Book of James - Ch. 4, Vs. 8-11 (03/12/2000) | NOTE: Incomplete tape

Start on time this evening James chapter 4.

I think we're my mark was at the end of verse 8 You shouldn't do things like that brother

Otis It's different it's not in the program Besides that it made me realize how

I didn't get beside that stream much last week. I was so busy. I don't like that little graph you draw either where it shows if you

Don't do that, then you lost that time Yes, yes

Well, I bet there are a lot of people in the room that walk with the Lord and pray without ceasing that sort of thing

But if you're like me You're a little remiss in the sitting by the streams.

You can tell where I was Sitting when we were doing that I was by the stream But that that's wonderful Well, let's look at oh

I was thinking about Bill during that time too you were at the stream with me and we were discussing how

God was right there And so as well as probably some of the angels and maybe even

Grandmom just simply in a different dimension So we couldn't see them and That's amazing what you can think of in a few moments, but anyway

James chapter 4 My mark is at the end of verse 8, but I want to go up to verse 6

I was not happy with the way brother Otis dealt with it last week. So I Want to go back to reteach verse 6 no,

I don't I don't I don't remember if we covered verse 6 through 8

But whether we did or whether we did not there's just a couple of thoughts to lead into verse 9 and I wanted to Kind of use verse 6 as a launching pad,

I think There are some interesting word studies you can do right in this area as well where Similar root words are used in different words in the

English Where the words mean literally the opposite and a little prefix can be added that Changes and makes it the opposite and you wouldn't realize they're really the same words being used in a sense

So let's look at this verse Verse 6 first it says but he giveth more grace wherewith he saith

God resisted the proud But giveth grace to the humble Let's look at this word resist for a moment

God resists the proud Because this is a word we're gonna see a little bit later

And I wanted to look at it in this verse It comes from two small Greek words that have been put together and Greek is built that way.

It's just built like you have these little root words that are just Built together like putting blocks together.

And so what happens is you end up getting very specific meanings very

Specific shades of colors of meanings that you don't get in the in the English Sometimes sometimes you can in English, but always you can in the

Greek and this word is Composed of two small words.

The first one is on T and In English, it looks like a

NTI. Now, what does that make you think of in English? It's also a prefix

Yeah, it means like against doesn't it and it comes from the Greek this is an

English word that actually comes straight from the Greek and in the Greek it means opposite or It comes to mean to stand against but it means in this case

Opposite it always denotes contrast it literally means opposite Now remember we're talking about this thing that God does to the proud he resists them and this word resist starts out with an

T and The second part of that same word is TASO t -a -s -s -o

Which this is amazing to picture this close your eyes and picture this all right to arrange in an orderly manner like the cosmos

TASO means to arrange in an orderly manner Now it has been translated in a couple of places in the

New Testament into the word to determine as the predetermined will of God to ordain as in the verse that says those that were ordained believed and And to set as if to set something in place as it's going to be

But it all carries these little Shades of color if you in the

English if you just had to determine that's kind of like English, you know Just boom there's what the word means, but in the

Greek it means yeah, but it you determine it by arranging it in an orderly fashion where everything's in the right place and That's what

God says Does not happen to the proud So he puts the little word

Anti in front of this beautiful word for arranging and it takes all the arrangement away and puts it into chaos

So it's the opposite of being arranged in a beautiful orderly manner

This is what God does to the proud But he giveth more grace

Wherefore he saith God resisted the proud but giveth grace unto the humble

So pride is something that we have to realize God Does not like especially

In the case where his children get into pride because what have we to be proud of?

Did he choose us because we're the mightiest nation? No He just simply loved us because we're his and we want to take

Advantage we want to take as if we brought that to be and we know better.

I mean we all know better But we still have a problem sometimes with spiritual pride

I mean if if the good old carnal kind won't get you then we can be proud of how spiritual we are

And that's just amazing that we can be proud of our prayers that God answered How many did you get in the water this week

Y 'all struck out You didn't get any in the water is that your job

Hmm we learned this morning. It's not and if you think it is you are discouraged all the time

But what is your job to sow the seeds and And So anyway, when when we do let pride in or in we have to understand we come under this resisting that God does

He he brings disorder Disarrangement I just made that word up, but it sounds pretty good into our lives and guess what all of a sudden we notice it

And all of a sudden we're uncomfortable and he sometimes brings us back to a right place in our

Understanding that pride has entered in you know the best way that God Or the thing thing

I've noticed the most in my life where God Eliminates pride

Is he'll put me in a place where I have to say I have absolutely no control over this situation

Absolutely cannot determine what's gonna happen in this situation. I have no power or no control at all

Did you know that with other people? It's always that way and you just don't think it is Most of us really do think we can change people and when they don't change we get upset

But only God changes people God has not given it into our hands to be

The instrument that makes a person be what we want the person to be it just doesn't work that way

And sometimes spiritual pride enters into our lives and God has to take us to the place where we just flat

No, he puts us in a place where we know we're out of control And it's horrible to go through at the time, but it's wonderful to pass through it come out the other side and realize

Okay, so maybe if I didn't have control in that situation, maybe I don't need to worry About not being in the in control of all these situations that come into my life

Now in verse 7 Submit yourselves therefore to God Now what is the word therefore therefore why are we supposed to submit to God?

We're supposed to realize that God resists the proud So, why should we submit to God?

What what do you have to do before you can submit to God or to anyone for that matter

You have to yield your own sovereignty Your perceived sovereignty

I should say You have to give that up because you can't both submit to God and be

God at the same time and So this is the opposite of pride Submit yourselves therefore to God Resist the devil and he will flee to you.

Now. Let's look at this word submit Now remember the word resist it was anti Tasso, what is

Tasso mean? Hmm to to place in an orderly arrangement

Now it's interesting that when we look at verse 7 submit yourselves Therefore to God the word submit is

Hoopoe Tasso Do you hear a familiar word in there? Tasso is there

Now what does Tasso mean means the same thing every time you see it. It means to arrange in an orderly fashion

So we have to look up the word Hoopoe and try to figure out what that means. Obviously, it's not anti It's not the opposite It means under so it takes the meaning of being brought under the orderly arrangement

And so when we submit to God we're doing the opposite of what happens to the proud person the proud person

God is resisting Which means he is doing the opposite of placing that person's life in an orderly arrangement

But when you submit yourselves therefore to God all of a sudden You're being brought under the power of this orderly arrangement

Now, I think it's kind of interesting here in the English. It says submit yourselves To interesting things the word yourself is not in the

Greek Because to submit yourselves puts you in control Doesn't it?

You you had to make the decision to submit to God in the

Greek New Testament It simply says submit

Therefore to God and it is in the passive tense.

What does that mean? It is something that is done to you not something you do

Anytime you find a word that's in the passive It means that the subject of the sentence is the recipient of the action

I receive the action the action is done to me in the English It looks like something you should do submit yourselves.

Therefore. I should make a choice to Submit myself to God in the Greek. What it says is that God is doing this to you

Now, how is he doing it? It's no secret you just look up at the top he resisted you when you weren't this way

You get a little bit prideful All of a sudden you're in control You're gonna make things happen because it's your plan your schedule

God begins to anti -toss. Oh you Now remember

God's one that doing all this you're not doing it You're you're down here thinking you're in control and God is anti -toss.

Oh in you and What happens do you like that pressure when

God brings disarray? disarray into your life and everything seems to be going wrong and nothing is working right and It's total disorder in your life.

Do you like that? Not supposed to be that way. Is it so what happens we go out to that little spring that he had me picturing

You think in your life? How few times have you gone out in the field by yourself and got along with God and then you stop ask?

Why did you do it at that time? Because You were getting squished by pressure

Usually now there have been a few times probably when you just went out there, but most of the time

You were out there for a reason Everything was in disarray

You're thinking. No, this is horrible And all of a sudden you're anti -toss. Oh, and why does

God do that? Because he is hoopoe toss He's bringing you under Arrangement.

He's bringing you to the place where you Realize he is in control.

You then begin to resist the devil and to submit to God Not because you yourself are submitting but because God is bringing his child under submission

Now you've many of you have raised children some grandchildren How many of you remembering a child himself submitting to your authority

Does it work that way? Okay. I Want you to go ahead and submit now

And you walk away and you know the jobs done, right? Is that how it works? No You bring them into submission.

That's all God does God is parenting us all the time and he brings us under submission and Then at that point we are told oh, by the way, not only is hoopoe toss.

Oh Passive which means this is something God is doing to you. He's bringing you into submission, but it's imperative

Do you know what imperative you remember what imperative means It is gonna happen

It's flag gonna happen Imperative Expresses an absolute command when it comes from God It's not like he's saying

I want to share with you that I would prefer if you went and did this He's just saying this is gonna happen in your life.

This is where you will be. It is a pressure of the Potter upon the clay

And so it's passive imperative You will come under the arrangement of God God will arrange your life in the most beautiful order

Because that's where you're going and he's taking you there now When we get into this resisting of the devil

The end of verse 7 the word resist is in the active imperative Imperative means it is flat a command that God commands us to do this

But active means it's you doing it not God doing it to you So the submission comes from God because if you weren't

Under submission to God you would never be able to resist the devil. He would have a field day with you and with me so once God brings us to the place of Antitaso and you're out of order and you don't like that pressure and and you get out alone with the

Lord And he then brings you under submission because it is it is what you want to do because you prefer that to the to the pressure and All of a sudden

God gives you that desire through these things that he's brought into your life and you come under submission

Immediately he gives you an imperative command. He says now resist the devil Resist the devil

Comes from two little Greek words. One of them happens to be this anti Anti the opposite of and the word that it's the opposite of is a word which means to stand

So he's saying to take an opposite stand from the devil take an opposite and Continuingly opposite stand to the devil, but remember it's active and it's imperative

Which means this is an action word and a command of God Now the mistake most people make is well

There are two mistakes that can be made and usually when we get on either end of the spectrum We're probably gonna be off a little bit

One is that you believe there's a demon under every bush so to speak All you want to do is talk about demons.

Oh a demon cause this demon cause that Oh Demon this demon that what happens do you think if you talk about demons all the time?

And think about them all the time. You think that'd be healthy. Do you think God wants us to do that?

You think he would rather us lift up demons in our heart than to to have the

Lord Jesus separated in our heart I don't think so So there's a group people that do that The opposite mistake over here is is there are people who don't believe any of that's going on at all

And for them, I would simply ask when the pigs went the water. Where did the demons go? Can they die?

No They're still in and around this planet and they're bothering

Things everywhere So it does exist now What's interesting about it?

Is that James said that when we come into submission to the Lord? We must actively

Ourselves actively resist Satan and then he will flee To do nothing is to lose that battle

Who was it Winston Churchill that said all that has to happen for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing

If he didn't say it he should have But in this realm

If you do nothing in the realm of spiritual warfare, if you just kind of put it neutral and do nothing

Then you're failing Because you're disobeying an imperative command that the

Lord gave us which he says resist Take an opposite stand to Satan and it's something that must be thought about To be done and I think all of Ephesians chapter 6 is given for that purpose for that reason you go and read about the armor spiritual armor

You can't just have you know There's some thought that has to be put into that You need to study this what is the spiritual armor,

I mean is this is this part of it is prayer part of it is

Witnessing it says something about your your feet are shod with the preparation of the gospel

Preparation means to study to prepare to be able to have an answer for every man for why you believe the way you do

Is that part of your armor? And why would God give the armor if he didn't expect us to use it?

So realize that on the one hand you don't want to be off just glorifying the enemy but on the other hand you don't want to just forget about that and play like it's not there because it is there and In any father who would let his children go to bed at night and sleep?

Without praying over those children and saying Lord wants you to be in control in this house tonight. These are your children

This is your place Our rebuke Satan don't let demons come around this place don't let anything

Interfere with dreams or thoughts of me and my children my family while we're asleep tonight protect us

You're being presumptuous If you don't resist and remember resisting is an active word is something that you have to do

It's not something that just happens. And so this is apparently part of God's plan Just like it's part of God's plan for us to work together with him in prayer

It's part of his plan for us to work together with him in witnessing it's part of his plan for us to work together with him against the enemy and his hierarchies and Especially with regard to our own families in our church family are our leaders

Everybody if we don't actively resist Then we're not fighting and Then we're expecting

God just to write in the sky. Okay devil leave that place leave them alone But he's chosen not to do it.

Not that God couldn't do that God could remove every demon from this world with a thought if he chose to but he does not choose to So he chooses to work together with us even in the realm of spiritual warfare

So for us to neglect the resisting is to be disobedient to the Lord and to be presumptuous and just to assume everything's gonna work

Fine if we don't take a part in that Now verse 8 draw nigh to God and I believe brother

Otis did a marvelous job with verse 8 So let's go to verse 9. I think we've covered verse 8

Be afflicted and mourn and Weep let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to heaviness

Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord and he shall lift you up now verse 9 How does that fit in with the

Christian life? If this was the only page of Scripture you had on a desert island and you were saved and you had this you've just gotten saved and Parachuted out and you got one page and you look at that You might tend to think this is what the

Christian life is all about be be afflicted and mourn and weep and turn your laughter in the morning and your joy into heaviness and So you might go around with a different countenance than some

Christians do who have the whole Bible Do you think this is just a general statement that we're supposed to not to have no happiness in our lives.

No joy No, no, no obvious joy that appears No laughter together.

No fun together. I mean we've we've actually been criticized in this church for sometime for for having laughter in the midst of some of the messages and I mean,

I try not to tell jokes, but mainly because I'm no good at it But sometimes I can find you doing funny things while I'm talking and I'll mention it and it's pretty funny

I think and then there was while one of you'll zap me back like Deborah does when she sits up here and and that to me that's

Not quite as funny, but sort of funny So are we never supposed to have laughter and happiness and so forth

Obviously not if you have a whole Bible and you can read the whole thing, you know, that's not what the Lord Jesus Offers us abundant life what life is really all about.

So what's the context here? The context here goes all the way back to the place in verse 6 where it says

God resisted the proud It goes all the way back to verse 1 where it says you're you are one with another

You lust and you have not you kill and desire to have and cannot obtain you fight you war and you have not because you ask

Not you ask and you receive not because you ask a mist that you may consume it upon your lust

We're dealing with carnality in this passage this chapter dealing with carnality and verse 9 is saying when

God Takes the order away when he anti -toss owes you

Gets you the place where everything goes out of order It is the right time to mourn to mourn over the fact of our our lack of Evident love for the

Lord to mourn over our lack of Choosing to spend special precious time with him like we did because he made us do it.

Wasn't that horrible? he made us close our eyes and and try to forget everything and just Picture yourself in a peaceful place and think about the

Lord and we didn't do that enough this past week We should mourn over that I mean that when we get to the place where the

Lord is bringing this pressure of the potter's hand on us We should in fact be afflicted and mourn and the laughter that the frivolous

Laughter that we sometimes have should go away the the Jesting that we can throw out all the time

I mean, it's not the right time for it when God has us under that pressure And so we should have our laughter turning into mourning mourning and crying and weeping over our own sin and our lack of Faithfulness to the

Lord that's what verse 9 talks about and when we go into verse 10 it says

Humble ourselves. Well, let's see. Let me look at some of these words The word afflicted look back at verse 9 first The word afflicted be afflicted.

I Almost left this out. I don't want to I should have put a little box here where I can see this

This isn't incredible to me Be afflicted now even in the

English if you think about what that says, it's obviously passive, isn't it?

Be afflicted Well in the Greek language it is passive imperative

This is something that God is doing to you. This is not something where God is saying I don't want you to go around with a sour face be grave.

Let everybody know you're a grave and you're a serious Bible student That's not what it's saying at all

It's saying when God Afflicts you be afflicted Receive it for what it is.

It is meant for good It is meant to get us to the place where we're back in order.

We are under his perfect Wonderful arranging of that life again So so be afflicted means allow it not that you can do anything about it because it's imperative

God's gonna do it But you can have an attitude adjustment You Know You can in your heart you can go through it with a right attitude in which case we benefit even more

And that's what's what it says in the language said when it says your laughter turn to morning That's passive imperative your joy turn to heaviness

Passive imperative. These are things that God is bringing into your life. God is turning your laughter into into Morning God is turning your joy into heaviness.

Now would God the God of today do that? No, the God of modern theology in America would never do that to you

It's never God's will for you to be sick, by the way, they teach For Paul had a problem didn't he had an affliction that never went away.

He must have been out of God's will You know, I'm being facetious So when these things this affliction this morning this heaviness

It is brought to us by the hand of the one who loves us more than you can even comprehend about love

Why to bring us under the perfect arranging of our life? Just thought we'd point that out in the grammar and even the grammar teaches it now in verse 10 where it says

Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord Now this is interesting but the word yourself is a little bit misleading you cannot humble yourself

When's last time you humbled your own flesh all you can do is lift it up But God can humble it

Kenny. So this once again passive imperative God does the humbling

God brings circumstances people Whatever is needed into our lives to humble us

So really, you know a better translation would be in verse 10 be humbled in the light sight of the

Lord And he shall lift you up Isn't it amazing that it's he that does the humbling and it's he that does the lifting up So what is it that he wants to do in the first place wants to lift us up?

Can he do that to pride? No, why it would bring total disarray in our lives

So God brings the humbling God brings the affliction the mourning the heaviness because he wants to be mean

Because he wants to be hard -handed. No because he wants to lift us up He's a wonderful parent and that's even a bad way to say it

There is no example to give in the human realm of what he is to us But I guess that's a pretty good human example.

He is the best of all parents Yes, a parent has to spank from time to time But he does it because he loves the child and there's never been a child once that believed that blind

But it's true and It's certainly true with the Lord Now we move into verse 11 and it changes the subject

Speak not evil one of another brethren He that speaketh evil of his brother and judgeth his brother speaketh evil of the law

How many of you have had a problem figuring out what that means? Well, I had to kind of read that a few times

Why is it that if I speak evil of you? That I'm judging the law of God.

I mean that that requires a little bit of thought Or if you're like me, you just go pick up Matthew Henry and see what he thought

He had some thoughts on it But if thou judge the law thou art not a doer of the law but a judge

Now here's what he's saying and then let's see if we can figure out why he's saying it God is saying if you talk about another brother or sister behind their back

Whether you telling the truth about them or whether you telling a total lie that you thought was the truth because the other guy told

You that so you assumed it's the truth if you're talking about them. You are doing several things here.

First of all You are judging God's law And then it says if you judge the law you are no longer doing the law

But you have become a judge now. You might put there. It doesn't just mean you're a judge

It means you're a judge of the law So now we find ourselves in a position where we're judging the law

Because we are speaking evil of another brother Now verse 12 says there is one lawgiver who is able to save and destroy

Who art thou that judges another All right now we'll stop

I don't want to go into 13 because that changes the subject again But that little passage verse 11 12, I'm telling you what there is some teaching there that would help the average church

There's not a church in this land. This wouldn't help because we battle not against flesh and blood

There's not a person That really is out to get you especially if they claim to be a brother and they're you know

Your brother and sister let's don't use the word claim. Let's just say they really are there say they're not really out to get you but sometimes the things they do and say can

But is our battle with the brother is our battle with the sister Our battle is with powers and principalities and spiritual wickedness in high places.

That's why we have to resist But when we speak evil of another brother or sister we're playing right into the hands of the one we're supposed to be resisting

We're on his team We're not his we decide to go over and play a little ball with him now anytime a person speaks evil of a brother or a sister he then begins to judge

God's law and To stop being a doer of the law and he becomes a judge of the law

It just simply means this that the law itself Tells us that we're not supposed to be

Bearing false witness. Certainly. We're not supposed to be gossiping about another person

Over in the Old Testament says in one place There's six things God hates yay seven and one of the things he hates is the person who brings division among the brothers and so that's

Old Testament and then you can certainly come into the New Testament and you find all kinds of areas such as for example, first Corinthians 4 3

But with me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you or of man's judgment

Yay, I judge not my own self Paul says for I know nothing by myself yet Am I not hereby justified but he that judges me is the

Lord Therefore judge nothing before the time. What does that mean? You don't have all the facts

You have you I promise you don't have all the facts So don't try to judge the thing you're prideful if you even make an attempt to judge it because you don't have all the facts

With regard to your brothers and sisters. And so he says Therefore judge nothing before the time until the

Lord comes who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness Listen, don't worry about it.

If you've been mistreated, it'll come out. I Love what? Dr. Rocky Freeman taught me a long time ago

He said David if you try to defend yourself, God will let you think about it

Think about that but God will bring the hidden things out and will make manifest the counsel of the hearts and Then shall every man have his praise for God It says ah, but it means for in the

Greek He'll have his praise for God in Romans 14 10 says but why does thou judge thy brother?

Or why does thou set it not thy brother for we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ So then every one of us shall give account of himself to God Let us therefore not judge one another any more

Now with the Old Testament and the New Testament law the laws of God telling us so plainly not to judge one another

Not to speak evil of one another because we've made a judgment that that is in fact wrong when we don't have all the facts

When we therefore do it We are then breaking the very law and we're judging the law saying

God's law is not adequate this book and Jesus Christ are not adequate to make these judgments.

I've got to get involved and help a little bit Does that make sense? That's what the verses are saying when it says that you judge the law.

Yes That's an interesting thought in other words that person over here has that same pressure going on and Maybe some of the things surrounding that life is the pressure and we're judging saying the person is evil or wrong and That person may be well,

I say maybe he is doing exactly what God has him doing to put pressure. Maybe the pressure is coming to me Maybe God's putting pressure on me through whatever is happening and for me to judge that judge is the very sovereignty of God That's an interesting point.

It goes right hand in hand with all this So we're not only judged the law, but we judge the lawgiver that's mentioned there in verse 12.

There's one lawgiver All right. So that's that's what verses 11 and 12

Well now that to me that verse about sin and the death is not talking about this little realm

We're into today. That's a whole thing to me You got to go back to the Roman Christians and the fact that they were under persecution.

They were being the death penalty was very harsh And so many things fell under that penalty that if a

Christian brother came to you and did in fact wrong you and you go and Turn him in so that he will be executed for it.

The Lord is saying look if he's your brother I don't say that you ask for that Now, I don't think that comes into play here but what you're talking about here is if you think you observe something a weakness in the brother and and you think that it's

Up to you to go to that brother and let them know And I will not rule out that that would happen because there are verses that say exhort which means encourage so that's kind of telling them in a positive way and Admonish, which is slightly less positive, but more businesslike, you know let me just share this with you and then rebuke which is like You you just broke the word and I'm telling you about it now

You have to understand you're almost dealing with a different area because this is dealing with Perhaps you heard something about a brother and you've heard it from this other person and you're you're collecting all of this information secondhand and Thirdhand and the first -hand stuff you has it have is that you have made some at a distance

Observations you you've seen their countenance You've seen them skip this or don't do that or they did this or whatever and you're putting in the stuff

You heard from these other people so it begins to formulate an actual imagination of the way it is

But it ain't really that way because you don't have all the information in that case. You don't have any right say anything to them

That's what it's saying not to do you don't judge him The the time when

I would say you can in fact rebuke is more like when Paul Observed that Peter was living one way in front of the

Gentiles But when the Jews came around he saw him go over here and wouldn't even sit at the table with the Gentiles Paul saw that and he zapped him.

There was no imagining. I mean there was nothing he had heard There was no imagining he saw it and it was it literally broke the law of God and he knew it

So seldom do we have it that clear -cut So we have to be very careful about judging about things where we have very limited information.

Does that help? Charlie And you're wanting to look into that to see if it's wrong or not

Is that the question? well

Well, that's see that fits more the case of what we just discussed where? Paul saw

Peter do something that's against the scripture. If you hear someone teach something that is unbiblical

And you can demonstrate that First thing I think I mean Are we talking about like a

TV preacher or someone in our group if someone in our group you go to the person? Jesus very clearly laid out the means for handling these is when you have a problem

You go to the person by yourself and you sit down and say, you know I heard you say that and would you share with me from the scriptures, you know

What did you mean by that and because I got a verse over here that seems contradicted and we know it can't so let's work

This out together and then if that person won't hear you You take another brother or two and you sit down and try to work it out and then if they won't hear you and they're still teaching something that you and the other brother that you took just Since with all your heart is unscriptural you bring it before the whole church if the church says yeah, you're right

Charlie the other guy's wrong, then they treat the other guy as what's the word as a

Not heathen but a Something like that. Yeah, you that's not exactly it but you you don't fellowship with him till he gets, right?

So that's how you would handle that Jesse And that's why you're not to speak evil of them

Because when you speak evil of them you are implying their motive was wrong That's right

Like the old Indian said if you hadn't walked a mile in his moccasins be very careful But but then again, you're right if the actions in there if the actions

That you see with your eyes are against this scripture. You do make that judgment.

That's not a wrong judgment But you don't speak evil of the person you go to the person and say explain your actions

You you can't Well, you just turn the

TV off I mean Well like a weaker brother and you're trying to share don't watch that for this reason

Well, I think you would then demonstrate to the weaker brother in the Bible where what he said contradicted some plain passages and leave it at That you know, you don't have to call that preacher names or anything

You just say, you know, he might mean well, but let me just show you here's why I don't want you watching That would work

Well, that's what you should be doing Right Yeah That's right, too you you you have been there and done that Charlie's been there on both sides.

I can tell yeah Yeah, that's exactly right when it's the other person I'm judging his actions

But when they're doing that to me, they're judging me in the wrong way. You're right That's why we have to be so careful with it

Except when it's that radio preacher We don't know it. No, those are good questions

Even when you do that you're judging that, you know, the whole Bible better than they do You have to you know, yeah

I mean this is this all gets this judging thing gets all real interesting because You know,

I guarantee you Jehovah's Witness would would judge what we're saying here today and they just know we're wrong

So only by the Holy Spirit can these be things be done and that's what you're getting at is if you have the right spirit

Of love and so forth. It's the only way it can be handled and I Know he can give you that little red flag that goes up But doesn't give us the right to speak evil of the other person

That's what this is teaching what we should do when the red flag goes up is go to the person and say explain your words

And your actions and line them up with the scriptures for me Not that you would say it like that, of course

But you're getting them to do that because you are giving them the benefit of the doubt Love love believeth all things.

So if you love that person, you're not believing they're doing wrong You're believing you're seeing some stuff and you're interpreting it as wrong

But I want to go see and you sit down with that brother before you talk to any other human being and that's what we do

Wrong right there is we talk too much and we listen way too much And now

Let me we'll close with this. Let me just It's gonna go into talking about your life as a vapor, which is another wonderful subject

But let me read what Matthew Henry says about this part about Judging It is evil.

I mean it it is interesting in verse 11 where it says speak not evil That the word evil is not the same

Greek word as the word for devil, but it's a perfect synonym In other words, if you spoke

Greek you would interchange those words just to make the language sound better But they mean identically the same thing.

So speak evil. The word evil is the same Meaning is the word devil. It's slanderer

It's someone who likes to slander the other person because for some reason it makes you feel better that they did something wrong

That's not of God Matthew Henry says we must not speak evil things