire because he was rich.

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Lazarus did not go to Abraham's bosom because he was poor. Each man went where he was spiritually prepared to go.

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That's the point of the text. There are plenty of poor people who are absolute scoundrels, loathsome individuals.

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There's lots of poor people like that. And there are wealthy people who are genuinely kind and humble and honorable.

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So the point is not that being poor is good and being wealthy is bad, that is not the point. In fact, there are many examples of wealthy people in the

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Bible who are humble, faithful servants of God. Abraham, very wealthy, faithful servant of the

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Lord. Barzillai in 2 Samuel Chapter 19, he was very wealthy, but he was also known for his loyalty both to King David and to God, and he used his wealth to serve other people.

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Joseph of Arimathea, a wealthy follower of Christ, gave his own tomb for the body of Christ to be buried in temporarily.

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So there are examples of wealthy people in Scripture who are faithful servants of God. There's nothing inherently wrong with being wealthy.

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Please do not think that. If you have worked hard and God has graciously allowed you to keep some of the fruits of your labors, wonderful.

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Praise the Lord. Don't be embarrassed by that, not at all. Ecclesiastes 3 .13 says, every man who eats and drinks and sees good in all his labor, it is the gift of God.

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Ecclesiastes Chapter 5 says this, Solomon speaking, here is what I have seen to be good, which is beautiful, to eat, to drink, and to see good in all one's labor in which he labors under the sun during the few days of his life which

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God has given him, for this is his portion. Furthermore, as for every man to whom

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God has given riches and wealth, he has also empowered him to eat from them and to take up his portion and be glad in his labor.

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This is the gift of God. If you're wealthy, even if you're wealthy by our standards, don't be embarrassed by that.

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It's the gift of God. Enjoy it. Use it for the furtherance of God's kingdom.

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In conclusion, Proverbs Chapter 30, verses 8 and 9. And if those of you who are note -takers, jot this verse down because this really sums it all up.

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Proverbs 30, 8 through 9. Give me neither poverty nor riches.

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Feed me with the food that is my portion, that I may not be full and deny you and say, who is

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Yahweh? Or that I not be and want and steal and profane the name of my

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God. Solomon says, give me neither poverty nor riches.

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Feed me with the food that is my portion so that I won't be full and deny you. In other words, that temptation to have wealth and then become self -sufficient, don't give me that.

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So I would become self -sufficient, prideful, and say, who is Yahweh? But don't give me poverty either so that I would be and want and be tempted to steal and therefore profane the name of my

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God. Give us, Lord, neither poverty nor riches. May we boast in neither our poverty.

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May we boast not in our riches. May we boast in the fact that God is sovereign and he has chosen us.

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May we boast in him, in him alone. Our identity is not in wealth, it's not in poverty.

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Our identity is not in skin color. Our identity as Christians is in Christ and Christ alone.

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Have you been seated with Christ in the heavenly places? Do you have an exalted position?

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Has there been a time in your life when you have been convicted by the Holy Spirit of God that you are a sinner, that you have broken

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God's laws? Romans 3 .23 says, all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

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We have all broken God's laws. And Romans 6 .23 says that the wages of sin, what our sins have earned us, is death, eternal death.

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And all of us deserve death. That's what our sins have earned us. Has there been a time in your life when you've been convicted that you have broken

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God's laws and that you are a sinner and that you deserve nothing but his wrath? Has there been a time in your life when you've been convicted by the

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Holy Spirit of God of the good news of the gospel? That even though you deserve hell,

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God has made a way for you to escape his own wrath. God sent his son,

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Jesus Christ, to this earth, who lived a perfect life. And Jesus, one person with two distinct natures, the

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God -man, lived a perfect life to the perfect pleasure and satisfaction of God.

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And then he willingly laid down his life on the cross. His life was not taken, he gave it. And on the cross, the sins of God's people were imputed to Christ and God treated

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Christ as though he were a sinner even though he was not. Our sins imputed to Christ and God poured out his righteous wrath upon his own son.

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And as Isaiah says in the 53rd chapter, it pleased the Lord to crush him, which is a staggering thought.

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It pleased God to crush his own son on our behalf. Jesus took the wrath of God that you and I deserve.

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He bore it upon himself, died on the cross, satisfying God's wrath.

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Three days later, bodily raised from the dead, proving himself to be who he said he was, God in human flesh.

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And if you will repent of sin, turn from your sin, and place your trust in Christ, he will save you.

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Has that happened in your life? Have you trusted

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Christ? Have you turned from your sin? If you're not sure of where you are in your relationship with Christ, if you're not sure if you have that exalted position,

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I would encourage you to get real honest before God, confess your sins to him. And if you will come to Christ empty -handed, trusting not in yourself, trusting not in your works, trusting not in any religious affiliation you have, trusting

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Christ and Christ alone. If you will come to him empty -handed, he will save you. You will pass from death to life, and the righteousness that Christ has will be imputed, will be counted to you, and your sins washed white as snow.

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And Jesus himself is our reward. He is our reward.