Trials are Good for You

Sanctification or Sin

(James 1:13-17)

Intro

Today I am going to take you back to a childhood memory. Amusement park? Nope. Baseball game? Nope. Camping? Not even close. Today we’re going to the dentist to have some cavities filled and our teeth cleaned.

Imagine the anticipation you felt all week waiting for the day of the appointment. Eagerly asking, “are we there yet?” as the car slowly backs out of the driveway. You count the minutes as you fidget excitedly until you arrive. The car barely rolls to a stop in the parking lot before you explode out of the car, racing to waiting room. It seems forever before your name is called. You walk back excitedly as the dental assistant drapes the apron over you, pulls out tools and begin to scrape tarter away from your teeth. How happy you were when the doctor filled up the silver syringe with novocaine, telling you “now you are going to feel a slight pinch” before injecting the numbing agent in your gums before bringing out the drill.

Your stunned silence and likely memories of the smell of burning teeth give me a sense the previous description does not match your experience at all.

The end result of clean teeth, healthier gums, and arrested tooth decay, all wonderous benefits of modern dentistry, do not change the fact that most of you still hate going to the dentist. In fact as the dreaded day of the appointment approaches, I suspect most of you trudge to the car, shuffle into the office, and wait white knuckled in the chair until the dentist and dental assistant are done tormenting you.

The nodding heads reveal I am not that far off the truth. Now let me ask you this question. As you cling white knuckled to your life as you suffer through various difficulties, do you also have the mindset that this is something you must endure until God is done tormenting you?

Let’s open our bibles to James 1:13-17. Here we read:

“13 Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone. 14 But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. 15 Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. 16 Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. 17 Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.”

We see here in James 1:13-17, the author explains three facts about trials so that you have the proper perspective regarding them.

1. God is Holy

2. Man is Sinful

3. Trials are good for you

Let’s do a quick flyover of the first 12 verses of James 1 to set the stage for today’s text.

James writes this letter to Jewish believers scattered by persecution. After his brief introduction, James encourages them in verses 2-4 to find joy in suffering for it fortifies and strengthens faith.

In versus 5-8, he continues with an encouragement to pray confidently to the Lord for wisdom because he will grant it to the believer who seeks it.

In verses 9-12, he reminds both the poor and rich believer that their current state of financial affairs should not be their focus. All who are in the faith are to focus instead on Jesus’ promise of everlasting life to those who are purified by trials and stand for the truth to the end.

This brings us to today’s text.

I. God is Holy

James writes, “13 Let no one say when he is tempted, ‘I am being tempted by God’; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone.”

This verse talks to three aspects of temptation.

a. Excuse regarding temptation

b. God Cannot be Tempted

c. God Does not Tempt

a. Excuse regarding temptation

We are so accustomed to excuses. We’ve heard them and we’ve made them. Reader’s Digest has compiled some good ones. “The dog ate my homework”, “I am late to work because a crow took my car keys”, and this gem, “I couldn’t come in to work today, I had a 112 degree fever” (105 merits a visit to the ER).

Blaming God for your sin is no laughing matter.

The Greek verb for “tempted” here is, πειράζω, (pay RA tso) which is a present, passive, singular verb form. It means “to entice to improper behavior,” James cautions the reader against the suggestion that God is the source of the temptation and the person tempted bears no responsibility.

Why is that. Look at the next phrase.

b. God Cannot be Tempted

This is contrasted by the statement that “God cannot be tempted by evil.” The Greek word is ἀπείραστος, (ah PAY ras tos). It is defined as “without temptation, either active=one who does not tempt, or passive=one who cannot be tempted”. In this case, it is the latter due to the particle δέ which links “God cannot be tempted” to the prepositional phrase, “by evil”.

This fits well with the definition of holiness found in Wayne Grudem’s text on Systematic theology. Grudem writes, “God’s holiness means that he is separated from sin and devoted to seeking His own honor.” God is without sin, above sin, separate from sin, and immune to sin. We see this holiness of God all through the bible.

In Exodus 19-20, God speaks to Moses and the people, directing them to consecrate themselves so they may approach, but not touch the holy mountain, lest they die. The awesome holiness of God so impacted the Israelites, they cried out in verse 19, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen; but let not God speak to us, or we will die.” 20 Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid; for God has come in order to test you, and in order that the fear of Him may remain with you, so that you may not sin.”

God directs His people to worship Him and to be holy as He is holy (Leviticus 19:2)

God directed the Sabbath be set aside as a holy day of worship. He directed that Aaron and His sons be properly consecrated, attired, and reverential in their worship of the Lord in the tabernacle because they were in the presence of a holy God (Leviticus 8).

We are to be reverential to God because He is perfectly holy, blameless and without sin.

This is seen in the decalogue, the ten commandments. God gives to Moses instructions, or commandments regarding man’s vertical relationship with God.

Exodus 20:2-11

2 “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of [a]slavery.

3 “You shall have no other gods [b]before Me.

4 “You shall not make for yourself [c]an idol, or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water under the earth. 5 You shall not worship them or serve them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children, on the third and the fourth generations of those who hate Me, 6 but showing lovingkindness to thousands, to those who love Me and keep My commandments.

7 “You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord will not [d]leave him unpunished who takes His name in vain.

8 “Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9 Six days you shall labor and do all your work, 10 but the seventh day is a sabbath of the Lord your God; in it you shall not do any work, you or your son or your daughter, your male or your female servant or your cattle or your sojourner who [e]stays with you. 11 For in six days the Lord made the heavens and the earth, the sea and all that is in them, and rested on the seventh day; therefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day and made it holy.

God takes the holiness of His name and His holy reputation very seriously. Those who do not will be held to account before the judgement. There have been times in biblical history, where God made an example of those who were disrespectful to His commands, and thought little of His holiness.

Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, were set aside and consecrated, along with their father, to serve God in the tabernacle. Leviticus 8 and 9 go into great detail explaining what had to be done to cleanse them ceremonially so sinful men could serve in the tabernacle of the Lord.

Leviticus 10:1 – 3

10 Now Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took their respective firepans, and after putting fire in them, placed incense on it and offered strange fire before the Lord, which He had not commanded them. 2 And fire came out from the presence of the Lord and consumed them, and they died before the Lord.

That seems to be very harsh. In reality, it actually reflects our lack of understanding of how holy God is. Remember, Isaiah in Isaiah 6 cursed himself because in the presence of God, his sinfulness was revealed compared to the immeasurable holiness of God. In Revelation 1:17 John saw the resurrected Christ and, “fell at his feet like a dead man.” Before the one who sees all things, knows all things, and is perfectly holy we can only fall at his feet in awe and terror because of our sin.

c. God does not Tempt

To suggest that God is not holy, that he tolerates sin or looks the other way is to indicate that God has changed. It is paint Him as capricious, malicious, and unholy.

To blame God for temptation, and suggesting that He is tempting someone to sin is to suggest that God has lied. Where have we heard this before? This deceipt is first seen in the garden of Eden.

Genesis 3:1 – 17

3 Now the serpent was more crafty than any beast of the field which the Lord God had made. And he said to the woman, “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?” 2 The woman said to the serpent, “From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat; 3 but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat from it or touch it, or you will die.’” 4 The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die! 5 For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.” 6 When the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was desirable to make one wise, she took from its fruit and ate; and she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate. 7 Then the eyes of both of them were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made themselves loin coverings.

8 They heard the sound of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and the man and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden. 9 Then the Lord God called to the man, and said to him, “Where are you?” 10 He said, “I heard the sound of You in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; so I hid myself.” 11 And He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?” 12 The man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me from the tree, and I ate.” 13 Then the Lord God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?” And the woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”

Walk through the doubt the serpent introduced, the sin, then the blame.

This really gets to the heart of the matter. As we saw in our first point, God is Holy. We can’t make the excuse that God tempted us because God cannot be tempted by evil and God cannot tempt others. So where does this temptation come from? Our second point. Man is sinful.

II. Man is Sinful

We see this in the next couple of verses. “14 But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. 15 Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death.”

Where an excuse proposes the idea a temptation leads to a rash, thoughtless action, James shows this is not the case.

Each of us has a sin nature. Because of the fall, each one of us comes forth from the womb speaking lies. Paul cites Psalm 14:3 when he writes in Romans 3,

“There is none righteous, not even one; 11 There is none who understands, There is none who seeks for God; 12 All have turned aside, together they have become useless; There is none who does good, There is not even one.”

In our natural state we are dead in our transgressions and sins (Ephesians 2:5, Colossians 2:13) until God through the Holy

Spirit transforms our dead heart of stone into a living heart of flesh (Ezek 36:26). We do have a freedom of choice, but until we are given a new life, we always choose rebellion and sin. This then is really the heart of the matter.

“14 But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust.”

We see here that this is an individual temptation. The Greek for “enticed” is, δελεάζω (de le ADZ o). This is is a verb form of the word used for “bait”. It means, “to lure by the use of bait.” For those of you who fish, you know different types of bait attract different fish. A well tied fly may work well for a trout, but won’t for a catfish. I’m told that hot dogs are best for a catfish.

This makes sense. It is easy to “tsk, tsk, tsk” when someone we know or know of fall into sin. “I’d never do that” you may think to yourself. That may be. But there is a sin you fight against. Just like Superman in the comics was all but invincible, he became weak and sickly when exposed to Kryptonite. In our lives each one of us has different sins we struggle with, that we are weak against. Some are susceptible to greed, others lust. James uses a fishing or trapping metaphor to indicate that each of us are drawn by different sins.

Just like a fish drawn to bait, there is a point in time when the fish either swims away, or takes the bait. This is where the hook is set, and like the fish, the person is “carried away”, ἐξέλκω (ex EL ko).

Like the fish, we can flee the bait. Paul exhorts us in

1 Corinthians 10:13

“no temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it.”

God always gives us a way out! Yet, our fallen flesh fights against the word of God. The progression of sin then is further described in verse 15,

“15 Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death.”

James uses pregnancy language because it is familiar to all of us. Many of us are parents, have nieces and nephews, maybe even a few grand kiddos running about. Children are a delight, a blessed gift from God. James uses a familiar experience to help us understand the insidious process of sin.

But, this language helps be illustrating the the progression from thought, to action, to consequence. God in His mercy often allows time to pass between thought and deed. Just as carnal lust can lead to conception, then after a time, the birth of a child, sinful actions usually involve some thought, and take planning, and time to bring to fruition. Paul’s encouragement in 1 Corinthians reminds us that there is time to flee and repent between the thought and the deed. On the other hand, patterns of unrepentant sin in life eventually end up in death; sometimes in physical death, always in spiritual death.

III. Trials are Good for You

To recap: We saw #1 God is Holy, and #2, man is sinful. What then was the reader to make of James’ warning against blaming God for trials? How are we to respond to the myriad difficulties and sufferings in our lives?

Rejoice! What? Yes, rejoice. Remember James 1:2-4? “2 Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, 3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. 4 And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”

James is comparing the proper response to trials with the improper response to trials. In James 1:2-4, responding correctly to trials leads to endurance. That endurance has its perfect result. What is the perfect result? Sanctification. Growing in the image of Christ. How so? By turning in faith to the one true and living God who loves His children with an unfathomable love when things are at their worst.

The recipients of James’ letter were the Jewish believers scattered by the persecution of the Jerusalem church. Some had fared well in their new homes. Others lost everything. All were facing trials of various severity. James was encouraging them to turn to Christ and place there trust in Him, for there is no other hope.

Tempered steel blades are heated in a furnace, hammered into shape, rapidly cooled in oil, then returned to the furnace. Only the blade that survives the process can be trusted in battle. Trials temper our faith in Christ. As believers we can trust our faith is genuine by our increased trust and obedience in Christ as we endure the trials of life.

We know this is true from past trials we have endured. Accidents. Injuries. Broken relationships. Many times we reacted sinfully, lashing out at others or God. Many other times, we relied on our faith, turned to God, and relied on His providence to see us through. Now it is past, we are able to show compassion and patience with others who are in the same situation.

We can have confidence that even if greater troubles or chronic trials come our way, even when we are facing death, our God is faithful. We can trust in His promises to help us through, to help us endure, and for that we can offer Him our thanksgiving and praise.

IV. Conclusion

Life is filled with pain. When we face trials, will we be sanctified by them, or will we fall into sin? For the believer take hope. Our God is quick to forgive His children. Turn to Him. Trust in His promises. Pray and find comfort in His word. When you sin, repent.

For those outside the kingdom the outcome is far different. There is no choice. In every trial you face, you will sin. Even turning from sinful activity is done out of a fear of exposure, punishment, or selfish pride. Isaiah 64:6 states, “And all our righteous deeds are like a filthy garment; And all of us wither like a leaf, And our iniquities, like the wind, take us away.”

There is no pleasing God outside obedience to Christ. John 14:15 is abundantly clear. Jesus said to His disciples, “If you love me, you will keep my commandments”. That is obedience to the whole counsel of scripture.

Friends, aren’t we tired? Do the troubles of this life weigh us down? Medical issues? Financial issues? Relational issues? Time issues? Do we not all grow weary of our struggles? We’d love to unload our burdens and not have to suffer. Often we want to know why we are suffering and who is responsible. When we can’t point a finger horizontally, we are tempted to point it vertically.

Would you take a moment and consider that this suffering has been permitted by a holy God, to help a sinful person pause, think, and look to Him? Would you repent of any and all sin in your life, and ask him to give you relief or strength to endure? Would look to the Father for comfort? Would you ponder the good that can come from your difficult situation?

I bet you can still remember sitting in that dentist’s chair; so loud, so scary, so painful as the dental hygienist is scraping away at your teeth, digging away beneath your gums, deafening you with the suctioning sound of the tube sucking away the spit so you don’t choke on it. The pressure and the dull pain of the drill as the dentist removes the cavities in your teeth before he fills it. When it was over, how many times did you bite your cheek or tongue waiting for the feeling to come back.

It wasn’t a pleasant experience. It hurt! Why would your parents do that to you?

Did you give them a hug and thank them? Did you stop and say, “thank you mom, thank you dad for that fine dental care. Thank you for preventing something much worse from happening to my teeth and gums”? Or did you sit in the back seat and scowl, perhaps say something mean? Your parents didn’t do this to punish you. They didn’t do this to watch you suffer. Your parents loved you enough to do what you didn’t want or like, because in the end you were better for it. God does this too.

Paul reminds us in Romans 8:28 - 29, “God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.”

God loves you far more than your parents ever could. In His providence Our Holy God has orchestrated everything, good or bad, to reshape us sinful people. And those difficulties are good for you.

Far more than a dentist trip providing us a healthy smile, our suffering provides us healthy trust in God.

Let’s pray…