Walking through James (16)

Bringing in the strays...

Last time we were together, we talked about the power of prayer. I believe that God answers prayer. I believe that God is able to do above and beyond what we can ask or think according to His power that is at work in you and me.

Tonight I’d like to share about our part in bringing people to Christ.

Let’s read our Scripture tonight.

James 5:19–20 NIV

19 My brothers and sisters, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring that person back, 20 remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of their way will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins.

My prayer is that if you have given your life to Jesus Christ that you would remain in His love and that you would not wander from the faith.

There is a song that was written in the 1700’s by Robert Robinson, and here are the words to the 3rd verse of Come Thou fount of every blessing,

“Oh, to grace how great a debtor, Daily I'm constrained to be. Let Thy goodness, like a fetter, Bind my wand'ring heart to Thee. Prone to wander, Lord I feel it; Prone to leave the God I love. Here's my heart; O, take and seal it, Seal it for Thy courts above.”

We have an enemy, an adversary that wants nothing more than to see us walk away from God. He comes to steal, to kill, and to destroy. He wants to discourage us and get us alone. He wants us to believe that we don’t need God.

I don’t know much about sheep, but I know that they are helpless when they get lost.

One thing sheep do is they look for greener pastures. No doubt you have heard the saying that the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.

Sometimes we are like sheep. We can look at our lives and think that other people’s lives are better than ours. We might think that if we could only have a life as good as their’s. Social media sites, like Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, X, and the list can go on, can cause us to want the lives that other people have, and yet we don’t get the whole picture. We see people that are famous. We see the glitz and the glamour. We see the smiles, but we don’t see the despair that others have.

If we aren’t careful, our hearts can be drawn away from God. There can be a lure to be like people who are in the world. It can be a slow fade. It doesn’t necessarily happen at once, but we can become lukewarm and then walk away from our faith in God.

We become like the people we choose to spend our time with. You might think, I can go to the bar, and it won’t affect me. I can gamble a little bit and it won’t affect me, but slowly we slip further and further from God.

Jeremiah 17:9 NKJV

9 “The heart is deceitful above all things, And desperately wicked; Who can know it?

We can be like that 3rd verse in the hymn, “Prone to wander, Lord I feel it, Prone to leave the God I love, Heres my heart Lord, take and seal it, seal it for thy courts above.

If we should wander from the truth, and

someone brings us back...

It can be so easy to write somebody off who has wandered. It can so easy to look down on them than to realize that Jesus is like the shepherd who leaves the 99 sheep in safety and goes looking for the one who has gone astray. And when the shepherd finds the lost sheep, he rejoices.

Many of us have lost things in our lives: Keys, jewelry, game pieces, clothing. A few years ago, I lost a wallet, that one I found, but a few years before that, I lost one in a quarter section. I never found that one. I really didn’t look for it because I didn’t even know where to start.

One time stands out to me. My sister lost her glasses when she got bucked of a horse in an alfalfa field. My dad, our hired man and myself looked and looked and looked until we were ready to give up. We stopped and my dad said that we should pray. When we opened our eyes, our hired man looked down and it was in the middle of where we were standing. we were amazed and it brought us great joy.

Maybe you found a calf that was lost. It brings great joy when the lost is found. Maybe for some of you it was a cat or a dog. Maybe you got a phone call that something that somebody had found what you have lost.

It brings great joy to the Lord when someone who has wandered from the truth, from the faith comes back.

James 5:20 NIV

20 remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of their way will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins.

The first thing that happens when someone comes to Jesus or comes back to the Lord,

They are saved from death...

Romans 6:23 NIV

23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

We are living in uncertain times. We might worry about the tariffs that are going to be put on between the States, China, and Canada. These might be alarming, but there is a tariff that is far more dangerous than one that can be put on from a country.

It is the result of the wages that we earn from sin. The wages of sin is death. Our cost of living might go up, but if we live a life of sin, the wages that we earn is death.

If someone should bring a sinner from the error of their way, they save them from death. When we come to Christ and believe that He died for us, and that He rose from the dead, we are brought from Spiritual death to life.

John 3:16 NIV

16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

Something else also happens,

we cover a multitude of sins.

1 Peter 4:7–8 NIV

7 The end of all things is near. Therefore be alert and of sober mind so that you may pray. 8 Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins.

The Greek word that is used here is agape is the love of God. Jesus shed His blood to cover a multitude of sins. His sacrifice is enough for everyone who has ever lived.

Our sin requires the death penalty, but instead of you and me having to pay for our sins, God demonstrates His own love for us that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Here’s the catch. The payment has been made. No other payment can ever be made for our sin. We can’t do enough good things to pay for it. There’s not enough money in the world that can pay for it, but God who is rich in mercy.

We have to receive it. If we refuse, we are still dead in our sins.

This is where you and I come in, God wants us to bring others to Him. Some have never heard, and some have heard and have wandered away. Will you go in the power of the Holy Spirit and tell others that have never heard the message of the cross? Will you go and bring people back who have wandered?

Let’s pray!

Maybe there is somebody here tonight that you have asked Jesus into your heart, but you just want to know that you know. I want to pray for you tonight. Maybe there is somebody who has never believed that Jesus has died for your sins.

Romans 10:9–10 NIV

9 If you declare with your mouth, “Jesus is Lord,” and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For it is with your heart that you believe and are justified, and it is with your mouth that you profess your faith and are saved.