Warnings Against Wordly Attitudes
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· 4 viewsWe become more Christlike as we humble ourselves before God.
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In chapter 4 of James deals with some of the most challenging attitudes Christians will battle with, in seeking to serve our holy and sovereign God in a fallen, sinful world.
James exhorted his readers to guard against pride, because of its corrosive effects on the individual as well as the church. Then James provides the answer as to how to live free from the sin of pride, by humble submission to God.
Submission to God is lived in the decisions we make regarding our desires, goals, and ambitions for the future.
So Samuel said: “Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, As in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, And to heed than the fat of rams.
Submission, obedience to the Word, will commandments of God, is the way to live free from the sin of pride.
Example: We look at King Saul a proud man the prophet Samuel addressed with these sober words: “to obey is better than sacrifice.”
The Prophet call Saul foolish when he presumptuously offered up a burnt offering instead of waiting for Samuel to arrive. Next, Saul made a rash vow that almost cost his son Jonathan his life. Then God gave Saul a direct command through Samuel (1 Samuel 15:1-3) Saul was told to attack the Amalekites and totally destroy all that belonged to them. Instead of obeying God, Saul kept wicked King Agag alive as a prisoner, and he kept the best of the sheep and cattle from the enemy’s camp.
For whatever reason, Saul disobeyed God. He reasoned that God would be pleased by his saving the sheep and cattle. He suggested he was keeping the best of the bad, as a “sacrifice” to God.
Saul, he denied his disobedience. “I have carried out the Lord’s instructions,” (1 Sam. 15:13). Then Saul justified himself by blaming others. Samuel explained: “For rebellion is like the sin of divination, and arrogance like the evil of idolatry” (1 Sam. 15:23). Disobeying God is rebellion against Him, an act Samuel equated to paganism and witchcraft. In Saul’s case, it was also connected to his proud heart. Saul decided he knew better than God. All rebellion is idolatry, a form of self-worship.
But rebellion wasn’t Saul’s only wrongdoing. For Saul, fear of man, and desiring their praise offset God’s priority of obedience. We see that in his confession in verse 24: “I have sinned. I violated the Lord’s command and your instructions. I was afraid of the men and so I gave in to them.” Saul was afraid of losing people’s adulation. Even when he said, “I have sinned,” he also said, “please honor me before the elders of my people and before Israel” (1 Sam. 15:30).
PRIDE PRODUCES CONFLICT
Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”? But He gives more grace. Therefore He says: “God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble.”
Strife & Frustration Caused by Lust
Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures.
Rather than pursue the way of peace found in true wisdom (James 3:17-18) some existed in an atmosphere of never -ending conflict , their conflict arose out of lust and their desire to have.
Hedonism: the philosophy that pleasure is the chief goal of living.
Some were being deceived by their own lust for things, covetousness, lusting for what belongs to others. James say’s there were two reason for prayers being meant.
They were fighting for things of this life, rather than seeking God in prayer for what was good and needed.
Their motives were sinful, they only wanted things to satisfy their lust. Gratifying themselves in the sinful pursuit of pleasure, rather than seeking to glorify God by their living and working to bless and help others.
Do Not Divider Your Affections
Adulterers and adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously”? But He gives more grace. Therefore He says: “God resists the proud, But gives grace to the humble.”
James established that evil desires were the source of strife and conflicts. They were guilty of adultery against God. Love of the world is unfaithfulness to God, spiritual adultery, making them enemies of God.
As Christians we must choose between God and the world either or, never both. An adulterous husband or wife cannot anymore be faithful to their spouse.
The Holy Spirit, whom God has caused to dwell in us, strongly desires the entire devotion of our heart to God.
James said, God gives to the humble, in whom His Spirit dwells, grace and more grace to love Him and reject the friendship of the world. He closed by quoting Proverbs 3:34
Surely He scorns the scornful, But gives grace to the humble.
Sinful, wordly desires cannot coexist with humble submission to God.
THE NEED FOR HUMILITY
Submit Yourself to God
Therefore submit to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you. Draw near to God and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners; and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Lament and mourn and weep! Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He will lift you up.
Because God gives grace to the humble, James commanded his readers to”Submit yourselves therefore to God”. Now this was one of the many commandments to believers in Christ James gave. He goes on and say’s:
Submit
Resist
Draw Nigh
Cleanse
Purify
Be Afflicted
Mourn
Weep
Be turned to mourning
Humble Yourselves
James saw worldliness as originating from the evil influence of the Devil, Satan. Draw nigh to God.
Submit to God for cleansing and purification is the right response to sin in our lives.
Self-affliction, mourning, weeping are all associated with genuine repentance which is necessary for the forgiveness of sin. We humble our selves before the Lord and He lifts us up.
James intent is to laid out a clear path to the rejection of worldliness and faithfulness to God.
Speak Not Evil of Others
Do not speak evil of one another, brethren. He who speaks evil of a brother and judges his brother, speaks evil of the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. There is one Lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. Who are you to judge another?
Here James focus was on the sin of speaking evil of fellow believers in Christ. The sin of making unfair or untrue accusations against fellow believers. Unfair if it is related to something in the pass, repented for and forgiven.
An accusation was untrue, if not based on facts. But understanding, speaking the truth could be unfair, if not spoken in love.
Judging, meaning, being excessively critical of their fellow believers, condemned as hypocrisy by Jesus in Matt 7:1-5
“Judge not, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you. And why do you look at the speck in your brother’s eye, but do not consider the plank in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me remove the speck from your eye’; and look, a plank is in your own eye? Hypocrite! First remove the plank from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.
God is the Lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. So James concludes: “Who art thou that judgest another.”
GUARD AGAINST PRESUMPTION
Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit”; whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.” But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.
Boast Not of Tomorrow
Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit”; whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.
James spoke these words of wisdom to businessmen, Jews who believed in Jesus Christ as the Messiah. James said they were thoughtlessly engaging in presumptuous sin in making plans for their future to earn income.
They were presuming they would live into the future, entirely focused on their own ambition to gain wealth.
James reminded them, that they did not know what the future holds. The failure to recognize that life is Gods gift to us, is a terrible lack of gratitude to God, the Giver of all life.
Seek To Do God’s Will
Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.” But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. Therefore, to him who knows to do good and does not do it, to him it is sin.
James instructed the presumptuous what they ought to say concerning the future.
“If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this or that”
The wise believer, seeks and trust in the will, guidance and provision of God. People who rejoice in boasting of what they will do, without recognizing Gods sovereignty. This is a sin of omission, the failure to do good.
Worldly living does not always show itself in hatred for God. Sometimes it appears in the form of disregarding God as we plan life’s daily activities.