James 1:16-18 Sermon

Introduction

Have you ever received a great gift?

Have you ever received a bad gift?

Have you ever received a gift that you thought was bad but later realized was good?

Have you ever experienced something that you thought was terrible but later realized God was using for your good?

Example: After losing my job in 2018, I applied to seven different churches and was denied a job at every one. I wondered, is God angry at me or something? So I stopped looking for a job at a church and reenrolled at Western Seminary to finish my masters degree. Illustration: Socks

Illustration: Socks

I think most of us are certainly tending toward viewing our present circumstances as distinctly “bad,” and obviously in some ways they are! But is it also possible that this current season will actually end up being good in some really important ways?

Some people, wrongly I think, are saying that God has cursed our world with the coronavirus because he is angry. I suppose that could be true, but perhaps we should ask a different question. Is there a way in which we might actually view this season as a gift from God because he loves us? Now, I’m certainly not downplaying the difficulty, sorrow, and pain present in many peoples lives because of what is going on. But nonetheless, might we look for ways that God desires to help us, teach us, bless us and ultimately do us good through this season?

Recap of previous week

Blessing comes through trials, because God uses trials for our good, and he will give the crown of life to the one who has remained steadfast through trial

But trials can also bring temptation because trials can cause us to doubt God’s goodness and to be afraid

We should not say that God is the one tempting us

James 1:16–18 ESV

16 Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers. 17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change. 18 Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.

I. God is the Father who gives good gifts to his children

James 1:16–17 ESV

16 Do not be deceived, my beloved brothers. 17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.

God is the giver of good gifts

Everything God gives is good

James is alluding Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount

Matthew 7:7–11 ESV

7 “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. 9 Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? 11 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!

Sometimes we don’t understand how what God has given us could be perceived as “good”

Sometimes we don’t see how what God gave us is good

Of course you can’t see! Your heavenly Father understands things that you don’t understand.

He is c

Parents often do things that their kids don’t understand because they see something that their kids don’t see - they understand the importance of a certain experience or lesson that a kid doesn’t understand

Illustration: I never understood as a kid why my parents always gave me socks for Christmas - I thought it was a terrible gift! But in reality, there is nothing in the world quite like putting on a brand new pair of socks! Socks in fact are an excellent gift that I once thought was a bad gift.

Some circumstances we come across are good even while they are bad

To acknowledge an ultimate good does not have to downplay the bad

God does not delight in your pain, nor does he desire for you to be tempted to evil

But he does delight in you becoming more like Jesus

Sometimes the purpose and end of something is good even while the pain it causes on the way is bad - we have to learn to hold these things in tension

Every good gift is ultimately from God

Matthew 7:7–11 ESV

7 “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. 9 Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? 11 If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!

Mathew 7:7-11

Everything good in the world is ultimately from God - again, James does not want us to be deceived into thinking that good exists in the world somehow apart from God

He is picking up a theme we find way back in the Torah, in

Deuteronomy 8:7–18 ESV

7 For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing out in the valleys and hills, 8 a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey, 9 a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity, in which you will lack nothing, a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper. 10 And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you. 11 “Take care lest you forget the Lord your God by not keeping his commandments and his rules and his statutes, which I command you today, 12 lest, when you have eaten and are full and have built good houses and live in them, 13 and when your herds and flocks multiply and your silver and gold is multiplied and all that you have is multiplied, 14 then your heart be lifted up, and you forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery, 15 who led you through the great and terrifying wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions and thirsty ground where there was no water, who brought you water out of the flinty rock, 16 who fed you in the wilderness with manna that your fathers did not know, that he might humble you and test you, to do you good in the end. 17 Beware lest you say in your heart, ‘My power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth.’ 18 You shall remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you power to get wealth, that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your fathers, as it is this day.

The people of Israel are about to enter a land

Moses knows they will be tempted to believe that their success and wealth will come because of their own strength, skill, insight and hard work

He warns them to “take care lest you forget...”, “beware lest you say in your heart, ‘my power and the might of my hand have gotten me this wealth,’”

Why? Because they should remember “the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the power to get wealth, that he may confirm his covenant that he swore to your fathers, as it is this day.”

Paul then picks up this theme in , where he challenges his readers - “what do you have that you did not receive? If then you received it, why do you boast as if you did not receive it?”

Do not be deceived…every good gift and every perfect gift comes down from the Father

Application: Humility nothing that we have ultimately belongs to us

Not our possessions

Not our intelligence, skill, wisdom or insight

Not my sphere of influence, platform, leadership or authority

Illustration: Be careful how you assert yourself in this house

Sometimes I remind Gwen that everything she has is a gift of grace, and nothing actually belongs to her

Then I’m humbled and convicted because I hear the voice of God saying to me, “Brian, let me remind you that everything you have is a gift of grace, and nothing actually belongs to you.”

Be careful about lacking generosity and hoarding things for yourself, because ultimately nothing belongs to you

God is the Father of lights

James uses an interesting phrase that’s used nowhere else in the Bible - the “Father of lights” - what does this mean?

“Lights” here is the Greek word photon, and it usually refers to lights in the sky like the sun, moon and stars. So why does James use this phrase? He wants to say two really important things about God as the good Father who gives good gifts - he wants to emphasize his power and his faithfulness. How does this work?

God’s power is displayed in the fact that he is the creator of the heavens and the earth, the sun, moon and stars

The one who spoke the stars into existence is certainly capable of giving good gifts to his children

The point? We need not doubt God’s great ability to work all things out for our ultimate good

God’s faithfulness is displayed in the fact that he does not change as creation does

The words for “variation” and “change” refer to the movements of cosmic bodies - the rising and falling of the sun, the phases of the moon, the movement of the stars

James is saying that God does not change like they do - he doesn’t shift from light to dark as the moon does, he doesn’t change position as the stars do, he doesn’t rise and fall as the sun does

The point? We need not doubt God’s good intent toward us - he is not for us one day and against us the next - in Christ, God is for us!

No matter what you are going through right now, God is the majestic, unchanging, ever faithful Father who gives you good gifts for your ultimate joy and not for your ultimate harm.

Which means that even while we lament the pain, suffering and difficulty of a global pandemic, we also look to God with hope that he is even in this situation giving a good gift for our ultimate joy

That’s a tough pill to swallow, I know, but for Christians, we can believe this because this is exactly what was happening in death of Jesus.

The cross was in one sense the darkest moment in human history, when the sinless and innocent Son of God was crucified by godless men not for his own sin but for the sin of all humanity - the cross was the moment of most excruciating pain and suffering

And yet, in the cross God was giving the greatest gift possible - his Son. In the cross, we need look no further for proof of God’s generosity and faithfulness.

It’s no surprise that in talking about God’s good gifts, James immediately moves to the greatest example of God’s faithfulness and generosity: the gospel.

James 1:18 ESV

18 Of his own will he brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.

II. The greatest gift God has given is Jesus

God has brought us forth by the word of truth

“Brought us forth” is actually a phrase that refers to birth - God has brought about a new birth for us

Reminiscent of Jesus’ words to Nicodemus in , “Truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.”

God has done that for us in Christ

“the word of truth” is James’ way of saying the gospel - the truth about the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus

Through receiving Jesus in his crucifixion, death, and resurrection, we are born new and transformed

God gives new birth by

God intends that we be a “kind of firstfruits of his creatures”

First-fruits refers to a prototype of a coming reality, a picture of a future that is certain but has not yet arrived

Jesus’ resurrection is referred to as a type of “first fruits” - that is, his resurrection is a foretaste of the kind of life giving power that will one day renew, restore and remake all of creation

Here James says that God intends that we be a kind of first fruits

That in our lives others see a foretaste of the kingdom of Jesus

That our lives are a reflection of the life of Jesus

Douglas Moo in his entry in the Pillar New Testament Commentary, describes it like this: “God’s grace has been extended through the gospel so as to bring into existence a foretaste, or down payment (firstfruits), of a redemptive plan that will eventually encompass all of creation.”

This is huge, because it means that we are not simply living in light of future hope in the sense that we are passively waiting for that future hope

Rather, we live today as pictures of that future hope.

We are not just waiting for God to redeem all of creation, we ourselves are to live our lives as pictures of God’s redemptive power that will one day be seen in all of creation.

All of this to say that other people should see hope for the future not only in the text of the scriptures but also displayed in the lives of God’s people.

Application:

We should live our lives in response to God’s greatest gift - his Son

Our lives should be a picture of the future hope of the gospel

Particularly, people should see in us a picture of the same kind of generosity and grace we have received in Jesus

As we have received good gifts from God, may we be people who freely give to others

It can be tempting to believe in a time like this, its time to be less generous and make sure we have enough for ourselves

But this is the time of greatest opportunity to reflect the character of Jesus by giving generously to those around us

If your neighbors are in need, help them!

Shepherds house is in desperate need of donations of food, as they have been handing out food and continually running out

The greatest gift you can give someone is the gospel

The news that Jesus lived a sinless life on their behalf and died in their place as a sacrifice for their sin

That through receiving him in faith and trust they are born again, reconciled to God, adopted into his family, empowered by the Holy Spirit, and destined for eternal life

Don’t be deceived, my beloved brothers and sisters. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.