Fire Insurance

Does anyone know what this is. It is a fire extinguisher. Now a fire extinguisher is an interesting thing. It is one of those things that we buy hoping that we will never use it. We buy it just in case. We hope we will never, ever need it but just in case we do need it we don’t want to not have it. Most people who buy a fire extinguisher don’t really think they will have a fire and often it is put up and forgotten about until it is needed.

When I wanted to use this as an illustration I asked my wife if we still had one and she said i think so. We kept them under the sink. When we moved we took out all of the under the sink stuff and put it in a box and them put it right back under the sink in the new house. When my wife handed me the fire extinguisher she said it is out of date. The Expiration date says 12/22/20. which is hilarious. The reason it is so funny is that we have only been living in this house for a little less than 3 years so they were already expired when we moved them from our last house to this house. Not only that but we left the parsonage in Quitman in October of 2020 and moved these two extinguishers to Conway less than 2 months before they expired. We have been hauling expired fire extinguishers all around the country. By the way the label says they may not work after the expiration date.

So what does any of this have to do with church today? I think too many people treat their salvation like fire insurance. It’s good to have in the house somewhere in case you need it. When there is a fire we drag out the fire extinguisher, if we can find it, to help us out. Some believe that they can drag out their salvation when there is a death just to help out. Someone once said I always expected to get very religious just before I died.

Many people have wondered at what they see as a contrast between what Paul taught about salvation and what James taught about works. Paul was explaining that good works cannot save you and you cannot earn your way to heaven by doing good deeds. James was explaining that good works is the natural outcome of salvation and if you have no good works then the truth of your salvation is very much in doubt.

James 2:14–26 NASB95

What use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but he has no works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and be filled,” and yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that? Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself. But someone may well say, “You have faith and I have works; show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works.” You believe that God is one. You do well; the demons also believe, and shudder. But are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless? Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up Isaac his son on the altar? You see that faith was working with his works, and as a result of the works, faith was perfected; and the Scripture was fulfilled which says, “And Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness,” and he was called the friend of God. You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone. In the same way, was not Rahab the harlot also justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way? For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.

Ladies, if a man told you that he loved you and then day after day and year after year he ignored you and treated you like you were stupid, called you names, did everything you disliked and nothing you liked, if he continually did the opposite of what you wanted him to do and never treated you with kindness or even simple courtesy, if he never spoke to you and never visited you house, if he acted like you didn’t even exist and then showed up one day and expected you to treat him like a beloved husband how would you react? Would you think to yourself “well he did tell me he loved me all those years ago i guess I better treat him just like I would treat someone who had loved and stuck by me through thick and thin, would you offer yourself to him and give him all that you have to give. I think not. You would probably slam the door in his face. The mere speaking of words does little to impress us unless the actions are there to back it up.

What if a man told God he loved him and that he wanted Jesus to be the Lord of his life and then went on to generally ignore God, God’s word and God’s house. If he continually acted as if God did not exist and ignored anything God said or expected, if he didn’t even give God the common courtesy of listening to him or visiting him, if he went on with his life as if nothing had changed and God had no part at all in his day to day would you think that man was sincere in his salvation prayer? What if this man, upon his death were to say to God, “ Well I prayed the prayer and walked down the isle all those years ago, isn’t that good enough, isn’t that what you wanted. How do you think God should respond. I think Jesus said it best.

Matthew 7:21 NASB95

“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father who is in heaven will enter.

What James was saying is that your works cannot save you, but your works are the proof that your words are true. Saying the words without really changing anything in your life, without doing anything about it, makes your words into a lie. God is not mocked or fooled, he knows who is sincere and who is not. Telling someone to be warm and fed without helping them find warmth or food does as little good as staring at a fire and stating that you always intended to buy a fire extinguisher. Or pulling out one that is out of date and doesn’t work and telling the fire, “I never meant to let it expire”. What you intended to do or not do wont put out a fire and what you said you would do or not do won’t save your soul. It is not the words that save you. They are not a magic spell or a ritual that has mystical power. The words are a promise, an agreement between you and God.

God I want to quit living for myself and start living for you. I want you to wash away my sins and I want to make you lord of my life. You cannot pray for salvation as a form of fire insurance to keep you out of hell and then go on about your life just as you please and expect God to save you. That prayer is dishonest and that faith is dead.

There is a standard phrase in all fire insurance policies that goes something like this :By specific provision, the entire policy is void in case of willful concealment or misrepresentation of material fact or circumstance, fraud, or false swearing. In other words if you were lying when you took out the policy and you swore falsely, that means you didn’t mean what you said, then the insurance company doesn’t have to pay if you have a fire.

Guess what, if you were lying when you prayed to God and you swore falsely to make him Lord of your life then that agreement won’t hold up either. That doesn’t mean that you have to be perfect. True faith, sincere faith is a living faith, a growing faith. Faith ebbs and flows, sometime it is strong and other times you may struggle, sometime you may grow by leaps and bounds and sometimes you may slide back a few steps. Faith is not a system or a set of rules it is a relationship between you and God, it is a living, growing thing. Faith is with you in everything you do and it goes every place you go. To have a living faith doesn’t mean that you never mess up or that you never sin, it doesn’t mean that you can’t fail or that you always know what to do in any situation but a living faith is always a part of your life. It influences your decisions and it makes a difference in everything you do.

A faith that doesn’t go where you go and isn’t involved in what you do is a dead faith, it doesn’t do you or anyone else any good. James compares a living faith to a living body and a dead faith to a dead body. A person is a spirit. Paul tells us that the body your spirit lives in is like a tent, it is a house that you currently inhabit. One day that house will die and you, that is your spirit, will live on. We are promised a new body, or a new house if you will, in the new heaven and earth.

Now imagine this, what if you had a body that was dead. As your spirit moved through the world you had to move without a body. You have no hands or feet, you cannot pick anything up or put anything down. You have no stomach to eat or mouth to taste. You have no ears to hear with or eyes to see with. You cannot interact with the physical world because your body is dead, it just lays there doing nothing. You may want to taste your favorite food but you cannot. You may want to pick up a crying child to comfort them or put a bandage on a skinned knee but you can’t because your body is dead, your arms and legs don’t obey your commands. You cannot even call for help because you have no voice. You might exist, you might be present, but you are useless.to yourself and everyone else, your body is dead.

James says that faith without works is just as useless as a spirit without a living body. You cannot do anything or make any kind of difference because you are literally dead. So what does that mean for us today. It means you can mouth the words and say the prayers without letting it affect you one bit. You can say you are saved and think you are saved but saying it doesn’t make it true. Let me make it as clear as I can. You cannot do enough good works to save yourself. It is not works that save you but works are the evidence of salvation. If you do not have works, any works at all, then you had better check to make sure your salvation is true and not just something you said.

At Palestine an interesting thing happened to me several times. It was an old church and through the years many people had come and gone and I would meet someone out in the community and start a conversation. They would tell me they were saved and I would ask where they went to church. Several times they would tell me they were members at Palestine Baptist Church. I would then stick out my hand and say that’s great, I am glad to meet you, my name is Pat Walston and I have been your Pastor for the last 5 years. That is an actual conversation that took place, more than once. Are you really a member of a church if you haven’t been there in five years. Missing a Sunday doesn’t mean you have to rejoin the church but when is enough enough, where is the line.

What James is saying is if you have no works your faith is dead and useless, it is not real, it is not alive. If you have very few works then your faith is sick, you may have fire insurance but you are definitely not living the life God has for you.

Romans 10:9–10 NASB95

that if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.

What does your faith look like, is it alive or dead. Is it a saving faith or is it just fire insurance. Have you confessed Jesus, have you believed in him?

If tomorrow the president made it illegal to be a christian and the police broke in here next Sunday and arrested everyone in the church. When it came time for your trial would the prosecuting attorney consider it an open and shut case. Could be bring forth wittiness after witness fact after fact until there was no doubt that you were guilty of being a Christian, or would he have to let you go because there was not enough evidence in your life to convict you. One way or the other, that’s pretty convicting isn’t it?