The Sinister Effects of Slander | Sermon 06/19/2022

Apologia Utah

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Hear now the inerrant and infallible words of the living and true God. 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. There is only one lawgiver and judge, the one who is able to save and to destroy, but who are you to judge your neighbor?

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Thus ending the reading of God's holy and inspired word, let's pray quickly. Father, would you please illuminate the scriptures today?

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Would you teach your people? Lord, would you speak through me, cause me to decrease and you to increase, oh

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Lord? Father, please help us to not leave here unchanged.

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Help us, Lord, to always take what we've learned, to be convicted by your spirit and to apply it to our lives when necessary.

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So Lord, please be with us now. Help me to speak in a way that is clear and helpful and that it always be true.

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In Jesus' name, amen. Slander, defamation, smearing, denigration.

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You could say this is one of the oldest sins ever committed when the serpent sought to make

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Eve question God, his word and his character. The scripture has much to say about the sin of slander.

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And before we get into our text, our main text for today, I want to call one such example to your minds.

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The 10th chapter of 2 Samuel. You can feel free to follow along here if you'd like.

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If it's better for you, you can turn there. 2 Samuel 10. You see, the

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Ammonites were enemies of God's people and they fought with them very, very often.

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So keep that in mind as we go through 2 Samuel 10. Verse one. Now it happened afterwards that the king of the

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Ammonites died and Hanun, his son, became king in his place.

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Then David said, I will show kindness to Hanun, the son of Nahash, just as his father showed kindness to me.

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So despite being enemies, at some point, Nahash extended kindness to David.

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And so David wanted to genuinely reciprocate the gesture. That's what it says.

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So David sent some of his servants to console him concerning his father.

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And it's possible David had gifts of consolation. He had maybe kind messages in writing to this king who just lost his father.

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Maybe he even sent some instrument players or singers to sing this man a song in his grief.

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Then it says, but when David's servant came to the land of the Ammonites, the princes of the

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Ammonites said to Hanun their lord, do you think that David is honoring your father because he has sent consulars to you?

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Has David not sent his servants to you in order to search the city, to spy it out and to overthrow it?

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And so the princes of Ammon, right there they sowed seeds of doubt, seeds of doubt into the king's mind, paranoia for sure.

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Do you think this man is truly sincere? They were saying. Is this not more likely a plot to destroy our nation is what they were trying to sow in Hanun's mind.

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They slander King David. They lie about David and they sell these false ideas to the king.

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David truly wanted to comfort Hanun during the death of his father. He probably wanted to demonstrate an act of peace even towards them.

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But these sinister men, they defame David.

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It says in verse four, so Hanun took David's servants and shaved off half their beards and cut off their garments in the middle as far as their hips and sent them away.

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You may think, well, at least he didn't kill them. At least he didn't kill them.

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But look in the ancient near east, a beard was a sign of dignity. It defined a man's masculinity.

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So this was an utter shame to these men, completely mocked and violated.

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They had half their beards shaved off. And then this word for hips in the original language in the

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Hebrew is actually buttocks. Literally they cut their tunics all the way down to their buttocks, to their behinds.

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And so they sent them on their way through the city and out of the city and they were just completely humiliated.

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One guy was probably thinking there would have been more honor in death. You know, that's certainly true in that culture at that time.

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So all this occurred because of slander and lies. Slander and lies.

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Verse five, when they told it to David, he sent to meet them. For the men were greatly humiliated and the king said, stay in Jericho until your beards grow and then return.

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David was so concerned for these men. He's just like, stay in Jericho, let the beards grow out. Might take a couple months.

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Maybe he gave them some essential oils to help the face exfoliate, get it going. But he cared for them.

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He cared for their arrival back into the city, right? They would not even return to their homes until their beards grew out.

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Hopefully they got a change of clothing along the way. Verses six and seven.

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Now, when the sons of Ammon saw that they had become odious to David, the sons of Ammon sent and hired the

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Arameans of Beth Rehab and the Arameans of Zobah, 20 ,000 foot soldiers and the king of Makkah with 1 ,000 men and the men of Tob with 12 ,000 men.

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When David heard of it, he sent Joab and all the army and the mighty men. No doubt,

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David was angry. It says that he became odious to them. He appeared upset.

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He had done this kind gesture and the treatment of his men was a large offense to him to the point where even

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Ammon thought, well, we better get ready for war. This is, Ammon thought that. We better get ready for what we've done.

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So look at how much this has escalated from the slander by the advisors of Hanun.

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This has completely escalated to the point of war. Verse eight. The sons of Ammon came out and drew up in battle array at the entrance of the city while the

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Arameans of Zobah and of Rehab and of the men of Tob and Makkah were by themselves in the field.

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Now, when Joab saw that the battle was set against him in front and in the rear, he selected from all the choice men of Israel and arrayed them against the

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Arameans. Think about it. This is war. All these men, this is many, many men, tens of thousands of men, battle, death.

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All this really over nothing. A kind gesture from David. What the

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Ammonites did was despicable to these men, no doubt. But David sent a kind gesture and then all of a sudden, slander, defamation of David, lies.

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It brought about this bloody outcome. They're at war because of slander. Verse 13.

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So Joab and the people who were with him drew near to the battle against the Arameans and they fled before him.

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So the Ammonites came to Joab, the armies of Israel. Joab is one of the commanders of David.

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And they fled. Once they saw the Arameans flee. But they didn't learn their lesson.

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Get this, after they had departed and the Arameans and the Ammonites departed from Israel, they came back, they doubled down, okay?

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Verse 16. And Hadadizar sent and brought out the Arameans who were beyond the river and they came to Helam and Joab, the commander of the army of Hadadizar, led them.

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Now when it was told to David that they returned, he gathered all Israel together, they crossed the

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Jordan, they came to Helam and the Arameans arrayed themselves to meet David and fought against the

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Israelite army. It says though, but the Arameans fled once again before Israel.

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David killed 700 charioteers of the Arameans and 40 ,000 horsemen.

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40 ,000 horsemen died that day and he struck down Shobak, the commander of their army and he died there.

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When all the kings, the servants of Hadadizar saw that they were defeated by Israel, they made peace with Israel and David and said, we will serve you.

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We'll just serve you. We're not gonna fight against you anymore. And it says, so the Arameans feared to help the sons of Ammon anymore.

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We're not gonna help you guys. You get us into trouble. We've had a massacre among our men.

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So the point is, do you see how one slander of a person, one defaming lie can lead to so much devastation?

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James was absolutely right about the sins of the tongue when he said, see how large a forest is set ablaze by one small spark of fire.

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Some fools in Ammon said some stupid things and brought ruin to their people. But what we're going to see in our text today is that even in the church, slander can have far reaching effects.

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It is startling. Defamation is more serious in God's eyes than we could have ever known.

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So let's take a look at that now, starting in verse 11. 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. If you remember from last week,

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James had just given 10 different imperatives, 10 different commandments in the previous section of Scripture.

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And now he gives us another. Do not speak against one another.

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This is just after the call to authentic repentance and true humility before God.

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Speaking against another is shown to be prideful. And as we saw,

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God desires for us to be humble and lowly like our Savior. And this is very much related to the jealousy, the selfishness and quarrels of previous verses.

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In fact, it's possible some scholars have said this might be a reprise of chapter three on the tongue, that this is almost a continuation that James was on kind of a rabbit trail and he's finally coming back to sins of the tongue.

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It's possible, interesting to consider. Speak against is katalaleo.

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And it is literally speak against or speak down. To speak negatively about someone with malice of the heart.

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To speak evil of another. Katalaleo is often translated in the

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New Testament in the Septuagint, slander, slander. And God hates it.

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Proverbs chapter six, verses 16 through 19 says, there are six things which the

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Lord hates. Yes, seven, which are an abomination to Him. Haughty eyes, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood.

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A heart that devises wicked plans, feet that run rapidly to evil. A false witness who utters lies and one who speaks against his brothers.

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That's where it is. Those who speak against their brothers. But you know what is just a big shock to me when

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I was studying this? We had just studied chapter four, verse seven.

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Therefore, submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. We talked about diabolos, devil, okay?

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And diabolos literally means slanderer in the original language.

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Slanderer. Slandering is not resisting the devil, but acting like the devil.

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Slander is his calling card. If you are in Christ, you have a new father now in heaven.

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Your father isn't the devil as he charged the Pharisees.

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So don't act like diabolos. This is defaming others.

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That's what Satan knows. That's what he does. Often attacking others is done because we have something to gain.

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We have something to gain. Maybe we get pleasure out of gossip. Maybe we feel like we look better than the person we're slandering, and so we have won the favor in the eyes of those who are hearing the slander.

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And we don't necessarily need to lie, but slander often comes with lies.

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And once it's out, the damage is done. It's really hard to retract slander, right?

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Someone could just make something up and it goes out there and the damage takes a really long time to clean that up.

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But it often contains lies. A defamatory word may be completely true as well, but just because it's true, it does not give us the right to say it.

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It really is related to that lowliness in verse 10. Slandering someone else assumes a position of superiority, that you are higher than other people.

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Speaking down, as the word means, speaking down on that person from a high place.

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This shows someone devoid of humility who slanders. And if we bring ourselves low before God, we are not then able to position ourselves higher than others.

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If you bring yourself low before God, you won't have room or capability to raise yourself higher than others.

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And if you and I were to simply look within, we would see a plethora of areas that need sanctification and improvement.

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We would. We would. When you hear something convicting, do you often first think about how that applies to someone else you know?

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Oh, this would be really good for so -and -so to hear, right? We think about that often, someone other than us.

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And pride is at the heart of slandering. One thing that you might've noticed that is different from last week is,

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James has changed his tone, right? He said, you adulterers, you lovers of the world, you sinners, you double -minded.

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And all of a sudden he changes to the more familiar brethren and brothers. This is the church community, no doubt.

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Listen carefully. Slandering brothers and sisters in the church can lead to the eventual destruction of that church.

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Slandering can destroy a church if unchecked. I remember

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Pastor Jeff told me as he was training me up and getting me ready for this, he told me he was part of the leadership in one church where the wife of one pastor just slandered all the women in the church.

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And it just went completely unchecked, unchallenged, uncorrected, and that church closed.

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That church closed. I remember him saying that. I know you've probably met people in your lives, hurt brothers or sisters in Christ, who had to leave a church after years of pouring themselves in to that local assembly because they were slandered.

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And granted, we don't know the whole story of what had happened, but it shows that something occurred.

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Something had happened and it wasn't corrected. Reconciliation wasn't reached. Something has happened.

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We've met people like that before. And the brethren relationship puts us all on the same familial level.

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We are family here, those in Christ. I remember growing up, if I heard some kid at school saying something bad about my older brother or something bad about my younger sister,

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I was gonna defend them, right? You guys probably did the same thing. Don't talk about my brother.

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Even though you go home and you hate his guts, you beat him up. But we would say, we would defend them.

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I remember one neighbor kid said, he said his dad could beat up my dad.

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I said, no way, bro. My dad used to box. He was a surfer. He played football. You list all these things off like it's a resume.

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My dad could beat up your dad. But really what was on the line was, in my eyes, the family name.

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The family name, right? The reputation. And that's it.

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When you speak against your own family member, you're actually defaming yourself too.

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You're defaming yourself too. When we slander a fellow believer, we are joining in with the world who mocks and slanders us.

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The outside stuff typically doesn't bother us, right? Yesterday, who knows, actually on Friday, now that I think about it, we have this video go out, right,

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Andrew? A plea to the LGBTQ community. We really wanna help them. We wanna see them come to faith in Christ.

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We wanna see healing brought to these people. They're just in complete bondage. And you've heard testimonies of people who have mutilated their bodies, and 10 years later, they're more depressed than ever.

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And so we have this video come out on our channel, and we thought to ourselves, well, you know, if,

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I don't know, who knows? Maybe if someone gets ahold of it locally, maybe they'll put it on the news.

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They'll say local church is like Westboro or something like that. But we resolved that we would do what was right, what was right, whether or not we could be defamed or slandered from the outside, because really, that doesn't bother us.

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The world is gonna do that. The world is gonna do that to you. Expect that. Expect for your unbelieving coworkers to tell lies about you.

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But Peter says, in the thing that they slander you, let it be your good behavior, right?

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Let it be your good behavior. But what hurts, what can hurt, is inside the church when we slander one another.

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Speaking evil of your brother or sister in Christ is running your name through the mud, too. It's running the name of Christ through the mud as well.

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You see, defaming others is acting like we are the spiritual firstborns. But the one with the title of firstborn is the preeminent one,

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Jesus Christ. We are not spiritual firstborns. We were adopted into the family of God.

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We were adopted in. We are not higher than one another. There's no one here higher than one another.

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Just because God has called me to speak up here and proclaim this word to you makes me no better than you.

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No better at all. And that's the key. The only one higher is our

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Lord. Isaiah 32, seven says, the rogue, the scoundrel, his weapons are evil.

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He devises wicked schemes to destroy the afflicted with slander, even though the needy one speaks what is true.

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So this person's already afflicted, and the rogue, the scoundrel, will speak against them.

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They'll slander them, even though they say what is true. We are to not be like the scoundrel.

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The church is already afflicted with attacks. Don't join in with the world doing it, too. Paul said it well in his letter to the church in Ephesus.

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Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice.

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Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving each other, just as God in Christ has forgiven you.

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Chiefly, because Christ has forgiven you of your great evil, stop spreading it.

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Don't give it. Don't charge slander to others' accounts, even if Jesus has forgiven them, you are to forgive them, too.

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This is your brother. This is your sister. How valuable are they?

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So valuable that God was willing to give His one and only Son to pay the highest price that the

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Son of God would give His life for those sitting next to you right now, for your brothers and sisters.

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Think about it. If someone speaks evil of my wife,

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I'm gonna confront them. And I know all the other men in here would, too.

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You would confront someone speaking slander about your wife. And how much do you think our

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Lord appreciates it when we speak evil of His wife, His bride?

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Not very much. Believers, we make up His bride. That's what the Bible says.

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He is working on her to present her spotless and unblemished to the

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Father. But here we come seeking to tarnish her name. We attack each other.

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We attack the bride. He won't have it, right? He won't have it.

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And I think defaming can go beyond the verbal speaking of evil of others.

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We slander someone in our own hearts when we assume something about them that we don't know to be true. We have no evidence for something, but we can assume motives in our hearts and slander them in our hearts.

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They are tainted in our minds now. We do smear campaigns in our minds.

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We assume something. We don't know it. We haven't verified it. We don't know if it's true, but we believe it now as truth, and that is wrong.

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That is slander in the heart. Don't paint a picture of a brother or sister to other believers that they should not see.

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What kind of picture are you painting of your brother or sister to others? Because that picture that we can paint, it can be unfair.

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It can be ungracious. Slander can change the way people think of others when that person has no ability to clarify or make things right.

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The photo went out. The image is out. The context was lost, and the damage was done.

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That's what happens. But it continues to compound, okay? The effects of slander continue to get worse, according to James.

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It says, 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. I think

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James has two commandments, two laws in mind here. The first one is Leviticus chapter 19, verse 16.

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It states, you shall not go about as a slanderer among your people, and you are not to act against the life of your neighbor.

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I am the Lord. A slanderer among your people.

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The Lord further clarifies, it is as acting against the life of your neighbor.

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That's what it's like. And it's true. One false accusation, one slander can ruin a person's life.

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Even if they are later able to show evidence to the contrary of that denigration. It's just the

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AC, everyone freaks out. You'll get used to it. There's a screaming banshee in here.

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No, that's just children and the AC. And the other law

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James has in mind is the merciful royal law that he spoke of in chapter two. It's from Leviticus 19, 18.

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The first one was 19, 16. Now it's 19, 18. Okay, just two verses after the command against slander.

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He says, the Lord says, you shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the sons of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

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I am the Lord. Don't you love it? I love those commandments because right after he's decreed and made a statute and a precept, he says, how does he firm it up?

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How does he put the authority in it? He says, I am the Lord. I am that I am. Do it.

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That's all the authority he needs. All he has to do is speak. But he backs it up and he says,

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I am that I am. I am the Lord. I am Yahweh. Do this. Fundamentally, James sees the breaking of the slandering law as the breaking of the royal law to love your neighbors yourself.

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The royal law is at the heart of all the law. And Jesus teaches us that in his

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Gospels. And so one becomes a judge of others and a judge of the law.

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A judge in a court is impartial in their evaluation of facts and evidence. They are to be just in how they apply the law in past sentence upon a charged party.

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A slanderer though doesn't seek to learn the facts. They don't care about the evidence and they won't speak their words of concern in front of the accused.

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They abandon the laws of love from Scripture and will act as judge giving a verdict and wanting others to do the same.

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He's guilty. Believe it. You say it too. He's guilty. Let's all do it. He's guilty.

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He's guilty. That's what the slanderer does. He wants everyone to think the same as him.

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But when we set aside the law in slander, we are the ones not doing the law.

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We are breaking it. We are transgressing the law. And eventually, he says, judging it.

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But what does James mean by that? What does he mean that we judge the law? When we judge the law by slandering, we are saying the love laws are wrong.

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That the law to love your neighbors yourself is wrong. That those laws should actually command criticism of neighbor and not love.

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Ultimately, if you deny the law, you deny the one behind it. And if you judge it, you judge the one who gave it.

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That's James's point. He makes that clear, especially in verse 12.

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Let's read that now. There is only one law giver and judge and the one who is able to save and to destroy.

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But who are you to judge your neighbor? James, of course, knows very well

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God's words. He knows Christ's teachings. This verse is almost a combination of Isaiah 33,

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Matthew 10, and ends with Matthew 7, one through two. Isaiah 33, 22 says, for the

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Lord is our judge, the Lord is our lawgiver, the Lord is our king.

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It's a proclamation. The reason why James would have to say there is only one judge and lawgiver is because by slandering, we judge and slander the law, and then we make ourselves out to be higher than the divine judge and lawgiver.

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We are saying, again, that the law should be rejected, that we have a new commandment.

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We have a better commandment. As if to say, I know better than God.

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Only God has the authority to change or omit a law, but guess what?

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He has never changed or omitted a law because the law is a representation of His very nature and character.

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He is immutable, He is unchanging. He will not change a law because He does not change.

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But He's the only one with the authority. And remember, diabolos means slander.

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And what did the devil try to do? The devil tried to usurp

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God's throne. He tried to take God's throne. And when we slander, this shows that we not only act like the devil in his defamation of the brethren, but now in that we try to act like we're

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God. Satan wanted to take God's throne. And so that's what he's relating it to.

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There is only one lawgiver and judge. You aren't one, you aren't Him. Quit trying to make yourself out to be

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God. There is only one God. What a contrast between God and man.

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Acting like God, what audacity, James is saying. To question

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God's law is to contradict and accuse Him. God can speak about someone who has sinned and condemned them in any capacity while not being a slanderer because He has no sin.

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Our Lord carries no sinful motives or desires, opportunities for sordid gain.

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He can charge anyone with anything because He is holy and everyone else has fallen.

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All that He says is true and He possesses no hypocrisy with it. It is true that God delegates power to man to enforce the law and to make judgments with the aid of God's law, but the

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Lord is the supreme and divine lawgiver and judge. Man enforces

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God's law, but it's not the one in whom it originates. To make righteous law, one must be perfectly righteous.

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And that is why any law in any country in anywhere throughout the world, if it has a law that is righteous in any way, it is because that law has been revealed by God in His Scripture or written on the hearts of men.

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If someone in the middle of nowhere on an island has a law with their people that says, you shall not murder, we shall not kill each other, it's because the image of God is in them and God, as Romans 1 and 2 says, the law has been written on their hearts.

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All righteous law comes from the righteous judge. Psalm 9, verse 20 says, let the nations know they are but men.

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They are mere men. Let them know that they are men. They are not the lawgiver and judge.

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James says, God is the one who is able to save and to destroy. Destroy here is apolliumi, apolliumi, which is similar to that word apollyon, the destroyer.

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It means destruction. Save here is sozo, the same word that we see used in references to salvation, being saved, sozo.

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And able here is dunamai, from where we get the word dynamite.

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God is powerfully able to save. God is powerfully able to destroy.

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He is able. He is the only one who has the dunamai, the ability, the power to do these things.

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Matthew 10, 28 speaks to this, do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul, but rather fear

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Him who is able to destroy both body and soul in hell. And the fact is,

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James, them, you and I, we have no power or ability to save people or to send them to destruction.

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None. His point is, so stop trying to act like you can.

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Stop trying to act like you can with your words, with your slander. James is thinking about judging here in terms of final, eternal destiny.

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We know that because he says save and destroy. That's what he means by judgment here. He's talking about only

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God can deliver the final judgment on someone's life. Only He can.

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We cannot declare with authority final judgment on brothers or sisters or neighbors.

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We don't know what God will do before the end. Now, we can look at the fruit of someone's life or the lack of fruit there is, right?

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And we can make judgments based off of their life.

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We can plainly see when someone has rejected God and we can understand then that they are an unbeliever, but that is different from acting as though that we sit upon the great white throne of judgment and we have the open books in front of us.

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There is such a difference. Yes, God has given us the ability. You will know them by their fruits.

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He tells the apostles that. You're gonna know people by their fruits. But ultimately, God says,

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I'm the only one who gives eternal judgment. Paul echoes these statements in his letter to the

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Romans. In Romans 14, he's talking about those brothers with weaker faith.

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It says, who eat only vegetables because they are convinced in their minds regarding meat, likely meat sacrificed to idols.

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He says this, but you, why do you judge your brother? Or you again, why do you regard your brother with contempt?

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For we will all stand before the judgment seat of God for it is written as I live, says the

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Lord, every knee shall bow to me and every tongue shall give praise to God. So then each one of us will give an account of himself to God.

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Therefore, let us not judge one another anymore, but rather determine this, not to put an obstacle or a stumbling block in a brother's way.

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He says, don't sin against them by causing them to compromise their conscience and sin in their hearts.

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Don't put a stumbling block before them. Don't judge your brother or sister for their weaker faith.

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You remember the good Samaritan? He did not talk down or slander the man who was hurt.

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He did not judge him. He saw his neighbor as equal. He saw his neighbor as worthy as picking him up, taking him to safety and caring him to get well, caring for him to get better.

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One commentator states, suppose I do know something to his discredit, my brother's discredit.

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Suppose I know something and may it be true. My task then is not to publicize it, nor even privately to berate him with it, but to go where my brother is and lift him up, to show him the truth, lift him up.

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We need to lift up our brothers and sisters and our neighbors. We need to lift them up.

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In essence, we have James exhorting believers, you aren't God, you didn't give the law, you aren't perfectly righteous, you aren't going to deal out our final judgment, you can't save or destroy anyone, so stop acting like you can with your slander.

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These are serious repercussions. With slander, James is literally taking us down to the point where he says when you slander, you're trying to act like you're better than God.

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You're trying to say you can change God's law. That's serious, very serious. David's kind gesture and the

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Ammonite prince's slander led to slaughter and death. The implications of slander are too great.

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We are not to partake in it. Don't gossip. Don't do it in your heart.

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Don't slander online, don't slander on Facebook. Don't do it with the brethren. So what should we do?

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What should we do then? Is James saying we don't make any judgments or we don't call out any sin?

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Is that what James is saying here? No, absolutely not.

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In fact, this whole letter, this whole letter of James, this whole epistle has been him calling out sin.

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Him calling out sin amongst the church. In fact, all the epistles demonstrate some level of calling out sin.

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Jesus gave us the example to call out sin, but there is a way in which we do it.

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It's not the slander way. James will later say in chapter five, our next chapter, he'll say to turn a brother away from sin is a righteous thing.

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He'll argue that. James will say, I believe it's in verse 20 of chapter five, he'll say to turn your brother away from sin is good, that you should do that.

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So let's tackle what he said. He said, who are you to judge your neighbor? We got to listen to Jesus in the

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Sermon on the Mount in Matthew seven. Pretty much everyone in Western culture has memorized the first three words of Matthew seven, verse one, and that is do not judge, right?

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Everyone in the world, that's their favorite verse in Western culture, do not judge. Maybe they'll put some sass in there.

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You know, I don't know. Do not judge. But let's read to verse five in chapter seven, it says this, do not judge so that you will not be judged.

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For in the way in which you judge, you will be judged. And by the standard of measure, it will be measured to you.

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Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?

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Or how can you say to your brother, let me take the speck out of your eye and behold, the log is in your own eye.

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Jesus says, you hypocrite. First, take the log out of your own eye and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother's eye.

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Basically, he's saying be ready. Be ready for scrutiny in that area in which you are calling out your brother or sister in the sin that you're calling them out.

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Be ready for scrutiny. If you're gonna do that, you better be above reproach there.

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This is a call to not be a hypocrite in your judgments. That's what

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Jesus is saying. It's like the guy with the anger problem trying to help his buddy who gets explosive.

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He said, man, you need to deal with your anger. It's like, bro, I saw you last week. Don't tell me that. Can I get someone else?

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You know? It's like the woman doing a lesson for a women's group on to not gossip, but after it's over and some women have departed, she goes to her favorite girlfriends and tells them all about some of the women who had already just left, but she just did a lesson on not to gossip.

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It's hypocrisy. Hypocrisy. First, deal with your sin,

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Jesus says. Remove the plank or the log from your eye then you can see properly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.

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And you know what? Jesus says that, right? He doesn't say remove the log from your eye and then it ends.

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He says, remove the log from your eye so that you can go to your brother or sister and properly see to help them remove the speck out of their eye.

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He doesn't stop that. He says you can go to them. You can help them remove it. You can do that.

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So many say we can't. Why would

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I let you tend my garden when yours has weeds sky high? Why would

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I let you tend my garden when your garden has weeds sky high? Christ will later admonish his disciples in the

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Gospel of John. He'll say, don't judge based off of appearance, but judge with righteous judgment.

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That is a quote from Jesus, from the Word of God. We can and should make judgments based off of the law giver's law to help others in sin, but to not slander or act as though we can declare eternal judgment on souls.

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That's it. You can help someone, you can correct them in love, but you cannot declare eternal judgment upon them with definite absolution and you cannot slander them in front of people.

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Every Christian ought to exercise the proper, necessary and biblical discernment process of those in sin inside and outside the church.

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They should. The fact is, how otherwise would we be able to perform church discipline if we couldn't make a judgment, right?

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If we couldn't determine that someone was doing something sinful and they're not repenting, then we would be disregarding

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God's law in Christ's words in Matthew 18, that if they don't repent, we are to remove them from our assembly.

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But how do we do that? We have to observe the sin they're committing and that they're not repenting from it.

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We must make a judgment. Not an eternal judgment, but a judgment. We must judge.

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How could an earthly judge bring down a guilty verdict on a murderer? I'm not allowed to, hey,

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I'm not allowed to judge. Don't judge, man. We just have murderers and lawbreakers everywhere.

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We are called and instituted by God, whether it be ecclesial or civil or even familial.

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I have to practice judgment within my family. I have to sometimes go to my daughter and she's done something wrong and I lovingly correct her and it may carry penalties, it may not.

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But we make judgments every day. You'll make a judgment on where you go to eat after this. It is false to say that we can't judge, okay?

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It is just not in the way that James is talking about. We can't judge in that way. If you've seen someone sinning and it warrants correction, go to them in love the way

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Matthew 18 advises. Go to them privately. Talk to your pastor if you're unsure.

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You see, going to others about a person will never help that person not sin anymore. You don't really care about someone then.

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Oh, this person sinned. Oh, he's in sin. I need to help him out. So let me go to these three guys and tell them what this guy's done.

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How is that gonna help my brother in any way? How will that help him grow and repent and move past this in any capacity?

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Maybe even then, I saw something, but I didn't see it right. Maybe I heard something, but I misheard it.

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And leaving them and telling other people doesn't give them an opportunity to explain, to clarify.

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Maybe they aren't in sin. We need to hear them out. We need to go to them first. And correction, when done rightly, is always done with the

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Word of God. That is, again, the law. And it's done in love. Confronting a brother or sister in sin will carry no selfish ambition, no pride, no quarrelsome nature, no jealousy or the like.

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That true correction doesn't have those things with it at all.

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It is the low approach to love, to show someone the love of God through the grace of God in Christ, in the reassurance of salvation, and the reproof necessary to repent.

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And it's important to keep some facts in mind when doing this too. We, before a holy

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God, are just as guilty as our fellow brother or sister.

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And let that humble us. Let that cause us to tread slowly and carefully.

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But look, if you love your fellow churchmen, you will desire to help them when they're in sin.

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That is a virtue. You know that? We all need to get better at doing that.

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We're really good at slandering and gossip, but we're not very good at caring enough to correct a brother or sister in the right way.

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Or we just do this indifferent, apathetic thing, and it's like, I won't do either, and therefore I'm not in sin.

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But no, the Bible makes it clear. A Christian will, in love, correct his brother or sister.

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When warranted, when needed. Don't become like the hypersensitive person after this, like a, you know, just going around, ah, hey, you're doing this wrong, you're doing this wrong.

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That's not what I'm saying, right? For serious offenses, for serious, repetitive, habitual sin, we need to go to each other in love.

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James, however, this is it. What is James saying? James is rebuking jealous, highly critical, and often damaging speech against others.

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That's what this is about. James is rebuking highly critical and jealous and often damaging speech directed towards others.

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That's what this is. The psalmist said in Psalm 101, whoever secretly slanders his neighbor, him

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I will destroy. No one who has a haughty look and an arrogant heart will I endure. Can we say that?

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Do you endure it? I want us to be so concerned about this that not only do we never commit slander and defamation as a church, but that you won't endure it, you won't receive it.

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You shouldn't receive it either, let alone do it. You'll have to say something like,

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I'm sorry. Lovingly, I can't receive that. I don't know if it's true. I'm sorry, please tell me no more.

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I can't receive that. But even if it is true, it currently doesn't involve me. I'd hear about this if it was relevant to me or if it had gone through the steps of church discipline, but right now that hasn't happened.

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So this isn't for my ears to hear. I would encourage you to take this to one of the elders and let them know not only of your concerns of this person, but even in the way in which you originally shared it with me.

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I think you should tell that to the pastors. That's something that we should say. We shouldn't receive slander, let alone give it.

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I think we can all tell the difference between what is appropriate to share and what is not, what is a true concern and what is spreading slander.

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We know our hearts. We need to keep them in check. You know, we know, we have to be careful.

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So let me wrap this up. We are different, church. We are not like the culture.

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We are not like the world. It loves slander. It loves baseless judgment.

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There are TV shows about others slandering and judging each other. And people love those shows.

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It feeds the fleshly desire to be like God, to be all -knowing, to have secret knowledge.

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You see, gossip is thinking, some hidden knowledge will edify me in a way that God's Word can't.

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Oh, I need to hear that. That's secret knowledge. That's information that I need.

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That's wrong. The secret things are for the Lord. What He has revealed is what

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He intends for us to know. And the principle stands in our communication with one another.

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Remember, whatever someone in this church does when they sin and you respond with slander,

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God, the righteous judge, could have struck that person for their sin and you for your slander.

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He could have destroyed both of us, right, for the sin that we've committed, but He didn't.

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God gave us grace through Jesus Christ. God gave us grace. Jesus Himself endured slander.

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If you have been a victim of slander, you're in good company. The eternal high priest has endured slander so He can sympathize with you in what you've gone through.

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Christ, the apostles, the prophets, and saints who have gone before us have endured slander and they know who their witness is.

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They know God has and will vindicate them. Maybe not in this life, but in the life to come.

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The people said Jesus, the people said that Jesus blasphemed God. They said that Jesus was a glutton, that He was a drunkard, that He was a friend of tax collectors and sinners.

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They proclaimed that Jesus cast out demons by the power of the devil, right?

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They reviled Him. And the thing is, our

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Lord endured all of that so that we would be sozo, we would be saved. How can we proclaim guilt upon one another when

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God's judgment of sinners and verdict of guilt was placed upon Jesus? You see what that is?

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Slander is like taking something off the cross and saying it wasn't paid for, putting it in front of that person.

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But it was paid for, if that person is in Christ. It was paid for. When we slander and accuse others, we deny the

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Lord's declaration of imputed righteousness and pardon. In Psalm 140, as Dusty read, the slanderer will not be established in the earth.

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They will not. So may we all be able to say that we can build up each other in love and correct each other in grace.

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And I think Paul says it best in his letter to the Thessalonians. He says, we urge you, brethren, admonish the unruly among you, okay?

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Encourage the faint -hearted. Help the weak. Be patient with everyone.

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See that no one repays evil for evil, slander for slander, but always seek after that which is good for one another.

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Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks, for this is God's will for you in Christ Jesus.

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This, he says, all of this, whether it be admonish your unruly brother or to correct in love or encourage the downhearted, all of it is the will of God for you in Christ.

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That is it. Let's pray, church. Heavenly Father, please bless the message that went out.

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Lord, please, if there are those of us here, Lord, all of us have committed to slander at some point in our lives.

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Some of us may still be struggling with gossip and slander to this day. Lord, I pray,

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God, that you would equip us by your spirit to abstain from this, to not be those who act as judges over the law, who act as judges of you.

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For God, you are the only judge and lawgiver. How could we ever make ourselves higher than you?

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And even then, how could we ever make ourselves higher than one another? We are no better. We are all sons and daughters of the living

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God. We thank you, Lord Jesus, for your grace. We thank you,

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Lord Jesus, for what you've done, that you've redeemed us from our slander, from the slander we've endured and from the slander that we've committed.

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We thank you, God, for your word, that it penetrates our hearts, souls, and minds. Please use it in us,

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Lord, and sanctify us with this word. We praise you and we pray this all in Jesus' name, amen.