Chasing after God

Introduction

Greet and thank Char for getting me to preach.

The topic that Char asked me to cover is about Pursuing God (great topic)

Issue is that Christians pursue God - but not only God

Christianity = a more ‘religious’ option to achieving our own goals

We pursue God for our own ambitions - our own sense of: Comfort, community, safety

This pursuit tires us out - because we are not receiving what the Bible says we will.

James addresses it in this passage - let’s take a look

PRAY

Pursuing God is a wholehearted endeavour

4 You adulterous people! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God. 5 Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”? 6 But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” 7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. - James 4:4-8

Context: James writing this letter to the church at large

Addressing internal conflict within the church: Gossiping, slander, negative speach

James uses these issues to point out their pursuit of God is tainted

He starts with a strong rebuke: Adulterous

Not reference to sexual activity.

Prophets used to compare Yahweh’s relationship with His people as a marriage - this is a way of saying we have been unfaithful to God

It is a definitive statement - being a FRIEND of the world is enmity with God.

friend[greek] = Philia - a fondness of, a love for the things of this world.

enmity:/ a state of active opposition

Those who pursue the things of this world - money, fame, fortune, comfort, sin, etc. set themselves actively against God.

James is calling out duplicity (this is written to churches) - in other words Christians who claim to pursue God but are also pursuing the things of the world

God is not a means to an ends. We don’t pursue God in order to be successful in our career, we don’t pursue God in order to have friends, we don’t pursue God to have good health or get good grades

The pursuit of God is exclusive - it occurs to the exclusion of all other pursuits.

God Himself is the goal of our pursuit. There cannot be another. This remains the only way for a Christian to truly pursue God.

ILLUSTRATION: Only Jesus can fix the world

One Sunday morning, a man woke up around 5 a.m., his wife and children still asleep. Glad to have time to himself, he went downstairs, brewed some coffee, and began to read the morning paper. Three sentences into an article, he saw his five-year-old daughter descending the stairs.

He said, "Honey, go back to bed."

"But I'm not sleepy," she insisted.

Determined to read his paper, he again urged her to go back to bed. Again, she told him she was not tired.

Looking down at the newspaper, he conceived a plan. In the paper was a picture of the world, which he cut into several pieces. Handing his daughter some Scotch tape, he instructed her, "Go sit in the dining room, and see if you can put the world back together."

His daughter accepted the challenge, and he went back to the kitchen to finish his coffee and read the paper. After only a few sips of his coffee, though, his daughter came bounding into the kitchen. "Here, Daddy, I'm finished!" she said, showing him the picture of the world put back together.

Amazed, he asked, "Sweetie, how did you do that so fast?"

She replied, "It was easy, Daddy. On the back side of the page was a picture of a man. When you make the man right, you make the world right."

In precisely the same way, only when we pursue God wholeheartedly will the rest of our lives begin to make sense.

Only when we choose to pursue God first and alone will the other areas in our life begin to fall in place.

“put God in the center and everything comes together”

If we are pursuing other things over God, or even alongside God - we will find life to be confusing, and faith to be powerless.

God’s jealousy is His right

5 Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”?

Verse 5 provides us with insight into the reason behind v4

God is jealous over us! Understanding His jealousy is the key to understanding why He is so exclusive about our pursuit of Him

Usually the word “jealous” comes with negative connotations. Because we associate it with people who are possessive over what is not theirs eg. I’m jealous over your car, or your house, or your girlfriend

But there is a context where jealousy is completely justifiable. God can be jealous of us because we belong completely to HIM

When you became a Christian - you profess to be God’s alone. That’s why the bible says in 1 Cor 6:19-20” Or do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, whom you have from God? You are not your own, 20 for you were bought with a price. So glorify God in your body.”

We are entirely God’s - and God is jealous over our attentions and our affections, rightfully so.

This is not a bad thing! God’s jealousy is a beautiful expression of the intensity of His commitment to you.

God will use difficulty and trials to get us to return back to Him - and the reason for this is simple: God tolerates no rival - once you belong to God, He will NOT share you.

Sometimes when God restricts and reduces us - it isn’t rejection, it’s a demonstration of His jealousy for you.

But if we are busy pursuing things other than God - then this will seem like a punishment, and an obstacle. Instead of God drawing us back to Him.

But it is a part of pursuing God

ILLUSTRATION: Goodness of God’s jealousy

When we were younger and not married yet - Sharon and I went on a holiday with a group of friends down south. We rented a house and stayed in it together, generally just having a good time.

One of the things we did is go fishing - just a couple of us, Sharon, myself and 3 others. When we were there we bumped into a couple of guys who were also fishing. Now to me, they were friendly guys. That was, until one of them started to hit on Sharon.

Apparently he tried to pull the moves, sat next to her, asked her where she was from, does she like dogs, the whole works.

I use the word apparently because there was a problem - I didn’t pick any of this up. Only after those guys left, Sharon came up to me blind with rage, accusing me of not doing anything. I was like “What? He was just friendly” She said, “He clearly was hitting on me, anyone could’ve seen that.” To which I said, “I don’t know what hitting on a girl looks like, girls usually hit on me.” Which didn’t go well.

It was weird for me at the time that Sharon was so angry at the fact I WAS NOT jealous. But now, it makes perfect sense.

A husband who is indifferent to his wife being seduced by another man cannot be said to be deeply committed to the marriage relationship.

God is not some abstract entity or impersonal principle - we should be thoroughly amazed that the Creator of the universe would so deeply connect himself to us, that He would even be moved by human rejection and betrayal.

Do NOT make the mistake of thinking that God is indifferent about the way your live your life, and about the things that you pursue. He loves you too much to be indifferent.

Once we understand this - God’s righteous jealousy, we must ask the question: How do we respond to this? And James has that covered in the last part of this passage.

Submission is the start of the pursuit for God

6 But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.” 7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. - James 4:4-8

How do we begin to pursue God, in the way that He wants? Undivided, and undistracted?

Submission. We have to humble ourselves, and submit to God.

That means repenting of our sin, submitting our dreams, submitting our way of life, our perspective, submitting our relationships and the way we run them, it means submitting our marriages, finances, it means submitting everything.

RESIST the devil: A very real test of whether we pursue God wholeheartedly is whether we resist the devil

An all-in Christian’s life is characterised by a growing resistance to sin, not by increasing compromise!

Notice the guarantee here - if we resist, then the devil WILL flee. It is a guarantee - satan has no power to coerce and keep you in sin. He can tempt you - but he cannot force you. Only your will can do that.

So if sin remains in your life - then there is a compromise which you must deal with.

When we allow the world to distract us from our single-minded pursuit of God we become people who are divided in loyalties - we become, as James says at the end here “double-minded”

Believers who simultaneously pursue the things of this world are double minded believers.

The issue is a divided heart. We do not fully submit to God - and so we cannot wholeheartedly pursue Him

If we attack what is dividing our heart, then we will remove that which divides our mind.

We need to examine our salvation - truthfully and constantly

Is God the undivided pursuit of our lives? Or are our hearts divided over who we are chasing?

When it comes to pursuing God - we need to drop everything to do it. Are you ready to do that today?

(Are we focused on a soccer game that’s coming up? Or on what God is saying to us?)

ILLUSTRATION: Teen brought her luggage

When Texas pastor Jim Denison was in college, he served as a summer missionary in East Malaysia. While there he attended a small church. At one of the church's worship services, a teenage girl came forward to announce her decision to follow Christ and be baptized.

During the service, Denison noticed some worn-out luggage leaning against the wall of the church building. He asked the pastor about it. The pastor pointed to the girl who had just been baptized and told Denison, "Her father said that if she was baptized as a Christian she could never go home again. So she brought her luggage."