Trusting God In Trials

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Well, if you guys would open your Bibles tonight, we will turn to the book of James.
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That's where we're going to be studying.
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This is our third week looking at the epistle of James, and tonight we're going to be looking at verses 9 through 11.
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Yeah, I'm about to give you one.
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In fact, well, Cody, you seem busy.
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Donna, you want to help me? There should be enough for everyone to have one.
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Yeah, let's, I do want to ask you to do one thing for me when you receive it.
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Everything, I make templates for our worksheets.
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I do my own worksheets.
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I make them myself, and I make these templates, but sometimes, just like in the bulletin, I'll mess up the date.
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Well, this week, I messed up the title, and it's got last week's title on it, so if you would, scratch that out and put this week's title, which is Trusting God in Trials.
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So I'll put this up here where it says there, it's actually the back of it under James 1, 9 through 11.
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It says Wisdom in Trials, but that was last week.
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If you'll just scratch through that and write Trusting in God, or Trusting God in Trials.
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There's a, the three lessons we've done so far.
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First was Joy in Trials.
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Week two was Wisdom in Trials, and this week is Trusting God in Trials.
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We have learned so far in our lessons, and for those of you who have not been with us so far, that James comes to us like, not exactly like, but in many ways like the Proverbs come to us from the Old Testament, in that they are to provide us practical literature by which to live the Christian life.
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James gives us things that we ought to be doing in this life, things that we ought to be living by, maxims that we ought to be considering for our life, and applying to our life.
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One of the things that is so, such a blessing that our family often does is we will take the Proverbs of the Old Testament, and there's 31 Proverbs, so we'll read one a day through a whole month.
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And knowing that, you know, if there's 31 days in the month, we can read one proverb a day as a family, and you you'd be amazed at how often it hits very specific things in our life, whether it's young men and the problems that they deal with, and children and the problems that they deal with parents and parents with children, and of course, men and women, their relationship to one another, and their relationship to people outside their homes.
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And there's so much wisdom that's to be found in the book of Proverbs, and it's just for your own edification.
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If you're having trouble with family worship, and you're having trouble trying to figure out what you want to do as a family, one of the things that you can do is just start, because you can start anywhere.
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Today is the 21st of October, you could start in Proverbs 21, and just read it.
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And then tomorrow, read chapter 22.
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The day after that, read chapter 23.
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And then next month, you'll start over and you'll read through it.
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In one month, you'll have read through all the Proverbs.
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And if you do that on a regular basis, you'll hear them more than once in a year, you'll hear them 12 times.
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If you do it every month, you'll hear these Proverbs, these important pieces of biblical wisdom, which we need to have.
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Now, having said all that, James comes to us as also a book of wisdom literature, not written as the Proverbs in the sense that it's specific statements written sort of as bullet points as it comes to us in the Proverbs often, but James comes to us as an appeal from a pastor's heart.
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James was the pastor of the church in Jerusalem.
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Now, he was one of the elders, if you will, but he obviously had a position among the elders as the man who would speak.
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If we go to Acts chapter 15, during the first biblical council there in Acts 15, it was James who stood up and said, I give my judgment about the matter.
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And what was the matter that they were dealing with? They were dealing with the issue of how Gentiles were being received into the church.
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Should Gentiles have to go through the same process of becoming a Jew before becoming a Christian? Should Gentiles have to be Judaized before they could become Christianized? And James, being the mouthpiece of the church in Jerusalem, there at the council stood up and said, I give a judgment.
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No.
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And then he gave, of course, how things would be understood from then on.
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So James had a preeminent position in the church.
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And as I've been reminding you each week, and I know some of you weren't here last week, so I want to remind you again, this is not James, the brother of John, that he has already died.
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By this time in history, he has already had his head removed by Herod Agrippa.
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That happened in Acts chapter 12.
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Actually, yeah, it's either 11 or 12.
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Let's go back and look at that.
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But we know that that happened, that he was killed there.
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And it was 12, actually.
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He had his head removed in Acts chapter 12.
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And so he has been dead for quite some time by the time of the writing of this book.
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And we don't believe that it was James son of Alphaeus who was one of the apostles.
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We believe this to be James, the brother or we would say half brother of Jesus Christ, the other son of Mary.
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He had several brothers and sisters, the oldest among them outside of Jesus being James.
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So that's who it is.
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He's the he's a pastor and he speaks with a pastor's heart about things that really concern him.
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And he is also the brother of Jesus Christ.
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But he doesn't identify himself that way.
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You look in verse one of James one, he identifies himself not as a brother of Jesus Christ so as to show equality, but as a doulos, the Greek word for slave or servant.
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He is a servant of Jesus Christ.
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So there's not equality between him and Christ, but there is a position of servanthood.
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He stands as Christ's servant.
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And he's writing to the 12 tribes in the dispersion.
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This is addressing the fact, if you remember, we've been doing acts on Sunday morning.
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It's kind of interesting how these two go together.
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If you remember, after the killing of Stephen, the martyrdom of Stephen, where Stephen was brought before the Sanhedrin, he preached a sermon.
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They became angry at him, drove him out into the street and they stoned him with stones until he was dead.
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After that happened, Christian persecution arose.
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That's when Saul of Tarsus began to really persecute and pursue Christians.
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And he went to the leaders and he got from them the right to go out and imprison people for their faith.
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And so the dispersion, and that's what it says there in verse one, the dispersion is referencing those Christians who had been forced out of their homes and out of their land because of fear of death and persecution.
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You know, it's not something that is beyond Christians to run from people who are trying to kill them.
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I've heard people say, well, if you're a Christian, you should just stand there and take the sword and just put your neck right on the block and be ready to take it.
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Well, the early Christians saw things a little differently.
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When somebody was coming after him with a sword, they went the other way.
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They thought it was OK to run.
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They did not think it was OK to deny Christ.
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If someone did take the sword to the throat and say, deny Christ, there was an expectation and a gift of grace that would give them that ability to stand firm in that moment.
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But they certainly were not running to the slaughterhouses hoping to be killed.
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They would actually depart from the places they were in so as to be able to, one, avoid the death that was imprisonment that was part of them being Christians, but also so that they could take the gospel.
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What good would it be if all the Christians were wiped out? If all the Christians were in prison, no one would be receiving the gospel.
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So the dispersion had a two pronged effect.
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It first affected the saving of their life, but it also affected the building of churches in other areas because it was through this dispersion that they were able to go out to places like Antioch, which is where we see the church that would eventually be the one that we're studying now in Acts 13 that would send out Paul on his missionary journeys.
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So this dispersion, that's what's the issue here.
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And that's what we're seeing is James is speaking to people who are dealing with very serious trials.
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He's dealing these are people who are dealing with very serious tribulation, very serious persecution.
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And so the first three lessons we've had, including tonight's lesson, he deals with trials.
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And the first thing he says is very counterintuitive.
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He says, take joy, my brothers, or count it joy when you meet trials.
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Now, that's difficult, it's hard, but again, this coming from a pastor's heart, he's trying to give them something to consider because he doesn't just give them a pie in the sky.
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He doesn't say, hey, just think of it as a joy when somebody's trying to hurt you.
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Just think of it as a joy when you had to abandon your family's property and have nothing.
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Think of it as joy when you had to abandon your home and your livelihood and your flocks and your fields and you had to run away in the night.
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Count that joy.
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You might say that sounds like pie in the sky nonsense, right? But he he adds to it, he says, count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know.
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That the testing of your faith does what produces steadfastness, endurance or patience, depending on the translation you're looking at, I've said I like the word patience because that's what it does.
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It produces in us the ability to persevere, that patient perseverance that's necessary in dealing with trials.
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Every trial that we has.
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That was bad English.
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Every trial that we have is an opportunity for growth.
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Now, when we're going through the trial, we don't often think it that way.
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We think of it as the worst thing in the world.
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We don't want to deal with it.
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We would rather just go away.
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But think back in your life.
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And I've said this for the last few weeks.
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I just want to remind everybody, think back in your life, the most difficult things you've ever had to go through and think about where you are now and have those things been used of God to make you the person you are today.
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I think we would all say yes.
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And there are some things in my life that at the time.
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I would have given anything not to have gone through them.
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And now I can't imagine my life had I not gone through.
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You see, that's what James is telling us.
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We can count these trials as joys because they are doing something.
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God is not letting you go through anything that he doesn't have a purpose for.
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Isn't that a blessing? Isn't that an amen moment where we can stop and say amen, that God is not allowing us to deal with anything that he doesn't have a purpose for? There is no purpose for purposeless evil allowed in this world.
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God is sovereign and there is no purposeless trial ever.
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So then in verse eight or I'm sorry, verse five, which is where we were last week.
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And many of you missed this.
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So I just want to because of the traffic problem that we had last week and a lot of you were out.
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So I just want to just kind of just go over it with you very quickly.
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He says, if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God.
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Who gives generously to all without reproach, well, what is the wisdom that's being referred to here? Because the reality is a lot of people take that verse out of context and they apply it to all sorts of things.
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The wisdom that's being addressed here is the wisdom to have joy in trials.
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That's the context.
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You see, it's hard for us to have that type of wisdom because the flesh does not want to join trials.
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It does want to it does not want to be patient.
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It does not want to be dealing with these things.
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So we end up getting frustrated.
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We need wisdom, God's wisdom to be able to do that.
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So what do we do? We have to ask God, we have to ask God, give me the wisdom to see in this trial your hand, give me the wisdom to see that you will cause all things to work together for the good of those who love you and are called according to your purpose.
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Give me the wisdom because I don't have it on my own.
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I don't possess it on my own.
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I need that wisdom.
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And he goes on to say that we need to trust, ask in faith, not shifting left or right.
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And that's what the word doubting there means.
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It means to waver, not wavering in and out of trust, but held fast to the trust.
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And God will give us that wisdom to get through that trial.
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So we've seen joy in trials.
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We've seen wisdom in trials tonight.
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We're going to look at verses 9 through 11 and we're going to see God's trust or I'm sorry, trusting God in trials.
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Now, everybody has a sheet, right? That was our introduction on your sheet.
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You'll notice that I give you on the what we I guess we call the front side.
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This is four different translations, actually three translations in the original, which I understand you can't read.
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Some of you might be able to, but I understand most of you can't read the Greek.
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I provide at the bottom the translation for the Greek.
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And the reason for that is simply to allow you to compare what these translations are saying to what the original language said, because there are times where the original language helps clarify places where we might have confusion.
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And there's actually one of those tonight because I want to read it to you.
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We'll read from the ESV first.
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It says, let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation.
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And the rich in his humiliation, because like a flower of the grass, he will pass away for the sun rises and its scorching heat and withers the grass, its flower falls and its beauty perishes.
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So also will the rich man fade, fade away in the midst of his pursuits.
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So what we have here in these three verses is we have a reminder that the Christian life is filled with paradoxes.
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You know what a paradox is? It's two physicians.
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Paradox, right? A pair of two physicians.
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Oh, come on.
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To get your attention somehow, a seeming contradiction.
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That's right.
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I'm going to write that down because that's a good definition.
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Seeming contradiction, a paradox is a seeming contradiction.
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The dictionary says a seemingly absurd or self-contradictory statement or proposition that when investigated or explained proves to be founded or true.
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OK, that's what a paradox is.
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It's a seeming contradiction that when investigated is not a contradiction at all.
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One of the ones that probably is most well recognized in the Christian vernacular is when Jesus in Luke 9 verse 24 says, for whosoever would save his life will what? Lose it and whosoever will lose his life for my sake will find it.
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So that's a that's paradoxical.
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He says, if you give up your life, you'll actually have it.
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But if you try to save it, you'll lose it.
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And that's paradoxical because that sounds like a contradiction.
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But it's not upon further investigation.
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It's like the doctrine of the Trinity.
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The doctrine of the Trinity is paradoxical, but it's not contradictory.
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The doctrine of the Trinity says God is one in essence, but he's three in person.
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We make a distinction.
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We don't say God is one God who is three gods.
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We don't say God is one person who is three persons.
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We say God is one God, one essence and three persons.
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And you say, well, that sounds contradictory.
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Well, no.
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If I have a rock, does a rock have essence? Sure it does.
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If I threw it at you, all that essence would hit you in the head.
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You'd know right then it's got a lot of essence, but it has no person.
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Do I have essence? Sure, you can come touch me.
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I've got that which is me.
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And do I have person? So rock has one essence, zero person.
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I have one essence, one person.
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God has one essence, but three persons.
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So it's not a contradiction because I've made a distinction in what is essence and what is person, right? And that's how theologians have understood the doctrine of the Trinity for 2000 years.
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That's not anything new.
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It's not something I invented.
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But the reason why I point that out is because the Christian life is filled with paradoxes.
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I want to quote to you from from Kent Hughes and his commentary on this verse.
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He says the scriptures contain many paradoxes telling us that we are weak.
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Or I'm sorry, that the weak are strong, the empty are full, the slave is free and the cursed are blessed and death brings life, all statements which first strike the ear as contradictory, but become increasingly true to us as we meditate upon them, end quote.
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So these are all things you think about each of those.
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The slave is free, the empty are filled, the cursed are blessed and the dead are living.
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Those are all contradictory things, unless we really think about them and what the meaning is behind it.
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Now, having said all that, James, in this passage, verse nine, is speaking to people who are very physically poor and he provides them with a major paradox.
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He says to them, let the lowly brother.
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And by the way, the word lowly there is simply means one who is in a humble state, one who is in a low status, one who is lacking in hope or discouraged.
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It speaks specifically of being dejected, downhearted, downcast or low in social status, basically poor folks, poor folks.
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And you could say, was he talking about financially poor? Well, let me tell you, one of the most difficult things people have to deal with is poverty.
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It's tough to see your kids not eat, it's tough to not eat yourself, it's tough to have to deal with that.
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And I don't think that he's limiting it, limiting it to that.
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But I certainly think in view is this dispersion group that we've already talked about, many of which have lost family, field and barn and everything else that they once have.
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Now they're dispersed.
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They don't they can't get they can't get the work that they once had because now they're on the outskirts of society.
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They're being pushed out of their their jobs.
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They're being hated by their family.
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They don't have what they once did.
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And the easy thing would be to simply go back, renounce Jesus and go back.
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And yet James says, let that person, the lowly, the poor, the dejected boast in his exaltation.
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That is a major paradox, because the word lowly literally means just that it means lowly.
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And James says, but let him boast in his high position.
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Let the lowly person boast in his high position.
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And everybody here says, well, that doesn't make sense on its face.
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It sounds like a contradiction, but it's paradoxical.
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Yes, sir.
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All of these people that we pray for them.
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Yes.
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So I'm just saying that I have a tough time praying sometimes for people like a person that is really ill and he's not expected to live.
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I have doubts that God will heal him.
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OK.
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And I think it's more of an attitude that we have.
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What you're saying tonight makes a whole lot of sense, I think, because it gives meaning to a paradoxical situation.
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OK.
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I'm just thinking.
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Well, one of the things I like to remind people, and I don't mean to if this isn't what you're saying, maybe I don't want to go a different direction.
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But a lot of times when I tell people we do pray that God will be merciful to someone.
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But that doesn't always mean that he would heal them physically.
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Sometimes the mercy is letting them pass on to the next life, especially if they're believers and they're suffering.
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You know, I don't ever pray God kill this person.
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Don't ever think I would ever say anything like that.
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But I say, God, be merciful to them.
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Whatever the mercy is that they need, be merciful to them, because there are people who are suffering.
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And I just pray that God will be merciful and be gracious to them.
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And if it's his if it's his will to heal him, I've heard people say it's always God's will to heal.
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If it was always God's will to heal, we'd never die.
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We are all going to die at some point.
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God's will to heal you will not be.
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And it would be the other.
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It would be his will to take you, not heal you.
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Has to be because we're all going to die.
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And so if you ever hear a preacher say it's always God's will to heal, raise your hand and say, I'm leaving because you're telling that's false.
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You're saying something false.
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Don't do that for a bit.
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You can leave, but don't raise your hand and interrupt.
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But yeah, I see what you're saying.
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There's a paradox sometimes in our prayer because we don't know how to pray.
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And I do think that that's where the wisdom of Romans eight comes in, which tells us that sometimes we we trust that the spirit is praying on our behalf.
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Because we don't know what to pray.
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And there's there's there's there's beauty in that of knowing that if I don't know what to say and there are times I get down on my knees, put my face in my on my bed, that's where I normally pray on my knees.
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I put my face down on my bed and I say, God, I don't know what to say, but you know everything that's going on.
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I'm just going to cry.
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There is somebody I know, you know, I'm not praying, saying, God, your will be done.
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Yeah, as I'm sure.
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And I like you're saying this becomes a very difficult thing for me.
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Sure.
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And that is where the the that's where we're going to be.
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We talk about trusting God in our trials.
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That's where that's where we're moving to.
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Yes, sir.
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Can I agree? I think I'm sure.
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Yeah, absolutely.
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OK, Mr.
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Paul, and he has said to me, my grace is sufficient for you for power is perfected in weakness.
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Amen.
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Most badly, therefore, I will reprimand you about my weakness.
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Therefore, I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ's sake, for when I am weak, then I am strong.
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And that's a paradox in itself.
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But it's the absolute truth because it's when we're at our weakest that we have to trust God the most.
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And that's really right with what James is saying here.
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Now, I do want to make a point about this text, and I'm going to move on, brother, if that's OK.
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I want to make a point about this text because there are those who might interpret this.
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It says, let the lowly brother boast in his exaltation.
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They might interpret this as a future exaltation, but it does not read linguistically as a future thing.
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It is a present reality.
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Because what some people might say is you can boast in the fact that one day you will be in heaven.
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But, you know, if you go to Ephesians 2, it doesn't say we will be seated in heavenly places.
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What does it say? We are seated in heavenly places.
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It is a present reality that we are exalted in Christ.
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And so James is speaking to these people, not of a hope to come, but of a present reality that they're in.
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He says, let you who are poor, let you who are lowly, let you who are downtrodden and downcast boast.
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And by this, he doesn't mean pridefully go out and boast, but be confident and internally understand that you are exalted.
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You're in Christ.
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No man can take that from you.
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People can take your food, they can take your fields, they can take your property, they can take your barns, but they cannot take your Christ.
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And so that's where you need to boast, as Paul says, I will boast in nothing but Jesus Christ.
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Right.
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People often try to put James and Paul against each other.
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It's amazing how they really are so close.
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The same Holy Spirit is speaking through both of them.
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And he says, let the brother of humble circumstance, that the NASB says, the humble circumstances or the one King James says, the brother of low degree and again, socially low, let him who is down, exalt, rejoice that he is exalted.
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He is in that condition now.
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Will we be exalted later? Will we receive new bodies and a new heaven and new earth? Yes.
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But we're currently in that position, too.
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We're currently in a state that changed when we got saved.
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When God regenerated our soul, he changed everything.
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And we can rejoice now, even in the most difficult times.
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Again, we can rejoice.
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So that's the that's the encouragement he's giving to the poor person.
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But then in verses 10 through 11, he speaks of the rich.
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Now, there is a big question that comes up in this passage.
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Commentators are divided on this question, and I want to share it with you.
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When he switches in verse 10, he says, and the rich in his humiliation, he says, let the lowly brother do what boast in his exaltation and the rich and his what humiliation.
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There is a question among commentators.
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Is the rich person here a brother or is he an unbeliever who has been humiliated? And we would almost automatically say brother.
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But linguistically, you have to make the connection because he calls the lowly person a brother, but he doesn't call the rich person a brother.
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So the question linguistically is, does the brother modify both lowly and rich? And the two words there, Topenus is the lowly and Plutus is the rich or the high.
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And the word brother, Adelphos, doesn't modify both.
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And it doesn't.
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Linguistically, it's hard to determine if you go down to the Greek.
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That's why I put the Greek in there.
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You can see Kalkas, though, Adelphos, Topenus, Ufe, Ata, that's the Ufe is the high.
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And then it's Ha-De-Plutus, that's the rich, Ente-Tape-So-Se or No-Se-A-Tal.
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So the question is, is the person, is the person rich a brother? Now, why would we ever ask that question? Why would that be an issue? Because throughout the New Testament, the rich person is almost always identified as a person who is lost.
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I'll give you an example.
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I'll give you several examples.
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Matthew 19, 16 through 22.
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If you write that down, a rich, young ruler came to Jesus.
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And he said, good teacher, what must I do to be saved? And what did Jesus say? He said, sell everything you have, give it to the poor, come and follow me.
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And the young man did what? He sold everything and came and followed Jesus, right? No, he went away sad.
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And what was Jesus's statement right after that in verse 24? This is why I tell you, it's easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich person to enter the kingdom of heaven.
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And that, of course, is hyperbole.
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Jesus is giving an exaggerated example to say it's difficult for a person who has worldly things to come into this otherworldly, supernatural relationship with God because he's so confident in what he has in the world.
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He doesn't want to give it up and trust in God.
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So the rich person in scripture is not normally seen in a positive light.
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I'll give you a couple more.
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In Matthew 13, verse 22, Jesus is talking about the parable of the soils.
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Remember, he said some seed fell along the path and the birds came and ate it.
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Another seed fell among the thorns and it didn't have much root.
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It grew up for a time, but the sun beat down on it and it died.
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He says that some fell among the weeds and the weeds choked it out.
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Later, when Jesus is explaining that parable, he says the weeds were the cares of this world.
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The person who's caught up in desiring everything in this world.
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He didn't specifically say rich person, but the idea is they're the person who's so concerned with accumulating this world's goods that he doesn't think about the next.
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Think about the man whose barns were filled and he filled his barns up to the fill and then he died.
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Right tonight, your soul will be required of you.
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Finally, think about the story in Luke 16, one of my favorite stories in the New Testament.
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Not quite sure that I understand every single part of it because it's a very powerful story.
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But Jesus said there was a poor man named Lazarus who sat outside the house of a rich man who fared sumptuously every day.
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You know, in that story, it says that Lazarus went to Abraham's bosom and was saved and that the poor, the rich man closed his eyes here and opened his eyes in hell.
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And, you know, it never mentions faith.
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It only this it only distinguishes between rich and poor.
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So in Jesus's story, the rich man represented a man who was not a man of faith and the poor man represented a man of faith.
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So that's interesting.
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It doesn't prove anything.
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It's just an interesting thing that we see that throughout the New Testament, riches are what keep people from God.
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And poverty is often what causes people to turn to God because they have no one else.
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To whom to turn.
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So using all that as simply the background, we go back to James 1, 9 and 10 and 11 and he says, And the rich in his humiliation, that doesn't prove that this rich person is not a brother, but it doesn't speak well of this person.
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Because what is the biggest problem with rich people? They trust what they trust in it.
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Is that what you said? They trust in their riches.
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That's exactly right.
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So what is it that's the paradox of the Christian life for the lowly person? He needs to understand that he's exalted in Christ, but the rich person needs to understand his humiliation in Christ.
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So if it's a brother, if it's a brother, he's saying you need to understand where you are.
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Your riches are not what make you right with God.
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You need to come down and submit to Christ.
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If it's not a brother, then it becomes somewhat of a sarcastic statement.
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He's boasting in his humiliation because he will, in fact, experience humiliation when all of his goods are burned up and he enters into hell lost.
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So if you're asking me for the answer, I will say this.
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I think that it is a Christian brother.
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But I do think that there's reason to look at both sides and ask the question, why would anyone think that it's a lost man that's being referred to here? Why do I think it's a Christian brother? I think it's a Christian brother for one simple reason.
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It is not impossible to have worldly goods and be a believer.
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It's just really, really, really, really hard.
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So I think James is speaking to that person and he's saying, you need to humble yourself.
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You do not need to remain exalted in your mind, but you need to be humbled and understand that everything you have that's a worldly good will eventually burn up.
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And the only thing that you really have that makes you anything is Jesus Christ.
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How many people think that their worldly goods are what make them who they are and Jesus is just an accouterment or a or a adornment or some type of ornament to their life? Jesus is not the focus.
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Jesus is the ornament.
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Their focus is their worldly goods, their position, their job, their their status, and Jesus is just one more thing that they have.
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I do think that it's referring to a Christian brother who has money, but the position that you need to take if you've got that money is you need to step down off your high horse and get on your knees before Christ.
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So having said all that, I want to I want to at least affirm my position based on another text of scripture.
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Turn with me to first Timothy six, and I'll show you why I think that first Timothy six.
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This is Paul writing to Timothy, first Timothy, chapter six and verse 17.
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He says, as for the rich in this present age, and he's obviously talking to Christians, he's talking to brothers, he's talking to people in the church that have money.
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He says, as for the rich in this present age, charge them not to be what? Haughty or self-exalted, nor to set their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but on who God who richly provides us with everything to enjoy.
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They are to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share the storing up treasure for themselves as a good foundation for the future so that they may take hold of that which is truly life.
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So what is Paul tell Timothy? Yes, there can be people who are Christians who have money, but let them not boast in their money, but boast in Christ.
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Let them be generous with their money and not stingy and let them not trust in their money, but trust in God.
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So I would compare that verse to what James is telling us.
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And again, this is my interpretation.
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You feel free to challenge me later.
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Send me an email.
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Tell me you want to take me to lunch.
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Tell me how wrong I am.
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That's OK.
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But but I think that James is dealing with the juxtaposition because he is dealing mostly with the dispersion Christians who are out and have nothing.
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But they're also witnessing to people who have things and they're being blessed by these people.
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They're meeting people.
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Churches are being built in Antioch and other places, metropolitan areas.
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Churches are growing.
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Churches are thriving in certain areas.
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And there are going to be people who have money.
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There is nothing wrong with being affluent as long as you can be responsible with your affluence and be generous with your affluence.
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The problem is that's hard to do.
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And that's where Jesus says it's hard for the camel to go through the eye of the needle than a rich person.
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Yes, you make every record.
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No servant can serve two masters.
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Exactly.
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You hate one and love the other.
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You cannot serve God and men.
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Exactly.
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And that's the point.
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That's the point.
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Both men, whether they're in a lowly position or a high position, need to understand that everyone is equal at the foot of the cross.
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That every man is equal to the man beside him or the woman beside him at the foot of the cross.
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Nobody brings anything to the cross that ups the ante of why Jesus needed.
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And that's why we and I know what you mean if you've ever said it.
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So I'm not kicking you, but people who say, oh, I love to see a celebrity get saved because then they're going to be influences on other people.
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One thing, let me say this about that.
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Most celebrities that get saved, quote unquote, saved, become advocates for bad theology.
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There's only a few of them out there that are doing really good jobs at not what we need to do with people who get saved is we need to put them in a good Bible believing church for two years and don't let them talk to nobody because they become advocates for bad theology.
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But also we think that because of this high position that they're going to influence so many people for Jesus Christ.
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But there are people who are on the mission field who are winning so many more souls to Jesus Christ than anybody on television ever hoped to win because they're faithful to God's call in their life.
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So so, you know, that that just we need to understand the equality at the foot of the cross.
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The high person needs to come down.
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The low person needs to understand where he is and understand there's an equality there.
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So having said all that, turn your page over and I'll give you the application for tonight's lesson, the application for tonight's lesson on the back.
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I try to give you application points to take home with you to go with your lesson.
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Here they are.
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Number one, a person's financial condition does not automatically determine their spiritual condition.
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A person's financial condition does not automatically determine their spiritual condition.
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I've met lost folks who are poor.
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I've met, say, folks who are rich.
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And I think you probably have, too.
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It's not an automatic thing.
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Number two, it is harder to be faithfully rich than faithfully poor, for the rich tend to trust their riches.
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That's that's clearly scriptural.
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It's harder to be to be rich than to be poor and be faithful.
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Because you you tend to trust in your field bonds and your field accounts rather than in Christ.
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Number three, and this is how I tie it back to trials, because I think all this is still dealing with the very first thing, joy in trials.
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I think it still goes back to that.
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Trials expose what we trust the most.
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Trials expose what we trust the most.
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Finally, number four, the Christian life is a call to live in opposition to the normal desires of the flesh.
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That's the greatest paradox of all.
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Christian living means that our natural fleshly desires, like when we're poor, we have a desire to mope and we're rich.
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We have a desire to trust in our riches.
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And the Christian call is to live that paradoxical life, that life which understands that to truly live, you have to die to self, to truly be in a position of greatness.
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You have to be humble.
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All of these things that you your flesh would say otherwise, God's word says, do this.
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Last night we had dads and dudes and we studied together.
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And one of the things that, you know, men get together talking and it says, do not return evil for evil.
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And I say, man, that's a paradox, because when a guy does evil to us, the natural inclination of the flesh of man is what? Get him back and do it double.
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You hurt me and I'm going to hurt you twice as bad and twice as much.
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And so the Christian life is a life of paradoxes.
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It's a life of trusting God, which is not always easy because our flesh, it's constantly pulling us the other way, which is why why James rather says we need to pray for wisdom.
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So that we will be able to do it.
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Father, I thank you for your word.
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I thank you for the truth.
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I thank you for the opportunity to study.
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I pray this has been beneficial to your people.
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And I pray that they have seen in this something that they can apply to their lives, whether it is that we who are in an affluent nation and many of us have much more than other people in other countries.
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Help us, Lord, never to trust in our riches, but to trust in Christ.
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And we do pray for those who are lowly, who are who are financially not secure, Lord, that they would find their position not in their lowliness of wealth, but in their exaltation in Christ.
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And Lord, for those who do have that, they would not find their position as being high because of their wealth, but that they would be brought low onto their knees before Christ and the cross, understanding that they have nothing if they have not Christ and it's in his name we pray.
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Amen.