Worldly vs Heavenly Wisdom

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Well, I invite you to take out your Bibles and turn with me to the third chapter of James.
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And when you arrive there, you can hold your place at verse 13.
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So we're James 3 and 13.
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When we first began this series several months ago, I made the point that James is a type of wisdom literature.
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In my opinion, what Proverbs is to the Old Testament, James is, in a sense, the same in the New Testament.
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Not exactly parallel, but they both serve a similar purpose in that they provide for us wise, practical guidance for living a life which is pleasing to God.
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They provide warnings against those things which do not please God.
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And they do both of those in a very applicable, practical, living out of our faith way.
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And so, tonight I want to address this text by reminding us that the Bible puts a premium or raises to a very high esteem the subject of wisdom.
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But before I even get to that, I want to ask a question.
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And it's a rhetorical question.
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It does not necessarily require an answer.
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I'm not telling you you can't answer.
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But in your mind, I want you to answer, What is wisdom? Think about what you would answer if somebody came to you and said, Well, the Bible tells me that wisdom is important.
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What is the definition of wisdom? What does the word mean? And more than just what does the word mean, what does the Bible mean when it uses that word? If you look at various dictionaries, you will see that there are several different definitions for the word wisdom.
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They all tend to include somewhat of the following.
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I want to read this to you.
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This is a basic definition drawn from one of many dictionaries.
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Quote, The quality of having experience, knowledge, and good judgment.
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That's how one dictionary defined wisdom.
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The quality of having experience, knowledge, and good judgment.
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Now there is a sense in which wisdom does include knowledge.
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But wisdom is not limited to knowledge.
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Certainly we all know, and I imagine you could all tell probably a story or two, about people who have copious amounts of knowledge, but are not very wise.
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I kind of see everybody's head.
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Yeah, you know somebody who knows a lot, but they're just not very wise people.
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Knowledge can exist without wisdom, but wisdom can't exist without knowledge.
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So there is a sense in which we define wisdom with the including of knowledge, but we cannot limit wisdom to knowledge.
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See, we send our kids to colleges, and kids go to college and they meet these college professors, and a lot of these guys have a lot of knowledge.
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I mean, they're eggheads.
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I mean, they're just filled to the brim with knowledge.
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But their wisdom is very low.
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But our children don't know that.
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They go in and they see this guy who has so much knowledge about a particular subject or about a particular field, and they think, Well, wow, this guy must know everything.
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This guy must be the end-all be-all, the bastion of knowledge, the very fountainhead from which all truth comes.
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And what happens? They get led down a very unwise way because someone with a lot of knowledge but didn't have any wisdom became their guide.
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Yes, and that's what we're going to get as far as the definition is concerned because that is the next line in my notes.
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No, no, don't be sorry.
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I like it when we're all going the same direction.
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Wisdom always includes an element of application.
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One simple definition of wisdom.
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I've got to find my marker here.
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Wisdom is applied knowledge.
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Wisdom is applied knowledge.
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Knowledge, I've heard this before, knowledge is learned.
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Wisdom is earned.
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Knowledge is learned.
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You go to school, you learn how things work, but you don't really become wise in the application of that knowledge until you go out in the real world and you start actually working, seeing how things actually run.
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Most people, rather this is because to most people, knowledge is only applied through experience and that's how we learn.
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Really, internalized knowledge is through experience.
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The Bible says so much about the nature of true wisdom.
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Proverbs is filled with pearls of divine wisdom.
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In its opening passages, Proverbs 1.7 says this, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.
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Fools despise wisdom and instruction.
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So in that particular verse, we have what's called a synonymous parallelism.
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Actually, it would be a contrasting parallelism because anytime in the Proverbs you have two sayings back to back in the same proverb where they sort of either compare or contrast one another, those are called parallelisms.
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And this is contrasting.
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It's saying the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.
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The fool lacks wisdom.
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Well, who is the fool according to Psalms 14? The fool is the one who says there's no God, right? The fool says in his heart there's no God.
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So the writer of Psalms, the writer of Proverbs is basing his definition of a fool on the way that the psalmist who wrote before had defined the fool.
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So he says in Proverbs 1.7, he says, The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.
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Fools despise wisdom and instruction.
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So in this, the parallel is between wisdom and knowledge.
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The contrast is between the one who fears God and the fool.
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That's what we call a contrasting parallelism.
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It's a parallelism, but it's contrasting.
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The fool from the wise.
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And what is the foundation of all wisdom? God.
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A fear of God.
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And people say, well, should we quake in our boots over God? Yeah! Some people say, I don't fear God, I just revere God.
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Well, you should start by fearing Him.
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You can get to reverence later.
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Start by understanding your sin, the very nature of your sin, the deserving of punishment, where you are.
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Begin with fear and then work to revere.
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If you've never feared God, you've never understood your sin and His holiness.
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What's that? Yeah.
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If you've never feared God, you really don't understand who God is.
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I love to hear these stories.
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I don't love to hear them.
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I laugh when I hear these stories, rather.
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When people say, I met God and I was so happy and pleased in His presence.
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And I was just overjoyed and laughing and making merry in God's presence.
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And there are people who watch TBN, man.
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People talk about this stuff all the time.
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I heard one guy.
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He was talking about being in heaven and walking in heaven with Jesus and all this stuff.
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Isaiah saw God.
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And he said what? Woe is me.
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Yeah.
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I am undone.
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I am disintegrated.
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I'm falling apart at the presence of my God.
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My hand is over my mouth.
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I am a man of unclean lips.
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Right? This is who Isaiah saw himself.
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Isaiah is the most righteous man in Israel that we know of.
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And yet when he saw God, he didn't dance a jig.
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He didn't laugh it up.
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He saw God and he fell to fear.
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Anytime the shock and high glory of God in the Old Testament is displayed.
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Sometimes you've heard it pronounced Shekinah.
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The glory of God.
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What do people do? They fall down.
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When Jesus was on the Mount of Transfiguration and His face shone with that same Shekinah glory.
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What happened? Down on their face.
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The fear of the Lord.
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That's right.
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And when every knee will bow, some of those will be bowing for the first time.
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And it will be an absolute terror of judgment.
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Because that's what they will be facing.
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It will be a begging knee.
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But it will be too late.
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So having said all that.
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My point in trying to bring all this out is the fool in Scripture.
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The Bible makes a distinction.
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The wise and the fool are the contrasting two.
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The fool is not necessarily a stupid person from a biblical perspective.
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Meaning that he is absolutely an ignorant, inane fool.
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In the sense that we think of a fool as a person who is just off his rocker or silly.
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Or dumb.
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Out of his mind.
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From a biblical perspective.
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The fool is not necessarily a stupid person intellectually.
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The fool is the person whose knowledge or wisdom is limited by one thing.
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His refusal or denial of God.
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The fool has said in his heart, there is no God.
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And I point that out because as wise as a person may be.
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And you probably know some very wise people who aren't believers.
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I've sat in the presence of guys who were very smart from a worldly perspective.
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Very wise from a worldly wisdom perspective.
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I mean I've had people, I've sat with people who other people come to sit and listen to.
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I mean that pay money to come and sit and listen to these people drawn on with their human wisdom.
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But the very best those men can do.
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The very highest wisdom they can attain.
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Denies the fountainhead of all wisdom which is God and thus it's foolishness.
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No matter how wise it may seem.
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Listen to the famous atheistic.
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Sorry, my throat and my lips didn't agree.
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So let me try that again.
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Listen to the most famous atheistic philosophers.
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They talk about good and bad.
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They talk about evil and virtue.
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And they'll say something like this, it sounds very smart.
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They'll say, if God exists, why doesn't He stop all the evil in the world? And all their little constituents go, oh that's so wise.
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But the reality is this.
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If God does not exist, there is no objective standard by which we can measure righteousness and unrighteousness.
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And thus His very statement on its face is failed.
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Because He says, if God doesn't exist, why does evil exist? And the answer is simple.
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If God doesn't exist, evil doesn't exist.
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Because there is no standard of right and wrong.
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If there is no law giver.
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And thus you have no objective standard by which to measure right and wrong.
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So if God doesn't exist, evil doesn't exist.
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All you have is subjectivity.
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What is evil to you? And what's evil to you might not be evil to me.
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And it might not be evil to another person.
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Why is what Hitler did evil? And yet what Martin Luther King did virtuous? Why is what Jim Jones did atrocious, but what Billy Graham did virtuous? Well the atheists would say, well they're evil because they hurt other people.
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And these are good because they help people.
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But what makes hurting a person wrong and helping a person right? You might say, well that seems obvious.
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Well it only seems obvious in a world that's governed by natural law.
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And law demands a law giver.
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And without a law giver, there's no natural law.
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And thus everything that you determine by presupposition is right or wrong.
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Has to come from some overarching presupposition.
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Did not Hitler believe that he was right? And even virtuous in his attempt to expel the unfit lifelines of the Jews from the world.
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Because he felt like the Aryan white race was the supreme one.
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And deserved to be lifted up and everyone else pushed down.
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And was that not to him as sick as it was? Was it not to him virtue? Absolutely.
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He thought it was right.
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You say, well that doesn't make it right.
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Why? Apart from an objective standard of righteousness.
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All you can say Hitler did wrong.
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Was he went against the normal standards of society.
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And as we have seen.
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The normal standards of society are always subject to change.
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Wisdom cannot be determined by the normal mores of society.
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There must be a higher standard.
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And when you eliminate the concept of God.
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When you eliminate the concept.
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The fountainhead of wisdom and knowledge.
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And you say there is no God.
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Then you have put yourself categorically into the position of the fool.
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Now I have said all of this.
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I want you to remember what I said earlier.
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How did the dictionary define wisdom? I want to remind you.
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The quality of having experience, knowledge, and good judgment.
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You see the dictionary though it is secular.
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Says good.
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Indicating that there is an objective standard.
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It has to be.
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You see even the secular world.
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Has to borrow from the Christian world view.
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To even make sense in its language.
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When Richard Dawkins talks about something being good or bad.
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He is borrowing from our world view.
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When the atheist says something about being evil.
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I say what is evil? You don't have a foundation for that.
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Your world view doesn't allow for that.
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You are borrowing from my world view.
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And I am not going to let you do it.
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Not without calling you out on it.
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You can't have that.
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That is mine.
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Now having said all that.
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We haven't even broken to James yet.
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All that was introduction.
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Because James 3.13-18.
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Gives the juxtaposition or the contrast.
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Between worldly wisdom and godly wisdom.
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But what do we know based on the Psalms and Proverbs? The foundation of godly wisdom begins with God.
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The foundation of worldly wisdom begins with the denial of God.
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So that is sort of the foundation I wanted to create tonight.
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So that we can open the text together.
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Now going to James 3.
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Let's just read it 13 and following.
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We will read down to the end.
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Remember the context is the power of the tongue.
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And James is challenging those people who would misuse their tongue.
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And he is telling us how powerful it is.
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And he gets here to verse 13.
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On the heels of his conversation about the tongue.
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And he shifts to true wisdom.
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Because true wisdom is necessary for controlling the tongue.
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So it still fits in context.
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Verse 13 says.
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Who is wise and understanding among you? By his good conduct let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom.
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But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts.
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Do not boast and be false to the truth.
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This is not the wisdom that comes down from above.
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But is earthly, unspiritual, demonic.
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For what jealousy and selfish ambition exist.
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There will be disorder in every vile practice.
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But the wisdom from above is first pure.
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Then peaceable.
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Gentle.
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Open to reason.
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Full of mercy and good fruits.
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Impartial and sincere.
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And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace.
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By those who make peace.
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So that's our text for the evening.
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Let's move back up to verse 13 and begin to make our way through it.
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I don't have necessarily an outline for you.
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I'm just going to go through and make comments as we go.
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James begins with a question in verse 13.
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Who is wise and understanding among you? This question is obviously rhetorical.
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But it is certainly one which many would answer in the affirmative.
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If you ask a group of people, who among you is wise? There are people who would vary without any embarrassment.
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They'd raise their hands.
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I'm wise.
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I'm no fool.
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Right? In fact, if you asked it that way.
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If you said, how many of you are fools? Probably nobody's hand would go up.
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And if that's the distinction, who's wise.
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And if you're not wise, you're the fool.
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And if you're not a fool, you're wise.
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If I say, are you a fool? No.
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Then you assume what? That you're wise.
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Most people think themselves pretty.
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Like they've got a pretty good handle on it.
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And I pretty much know what's going on.
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I'm no fool.
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In fact, what do people say when they get fooled? Or somebody does something.
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Somebody takes them for some money.
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I can't believe he fooled me.
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I can't believe.
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I'm a pretty smart guy.
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I can't believe he pulled one over on somebody as smart as me.
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So James is saying, who among you is wise? Who among you is understanding? The assumption is there's going to be some people that go, right here, James.
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Me.
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I'm the wise man.
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Then James turns the question on its head.
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Because he says, who is wise and understanding among you by his good conduct? Let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom.
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So here's what James is saying.
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He's saying, who among you is wise? Hands go up.
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Are you showing it by how you live? Remember what wisdom is defined.
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Wisdom is defined by knowledge applied.
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So the person who raises his hand says, yeah, it's me.
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By your good conduct.
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Let him show his works in the meekness of wisdom.
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Godly works done in humility are the hallmark of true wisdom.
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A man can boast all day of his wisdom, but if he is not displaying it in his actions, his wise thought is just a thought.
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It's not true.
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It's not real.
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It's all talk.
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Faith without works is dead.
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James has said that, right? Well, wisdom without good conduct is also dead.
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Wisdom without godly conduct is not true.
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Wisdom.
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And so, verse 14, the next verse, provides the contrast.
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Because he says, look, who is wise? A few hands go up, maybe all the hands go up.
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And he goes, well, your good conduct will prove it.
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Your good conduct, your godly behavior will show it.
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But, and this is where the contrast comes in, that word but.
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But, if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth.
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And you might say, well, that's kind of an odd way of saying that sentence.
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Here's basically what he's saying.
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He's saying, I'm asking you who's wise.
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If you are wise, it's going to show up in how you live, in your conduct.
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But, if you live by bitter jealousy and selfish ambition, you're lying.
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Your claim to wisdom is a false claim.
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And you should not be saying that you're wise if that's the way you are.
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Do not boast and do not be false to the truth if that's not truly who you are.
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James is saying, you need to be honest with yourself.
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So, let's look at those two things he says.
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He says, bitter jealousy and selfish ambition.
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Both of those are listed in other places.
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If you want to write it down, 2 Corinthians 12, 20.
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Paul is giving a list of sins.
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Bitter jealousy and selfish ambition are there.
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Galatians 5, 20.
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When he's talking about the difference between the fruit of the Spirit and that which is unrighteous, it's there as well.
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The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, all those things.
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But, the things that are not the fruit of the Spirit include bitter jealousy and selfish ambition.
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It should be noted that both of those things are inwardly focused sins.
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Jealousy extends from a heart which puts itself first without considering others.
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And, selfish ambition is essentially the same thing.
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And, I do want to make it clear that Paul is making a distinction between selfish ambition and ambition in and of itself.
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For instance, if a person says, I make it my ambition to please God, that's not wrong.
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Paul said that.
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Alright? If somebody says, I make it my ambition to become a doctor because I want to serve God as a doctor, that's nothing wrong with that.
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If somebody says, I want to be a doctor because doctors make all the money, they get all the ladies, and they drive all the nice cars, and they have several houses, and I want to build my barns up to the full, and I want to savor it all, and I want to grab for all I can while I'm here.
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That's selfish ambition.
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Same thing can be motivated by two different things.
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One is motivated by selfishness, one is motivated by righteousness, and that really is where motivation becomes the key.
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Byron Starkweather, our former elder before he moved to Tennessee, we used to talk about this all the time.
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Because it's almost always a motivation issue with people whether or not something is a sin.
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It's why we do stuff.
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Some things are sinful no matter what.
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Obviously adultery is always sinful, whether you're motivated, I want to please God by committing adultery.
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No, that doesn't work.
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But in a lot of situations, a good thing can be ungodly because you're motivated by the wrong motivation.
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Motivated by greed, motivated by selfishness.
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You want to tell somebody that they're sinning because you want to restore that person out of their sin.
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That's good.
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You want to tell somebody they're sinning because you're sick and tired of them, and you want to tell them about themselves, and you want to walk away feeling higher than them, and mightier than them, and you want to let them know about themselves because they need to hear it from you because you're better than them.
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Guess what? Now you're sinning.
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Same thing though.
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Same thing.
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The motivation is the problem.
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And so that's why I call these inwardly focused sins.
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Jealousy, bitter jealousy is when I see someone who receives something that I think I should receive, and now I have a hatred towards that person.
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And I think I should have got that accolade, I should have got that seat, I should have gotten that position, I should have gotten that award, I should have gotten whatever it is, and now I'm bitter towards that person, and I'm jealous because I'm putting myself first.
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Right? Or I'm aiming for something, shooting for something, or whatever, because I'm putting myself first.
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Both of these things, James says, are inwardly focused sins.
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And I want you to notice in the text, he says, if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, in te kardia, the Greek, kardia is the Greek word for heart, so we get the word cardiac, you know, and the doctor talks about cardiac arrest, or whatever, kardia is the Greek word for heart.
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And this is where those problems originate.
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And the scary thing is these are internal sins, not external sins, and the problem is sometimes people hide them really well.
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Sometimes people are bitter and jealous, and nobody knows it but them.
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Sometimes people are selfish in their ambition, and no one knows it.
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They talk a big game, but really they're just selfish.
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So that's why James adds the phrase, in your heart.
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He says, if you have this bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your heart, you may be the only person who knows it, but you don't need to claim to be wise.
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Because by that, you're demonstrating your foolishness.
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It's not about God, it's about you.
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It's not about God, it's about what you want.
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And what was the definition of the wise versus the fool? The wise man understands who God is.
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The fool says there is no God.
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The fool puts himself first.
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That's why he says don't boast and be false to the truth.
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Don't lie to yourself.
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If this is who you are, you need to repent.
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If this is who you are, you need to recognize it and repent.
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Don't keep lying to yourself if this is who you are.
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Verse 15.
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This is not the wisdom that comes down from above.
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Talking about what? The wisdom which comes out of bitter jealousy and selfish ambition.
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That is not the wisdom that comes down from above.
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But that wisdom is three things.
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Earthly, spiritual, demonic.
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I want to remind you, what are the three great enemies of the soul? What are the three great enemies of the soul? I've talked about this several times.
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If I start it, you'll finish it.
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The flesh, the world, and the devil, right? That's the three great enemies of the soul.
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If you want a Bible verse for that, Ephesians 2.1.
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You were dead in your trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, and the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience.
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It's the flesh, the world, and the devil are all referenced there in Ephesians 2.1.
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James tells us this wisdom doesn't come from God.
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It comes from within you.
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The selfish ambition, that bitter jealousy, comes from within you.
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And it is earthly, unspiritual, and demonic.
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That's another way of saying, it's flesh, it's the world, and it's the devil.
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Look at the three words there, earthly.
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That's the world.
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That is what he is saying.
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The world, unspiritual in the ESV, is actually, psuche, psuche, is the flesh.
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Actually, it's the psyche.
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It's fleshly, it's from the mind of man, not the mind of God.
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It's not from the spirit, it's from the flesh.
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And then what is the last, demonic? It's from the devil.
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I wonder how many of us really believe, in our heart of hearts, that the devil is there.
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I mean, in a group like this, I imagine we would affirm that the devil exists, because we affirm that the Bible is the word of God.
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But if I went and talked to a group of twelfth graders at a high school, and it was a mixed multitude of people who come up in different backgrounds, and I said something about, the reason why you are so influenced to your flesh, is because the world is being influenced by the devil.
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I would be laughed out of the school.
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Well, that's true, that's true.
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Yeah.
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But I guess my point is just that, we don't often attribute, you know, some people over attribute to the devil.
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Every time they turn around, the devil made me do it, they become like Flip Wilson, and everything is the devil made me do it.
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And, you know, I've been in churches where it's always the devil, always the devil, always the devil, and that's bad too, because then you're giving too much credit.
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The devil's not in charge, he's not sovereign.
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But he's influential, and he is the prince of the power of the air.
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He is influencing this world.
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And if we deny that, we are denying who our enemy is.
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And one of the first things of warfare, that any soldier understands, is identify the enemy.
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And if you don't understand who the enemy is, and what his purpose is, the destruction of your soul, because he knows he has got an expiration date, he knows that his power will end one day, and he will suffer for eternity, and he wants as many people to suffer along with him as possible.
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His redemption is no possibility, there is no possibility of redemption, and he doesn't want that for anyone else.
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It's as simple, his hatred for you is immense.
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And so, the demonic world wants to see you in the same condition it's in.
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Lost forever.
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We need to understand, when we are seeking to have the wisdom of the world, that's where that wisdom comes from.
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That's where the Dawkinses, and the others like him, are really deriving this seemingly vast knowledge with no wisdom.
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The wisdom of this world doesn't fight the evil within it, it is spawned by the evil within it.
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This is why the same person who will fight to save a tree, will fight to kill a baby in the womb.
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This is why the same politician who wants to end capital punishment, will vote to legalize euthanasia.
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That's the wisdom of this world.
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And we can go on and on and on, with example after example.
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This is right, this is wrong.
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With no foundation outside of pure subjectivity.
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Because they've denied the fountainhead of truth which is God.
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Verse 16, and we'll move now, begin our push to the end, because he goes on in verse 16, he mentions again, jealousy and selfish ambition, he says, but where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice.
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This again is just saying, look, there's two ways to live, guys.
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You've got the way that seeks after God, and seeks after His wisdom, and is wise in the ways of God, and is in understanding who God is, and then you've got worldly wisdom.
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And worldly wisdom ultimately is going to bring about disorder and vile practices.
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Another way to render this verse could be, whenever people are jealous and selfish, they're always causing trouble and doing every kind of evil.
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And don't we see that? Look at our, right now, our political landscape.
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And I have not, I have intentionally not mentioned anything about any candidates.
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I'm not going to.
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It's not my place to stand here and tell you for whom to vote.
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But if you can look at our list of candidates on either side of the aisle, with pride, I don't know where that pride is coming from.
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Because all I see is jealousness and selfish ambition.
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The wisdom of the world.
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They say, who is your favorite candidate? I don't have a favorite.
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I really don't.
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There are ones who I could see as less than others.
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The only ones that I would have thought were good have already dropped out, if that tells you anything.
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Because they don't have constituents.
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Because they don't yell, and shout, and scream.
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They simply speak wisdom, and nobody wants to hear wisdom.
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And they speak in such a way that no one will listen.
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They want to hear the guy yell.
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They want to hear the guy curse.
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They want to hear the guy slam the lectern.
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Because that's exciting.
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And Nero fiddled as Rome burned.
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Verse 17.
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But wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.
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Seven things that true wisdom produces.
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This isn't the fruit of the Spirit, but beloved, it parallels Paul's admonition.
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What is the fruit of the Spirit? Love, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness.
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All those things, we see them.
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Peaceable, pure, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruit.
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Impartial, sincere.
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This is godliness.
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This is wisdom.
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Because I want you to think of it like this.
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I want you to hear this.
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The jealous and ambitious person is not pure of heart because his motivation is wicked.
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The jealous and ambitious person is not peaceable because he's always seeking his own way.
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He's not gentle because he's willing to hurt others to satisfy himself.
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He's not open to reason because it's his way or the highway.
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He's not full of mercy and good fruit because he extends only judgment to others.
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He's not impartial because he's partial to himself.
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And he's not sincere because he's motivated to benefit himself.
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But godly wisdom is all of those things.
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And it sows into the lives of others, perpetuating itself in a harvest of righteousness.
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And as a result, one man's wise behavior becomes another man's because he makes a disciple.
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And the wisdom of that man is used by God to train another man.
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And iron sharpens iron, as they say, as the Scripture says.
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And so one man sharpens another.
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And that's how that wisdom is perpetuated.
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And that's why it says in the next verse, And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.
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Who are those who make peace? The wise man.
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The man who's not governed by selfish ambition.
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He's not governed by jealousy, but he's governed by a fidelity to God.
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And his heart is to do what? To see people at peace with God and at peace with one another.
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And so a harvest of righteousness comes from that man.
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And I like the fact that it says a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace.
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Because normally we don't talk about the harvest being sown.
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We talk about the seed is sown and it becomes a harvest.
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Right? But the language James uses here is very specific.
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Because he says the harvest of righteousness is sown.
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Why? Because the harvest produces fruit.
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And out of the fruit comes a seed.
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And out of the seed comes a new sowing.
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And a new sowing becomes a new crop.
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See, it's an extension of what's happening.
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This man's righteousness, his heart that desires to follow after God, is planting seeds.
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And those seeds are growing.
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Just like the apostle said, he said, We planted the polished water and God brought the increase.
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That was Paul's whole life.
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Planting seeds of righteousness that God might give them life and growth and disciple making.
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That was his whole life.
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A wise man is a man concerned not with himself, but concerned with others.
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In the Beatitudes, Jesus says, Blessed are the peacemakers.
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There is a connection between godliness and peacemaking.
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War is natural because human beings are sinful.
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Peace is actually the unnatural state of man.
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In the thousands of years of human history, how many of those years have been filled with peace? Not many.
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Might be peace in one area, but there's war somewhere else.
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It is the man of true wisdom who is able to go against the natural default of war.
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And be one who teaches God's peace.
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So let's look at our application points and we'll conclude.
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Number one.
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True wisdom begins with a proper understanding of our Creator, of His Word, and our position as His creatures.
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I'll say it again.
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True wisdom begins with a proper understanding of our Creator, His Word, and our position as His creatures.
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You talk to anybody who's got worldly wisdom, they've got one of those mixed up.
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Either they don't believe God, they don't believe His Word, or they don't believe that they're His creature who are subject to Him.
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Number two.
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Those who deny transcendent wisdom, and let me just explain what transcendent wisdom means.
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That wisdom which is higher than our wisdom.
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A wisdom which rises above our wisdom.
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Those who deny transcendent wisdom have no objective standard against which to measure their own wisdom.
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How do men measure their wisdom? Who are ungodly men who don't believe in God.
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Where do they measure their wisdom? Against one another.
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And it comes down to subjectivity.
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I'm wiser than you because I think I am.
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Yeah, exactly.
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Yeah, absolutely.
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Number three.
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Godly wisdom will demonstrate itself in a person's conduct.
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That's right in the text of James.
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Godly wisdom demonstrates it in our conduct.
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And finally, worldly wisdom may bring the accolades of men, but it will not produce a harvest of righteousness.
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It will not produce, in the end, a harvest of righteousness.
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Well, I hope tonight was encouraging to you.
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I hope it was helpful.
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I hope we can see the distinction between godly wisdom and worldly wisdom.
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And what it all begins with is an understanding of God.
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The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.
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Let's pray.
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Father, I thank You for Your Word.
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Thank You for this time to study.
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I pray that it will be fruitful in the lives of Your people.
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Thank You for Your Holy Spirit who speaks tonight through Your Word.
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May we be ever faithful to following what He has taught us.
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In Christ's name, amen.