Intro to James

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, �But we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn�t for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we�re called by the Divine Trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here�s our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry. I almost said, �Welcome to Bethlehem Bible Church but it was maybe the Noah Cain, Steve.

Welcome to Bethlehem Bible Church. It�s Sunday morning, boys and girls.

That�s what I was thinking. Do you know where your pastor is? Because I don�t do announcements typically, but now on Sundays, since there are no announcements, the announcement we have this morning is there are no announcements.

Yeah. I mean, it�s kind of hard to have announcements when you have no activities at your church. Almost no activities. I mean, there�s an item or two here or there.

How about no right hand of fellowship for the rest of eternity?

I�m not a big fan of that, but you know, I did meet somebody for breakfast. Don�t tell the governor, but I did meet somebody for breakfast last week, somebody I�d never met, and he offered me his hand, and I took it and shook it.

You know what? I have noticed, Steve, that the culture and climate that�s been created by our government has brought out some rebellion in people, and so they like to shake hands now.

The clandestine handshake. I know.

Well, even before this, I remember I�d go to church on Lord�s Day worship service, and I�d always, after the right hands of fellowship, you know, because I shook several hands, I�d always go get the goop and goop up my hands before I preached.

I never give the left cross of fellowship, though.

That�s usually down and you�re out. That�s just one, down and outers. Down goes Frazier. Yeah. So, anything happening with you? Any updates we have for our cultural awareness moment?

You know, you really need. I mean, how long have you been doing this show?

This is going into the 11th year.

We need some, like, you know, music for these little segments. I think a cultural awareness moment, you know, stuff like that would be good. I mean, I�ve always thought, like, the message moment should definitely have, like, some fanfare.

And if we had somebody to actually re-record some songs, you know, we could do. I don�t know who it is. The Four Tops or Temptations or somebody,. �This message moment.

Fenway with Black Lives Matter and all that other stuff all postured around. Sad times. Anyway, here�s a bookmark. And the first three words on the bookmark are �how to pray. How to pray. That�s pretty good, isn�t it?

Teach us how to pray. Lord, teach us to pray. It does give you an example, and it says, �Let us pray. Uh-huh. And this is reprinted from Reverend John Keating. That should give you a little hint.

Reverend John. That doesn�t help me, but the Keating part does. Shouldn�t it say, �Father.

Yeah, it sounds okay to me.

Grant, we beseech Thee, that meditating upon these mysteries of the Holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary, we may imitate what they contain and obtain what they promise through the same Christ our Lord.

Amen. So there we have it. That�s a little bookmark. And then on the side here, it gives you the whole deal here, what the rosary looks like. And I don�t know if you knew this before, but the end of the rosary, which is the crucifix, the cross, you�re supposed to say the sign of the cross, and then the Apostles� Creed.

Then you move up a bead, is Our Father. Then there�s a triple bead, that�s not for the Trinity, but three Hail Marys. Then there�s another space, and that space is Glory Be to the Father, you say that.

Then there�s another bead, and that�s the first mystery, and that is Our Father. Then there�s another space, and you go over a little bit, counterclockwise, six beads, those are, ten beads, those are the Hail Marys, Glory to the Father, and then the second mystery, Our Father.

So that�s what those things are for.

So, she doesn�t get honored, you know, as deity, but she�s mixed right in there with them.

Well, you know, it�s the twin towers of idolatry of Dulia and Latria.

Man, oh man. I mean, I�ve said this a million times, but I don�t know how you fit that fourth person into the Trinity. It seems a little crowded. Steve, Quadrinity, I think that would be. Yeah, it would be, and it�s heretical.

Since we both believe that you begin to become like what you worship, right? If you worship idols, so you begin to, you know, take on their attributes because of all the Dulia and Latria. What do people who not esteem Mary or are thankful for Mary, but if they worship Mary, what do they become like, I wonder?

Mary. But the thing is, not the real Mary, but a false Mary.

This image of Mary that Roman Catholicism has invented. I mean, here�s one thing I�m absolutely certain of. Mary is not listening to our prayers. Mary cannot answer our prayers. I mean, ultimately, what are you doing when you say that?

You�re attributing to Mary attributes of God. You�re making her a god. I don�t care what you want to call it. You can call it Latria, you can call it Dulia, you can call it, you know, whatever. You are saying that she�s omniscient, that she�s, you know, listening to everybody pray all around the world, that she�s omnipotent because she�s able to act on all these things, and you�re attributing to her the attributes of God.

Mary, Idolatry, and the Attributes of God

Steve, often when we look at the Bible, we might go to the Old Testament, for instance, and watch a Bible character, and then we say to people, well, that Bible character did something well, and you should do that too.

And you know what? That�s not always wrong. Sadly, a lot of preaching takes that to the wrong extent. But many times there are things in the New Testament that would tell us about Israel as an example, and 1 Corinthians would say, well, don�t do that, right?

So this exemplary or non-exemplary kind of preaching. Well, what about Mary? If she�s to be so venerated or so highly esteemed, what does Mary do? And Mary said, Luke 1, �My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.

Just that one sentence there in the Song of Mary in Luke 1, she�s worshiping the Lord. She wouldn�t want worship for herself.

No, she would not. And you know what, I, well, they just, they�ve taken, because where it says, �Hail, favored one if you read Catholic sources, they basically blow that out of all proportion and say that she�s to be honored forever, and they make her into a lot of things that she�s not.

It is very peculiar, and it has all the marks of idolatry.

Well, the message translation says, �And Mary said, �I�m bursting with God news. I�m dancing the song of my Savior God. God took one good look at me, and look what happened. I�m the most fortunate woman on earth.

Is that the message, or is that Saturday Night Live? I mean, I�m dancing? What is that?

The Book of James as Christian Law

Well, so, our show, so it�s not called No Content Radio, so we can have some kind of content. Let�s talk a little bit about the book of James, because I�m going to start preaching that this Sunday. Any thoughts pop through your mind right away as we try to help our listeners with the book of James?

Yeah, one thought immediately springs to mind, and that�s law. Law. Yeah.

I think for years I said, because I misremembered, 52 imperatives out of 104 verses, but I was wrong. It�s 54 imperatives, 108 verses. Yeah.

But it�s 50%. Yeah. I think that was the essential stat that you were trying to.

Right. And then some guy did some word study, research, comparison, tabular taxonomy or something, and he said 2 .6 of all the words in James were imperatives. 2 .6%. Well, that doesn�t seem like a lot.

It doesn�t seem like a lot, but I guess there�s a lot of prepositions and particles. Yeah. Everybody says, well, James, you know, is a right straw epistle according to Luther. But in the same preface, Luther writes a lot of good things about James.

Did you know that? Why do we only get the negative comments about Luther and not the positive comments?

Well, because people are trying to set James against Paul, you know, generally speaking. That�s usually why it comes up.

I like what you said earlier when we were talking privately. You�re preaching through John. I believe it�s like the feast of, I don�t know, unleavened bread, or we�ve got the lights going on with the John 7 thing.

All of a sudden, you�re Jesus�s half-brother, and you�re not buying what�s going on. And remember back in Genesis, of course, we have Joseph, the favored son, and how did the other brothers respond to that favoritism?

And now you have Jesus, much more the favored son, that is, the one in whom the great father of lights is well-pleased. I�m sure that didn�t go over well with the half-brothers of Jesus.

In fact, in John 7, you know, everybody�s going down there to Jerusalem, the Feast of Booths, and his brother said to him in verse 3, �Leave here and go to Judea, that your disciples also may see the works you are doing.

What they don�t get is what�s going on in verse 1, because the Jews, the leaders of the Jews, were seeking to kill Jesus. And if he just, you know, goes down there and just traipses into Jerusalem, he�s going to be arrested and killed.

But they don�t care about that, and they don�t really believe that. I mean, they don�t understand any of this. It�s not, it doesn�t interest them, and they�re not following Jesus. I think, you know, it took, and what we were talking about before, it basically took James, you know, even after he�s not present at the crucifixion that we know of, certainly there�s no gospel writer who mentions him, which they probably would have, and I don�t think Jesus would have given Mary into John�s care if his own brother was there, right?

But it takes the crucifixion and the resurrection for his brothers to believe, and then finally they start putting the pieces together, right? They�re like, �Oh, yeah, that life he lived, all the things that he said, all the things that we heard, oh, you know, now I get it.

Well, and what you said earlier, from the human perspective, this is all wrong. It's all backwards. This is, it shouldn�t take the crucifixion account and the resurrection, maybe resurrection, but it just seemed like, you know what?

If Christianity�s not true, well, here we have James and the brother, and I can't tell you what I�m trying to say, but what I guess, in summary, this is only a supernatural event of God where now, after the crucifixion, he believes.

I mean, you know, all the, because certainly they would have heard and even maybe seen some of the miracles. They would have seen and heard some of his sermons. They would have seen and heard, you know, just from people being impacted by Jesus during his life.

And none of that mattered. None of that softened their hearts. None of it had any, you know, but after the resurrection, they hear the gospel and now they're like, wait a second, wait a second. You know, everything falls into place and they go, oh, oh, and you know, how is it that James becomes a leader in the church?

It's not because he's Jesus' half-brother. I think it's because he just, everything he knows now, it's like it snaps into place and he takes off like a rocket ship and everybody's like, whoa, check this guy out.

James, the Brothers of Jesus, and the Resurrection

Well, we're talking about James today with Pastor Steve here on No Compromise Radio. What about, what does this say about the deity of Christ and the humanity of Christ? Let's think about humanity for a second.

If anybody would buy into some kind of false view of Jesus, like, you know, he's not really human, I think they probably, I think the brothers knew that Jesus was really human. Yeah, I'm sure they slept in the same, you know, quarters.

They watched him eat, all that stuff. Yep.

And they would have, I'm sure, played, you know, with him, interacted with him, you know, in different ways. And I don't think Jesus would have been above changing a diaper or what, you know, whatever was going on in the household, you know, all the typical things that older kids get stuck with doing, you know, whether it's taking out the trash.

I don't know what, you know, it was like living in an ancient Jewish household, but I just know that whatever Jesus was supposed to do, he did, right? And they would have known that. I mean, it's not like James would have been, to your point, in any kind of quandary about whether Jesus was a real human being, right?

Uh-huh.

And interestingly, there early on, speaking about the deity of Christ, he didn't see that. He couldn't see that. He probably noticed Jesus didn't do anything wrong, right? I don't know if he sat there and thought, this man is sinless, but, you know, he's around someone that never does something wrong, but he still can't see the deity of his own brother.

I mean, there are so many implications to even what we're talking about, though, you know, I mean, just think about this. I like this, generally speaking, if you think about how the Bible was written, even the New Testament, it doesn't put people, even the believers, in the best light.

For example, you would, if you were James and you were some kind of big shot in the early church, and he was, you know, and most of the New Testament was yet to be written, when it was written, you would want them to say, if it was a fake religion, you know, make sure you make me look good, right?

I mean, I wouldn't want to, but that's not what happens at all, right? I mean, the people are never the star of scripture. It's always the Lord Jesus and, you know, the Father and the Holy Spirit. The people are actors, you know, they're just people who get acted upon, essentially.

But again, it goes to his brothers are complete, from a human perspective, losers during his life. Sinners. Yeah. Unregenerate. During his ministry. They just don't get it. And it's only afterward that they get saved, and then they really come to light.

It's interesting because the text says, for not even his brothers believed in him, period. Jesus said to them, my time has not yet come, probably for the cross, but your time is always here regarding the Feast of Booths.

Right. The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify about it, that its works are evil. You go up to the feast. I'm not going to the feast for my time has not yet fully come. And saying thus, saying this, he remained in Galilee.

The world didn't hate them because they were just like the world. They were perfectly acceptable.

And you know, when you see the book of James, he says at the very beginning, James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ. There has to be something in you that wants to say, I'm the half brother.

Yeah.

Yeah. I got to brag a little bit, you know?

Yeah. How would you like to say, because you, you have a brother. Yes. I have a brother. How would you like to say, you know what?

I'm a servant of my brother. Well, I mean, just, just imagine, just imagine for a moment, your brother is president of the United States or something like that. Or, you know, he's got the number one ministry in the country, 10 ,000 people every.

Doesn't Pat have that? Well, yeah, of course. But 10 ,000 people every Sunday in Omaha, you know, 15 campuses. Oh, Pat would love that. No, no, he wouldn't. But you know, you'd want to say, yeah, my brother, Patty McGrath, you know, the massive, he's got the mega, mega, mega church or, you know, or he's president or whatever, you know?

Yeah. Because part of us wants to brag, but James isn't like that at all. Because he knows better. I mean, you know, we were talking about it earlier off air. You know, what is, what does faith say? This was, this was actually from your, your son, right?

He was saying that faith says, I haven't done anything, right? All the things that apparently, you know, were done by me were actually done through me by the Lord Jesus Christ. And you know, it's the people who say, Lord, didn't we do this?

And didn't we do that? Those are the people who'd never believed that at all. They want to take credit.

You know, it's kind of fun. As Luke was telling this, telling that to us over FaceTime, I thought, you know, it's kind of fun. Now I get to learn from Luke. That's a good point, right? All those years you try to teach your kid and then you go, oh yeah, he has something to teach me now.

Yeah. The Luke discussion of Matthew 7 and Matthew 25. How about, what do we do since there's so much law in this book? How do we think through it in a Christian fashion? Because it is in the New Testament.

There's some discussion there about the Lord Jesus Christ, the compassion of God, the Lord of glory, Jesus in chapter two. There's monergistic regeneration, but there's not, you know, death, burial, resurrection of Jesus.

So how can we frame this? So when we read it, it's just not moralism because Dr. Phil would probably say count it joy in trials.

Yeah. Well, why don't you want it to just be moralism? What's wrong with that?

Yeah. To ask the question is to answer it.

How to live the Christian life, right?

But people hanker after that. We talked about that too off-air. Just the desire for basically extra law via the holy quote unquote practical application.

Give me some practical app. You know, that's all fine and good to talk about sin and death and resurrection and Jesus and all that. Can I have something to do? You know, can you give me some ways that I should, some practical ways that I can not discriminate against somebody or that I can, you know, take these difficulties I have in life and really count them as joy?

Can you, like, give me a spreadsheet? Can I?

Well, when you think of a spreadsheet, when you think of gospel and law and, you know, gospel is done and law is due, if you think about those categories that I think help, you look at the culture, the Black Lives Matter, racial systemic injustices, white privilege, all this kind of nomenclature.

It's all law. It's social justice is law. It has nothing to do with gospel. They say it's a gospel truth. That's an easy way to spot that is when people are spouting all law, better be careful.

I can say this. The woke is always repenting, never repentant, because it's never done. Right. Never, never, never, never. Jesus paid some of it, but you've got to pay and pay and pay and pay.

Have you been watching the Eric Mason's little sermonettes that he's been putting out? Blessedly no. Wow. I think that's Paul Tripp's pastor now. Yeah, I'm afraid it is. They are eye-opening to say the least.

Really? I might have to look him up. He's been on a lot of the woke preacher Twitter accounts and it's essentially whites are bad and you need to have a bunch of reparations and Zacchaeus got reparations.

Let's say it's true that whites are bad. I mean, certainly, you know, let's say during Nazi Germany, we could say, well, Germans are bad. Okay. Well, I agree. That's not the gospel. Right. I mean, that's, I mean, and I can't repent of being German.

I'm not German, by the way. But you know, there are things, the color of your skin, the nationality that you are, those are God ordained and they're not sinful. They're not inherently sinful. We were talking about it, I think even last week, you know, you don't get to decide whether you're black, you're white, you're whatever color you are.

Just like we don't know what color Adam was. We don't know. There are a lot of things we don't know and they're irrelevant, completely irrelevant to the gospel, which is Jesus died for me. He lived a perfect life in my place.

He was crucified for my sin. He was raised on the third day.

That's the gospel. I need to believe in that. Well, and that's what happens with these people that don't distinguish between law and gospel. They're out there talking about all this law and that's what you said, Steve.

They're telling people to always repent, but it's never enough because if you're only going to give law, then there's never going to be enough because how much do you need to do? Well, more.

You didn't do enough. A hundred percent. But, but wait a second, I've, I've done everything I can, well, it's not, it's not enough, bro. You got to keep going.

Law and Gospel in the Christian Life

So our time is almost over, but I want our listeners to understand that when you open the book of James, I think you can easily remember that it's in the New Testament. It's a Christian book and it should be read.

Comes after Hebrews. I know. And it should be, it should be read in light of who Jesus is demonstrated in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. And so if you understand that, you won't buy into, well, it's moralistic or it's pietistic or something like that.

First God, our first book written in the New Testament, do you think time-wise, chronologically?

Time-wise, there is some argument maybe for Galatians, but you know, you see Jesus on earth. It's essentially gospel. I mean, there's Sermon on the Mount. He'd give some law, but essentially the good news incarnate, Jesus Christ has happened.

He dies at 33 for argument's sake. And then 10, 12, 15 years later, the first written book says, this is how we live. This is who he is. This is how we live. This is how Christians live. And they don't have to be perfect, but this is guidance.

This is law for the Christian.

Ooh, law for the Christian, I like that.

So anyway, Steve, anything?

Well, so I'm tracking with you. You just got through with Hebrews, like before the summer, and now you're in James. So then what's next after that?

I guess it's, I guess is it first Peter? Yeah. Yeah. Then second Peter?

Yeah. Yeah. Working toward revelation.

Oh, I have been asked to preach revelation. I know how to preach it from a particular vantage point. I don't know if I still agree with all that vantage point, but I know how to do it.

Just trying to get you in trouble on No Compromise Radio.

I know. I think there are people though, they're like, well, you need to talk about eschatology more or this, that, and the other more. And I'm thinking, well, we'll get around to it. Yeah. Hopefully after we die.

I can't say that I'm less dispensational now than I used to be. Now that means either I'm not at all, or I'm just a little less.

Or we're looking forward to the return of the Lord Jesus.

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at 6. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.