James (part 3)

And for Mr. Laskin, he'll be back in a little over a month or so.

Hopefully it's each Tuesday. What was that? Hopefully he'll be back to teach Tuesday. Yeah, that's right, you guys are on every week.

All right, so yeah, we're going to finish off Chapter 1 today.

I didn't want to span 1 and 2. So I think we have, based on the time, last week

I thought we had a really good discussion. So thanks for everybody pitching in. And I thought we had a good discussion last week.

So we're going to do James 1, 19 through 27 today. And so I have a bunch of questions.

And I'm always surprised at how it's always easy when people participate and you have a good conversation.

And I remember looking at the clock and being like, wow, I'm not even halfway through my questions and we're coming on 20 minutes left to go.

So if someone's saying they want to throw us a prayer, then we'll dive in. Heavenly Father, thank you for just being here, all of us, to dig into your word and James.

And even this morning, not like last Sunday, it's a little on the chilly side, cold, but you are the maker of all things.

This is your creation. We're thankful for your beautiful creation to give us, even when it's cold.

And for those that are cold, Lord, need a little warmth, we just lift them up to you.

But this morning of this prayer that you would be with Eric as he leads us into the discussion of James.

Open up our hearts, our minds, our thoughts to you, Lord, that we can be deeply ingrained in your word and to understand it and to be drawn closer to you.

And all that we think and learn here this morning. We pray this in your name. Amen.

Alright, so like I said, we're going to do 19 through 27. And kind of as I was going through the week,

I was really trying to... It's funny, as you look at notes and you look at some commentaries, everything is always...

How can we practically apply this to our lives today? But Tim, I was really encouraged by your challenge to John on our first Sunday.

But we also need to remember the context of who's the letter addressed to and what is

James trying to say to these scattered believers. And we need to really try to get into their sandals and kind of think about what they were experiencing.

So I'm trying to make sure that my questions are kind of both.

Let's think about how this affected them and how they were reacting to the situation. But then also we want to practically apply this to us.

And what if is relevant or not in the passage to us today. So hopefully

I did... I think last week was a little bit too much on us. I'll hopefully try to balance it out a little bit this week.

Because that was one of my... I took an Old Testament class. And that was the one thing that Dr. Hulbert had said.

He always said, we want to get into their sandals. What were they specifically doing?

Where were they? The geography. And he was really big on knowing exactly what was going on in that situation.

Because it was helpful for us to understand what they were going through. And then be able to hopefully relate it to us today.

So last week we were going over... We kind of reviewed the first part of it again.

We talked about if we lack wisdom to go to God. We talked about how

God doesn't tempt us. There are things within each one of us that draw us away into sin.

And today we're going to be focusing on hearing and doing. And then what James defines religion as.

Hopefully some good conversation today. So if we could read 19 -27 and then we'll open up our discussion.

So if anybody wants to start off and take a couple of verses or read the whole passage. Know this, my beloved brothers.

Let everyone be quick to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger. That says it right there.

For the anger of a man does not produce the righteousness of God. Therefore put away all filthiness and rampant wickedness.

And receive with meekness the implanted Word, which is able to save your souls.

Do not merely listen to the Word and so 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 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 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.

Okay, thanks. So last week we also talked about the most quoted command was do not fear.

It's in there 365 times, so we have a verse for every day of the year. And in our small group two weeks ago in our discussion we had also mentioned that a lot of times the commands that we see in there are because it's not what we're bent towards.

We tend to fear, so God reminds us very often that we shouldn't fear, we should put our trust in him.

So as we think about the first part of this passage, so why is

James, so James is telling us to be quick to hear and slow to speak. So let's think about why would he be addressing that to this particular group of believers at this time, but then also how can we think about that in our own lives.

And just to throw it out there, I know I'm guilty of this, how many times have you found yourself in a situation where you're doing the opposite, that you are ready to speak and you're not even really listening, like you've already, you're chomping at the bit for the mouth to stop, for you to throw in your own two cents, and you're not even listening.

So we can open up with that today. Well the original readers, as we talked about last couple weeks, were facing persecution, they were scattered, so they were feeling a lot of pressure to deny their faith in the way that they lived, to not live out their faith.

So as these various pressures and difficulties are coming their way, it would be very easy for them to get angry and do the opposite of what

James here is telling them. I find it encouraging that he starts with my dear brothers, so he's not hammering this at them, he's coming alongside of them and saying, you know, you're scattered, you're persecuted, this is hard.

And he's just talked about every good and perfect gift coming down from the

Father of the heavenly lights, and how God chose to give us birth through the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first roots called and created.

And then coming alongside of them and saying, dear brothers,

So it's encouraging to see him coming alongside of the people that he's writing to, not in a heavy -handed, authoritarian kind of way, but as an encouragement to come alongside of them in the midst of their difficulty, as they're facing persecution.

Yeah, and I think we see that with a lot of the authors, that there are times when they need to be very forthcoming and firm with the churches, with the cities that they're writing to, but there's other times where they need to have a little bit more tenderness to their writing, so that's a great observation.

Overall, too, we tend to be defensive and self -justifying, and the overall message is that you're going to win a lot more people for your actions, helping other people and loving them, rather than by self -justification.

This is also a period of time when the Christians were being scattered, and then the

Jews, along with that, accepted Christ as their Savior. Now they're scattered, they're in net of synagogues, and their brothers are looking at them like they're crazy.

We don't accept that. Now James has come along and given the word, you know, your actions, more of listen, listen, listen, and your actions will do more good for you than trying to speak, speak, speak, speak, speak, speak.

So there was a big conflict going on among their own people because of this being scattered.

Now James is trying to come along and say, hey, you know, quit trying to speak so much.

They don't see it through your actions, through your love, helping one another. I think also there's probably, if you're thinking back to them, some frustration, too, as to, like, they're trying to navigate this new, like, this

Jesus guy, like, you know, we're talking about Luke, like, who is this man? Like, he keeps revealing himself to them, and now he's been crucified and raised again, and, you know, there's this new following, the way, and, you know, you find out about it, and you hear about it, a message, or you read one of these letters, and you're breaking away from your old traditions, and, you know, we see in some of the other, you know, books where they're like, well, you still need to be circumcised for this, and you need to do this, and you do that, and then they're like, no, this is, we've got a new law that we're following, and it's not that way, and I could see that being really frustrating and causing a lot of heated arguments, and I think, too, back then with, you know, polytheism was very rampant or evident in those cultures, so they were very accepting of what was going on, and they probably had healthy dialogues about that, but now we're saying this is the one true way, and maybe people are getting offended by that, and I think back then, too, and it's probably true with some people today, but I don't think you don't have that much conflict.

You have the, well, it's okay if you believe that, I believe this, and maybe you rub someone the wrong way, and you'll get someone who's a little bit more fired up about what they believe in, and they'll be in your face, and I don't like what you're saying to me, but maybe we don't have those kinds of conversations where we're ready to stand up and fight for what we believe in, like what was going on back then.

It's just something I was thinking about. Well, we do in a sense, because I've run into that, and I'm not telling anybody under the bus on this, but when you're talking to a rabbi or a

Jewish person very heavily involved into their faith and their worship, okay, of the

Old Testament, and you bring into the New Testament with them, there's conflict. I mean,

I've run into that very heavily, and, you know, it's, and finally, you know, you have to say to them, wait, wait a minute, you believe in God, the

Father Almighty, well, so do I. What are we arguing about? Something, you know, it's been written after the

Old Testament that I ever picked up, but I still believe in God, the Father Almighty, who sent

His Son, you know, and then they go, yeah, we are fighting, but, and I mean, we were fighting.

They were defending the Old Testament, and they were very adamant about that. And here comes

James along, and he says, you know, faith and works will work together. You'll see that, but they don't see that.

So who, so who are we supposed to hear? So he's talking about being quick to hear.

So who should we be, who should we be listening to? Who is he talking about in this passage? We should be quick to listen to what

James is saying. Like Stan was saying, these are Hebrews that are adhering to the

Old Way and saying there's so much in the Old Way. But he's saying, no, be quick to hear what I have to tell you.

Not the Old Way, be slow to speak, be quick to hear, be quick to learn. That's basically,

I think, what he's saying here. Because it's hard to break off from the Old Ways, you know, if you're a

Hebrew Christian like Stan said. I think it could be that, but it could be just generally.

You know, when you're interacting with your family, with people, with community, don't be so quick to speak, speak, speak.

One mouth, two ears. Yeah, he always says that. I say that to my students all the time. Two eyes and two ears for a reason and only one mouth.

The other two should be working twice as hard. I think, too, he's also encouraging them to remember that they've been indwelled as a new believer.

You have the Holy Spirit within you now. You need to be quiet and listen to the leading of the

Spirit. John 14, 26 says, But the Helper of the

Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and bring you your remembrance, all that I have said to you.

So I think that they need to, like you said, take time and meditate on what they're learning in their worship services or what is going on with them.

But they need to listen to that person. And also remember to be a good representative. Like Jesus said,

My sheep hear my voice. You're not going to be able to hear my voice if you're talking all the time. You've got to be quiet and listen and learn.

Not only that, I think it emphasizes implicitly the importance of asking a good question on our part.

And then be willing to listen to their answer and maybe discern from that where they stand.

Right, and I think too, when you take the time to listen to a person's argument or belief system, you're showing them respect, but you're also they're giving you an insight to their heart and where they stand.

Julian had gotten in an argument once with a classmate. And he was like, Oh, I know

I'm right. Because I know Jesus, he's the way. And I'm like, You are correct. I said,

But you have to remember that they think they're right too. But you have to know that you know the truth and that they're being deceived and blinded by the devil.

But you have to do it in a loving way. You can't come and punch them. You can't say that because then you're cutting off that relationship.

That person may say, I don't want anything to do with that girl anymore because she offended me. Even though you're right.

So that was one of the things that Jeff spires. When we first started coming here, we were talking about apologetics.

About how when you listen to someone, they are opening up and telling you what they believe.

And then you know how to engage them and ask them. It was, I think

I mentioned last week this guy, Michael Ramson. It was this conversational apologetics. So by following what

Jesus did with the Pharisees, asking them questions, you begin to let them open up and share what they believe.

And then you can say, so on some of the hot topics like with abortion or evolution. Evolution is a huge span of scope of what was it?

This part or that part or this bad big thing, whatever. And you can narrow those things down by asking them questions.

And you're like, okay, now I know where to direct the question, the conversation, and not be messing around with things that maybe aren't pertinent to them.

And you don't have to, I don't think you have to do it all at one shot.

If it's a person that you know and you're going to see very often, little bits and pieces. You find the way to work in the gospel to them or just understand them and build that trust with them.

So I think then you can have those more deeper conversations. So I think that's another thing too.

So when we're too quick to speak, and we're very passionate, sometimes we can come off as being offensive or God sounds, we misrepresent him the way he truly is.

I did look up the word, so I'm getting ahead of myself,

I'm thinking about anger. There was another verse in Proverbs that talked about why we should be slow to speak.

And it was like a fool takes no pleasure in understanding but only expressing his own opinion. So I think we need to be careful to not just overreact too fast.

You know, along with that, slow to speak.

We have right here in front of us, he wants us to get into the word. In fact, I'm going to be teaching at this point.

Get into the word. The word, the spirit will speak to you. If you're not into the word, and you're going on just on your own, mumbling or whatever it is, you're not really helping yourself without helping others.

Get into the word. Let God speak to you. And then when the opportunity arises, in a very nice, subtle way, as a friend, you can very nicely say to someone, you know, this is,

I'm reading God's word, and this is what God's word said to me. An example of that is, on Thursday night, the prison ministry.

These guys, there's 16 guys, rambling on, you know, with anger, and hate, and everything else, and trying to get their lives back together.

And they go on for maybe 10, 12 minutes, and John or myself will give them a verse.

We listen to them. I get a reference, and I give a word, and they all stop.

And they listen. That's what we're doing here. It's read God to them.

When you know the word of God, when He speaks to you, and you have that opportunity, not to be boastful, or,

I know it. No. Very gentle. When you just, let them know, what

God's saying. And they listen. And when that happens, then all of a sudden, you got 16 guys, going around the word of God, that, yeah, yeah, yeah, you're right, we should be doing this.

Well, it's the same way in life itself. When you talk to your neighbor, your friend, your relative, when you have that opportunity, if you're into the word of God, then you can speak, in a gentle way.

Our word may return void, but His word will never return void. And I see that in action.

And I think too, like, back in verse 3, or 5, where He talks about, if you're lacking wisdom, to pray and ask

God, and He gives generously. And the wisdom we have is His word. So we pray for that, we read it, and talk about being double -minded, like, we need to be careful of the wisdom that we hear from the world.

And also, we need to rely on His word as we discern our own lives and as we have conversations.

So I was thinking too, I have found over the last few years as I read, I'm very skeptical of, even works of literature, or even in the

Christian world. I want to know, who's the author? I've never heard of this guy. So I want to,

I'll ask Jeff, what do you think, do you know anything about this guy? Because I want to make sure that I'm not being deceived, or they're twisting something.

Yeah, it's like, even, because you see it all the time in research studies, or things like that, they twist the data, or they leave a few things out, or they try to make the study, you know, find out who's, soda's really actually good for you.

Well, who's researching, funding that study? Coca -Cola and Pepsi. It's like, well, they won't push their product.

Maybe it's not the corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup that's so bad for you. It's, you know, you know, so I'm always,

I've found that I'm more and more skeptical, even when I find, when I meet people and they say that they're a

Christian. I was like, alright, well, I want to know, what does that mean to you? You know, what, are you studying the

Bible? Do you go to church? You know, I start asking questions, because I want to figure out, what am I dealing with? Am I dealing with a true believer?

Am I believing, or is this just a person who celebrates Christmas, and that's how they label themselves as Christian, as opposed to,

I remember in, it was maybe my second or third year of teaching, I had, my school district at the time was pretty much all white kids, but it was

Christian and Jewish, very, very heavy on Jewish, and the kids were sitting there, Mr.

Meyer, are you a Christian or a Jew? Are you Jewish? And I'm thinking like, wow, this is amazing, like they're asking me what

I believe in, and it really boiled down to, do you celebrate Hanukkah or Christmas, because we were coming into December, and they wanted to know whether I was on this side or that side, and it turned out to be a really good discussion, because I'm like, well,

I'm not, I'm not Jewish, but, and then I said, well, you know, technically because I'm a Christian, I am brought into the, and then the kids are like,

Santa Claus, and they're like, Moses, and I'm like, you know, I have to decide, Moses is definitely better than Santa, you know, and they're like, what do you mean?

And I'm like, he doesn't give us presents, and I'm like, well, he gave us the first five books of the Bible, so we had this kind of fun discussion with the kids, and I'm like,

I'd take Moses over Santa any day, and so, I'm just a little, I'm the devil, a little bit off the path.

Eric, you asked a question to start this part, who should we be listening to? What's the answer?

I, I, we kind of talked around it, but, who should we be listening to according to what he's saying here?

Is it to each other? Is it, you know, what's he trying to imply here? I mean, I, I think both, you know, as the author of the letter, as Rich pointed out,

I think he wants, he's encouraging them, he's saying like, he wants to draw them back in and say, listen to what

I have to teach you, but I think ultimately, we're to be listening, as Santa, to the word, and to God, and to the

Holy Spirit, that's dwelling within us, because that's, that's where we're going to get all of our, you know, we're going to be, our paths are going to be made straight by him.

But I, I would, I would also encompass in, you know, the other believers, you know, because that's what we've been, we've been given that responsibility, that we're all ministers of the word, and we all need to encourage each other.

I was, I was very thankful that I was talking to Jeff before we started, about how, you know, when

I shared from the pulpit last week about the circumstances that we had been in, but he came back right away and just said that he was so encouraged to see, to know that he was coming into a church that had been without a pastor for two years, and people that were in here were willing to take up those, the roles that were given to us and to serve, and we were able to survive through that period of time without a pastor.

Like, we didn't just flounder and all fall away and, and dissolve and shut the doors.

You know, I think for him, he was saying that he was so strongly encouraged to know that I'm coming into a church with people that, that want to lead, that love

Jesus, that love each other, and that kept MLFC up and running for the two, two plus years that we had for without him.

So, but, you know, he, he strongly encouraged us that, that morning too, that, you know, we all have this, we all, we're all commanded to do this.

It's good that you mentioned about being skeptical about somebody teaching, because Paul, you know,

Tim, Paul says in 2 Timothy 4, 3, that in these last days or the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions.

And that's the age we're living in. So, we have to take it to God in prayer, you know, and search the

Scriptures for ourselves like the Bereans to see whether or not these things are from God or just the opinion of a man.

Right, and I think you just, you also go back to the garden you know, how did the devil do it?

How did Satan do it? Just subtle change of some words. Everything is very subtle, you know, the way that he works in the world.

We're, we're to listen. I think you already mentioned it there, you know. Really, we're in the

God's Word, but God has spoken to man, Moses, Abraham, David, okay, and we go on on the prophet.

God spoke to them. Even today, God speaks to certain individuals that are just filled with the

Holy Spirit. Those are the men that you really want to get close to, like, oh,

God is really working through this individual. I'd love to sit under somebody's ministry like that.

We have one here, Jeff. When you can see God working through him, you listen and you take notes to it, you know, and that's the same thing like God spoke to him through his

Word and now he's related to us. All right, so let's, so what does

James say about anger? Time is flying by. We've got a lot to still cover.

So let's, let's, so we've talked a lot about hearing and being slow to speak and that's, that's one part of this passage, but there's also the doing part which we need to get to, but let's,

I think it's important for us to touch on what is James talking about anger. Anger does not produce the righteousness of God.

Man's anger. Yeah, specifically man's, man's anger.

Because there is good anger also. True. Yeah, so I did, I did look up the

Greek word for this. It's, it's ogre. When I first looked at it I was like ogre, but then

I stopped. I'm not sure, it's ogre, I guess you would pronounce it, but that word is violent passion and it's like, as I, once I was reading that I was thinking of like, you know, in your, like, these people were, they were like fired up and they were offended by what was going on like to the point where they were ready to punch someone or, so how do we, you know, and it's not just a casual, like, that guy over there he's always annoying me.

This is like, get right up in your face mad. Yeah, so as, as him encouraging, so there was, there must have been a real problem going on with these, these believers.

I think that's more a sign of pride. I'm right, you're wrong. Yeah, and that does nothing to help the situation with the people.

It's probably connected to verse 21 where he then says, get rid of all moral filth and the evil that is so prevalent and humbly accept the word claims that any witch can save you.

So I think probably the moral filth and evil that is so prevalent is connected to man's anger. Yeah, yeah, and as we, as we go through the sanctification process, there, we all, we all mature at different speeds and levels.

We all, and we have, we talked last week about the temptations that each of us have different temptations that draw us back into sin and some, some of us go from the milk to the meat quicker.

Some of us need the milk a little longer and that's why I think it's important for us to continue to encourage each other, you know, help each other out.

I think that's why we're told to confess our sins, to go to a brother and say, hey,

I need help. Like, can you speak some wisdom into my life? Maybe God can use you as a vessel to help me as I've been primed to Him as well.

As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another. We should constantly be in communion with each other to love each other and encourage each other and build each other up.

You know, it's no good if you keep it to yourself. What did John say at the beginning? The gifts of God have been given, first of all, for God's glory, but second of all, to edify one another.

So Kim, you brought up the point that that anger, I was going to ask, is anger a sin?

But I think you brought up that too. Yeah, there's righteous, righteous anger is a good thing and that it can be very constructive and be reflective of God's anger towards sin.

But then there's also man's anger, which is a good thing. so how do we walk the line on that?

When does our righteous anger become, do we tip back to our own man's wrath as opposed to staying with, on God's side of...

I think the reference of the anger is important. So I think righteous anger reflects when something is morally wrong or abhorrent to God, whereas man's anger is more self -referent, that says,

I don't like that and it has more to do with me than it does to do with God or the good of those who are being harmed or those who are suffering as a result of the evil that's being done.

It seems too that Jesus' righteous anger was often directed towards the religious types rather than enemies.

And our righteous anger might be directed more to believers because we have common, supposedly common beliefs, but we wouldn't judge non -Christians according to our standards so much.

I think too, if you're, if you're in the frame of mind as Kim was describing, you are, you're calm, you have your wits amongst you, like you can,

I think abortion would be a good example. Like, you know, like we, we could be very angry with that law being passed and what it does to women, the lies that are told about it, but if you're in this, in this other one where this violent, violent, passionate thing, you, you lose your sense, like you, you know, growing up to comics, like I, there's certain comic characters like Wolverine comes to mind or the

Hulk. These guys are just like, they're angry all the time and they're, they're violent and they're nasty and they, think about being green.

Right, yeah. Just like, I used that in a sermon once, you know, where he talked in that Avengers movie, and where Captain America's like, don't, don't

I need to do something like punch you or something to get you mad? And he's just like, I'm, I'm always angry. Just turn it away and boom, there he is.

But they, they, they function on rage and, you know, look at New York City after the

Hulk walks through. You know, it's a mess. You know, he's not thinking about, I get angry when

I hear about ISIS chopping off heads or killing Christians. That, that gives me, I believe I'm righteous in the nation.

I hate what they're doing. I hate it, so I pray to God, Lord, you be just. They hate your people, they're doing, they're committing evil sins.

Destroy them, Lord God, destroy their evil. Am I wrong in saying, praying for that? I pray for their salvation, first of all, but if they don't, if they continue to resist and defy

God, I pray that he eliminates them. I think we're going to stand up to evil.

And we're called to stand up to evil. In the Old Testament, you know, God, he isolates the power to overcome evil.

The Yites, they were just totally against him. So he said, go in and wipe them out.

Well, what's wrong with us today doing the same thing, fighting evil? You know, they're really destroying, destroying what we have today, you know, in Christianity, but yet they are totally against Christianity, against God.

I think, like the apologetics, we are to stand and defend. We're not to be walked over, you know.

Some people think it's Christian, but it's, yeah, okay, no, we are to defend. There's a standard.

Yeah, we're in a dispensation of grace, we're not under the law of Moses, so what Jesus told us to do is pray for those who persecute you.

So, I see where you're going with that, you know, with, look, in the Old Testament, God said wipe them out.

That was true for those people at that time, now being under, being in the church in the age of grace,

Jesus has given us a new law, a new command, which is love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you. So, personally,

I wouldn't say that we should be asking God to judge those. I would absolutely pray for their salvation, pray that they would come to know the love and the grace and mercy and kindness of God.

Not that he would wipe them out to send them to eternal judgment, but that he would save them by his grace just like he has done for us.

But what Hebrews say if they continue to blaspheme and treat as unholy the righteous blood of Christ. What will

God do to them? That's up to God. It's not for us to say you've crossed that line of sinning too much, now

I'm going to pray that God smites you. Our hearts should be breaking for them because they're separated from God.

That's true, but of our brothers and sisters that we love and care for.

We pray for their protection, but I also pray to destroy those that are killing the people

I love over there. Apostle Paul solved the ball.

Wasn't he doing the same thing? And what happened to him? He became one of the greatest apostles and authors in the

New Testament. So I would bring that point up. Plus our own sin that we commit is worth our own death.

We've been given the gift of life. We've been offered forgiveness.

I would agree we need to pray for those people. God uses their deaths and martyrdom to, as sad as it is to lose a brother like that, but God will use those for his purpose, to glorify his name, to further his kingdom over there.

Yeah, I think it's up to God to judge those people and I would also encourage to pray for their salvation because in Matthew it talks about how if we're to judge, we'll be judged as well sometimes.

I think Acts chapters 7 and 8 is a good example of that where Stephen before the

Sanhedrin has given a very lengthy sermon, if you will, testifying to who

Jesus is and at the end, they drag him out of the city and stone him and as they're stoning him,

Stephen cries out, Lord, forgive them. Don't hold the sin against them. So there's somebody who's being killed and he's saying, don't hold this against them because he wants them to be saved.

So he's not saying, you know, smite them, judge them, he's crying out as he's donning,

Lord, don't hold the sin against them. Wasn't Paul there who later became solved? Yes, the witnesses later both of them became solved.

We also, when we read about the anger of Jesus, he lashes out, when we read about the anger of Jesus, he lashes out, when of Jesus, he lashes out, when we read out, when of Jesus, he lashes out, when we read out, when we read out, when we read out, when we read we read out, when we read out, when we read out, when we read out, when we read out, when out, when we read out, when we read out, when we read out, when we read out, when we read out, when we read out, when we read out, when out, when you know, the things that they had done as well as they fought

Islam at that time. We're devout Muslims who think that America is so evil, they call themselves a

Christian country, but look at that horribly, look at our TV and our movies and think that that's just horrible.

You know, the sex and the violence mostly of sex, you know, that women should be modest, women should... And you listen to them and think, man,

I should be more along their thinking in a lot of ways. You know, I've seen interviews and talked to different people who are devout and, you know, they're not extremists.

And think, yeah, they're pointing out the evils in the United States and pinning it on Christianity because the

United States likes to boast of itself as being a Christian nation, which it's not. And, you know, to have that label almost does more harm because then people go, yeah, this is what

Christians are about. And there's the posters and models and all the stuff that a lot of the world finds really offensive.

That we're so used to it, it's like, oh, I don't find that offensive. And yet other countries say, how can you have those things in your store?

And it's just like, ugh. Time is getting...

John's going to have to redo a lot of this. So let's look at 22 to...

Yeah, so in verse 22, James now says, The doers of the word and not hearers only deceiving yourselves.

So how can we deceive ourselves by just listening to God's word? Because that seems a little counterintuitive.

It's like you were saying before, there's a lot of people who define themselves as Christians because they go to church, they hear the word, but it's head knowledge, it's not the heart.

So that's how you can be deceived, I think, if you just listen to the word, but you don't apply it in your life.

I think it's a self -righteous lack of humility. As you're repeating what

Jesus said, if we hear his words and don't do them, they're like building our house on the sand that will be washed away.

So hearing is the first part, okay? So we need to do the second part.

So what would be some examples that we see in Scripture of being a hearer and a doer?

The doing is in the last part of verse 27. And you can add prisoners to that, too.

Yeah, and my son is, you know, a powerful legion. Visiting him in Burgas, you know, is,

I believe, doing it. You know, sharing the word with him, praying with him. You know, not leaving him in, you know, in a coffin.

There are plenty of people who have crippled children. They leave them there. They never visit them.

They die without ever seeing them again. But that's part of it.

But we do. We have to visit widows and orphans and the crippled, the prisoners, and stand visiting the prisoners, you know, helping the prisoners.

Him and John told him. I have a comment about that towards the end.

That was one of the last questions I had. So why just those three things? Like, you would think at that point, like, he could, there could be a whole other paragraph of all, so many other things that we could do that are good as well or that would.

Maybe these were things that were being slated, and he wanted to bring the attention of the people to remember, you know, those orphans.

We went, we saw the movie Lion a couple weeks ago, and I was just blown away.

It was 50 or 80 ,000 children go missing in India a year.

Like, that just, and to see these children just on the, and people were just walking right by them.

Yeah, yeah, they had no even, and the children were really trying to stay hidden so that nobody would try to, but the people weren't being attracted to these little children.

It was just, it was horrible. So I just think, like, maybe these were a few things that people really didn't even think about.

Oh, the widows, you know, we don't have to worry about that. So maybe he had to bring it to their attention that there was a lot of people who were in these categories who were being underserved.

Yeah, I think if you go back even to Acts, as the early church started, that was a concern that was brought up, that these were poor people that were being overlooked, and, like, we need to take care of them.

And then they sort of created, like, as the defense at that point, like, we need to continue to preach the word, so let's pick some people to take care of the orphans and things like that.

All right, so we're getting a little out of time. But I was going to say something else, but let's get back to that.

Come back to me. All right, so I think we probably need to wrap it up. So I think there's still –

I think I'll try to encourage John to finish off the latter part of this, because I think there's still some good things for us to talk about here.

One of the guys, one of the commentators, was talking about how this latter part of Chapter 1 is really

James setting up, like, it's kind of like the springboard for the rest of the book. So he's talking about visiting and orphans and widows.

And now he's getting – and we talked about last week about the differentiation between rich and poor, and now we're going to get into Chapter 2 to center partiality and things like that.

And, like you said, I don't think we are – I think if we were really aware of the real suffering that was going on, it would totally break our hearts.

I know for us, as a parent of young kids, you try to, like, how do you teach your kids to be compassionate or think about that or to just want to be – they should be so thankful for – that they have a bed and a pillow and three square meals a day and snacks throughout.

You know, it's like, they're kids. Like, we go – Carrie and I would say, like, we want to, like, take them somewhere so they can see what the rest of the world looks like.

You know, this room would be a mansion for a family. You know, half of this room would be a mansion for a family.

Plus they have chairs. Yeah. You have $2 in your wallet. You're among the richest people in the world.

We can't fathom those things because of all the affluence around us. We talked about that.

Wednesday night, Mike Carrillo said, he said, we're going to have 30 years.

And he said, not to Bob, but the troops said, wouldn't it be wonderful for our high school junior line?

We're in this town right here. You've got a home depot. And work.

We can just work and see what the rest of, you know, outside of this area has.

All right. Thanks, everybody. I'm going to close, and then if we could bring the chairs back into the office and set up for Spanish teaching today right here.

Diller, thank you for a morning, again, where we could study your word. And we're thankful for everyone that was able to make it today.

Pray that we would go away hearing your word, that we would be doers of your word, that we would be changed, that we would find ways to serve you every day, to grow closer to you every day.

Ask that you be with the kids' own teachers as they teach the kids during the sermon time.

Ask that you be with Pastor Joe as he brings the words from Luke today. Be with the worship team as they help prepare our hearts for worship as we sing to you this morning.