A Jet Tour Through James (part 4)

Bethlehem Bible Church

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All right, let's turn the Bibles to James, please. The Epistle of James, and James is one of these fast -paced epistles.

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I hope I can get through James tonight, we'll see, it just depends on how deeply I'd like to dive into the book.

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I preached James when I first got here to the church, and the reason why I picked that book is because I thought, well, there must be at this church lots of unregenerate people, and so I'll preach

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James and smoke those people out, and maybe God will save them, because it's a book on the test of saving faith.

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Now that I think I'm older, well, I know I'm older, and I hope I'm wiser, I probably wouldn't have picked

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James, I probably would have picked a gospel, I probably would have picked John, or maybe

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Luke, and just show the people here the greatness of Christ Jesus. New pastors, I think, should preach

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Christ, even though James is just as inspired as John chapter six, isn't it?

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But somehow it's different when you hear the words from Jesus. People can rebel against the sovereignty of God, but when

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Jesus says, only the ones that come to the Father are the ones that I draw, it just seems to go down easier for people when they hear from the words of Jesus, although all the words in the

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Bible are what we would call written in red, that is, written by Christ are His apostolic messengers, are

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His prophets of old. And so, I probably wouldn't do that again, but I think my intentions were good, and now we revisit it on Sunday night, because I think there are many new people who haven't been through James, and it's just an exciting book.

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I've said this before, and I'll say it one more time, even if you've heard me teach the Jet Tour of James like Steve and Janet have 15 times, or Kim has probably heard me teach it how many times, 20, she could probably teach this to the ladies'

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Bible study, I think you'll still be convicted tonight as you go through here, and you'll have a desire to say,

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I'd like to live a godly life for the glory of God. James is one of those books, don't you think it'd be good to even read once a month?

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It's just fast -paced, it's moving, and you read it and you think, I never can read the book of James and say,

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I've arrived. I've mastered that book, I've put it to bed, I've memorized it, and then now it's off to greener pastures.

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Can anybody here admit to that? Probably not. If you're not, that's why you're here, and you encourage me when you show up.

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So James is a book of saving faith tests, the test of saving faith, and we're up to test number nine, found in chapter four.

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So let's turn to chapter four. We weren't surprised last week that in the middle of chapter four, in a book of tests to say you think you're a

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Christian, prove it, that he says in chapter four, verses six through 10, here's the call to salvation.

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Here is the enter through the narrow gate. Here is the, not many will say to me on that day,

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Lord, or many will say to me on that day, Lord, Lord, and he calls people to salvation in the middle of the book.

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Then we move to chapter four, verse 13, which is the ninth test of saving faith, and we'll call this the pride test.

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The pride test. And so, why don't we not go to 13? Let's back up a little bit to verse 11.

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Chapter four, verse 11, the pride test running through verse 17. How does pride show up in people?

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Number one, it shows up in people as they speak harshly about others, verses 11, 12, and it also shows up in people when they plan their future like God isn't involved.

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And so this is a test. We know we're not perfect, but we know Jesus is perfect, and we'd like to live up to who we are.

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We'd like to have conduct befitting an officer. And so, chapter four, verse 11 and 12, we went over a couple times ago, do not speak against one another, brethren.

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He who speaks against a brother or judges his brother speaks against the law and judges the law.

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But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law, but a judge of it.

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There's only one lawgiver and judge, the one who is able to save and destroy, but who are you to judge your neighbor?

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And you can just hear James, the preacher, ask that question. People like to judge others.

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They like to put others down because it makes them, in their eyes, look better. Show me somebody that wants to critique and criticize and judge and slander and say other things.

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They're usually trying to lift themselves up. Well, it would be prideful, and there's another way pride exists, even in Christians.

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Verse 13 and following, somehow not recognizing God as the God of the past, the present, and specifically here, the future.

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It's one thing to have pride and judge other people and be their critic. It's another thing to say the way I live my life should show that God is the one in charge.

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And I write everything I have in pencil. Just in review, it says in verse 13, come now, you who say today and tomorrow will go to such and such a city and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit.

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Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You're just a vapor. Appears for a little while and then vanishes away.

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Instead, you ought to say, if the Lord wills. Remember last time we looked at the

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Lord willing? Lots of times the Puritans would sign their name with two initials, and what were those initials?

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Ferdie? I looked up, and by the way, DV like Deo Valente, God willing, except the text doesn't say

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God, does it? It says Lord. It should say something like Curios willing. They should sign it

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KV, except the V is Latin. So I looked up the Latin word for Lord, and do you know what we have?

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We have, this is a little corner over here where maybe these two young boys can just talk. Remember, I want the young boys here, and I want the dads holding the young boys and moms just here.

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So I think probably the young Andrzejak boy is loud enough to maybe drown me out, but let's just see how it goes.

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So you guys are welcome to just stay right here. I don't want to try to make you go upstairs.

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What am I talking about? Well, where we get the word Dominion is the

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Latin word for Lord, Dominus. So there still can be proper

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Greek Latin signature that you write DV. You could write it on your calendar. You could write it on your

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Outlook calendar. You could write it on your iCalendar, DV, Lord willing, I'll do this, that, or the others.

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And so a self -sufficient, prideful person wouldn't do it. They'd have all their plans, and they would never have this possibility that God can come in and change any plan at all.

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And so for Christians, we don't want to act like we used to, and that would be self -sufficient and prideful.

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We don't want to do it because life is unpredictable and God is the King. Test number 10. Now let's go to some new information.

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Chapter 5. This is like a flamethrower kind of passage. This is a bazooka passage. How many people here have ever seen the damage a bazooka could do?

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Not many, but you've, well, probably seen it on TV or some kind of movie or something.

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This is a bazooka kind of passage right here. Never thought I'd say bazooka from the pulpit in my life, but there you have it.

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The 10th test, the test of saving faith. Look at your life and say, this isn't perfect in my life, but I like the way the direction's going.

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I take a compass and I spin it all around and then it sets there quietly for a moment and it always goes back to north.

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And so we have this desire to live this way. I call it the patient endurance test. Our steadfast endurance.

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Chapter 5, verses 1 through 11. The patient endurance test. Now chapter 5, verse 1 and the several verses early on are not directed towards the

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Christian. They're directed towards people in the church who are not Christian and they're rich oppressors.

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But the Christians have to live underneath these rich oppressors. You know what the golden rule is, right?

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He who has the gold rules. And these people, the Christians who are receiving this letter, are being persecuted by rich ungodly people who have the nerve and the audacity to show up at church and now

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James is going to talk to them before he says, by the way, congregation, how do you live underneath these oppressive rich people?

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That will be a test of showing your saving faith. Are you able to do it? Because you know God's the king. But while he's at it, you ever got in a fight with somebody and you say to your mind, you say in your mind, while I'm at it, those that just smiled at me,

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I think you've done that. You've read about it. How does a

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Christian hold up under persecution? We're going to get to that, but right now he's going to point his finger at the persecutors.

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It's like the finger in the sternum. Have you ever had that happen to you? Somebody's doing some kind of torture.

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My dad used to hold me down by my wrist like this and just take his two fingers right on my sternum for some kind of Chinese torture, some kind of water torture.

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If you're Chinese, sorry, maybe it's not some kind of Ugandan torture.

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And you know, the good news is now I do that to Luke. So you know what comes around goes around. That's what this is.

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As Paul, as James is going to say, before I talk to you, Christian, about holding up under this persecution, let me talk to the rich, unbelieving persecutors.

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God loves you and has a wonderful plan for your life. God's just crazy about you.

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What do you think he says? Watch this bazooka passage. Come now. Now listen up.

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This is grabbing your shoulders with a good old shake. Do I have your attention? You can just imagine if you take a young man who's disobedient and you say, son, look into my eyes.

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And the kid's kind of looking around. Come now. Look into my eyes. Eye to eye. That's the kind of language that he's using here.

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Come now, you rich. By the way, this is not talking to the rich Christian.

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There are all kinds of rich, rich Christians in the Bible. Christians can be rich, but these are the oppressive ones.

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Come now, you rich. What does he tell them? I mean, who talks? I'm just losing my voice.

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Who talks this way? Weep and howl for your men's miseries, which are coming upon you.

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He says with audible decibels, this has decibels written all over it, loud weeping and howling.

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Why? Because one day there's judgment coming for you. By the way, these miseries that are coming on you, it's plural, they've earned it.

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You act this way, you're going to get this. What's he say?

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Verse two, your riches have rotted and your garments have become moth eaten.

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People are rich today. They have gold, stocks, real estate. The wealth back in those days was produce.

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You'd have grain, corn, clothes, and gold or silver. Produce, clothes, and gold slash silver are the mutual funds, stocks, and bonds, and cash of those days.

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What happens? Your riches have rotted. This is not like there's money, like bills that have rotted.

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The riches, the grain is rotten, your garments have become moth eaten. There's all the larva of the moths that are in there.

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Moth eaten clothes aren't good for anything. By the way, were clothes valuable back then? Just how valuable were clothes back in those days?

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So valuable that Joseph gave a change of clothes to his brothers. So valuable that Paul said, you know, when

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I preached among you, I coveted no man's what? Apparel. Changes of clothes,

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Samson promised to anyone who could solve his what? Riddle. This is, if you had a wardrobe, you were rich.

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He says in verse three, your gold and your silver have rusted. By the way, can gold, pure gold rust?

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Can pure silver rust? Well, how can he say this? The very thing that you would never expect to happen that you don't think can happen is going to happen on that judgment day.

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You put all your desire to hold up, hold fort up in gold and silver.

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It can't rust. It can't corrode. When it comes to judgment day, there's going to be, as it were, gold and silver rusting and corroding.

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Your wealth is doomed to decay. We'd say you can't take it with you. Rust is a symbol of disuse.

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You rich people should have been using your money for the Lord's kingdom and you use it to persecute Christians and there's going to be payday one day.

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Remember, I think it was Ralreese, my first pastor, and he would always talk about layaway.

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Remember, who knows what layaway is? It's a lost art. Which kid knows about layaway?

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Who does layaway? Luke knows. I think we had some stuff on layaway at Marshall's.

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It's the divine layaway program, Ralreese said. Sin now, pay later.

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There is going to be a judgment day and all your things that you trust in now, some trust in horses, some trust in gold, but this is not a rags to riches story, this is riches to rags.

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I call as my first witness, rust, take a look at the passage, and their rust will be a witness against you and will consume your flesh like fire.

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You use something on a regular basis, it doesn't rust. You've got money, it's rusting, you're not using it for what you should, you're just hoarding it up.

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I call my first witness, rust, guilty as charged. That's the kind of language that's here.

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They hoard it. Your God is money and your God is going to be consumed on that day.

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Listen to Proverbs 11, riches do not profit in the day of, look at the passage, again at the end of verse 3, it is in the last days that you have stored up your treasure.

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You've hoarded it. You've stored up your thesaurus, your treasure.

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A thesaurus is a treasure of English words. You hoard money, you hoard clothes, you hoard food, and it's going to be like the depression in 1929, except it's going to be a spiritual depression.

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1929, you go to bed a millionaire, you wake up, you're broke. You go to bed a millionaire, you wake up in hell forever and you are spiritually and eternally broke.

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Proverbs 23, wealth certainly makes itself wings like an eagle that flies towards the heavens.

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And most people said amen, bye bye. Now here's more bazooka talk from James, behold the pay of the labors who mowed your rich fields and which has been withheld by you, cries out against you.

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And the outcry of those who did the harvesting has reached the ears of the Lord of the

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Sabaoth. You're greedy. You're not just, you've withheld wages, you've lived a life of pleasure.

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You kill righteous people. These day labors, they expected to get paid at the end of the day because they're living from day to day and it is against God's mosaic law for sure to make a day laborer work all day and then not give him his money at the end of the day.

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No credit cards in those days. No wonder Jesus taught his people to pray, give us this day our daily bread.

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Verse five, you thought it was bad before, this is double bazooka now. You have,

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I can't believe these people stayed in the congregation. Can you imagine James looking, you can imagine he looked right over to those rich, he looks right over to the rich person and looks at him and says this next word, you have lived luxuriously on the earth and led a life of wanton pleasure.

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You have fattened your hearts in the day of slaughter. Some amazing preaching.

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That's graphic. The day of slaughter, you're like prodigal people living a day, living voluptuously, wantonly.

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Caviar and wine while these other people have nothing. Look at the end of verse five, you fattened your hearts in the day of slaughter.

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You've glutted your bank account and your bodies to the point of satiation and then what?

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Verse six, you've condemned and put to death the righteous man. He does not resist you.

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He can't resist you. How could he resist you? And so now

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James says, I've just dealt with these rich people that persecute you. What if you're living under the persecuted rich?

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What do you do? Here's what he says. First of all, be patient. Verse seven, oh this is a good attitude.

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Be patient therefore brethren. Those of you that live underneath this persecution until the coming of the

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Lord. Behold, they'd all get this illustration wouldn't they? Verse seven, farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil.

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Be patient about it until it gets the early and the late rains. Be long suffering.

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Be long spirited. Hold your spirit in check.

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Restrain your temper. Don't be bitter. Don't have despair. This word is used of God.

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Now shall not God bring about justice for his elect who cry to him day and night?

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And will he delay long over them? Your trouble is not everlasting.

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Your trial is not eternal. He says, the farmer, just imagine the farmer.

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Look at this closely. Behold, stoop down and look at this little illustration. Take a look and see how things grow.

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How many people here remember back in the school days, and now my kids are in school, and they have to bring home some kind of, maybe you just do it at home school too, you get some kind of cup, it's a clear cup, it's a plastic cup, it's a glass cup.

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You put a seed in there and you put some dirt in there and you have to water it every day and you just wait for that thing to grow.

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You can almost see somebody standing there watching that thing waiting for it to grow. Well, you have to be patient.

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Farmer can do a few things. He can clear the land and prepare the soil and sow the seeds and weed the thing, but he can't make the seed grow.

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So he says in verse 8, you too be patient. You too be patient. It's God's purposes.

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It's God's design. He works on a different time frame. I love the story, the great preaching professor,

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Phillips Brooks in New England, usually had poise and usually had a calmness, but once in a while he'd kind of go off the edge.

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One day, the text says, a friend saw him feverishly pacing the floor like a caged lion.

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What's the trouble, Mr. Brooks, he asked. The trouble is I'm in a hurry, but God isn't.

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I'm suffering under this persecution. Let me out. I want out. In 1

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Corinthians 10, verse 13 would say, the way is not out, the way is through. Patience.

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I like this little ditty and you're really going to like it too. I guarantee you. If this is all you came for tonight, you'll be happy.

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Patience is a virtue. Possess it if you can. Found seldom in a woman, never in a man.

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See, you thought I was going to be dogging you ladies. Be patient, he says.

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Okay, I'm going to say it. I wasn't going to say it, but I'm going to say it. I don't care how bad this country gets.

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I don't care if it becomes socialistic, fascist, fascistic, is that a word, communistic.

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These are good words for the Christian to live by. You don't see in here, unite, get together, overthrow, pool your resources, leave, flee.

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You say, you see that James is saying, you need to realize that God is in control of everything and you be patient and obey him and everything's going to be fine.

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Why? Verse 8, he says, you too be patient, strengthen your hearts for the coming of the Lord is at hand.

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If you're a Republican, don't wig out over President Obama and his policies to the extent that you forget that Jesus is going to come back.

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He says, be courageous. I found a definition of courage by John Wayne.

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Courage is being scared to death but saddling up anyway. I found an illustration of what courage isn't, stolen from Adrian Rogers.

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He talked about a man who bragged that he'd cut off the tail of a man -eating lion with his pocket knife.

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Asked why he hadn't cut off the lion's head, somebody else already did that. The Lord's return is soon, all wrongs will be righted.

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And Christians suffer that James is writing to and maybe you.

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If the end of all things is at hand, there's a right way to live. Verse 9, it's going to be convicting.

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This could have been in my sermon this morning. How do you steadfastly endure trouble, rich persecution, you don't like the government, the list could go on and on.

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Verse 9, I'll tell you what we're prone to do and he tells us what to do in the opposite direction. Do not what?

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Complain, brethren, against one another. Yeah, you're being persecuted by the outside by these rich people but then you end up complaining about each other.

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He says don't do that. That you yourselves might not be judged. The rich will be judged for what they've done now.

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You don't want to get in on some of that action of being judged, do you? No. Behold, the judge is standing right at the door. Now there's different words for complaining.

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One kind of complaining is an out loud complaining and you're just kind of, I don't like what they're doing.

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This doesn't measure up to what I like. And there's another kind of complaining that's this. You don't want to do it loud enough for other people to hear so you just kind of go, which one do you think it is?

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The second one. The second one here. You can go to find the other kind of complaining in Philippians chapter 2.

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But here, it's not even a murmur, it's a sigh, it's a groan. It's like, you know, somebody does something to you and you show other people.

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Some kind of disapproval with your face or with your voice or with your breath.

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It's not some kind of criticism, I don't like the way he does such and such. I don't like the elders to do this.

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I don't like the nursery worker back there. Why do we have these kind of numbers back here with the nursery worker? It reminds me of being at the

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Olive Garden. You get one of these things, you know, it's not this outside thing. Difficult times, unbeliever before you were saved, complaining frenzy, difficult times, test of saving faith for a

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Christian. There's a way to endure this and that enduring shouldn't be with groaning, with, it's bad for unity.

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You don't want to be judged and where is the judge by the way? He's standing, what's the text say? He's at the door.

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He knows what you're doing. I used to, I tell the story all the time, I used to love it when the kids were really little and I could tell when a kid was off and they were just about ready to disobey because they had been disobeying but I couldn't really catch them doing it and so if you follow a kid around enough, you can just catch a really little kid who's disobedient soon enough and then you can swoop in for the discipline.

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So I used to love to just open the door up just to crack, the kids would be in there playing and then all of a sudden one of them would really do something ornery and then

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I would open up the door, you know how if you're surprised, what do you do? Jump, you know, you're scared, conscience and I would,

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I wanted them to think this. I wanted them to think that your dad is omniscient. Your dad is omnipresent.

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You might run but you can't hide. I see all, I know all, sadly that's not the case these days, they know differently.

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But here, the judge, we're not the judge. Why are we judging other people with this kind of disapproval and we don't like it and we're getting pressure from the outside.

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It's like, you know, the marriage that gets pressure from the outside and they take it out on each other. It just doesn't make any sense.

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The Lord will return soon. So quiet with the complaining is what

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James is saying. By the way, we're not even getting persecuted by the rich and dying for our faith.

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The Lord will return soon. Luther said, I preach as though Christ died yesterday, rose from the dead today and was coming back tomorrow.

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I like it. Test number 11, test number 11. Let's move on to chapter 5 verse 12, the test of truthfulness.

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I don't know about you before you were saved but I know before I was saved, I pretty much cheated my way through college.

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I tried to lie as a sales rep to just get the business. We don't want to act that way anymore.

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We don't live like we used to. Chapter 5 verse 12. But above all, this is not the most important thing.

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It's a way of him saying, this is an important issue. This is a thing you should focus on.

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There are other things that are just important, but it's a figure of speech. And he says, but above all, my brethren, do not swear either by heaven or by earth or with any other oath, but let your yes be yes and your no be no, so that you may not fall under the judgment.

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If you're under trials, persecution, the rich are after you, you're in some kind of fascist state, you might just hedge a little bit and you might be prone to some kind of hasty oath, some kind of temptation to deny something with an oath.

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And here he says, don't swear either by heaven or by earth or with any other oath. What kind of oath is he talking about?

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Is he talking about the doctor's Hippocratic oath? Don't become a doctor. Is it okay to take the

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Hippocratic oath? Yeah. How about if you go to the court and you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, nothing but the truth, so help you

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God. Can you take that oath? Actually, did people take oaths in the Old Testament? Well, there are many oaths in the

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Old Testament. Abraham took one, David took one, Paul gave a vow. It's not a blanket statement, but it's the kind that says, you know,

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I'm going to try to get out of this if I really need to. I'm going to have a promise and I'm going to keep my word that can be trusted and there's going to be another promise that I give that you might not be able to trust.

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So basically what James says is don't misuse God's name in a promise, even in tough times.

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Calvin said, we do not reckon how atrocious a crime it is to dishonor the name of God.

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I swear on a stack of Bibles this is true. Cross my heart, hope to die, stick 10 needles in my eye.

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For heaven's sake, it's real. As God is my witness, we just don't need to talk that way.

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Yes, yes, no, no. Cross my heart, hope to die. Boy Scouts honor.

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One man said, don't let your speech be full of fine print. That's the way it is.

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Simply yes, simply no. It sounds like Jesus, but let your statement be yes, yes or no, no.

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And anything beyond this is evil. We don't need any more judgment.

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Next test, test number 12. Oh, we're almost finished. Not with a sermon, but with the points. OK. Somebody said to me this morning, you need to preach longer.

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That's two weeks in a row. Preach longer. All right, we're just going to preach until we get this part done. The test of prayerfulness.

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Chapter 5, verse 13 through 18. Ask yourself this question. What was your prayer life before you got saved like?

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What was it like before you got saved? Oh, many of us prayed. I remember praying before meals. We prayed before every meal.

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Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest. Let this food to us be blessed. Amen. That's actually a good prayer.

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You ever prayed that and meant it? Come, Lord Jesus, we'd like you to be a guest at this meal. Come, Lord Jesus, be our guest.

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Let this food to us be blessed. That's a good prayer. I prayed before I went to bed.

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We had an amended version of a prayer, our Lutheran prayer. Now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to take.

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If I should die before I wake. The prayer is, I pray the Lord my soul to take.

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But we didn't like that taking sound in our family, so we prayed this way. Now I lay me down to sleep.

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I pray the Lord my soul to take. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. No. Yeah, was that it?

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We switched to take and keep. Whatever. It didn't really matter what it was, because we just were praying to some kind of little genie

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God, this God that we could throw a bone to once in a while and everything would be fine. But how does

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James want people to pray? How are you as a Christian supposed to pray? Fascinatingly, look at chapter 13.

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Pray when things are difficult. Well, this seems sensible. Is any among you suffering?

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He talks about trials in chapter 1. He's come full circle now. If you're in suffering, if you're a sufferer in a trial, you should what?

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Let him pray. Very open ended, whatever kind of trouble you're in, could be mental, emotional, physical, spiritual, some kind of oppression, you need to pray.

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Let him pray. Suffering, don't sit off and stare into space.

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You're suffering, don't say, I've got to go to some movie to get my mind off of life. Nothing wrong with the movie, but here you're in trouble.

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Let him pray, one Greek word. Have the attitude of prayer, present imperative. Keep praying.

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You're in trouble, pray. Sounds like Jesus in the garden, by the way. He was praying very fervently, being in agony.

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And sweat became like great drops of blood falling down upon the ground. Sounds like casting all your anxiety upon him because he cares for you.

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When you're in trouble, pray. You say, yeah, but I don't want to bother God with my little problems. A woman said that to G.

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Campbell Morgan, the guy who was the pastor before Lloyd -Jones.

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Oh, I could never take my little problems to God. I would not want to bother him with those. I take only my big problems to God.

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And Campbell Morgan said, are any problems big to God? That's good.

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When you're suffering, when you're hurting, when you're in a trial, pray. Well, now look at, there's more though.

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It's the flip side. Is anyone cheerful? Let him forget about God until something bad happens.

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No, is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praises. The opposite of suffering is cheerful.

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You're in good spirits, good courage, top of the world. You pray. But here the prayer is, you sing praises.

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Let me tell you the Greek word for sing praises and I bet you can guess the English word we get from the Greek word.

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Ready? Saletto, P -S -A -L -L -E -T -O.

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To sing with musical accompaniment, specifically probably plucking a string.

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So much for guitars are from Satan. This is kind of a prayer, isn't it?

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Flies smack dab in the face of foxhole religion. We're just going to pray when things are going bad.

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First Chronicles 16, sing praises to him. Psalm 95, shout joyfully to him with psalms.

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Say, I can't carry a tune. You don't need to carry a tune to obey. By the way, this isn't singing gibberish.

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This is singing with spirit and with mind. You know the story, but it's an emotional story, but true and effective.

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There's a Christian man, he was a wonderful singer. He had cancer of his tongue. He had surgery.

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Just before surgery, the man said to the doctor, will I ever sing again?

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The surgeon didn't really know how to answer this difficult question. He just shook his head, no. Patient sat up.

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I've had many good times singing praises of God. And now you can tell me I'll never sing again.

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I have one song that will be my last. It will be of gratitude and praise to God. And then he sang

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Isaac Watt's hymn. I'll praise my maker while I've breathed. And when my voice is lost in death, praise shall employ my nobler power.

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My days of praise shall never be passed. While life and thought and being last, our immortality endures.

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If you're suffering, pray. If you're cheerful, you sing praises. Can you think of a time where somebody was in jail, in stocks, and they were super happy and they were singing praises?

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I can. That's Acts chapter 16. It's an amazing thing. Well, what about this?

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He says in verse 14, there's another time to pray. There's a time for elders to pray when you can't pray.

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What do you do when you can't pray? Have you ever been so distraught you think, I can't even pray? Can't even think to pray? You're suffering, pray.

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You're happy, pray. You can't pray, send for someone who can.

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Verse 14 and 15. Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the

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Lord, and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up, and if he's committed sins, they will be forgiven him.

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Now, that word sick in verse 14, do you see it? Is any among you sick? It can mean sick, and in the gospels, it does.

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Now, there was a certain man, Lazarus, who was sick. In the gospels, it tends to mean someone who is physically sick.

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But it acts in the epistles, most of the time, it's not someone who is physically sick, it's someone who is without strength, who is spiritually weak.

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Let me give you some examples, and you don't have to turn there, I'll just read them. Therefore, I'm well content, 2

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Corinthians 12, with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake, for when

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I am weak, then I'm strong. Guess what the Greek word for weak is?

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The same word in James 5 for the word sick. When I am weak, then I am strong.

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1 Corinthians 8, verse 12. Thus, by sinning against brethren, and wounding their conscience when it is sick or weak, you sin against Christ.

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How about this, Hebrews 12. For consider him who has endured such hostility by sinners against himself, so that you might not grow sick or weary and lose heart.

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James is not referring here to people who are on their deathbeds, who are sick physically.

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Instead, he's writing to people who are morally and spiritually exhausted and weary, and they can't pray while they're suffering.

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They can't pray because they're happy. They need someone to pray for them. Listen to what

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MacArthur said. James moves beyond the suffering believers of the previous point to address specifically those who have become weak by that suffering.

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Ever met anyone who's going through something physically and it is so bad it hurts them spiritually? Is anyone among you sick?

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Let him call for Benny Hinn. Oh, sorry, that's not in there. It doesn't say, let him call for those in the church who have the gift of healing.

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By the way, what was the first book in the New Testament what's the first book that was written in the New Testament? The oldest

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New Testament book, James. You think there were miraculous gifts going on in the days of James, 46

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AD? I hope you say yes, because when 1 Corinthians was written, 10, 15 years later, maybe even 18 years later, there were signs and wonders going on.

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If someone is really physically sick, then let's call for people who have the gift of healing.

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Wouldn't that make sense? Well, he doesn't say that. He says instead of calling for people to help you with their body, help you with their spirit, and that must be the elder of the church.

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How does God want this to happen? Well, what do the elders do? Person calls for the elders.

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And what do the elders do, verse 14? You pray when you're suffering. You pray when you're happy. When you can't pray, you have somebody else pray.

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And let them pray over him. By the way, when you see an I -N -G word, it's a modifier. Anointing him with oil in the name of the

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Lord is not the main part of the passage. Everybody says, well, what kind of anointing is this? Is it rubbing?

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Is it figurative? Is it symbolic? All that stuff. And they miss out the most important thing. The most important thing is elders praying.

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Let them pray over him. Doesn't say laying on hands.

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It says pray. This is not extreme unction, by the way. In the

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Roman Catholic version of the Bible, the Douay version, the footnote for this passage reads, I quote, see here a plain warrant of scripture for the sacrament of extreme unction, that any controversy against its institution would be taken against the express words of the sacred text in the plainest terms.

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And sadly, they even translate the word elder, they're priests. Let the priests come and pray.

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This isn't extreme unction. What is it? Well, there's two Greek words for anoint.

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I think this will be helpful. Two Greek words for anoint. The first one used here in James chapter five, verse 14, means to anoint by dobbing or by smearing.

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You could take some little cloth, dip it in some water, and you could kind of dob it. That would be the word here, anoint.

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It just kind of dob it here. A little dab maybe will do you. You can rub it in. That's the word.

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The other word for anoint has to do with a religious or kind of a sacred thing. It would be this kind of anointing.

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Watch. Some kind of anointing like that, a spiritual thing.

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What's he saying? What's going on here? Well, the focus is we want the elders to pray.

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But what do the elders do while they're praying? What are they trying to do?

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Do people need to have some oil put on their head and in the name of the Father, Son, and the Spirit, something like that?

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Does it mean to rub? By the way, oil was a medicinal thing back in those days. They had no

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Bengay. I guess you probably could get some hot peppers and grind them up and rub them on people, I guess.

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I don't know. But they didn't have anything like that. They had oil. They'd rub oil. Maybe if you've gotten a massage recently, you get some oil rubbed on there.

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What's going on? What is he doing? Listen to what James Roskopf said,

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Master Seminary Professor. Quote, it is more adequate to say that the anointing is for the purpose of symbolizing tangibly the setting apart of the man to the miraculous healing work of God.

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It would be an aid to his faith by prompting a sense of expectancy. Christ himself applied saliva to men at times evidently to symbolize by physical contact the healing that God would affect, end quote.

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So what do we do? Here's this man who's weak in the faith, whose conscience is weak, and the elders come and pray.

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How do you prop up a weak man's conscience? You say, by the way, we're not just going to pray, but we're going to take some oil and we're gonna rub it on your forehead.

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And the guy goes, yeah, the prayers are good, but I can have something that I can touch and hold and it's oil.

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Maybe soothing itself, but it's more of this symbolizing. We're setting you apart tangibly for the work of God.

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By the way, the same reason we have communion is this reason, because you think, oh,

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I can taste, I can touch, I can feel. It's tangible. Vincent said,

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James point is that the weak and weary spiritually people would be refreshed, encouraged, and uplifted by the elders who rubbed oil on the despondent's head and prayed for them.

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If you're sick, call for the elders. By the way, still, as long as I've been here 13 years,

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I've never gotten a phone call that says, by the way, I'm suffering so much that I don't even think

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I can pray. My faith is weak, my conscience is weak. I can't seem to even pray for myself and I need help.

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Could the elders come over and just pray for me? You almost think that people would call. Does the text say the elders have to find the ones who need that and say, do you need us to come over?

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What's the text say? Help me, help come over. I've had people who've come and said,

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I think I'm about ready to die. I think I have to have surgery. Could the elders specially anoint me and I walk through the passage and tell them.

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This has nothing to do with that. This has to do when you need a crutch, when you need someone to be helping you, when you need those who are acting spiritually to come alongside of you when you're weak, call them and they'd love to come and pray with you.

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It's not physical restoration, but the restoration of a weak Christian to wholeness. Verse 15, and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who's sick or will raise him up.

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And if he's committed sins, they'll be forgiven him. This prayer offer in faith, this fervent, strong wish, a petition by the elders, will do its job.

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Faithful elders, by the way, oh, I don't want to jump ahead, so I won't. Verse 15, and the prayer offered in faith will restore the one who is sick.

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And for the first time, we get a little peek. Maybe the reason why this person is spiritually emaciated is because of sin.

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Sin might have been the cause of that. Raises the possibility. If he's committed sin, they'll be forgiven him.

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The elders don't forgive, but the elders ask God, if this sickness and this weakness and this handicap is because of sin,

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God forgive him. One man said, for the fallen, discouraged, distressed, weary believer, restoration is assured and the elder's prayer offered in faith will make the weary one well.

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And the Lord will raise him up from discouragement and spiritual defeat. Dr. Mayhew said, a believer has wandered off into sin, remained in sin, and God has chastened him by bringing sickness and weakness into his life to bring him back to himself.

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When the believer recognizes that God has brought a very untimely and severe situation, he is to call the elders of the church.

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Main point is pray, though. And finally, the test of evangelism found in verses 19 and 20. We're almost done, we're almost done.

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The final test of saving faith, and it's the test of soul winning. Verse 19, my brethren, if any among you strays from the truth and one turns him back, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.

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And then it ends. Who ends a book like this? This is almost as odd as 1

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John. Little children, how do you end 1 John? Keep yourself from idols.

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The end. I mean, he does this abruptly for a reason. The summons to action.

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You maybe were here a few months ago when I preached a sermon. Where's the best place to evangelize in all the world? Lowest hanging fruit, as it were.

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In the church. We had unbelievers in the church today. This is in the church.

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Look at the text. My brethren, if any among you strays from the truth.

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Among you, professing people in the local assembly. People that hear the Word.

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Luke says people can even hear the Word with great joy and they're not Christians. He's going to say it's all about evangelism.

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I could ask you this question. Before you were a Christian, how was your evangelism life? Some people as unbelievers evangelize in an odd kind of way.

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Maybe kids. But now as a Christian, what am I supposed to do? You think, before I walk out that door, you're now entering the mission field?

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You're in the mission field. Don't forget there are people in the church who aren't Christians. You say, well,

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I don't really know how to evangelize. Here's what one man said, a definition of evangelist is this.

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A nobody who is seeking to tell everybody about somebody who can help change anybody. Alright, I like it.

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Capital S for somebody. Show me someone, look at verse 19, who strays from the truth and I'll show you someone who needs to be saved.

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He planets away from the truth. The word planet means to stray, to go astray. Missed its path, is lost.

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And he strayed from the truth. The truth of the Gospel. Oh, he might not practice the truth, but here he strayed from knowing the truth.

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And it's your duty. What's your duty? And one, verse 19, turn him back. When one turns him back to go around, 180 degree turn, repent.

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God uses human instruments like you, like me, to do this very thing. Paul said in 1

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Corinthians 3, we're God's fellow workers. One turns him back.

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Like Acts 14, turn from vain things to serve a living God. Well, what's the result?

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Verse 20, let him know that he who turns a sinner from the error of his way, through preaching the

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Gospel, obviously, will save his soul from death and will cover a multitude of sins.

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Once again, the word there for sinner is not the word of a sinner who's a Christian. This is someone whose life is dedicated to sin so much they're characterized by this word, sinner.

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I did not come to call righteous, but sinners. What does your preaching do? Save them from death, spiritual death, eternal death, and cover a multitude of sins.

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It's like there's a big asbestos sin blanket. No trace of sins can be seen outside of that blanket.

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And by the way, when you ever think of sins, begin to think like this. Some people think, well, I never murdered anybody and I never killed anybody.

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Well, that's fine. But if you're supposed to love the Lord as an unbeliever with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength, how often do you not do that?

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How many sins per day do you think an unbeliever is heaping up on the day of destruction? One, five, 50, 500.

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Let's just say for sake of argument, 500 times in the day, at least they're not loving God with their heart, soul, mind, and strength and loving their neighbors themselves.

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What's 500 times 365 days a year? Times 50 years of their life.

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And if you preach the gospel of them and God forgives them, Jesus has paid for the punishment of all those sins and you've covered their soul,

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Jesus covered their soul, but you have been the instrument that their soul would be covered from a multitude of sins.

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That's an amazing thing. This kind of cover language, if you get a bill at a restaurant and you get a bill for $76 and you hand the person 100 and you say, that'll cover it, what does that mean?

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That's that kind of language here. Totally paid bill, sufficiently paid bill, sins covered sufficiently, sins paid for sufficiently.

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Reminds me of Romans four, blessed are those who lawless deeds have been forgiven and whose sins have been covered.

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He made him who knew no sin to be sin on our behalf that we might become the righteousness of God in him. Friends, remember you aren't saved by obeying these tests of saving faith, but if you're a

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Christian, you'll want to do these, you'll be sad when you don't do them and you'll say by the grace of God, I want to live this kind of life.

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Well, let's pray. Thank you Father for our day. Thank you for our night. Thank you that you've given us the noble task.

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As John Calvin called it, the noble task of preaching the gospel. We want to do that. Father, we want to be wise and we want to be kind, but we want to be able to preach the truth that Jesus Christ, the risen

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King saves sinners. Lord, we thank you for James. I thank you that he's got rough edges and sharp corners because I know

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I need that and I know the church here needs it too. Bless our fellowship now, bless our time around some food and friends and family.

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Thank you that you've sovereignly called this body together and we are who we are by your grace. In Jesus name, amen.