and who gave us His righteousness
before you. And so as we open your word tonight
and as we continue to learn, Lord, I pray for our church.
I pray for our family. I pray that each one of us would
be patient, that we would listen, that we would not think so much
about everything, Lord, that we would just be concerned about
being prayerful for one another, Lord, that we would take time
out to be in your word, that we might grow in the knowledge
of grace. And as we continue in this letter tonight, Father,
I thank you for the gift that it is to us, your people. to
whom you have given to Jesus Christ your Son. In His name,
Amen. Well, let's turn to James chapter
1 and read together the first few verses. Verse 18 again. James,
a servant of God and the Lord Jesus Christ to the twelve tribes
in the dispersion. Greetings. Count it all joy,
my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know
that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let
steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete,
lacking in nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, let
him ask God, who gives generously to all without reproach, and
it will be given him. But let him ask in faith, with
no doubting, For the one who doubts is like a wave of the
sea that is driven and tossed by the wind, for that person
must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord.
He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. Let the lowly
brother boast in his exaltation, and the rich in his humiliation,
because like a flower of the grass he will pass away. For
the sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass, its
flower falls and its beauty perishes. So also will the rich man fade
away in the midst of his pursuits. Blessed is the man who remains
steadfast under trial, for when he has stood the test, he will
receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who
love him. Let no one say when he is tempted, I am being tempted
by God, for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts
no one. But each person is tempted when
he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire, when
it is conceived, giveth birth to sin, and when sin, when it
is fully grown, brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my
beloved brothers. 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. Of His
will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we should
be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures." All right, there's
a lot there. Remember, I have divided the
letter into four different categories. The first category being trials
unto maturity. The second category being maturity
into love in the midst of trials. The third category being love
with trials with each other. In other words, we have trials
within the church. And then fourthly and finally,
and I have a fifth one, but I'll save it to the end. Fourth main
division is living with each other in the world, being not
of the world, with eyes that look to the sovereignty of God.
And I know these are not succinct little things and they change
from week to week in wording or order. but this is the crux
of what we're doing. We're going to continue for the
first 18 verses over the next month or so to look at what James
is instructing, to listen so that we may be complete, because
this is what he's telling us. Over in verses 2 through 4, it
says, "'Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet various
trials, trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing
of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its
full effect, that you may be perfect. and complete, lacking
in nothing. So with that, we've gone over
that the last few weeks, we know that James is saying that all
the trials, as we look all the way up to verse 17, are part
of God's good and perfect gift. And all of the trials that we
experience are to teach us steadfastness and to test and produce steadfastness
in our faith. What does that faith look to?
Faith looks to Christ Jesus. Faith always looks to the promises
and the proclamation of God concerning redemption in Christ for His
elect. So then as steadfast, fastness
has its full effect, we become perfect and complete, lacking
in nothing. And that is just a recapitulation
in sequence that James uses there to say we'll be made perfect.
Now this is not a perfection in this life. This is not a sinlessness.
This means that we are lacking in nothing. We have everything.
It reiterates that or it is similar to that which Paul says over
in Ephesians chapter 1 when he says, blessed be the God and
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ who has blessed us in Christ
with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. Then
giving that description as he has chose us in him before the
foundation of the world that we should be holy and blameless
before him. In love he predestined us for
adoption to himself as sons through Christ Jesus according to the
purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which
he has blessed us and the beloved. In him we have the redemption
through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, of our trespasses according
to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom
and all insight, making known to us the mystery of his will
according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan
for the fullness of time, to unite all things in Him, things
in heaven, and things on earth." And so when we hear these two
apostles speak, they are definitely congruent. They are cohesive.
They are holding fast to the gospel of free and sovereign
grace. They are not waving to and from and placating to the
to the nature of humanity but they are proclaiming the reality
of God's power and salvation. Now last week we talked about
several things in regard to joy resting in the fact that Jesus
stands in his promises. We talked about joy in the midst
of trials and that what steadfastness looks like. We talked about the
opposite of steadfastness and that we oftentimes just want
to throw our hands up and quit because of the trials of life
because we fail to trust in the Lord As we've trusted in Him
by His own gift to believe that Christ is sufficient for our
salvation, for our righteousness, we in the same type of faith
given by the Father are to trust in His promises in the day-to-day
provisions of life, and most importantly, in the trials of
life. And the reason that we want to
quit is because it's the natural thing to do. But the reason that
we don't quit is because God is sovereign in keeping us. He
holds us. He does not let us go. He cannot let us go. He has given
us to His Son so that in that we are perfected by the power
of God. So we're still in this mindset
of understanding that trials build maturity, build growing,
build steadfastness, which is completeness. And then the next
very simple question is, how am I supposed to understand this?
How am I supposed to apply this? What is it in my life that I'm
supposed to know or do in order to obey the command, in verse
four, let steadfastness have its full effect. In the midst
of trials, rejoice that you may be perfect and complete, lacking
in nothing. And so if you look at verse five, I think James
answers that question for us. What are we supposed to do? We're
supposed to seek wisdom. Now the word wisdom has been
thrown around in every culture throughout the history of humanity.
No matter where you look, whether it be in atheist annals or the
annals of world religion or the cults or evangelical cults or
whatever it may be or philosophers or the like, you will always
find the idea of wisdom. And wisdom in a simple sense
can be defined culturally pretty much holistically in every culture. Wisdom is knowing what to do. Wisdom is knowing what to do.
Now that's a practical sense because we also know that Paul
says that Christ is our wisdom. Christ is our wisdom. So there's
a spiritual sense in which wisdom makes no sense pragmatically.
There's a spiritual sense in which Christ as our wisdom makes
no sense in any application. Because it's not about what we
do, it's about who Christ is and what he's accomplished for
us. So that is the foundation, that is the top, that is the
bread pieces of holding together the sandwich of life. Is that
Christ is our wisdom, he is our righteousness. He is everything. All things have been given to
Him. We have been given to Him and He has laid down His life
for us and credited to our account before the Father of righteousness
and the Father of justice and the Father of wrath, His righteousness.
So what kind of wisdom are we looking for then? Well, there's
a specific context. James is talking specifically
about the wisdom in the trials of life. Not the wisdom about
every little thing, what shoes to put on, what hairstyle to
go with. I mean, I don't necessarily think those things take wisdom,
though wisdom is a part of that. Because we know that certain
types of clothing, certain types of hair, certain types of things
can mess up a particular, or can impact, not necessarily mess
up, but can impact culturally certain elements of our lives.
I mean, if I tattoo a nude person on my face, then I probably won't
be customer service front line. However, you know, times are
changing. Who knows? But that takes wisdom. But that's not the wisdom James
is talking about, though it certainly is salt in the same manner. The
wisdom here is how do I steadfast under trials? How am I supposed
to rejoice in the midst of suffering? What particular suffering? Well,
there are three types of suffering that James will talk about. The
suffering that comes from being just part of the world. Well,
four now. Just being part of the world. Because of the Fall,
all things and all living creatures are subject to the Fall. Subject
to sin, subject to suffering. So as human beings, we're going
to be subject to suffering. We have good days, we have bad
days, we have healthy days, we have unhealthy days, we have joyful
days, we have depressing days, and it's going to always be.
But secondly, these Christians here, these Jewish people who
were in Christ, they were suffering because of Christ. They were
suffering because they were identified being in Christ. They had forsaken
and walked away from Judaism completely. The way of life,
the culture, the impact of what it had, everything that was just
a shadow of the gospel. These people had been given eyes
to see that it was a dead work. It was not righteousness, but
that Christ alone, all these things pointed to Him as the
fulfillment of God's righteous promise of eternal life to the
elect. It wasn't about being Jewish. It was about being in
Christ. And so because of that, these Christians were suffering
greatly. They had been removed from their
homes. They had lost their families. They had been ostracized from
their businesses. They had been ostracized from their communities,
from their state, from their country. They were hated by the
government. They were hated by their neighbors.
They were hated by other religions. They were sought after and killed
by other leaders of certain Provinces and etc. And so they were really
just hanging out in the wilderness moving from place to place to
escape persecution. So that's the second type of
trial that they had. The third type of trial that these people
had were the trial of the internal trials. The internal trials of
their own mind. The depression. The fear, the
doubt, the things that all of us sort of stick around with
internally, but when somebody says, how's it going? Oh, everything's
great. Everything's fine. Oh, it's awesome. We love to thumbs up
the world, but in reality, that thumb is sticking us in the eye.
So we have these internal sufferings. We suffer, we know that we have
lost a lot of things because of Christ, but we also understand
that it is joyful as the one who finds the treasure in the
field and covers it up quickly and goes with joy and sells all
that he has so that he might come by the field for the priceless
treasure that he has found. That is what God gives us. understanding
and comparison to the world and all of its treasures and everything
that we could have and all the relationships that we have, though
they are very dear to us, and the comparison of who Christ
is and what he has given to us, all those things are nothing.
But it is still a trial. It's not easy. It's not like
we just stand up and go, And the fourth type of trial is the
trial within the body itself. The trial between two believers,
different types of believers, different types of personalities,
different types, and I'm saying different types of Gospels, but
I'm saying different types of personalities, different ideologies,
different philosophical ways of looking at things, different
approaches to logic, different attitudes toward different types
of people. That's specifically one of the
things that James deals with, people who felt like they were
better in a sense than other people because of their stature
in life. Though they were all together in the dispersion. They
were all together as objects of mercy when Christ died on
the cross. They were all one body, one bride. God is not a
polygamous. He takes one bride, that's it.
Gives it to his son. So these are the trials. These
are the types of trials that take place. And all sorts of
trials. I think every trial that we could
experience falls into one of those categories. So the question
is, how am I to stay joyful and steadfast in all these types
of trials? What about the fear of even the
unknown? Well, it takes wisdom, doesn't it? What am I to do?
How am I to act? What am I to say? How am I to
answer? Where am I to go? How long should
I endure? To what end am I to turn the
other cheek? There's always a question, and the word of God teaches us
that this wisdom is ours for the asking. It teaches us that
it is concerning specifically wisdom of how to remain steadfast
in trials because we are not just naturally or even supernaturally
granted wisdom. We don't wake up in the morning
and go, poof, I know exactly what I need to do. Oh my goodness,
I wish people would just ask me and I'll tell them how they
should handle things. Some people have that mindset.
They are wrong. But this wisdom comes in several
ways. First, we need to see here is
what James says, if any of you lacks wisdom, because not all
the times in every trial do we lack wisdom. We have been given
wisdom for some things, but there may be some other things that
we lack wisdom. We don't have the will. We don't know what
to do. What am I supposed to do? The Bible says, if you lack wisdom,
if any one of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God. Let him ask
God. I mean, how do we ask God? We
pray. So wisdom is given through prayer.
And I'm gonna talk about 10 or 11, 12, maybe 12 things, top
of my head. I'm thinking, yeah, about 12 things, maybe more,
that come in the context of God-given wisdom and how it is received
and how it is understood. But here, the simple instruction
is this. I don't know what to do. Lord, help me have wisdom. I need to know. Father, empower
me. Lord, give me the path." Now,
the other part of that is we ask God and we do that through
prayer, but how does God answer our prayers? How does God specifically
give us the detailed answer of how to deal with certain things?
What's the first answer? the Word of God. The Spirit of
God does not work outside the Word of God, for the Word of
God is living and breathing. The Spirit of God is the one
who operates in the illuminating of the Word to the people of
God. The Spirit of the Lord is the one who grants faith. The
Spirit of the Lord is the one who gives wisdom. And the Word
of God is the source of that wisdom. So we pray, then we read. We pray, and then we read. We
pray, and then we seek the Scripture. But you know what a lot of our
prayers are? A lot of our prayers are Google searches. We're praying
to the God of all the world around the Internet, rather than to
the God of Scripture. I need to know what to do here,
let me Google the circumstances. Where in the Bible does it say,
how do I handle this? Where in the Bible does it say, what am
I supposed to do here? And what you end up with is a bunch of
blogs, and a bunch of weblogs, and a bunch of videos of other
people's opinion on what God has shown them to do in certain
circumstances, and you are not receiving the Spirit of God's
wisdom. It is not of God, even if God gave them the answer,
it is not the answer He's given you. Because the answer must
come from Scripture. The peace must come by being
in Scripture. So we ask God and He gives it
by the Word. But there's a way in which God
gives wisdom. Look at what James says, the
latter part of verse 5. God gives generously to all who
ask without reproach. So let's read that in together.
If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives generously
to all without reproach, and it will be given him. So here is the manner in which
God gives wisdom. It comes from the Word. That's
a given. If we want to debate that, I have no time for that
debate because the scripture is all needed, all we need. in the context of that. So that
our relationships as the body of Christ, when we seek counsel
from one another, it needs to be contextual counsel. It needs
to be, this is what the Word of God says here. This is how
the scripture teaches us here. And all the New Testament letters
give us wisdom on how to handle certain things. James is going
to give, by the Spirit of God, wisdom to these Jews, to these
Christians, who were lacking wisdom in every aspect of their
lives. They're living Notoriously. And they are not doing that which
is pleasing to the Lord. And He's going to correct them.
And He's going to give them wisdom. He's going to give them wisdom.
So this wisdom is given by God through prayer from the Word. And this wisdom is what will
give us joyful steadfastness. Then we will lack nothing. We
won't be wondering, what are we supposed to do? We will not
lack in this. But he gives generously. Now
what is generously? What does generously mean? Hey
dad, can I have a little bit of money? Just take all the money.
It's, you know, and you might think, well, that was sort of
odd that you read so much of the first chapter of Ephesians there.
Well, I got a whole lot of other first chapters to read. I mean,
I could read all certain, a lot of things, and I will before
I'm done tonight. I'll just go to 2 Timothy, I'll go to Philippians
1, 1 Thessalonians, James chapter 3. I mean, let's go over there
to James chapter 3 real quick. Look at this, verse 13. James
asks some questions, doesn't he? He said, who is wise and
understanding among you? Who is it? And then he answers,
by his good conduct let him show his works in the meekness of
wisdom. So there's some illustrative
things about wisdom and one of them, and this is not today's
sermon, it's a couple of months away, but one of them is meekness.
But if you have a bitter jealousy, what's the antithesis of meek
wisdom? If you have bitter jealousy, selfish ambition in your hearts,
do not boast and be false to the truth. This is not the wisdom
that comes from above. It is earthly. It is unspiritual. It is, and this is where I get
this all the time, and people say, you're being too harsh.
It is demonic, James says. For where jealousy and selfish
ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice. But the wisdom from above is
pure, then peaceable, then gentle, open to reason, full of grace
and good fruits, impartial and sincere, and a harvest of righteousness
is sown in peace by those who make peace." See, there's the
answer. There's the sermon. We're done.
Let's go. That's the answer. Let's unpack it for a minute,
just in this sense that God gives generously. God gives us the
instruction that we need in order to please Him wisely in the context
of trials, whether they be trials from the government, whether
it be trials because of the faith, whether it be trials in life,
whether it be trials in finances, whether it be trials in our own
minds, whether it be trials in our body, trials in relationships,
trials within the church, or trials anywhere else in the cosmos.
Maybe you took a rocket ship to Mars and you've got some problems.
God is there too. And His wisdom will carry you
there. Should have asked beforehand and you got on the ship. But
you have and now you need wisdom to get through the trial. God
gives generously. That means He doesn't hold back.
He doesn't sprinkle a little bit of wisdom cracker bits on
the floor and expect you to lick them up and get a taste for it
and then watch what you're going to do and then sprinkle up tidbits.
It's not like E.T. being led to the closet, for
those of you who know that movie from 1982, with the Reese's Pieces. It's not like the cartoons where,
you know, you lead the creature into the cage by putting down
bits of... This is not how God gives wisdom. God gives generously. Everything He's got, He just
gives it to you. You've got to ask. What are you asking for? Wisdom. What kind of wisdom?
Wisdom to stand steadfast in trials. Why? So that I can rejoice. Why do I have to rejoice? Because
that is your thankful worship to the Lord Almighty. There is
no other type. To the praise of His glorious grace. Thank
you, Lord. Romans 1, there are those who worship in thankfulness
and those who don't. Thank God. You see? Romans 12,
same thing. He gives generously. And what's
the other thing that the scripture says how God gives? Without reproach. Without reproach. What's that
mean? I mean God is not going, you dumb stupid child. I gotta
tell you this again. Are you dumb as a bag of potato
chips? Do you have the intelligence of a hammer? God is not scolding
us to give us wisdom. He generously gives, joyfully
gives, lovingly gives, and we're not caught in the midst of should
have known better. That's what it means without
reproach. God's not going to bring reproach
upon you for asking for wisdom. He's not going to get on to you
because you didn't know the answer. He's not going to discipline
you because you didn't remember. Because you ask and He gives
generously. That's what a loving father does. That's what our
Father does. Now the next thing out of most
people's mouth when I talk about these things in midst of trials
is they say, well, I've done that. I have prayed and I have
prayed and I have prayed and I just don't know what to do.
And I still feel at despair and fear and everything else. Well,
what is despair but unbelief? What is fear but unbelief? What
is doubt but unbelief? So James answers that. But, verse
6, let him ask in faith with no doubting. With no doubting. Isn't that crazy? How in the world are we to do
that with no doubting? Well, almost all of us would
stand and say, you know what, I do not doubt the work of Christ
on my behalf. I do not doubt that my righteousness
is imputed to me. I do not doubt that Jesus Christ
raised from the dead and I do not doubt that the promises of
the word of God are yes and amen, but I don't know what to do and
I don't think God can help me. I hope he helps me. I wish that
he'd help me. You see, that's what we do. That's
what James Tippins does. That's what all of you, if you
were honest, that's what we do. That's what we do. And so God,
in His infinite mercy, the Holy Spirit has preached to us that
we shouldn't doubt through the letter of James so that we will
be reminded and not chastised. Because God's going to give us
this wisdom not to make us feel guilty about not knowing and
remembering that He's the sovereign God of all things, but He's going
to patiently and kindly remind us and then we will go, oh yeah,
that's right. How many times do we need the
reminder? every second of our lives. I've never met a man in my youth
who could teach me James correctly. Because the book of James for
most people who claim to be in Christ is a scary letter. But
the book of James, for the beloved of God, is an encouraging letter.
I have been so encouraged studying this letter again, that it has
healed my soul. Because God has given me wisdom
without reproach. And it took a while because I
kept asking, doubting. Saying, Lord give me this, and
I read in the word, and then I look away and I try it on my
own. Isn't that what we do? That's what we do. Wisdom is
given. Wisdom is received. Wisdom is
given by God and wisdom is received from God and it is received in
Christ. Christ is our wisdom, so as Christ
and as God the Spirit and as God the Father works to show
us wisdom through the Word, we rest in an uncanny way. We rest with a peace that surpasses
all understanding. Wisdom is given and received
by faith. Let him do it without doubting. Don't ask thinking
this is not going to be given to me. I'm never going to know. That's a cry of despair. It's
not a request of God. But let him ask in faith with
no doubting. Why? because the one who doubts
is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind.
Verse 7 says, for that person must not suppose that he will
receive anything from the Lord. He's double-minded and unstable
in all his ways. Wow. What does that do? Why would James write that? Why
would God the Spirit pen that through the Apostle James? Because
he wants to humble us. He wants to show us that we are
unstable people. but that we are standing on a
stable foundation. Jesus Christ is steadfast. Jesus
Christ cannot be moved. The Father of lights with whom
there is no variation or shadow due to change. God is immovable. So we're reminded about these
things through the learning of the Word and the continual reading
of the Word and together, when we are all standing in our hearts
and minds truthfully, without doubting the foundation of Christ,
we are not unstable because we are resting in the One who is
stable. But when we doubt, what are we
doing? We're not believing that Christ is stable. We're thinking
that we must stabilize ourselves. And so what is that going to
do? It's going to reveal the very stability that we have,
which is nothing. In my flesh, I have no stability. I used to
pride myself in my ability to multitask in my mind. God took
it. I used to pride myself in my
ability to remember everything I read. God took it. I used to
pride myself on my ability to do things physically. God is
taking that by the second. I can't even see anymore. God's
taking it. Why? Because that's the natural
order of things. What's changed? I'm dying. My body is dying. I don't have
any doctor telling me I'm terminal, but I know that I'm terminal.
I know that I will not live forever in this flesh. but I have eternal
life in Christ. And what I am going to be has
not yet been shown to me, but I know that I will be like Him,
imperishable, unfading. This is it. And if you think
I'm just imparting some weird philosophy or poetry, beloved,
just look at verses 9, 10, 11. He talks about the lowly brother
boasting in his exaltation, the rich boasting in his humiliation,
because just like a flower of the grass, he will pass away.
The sun rises with its scorching heat and withers the grass. Its
flower falls and its beauty perishes. So were the rich man fed in the
midst of his pursuits. James Dippins will fail when he's standing
on his own two feet. As this leak has shown me, I
will fall. This little boot makes me about
three inches taller if I stand on it. And so when I'm thinking that
I need wisdom and I ask the Lord for wisdom and then I take it
back into my own hands, then I'm putting my trust in my foundation,
the foundation of my flesh, not the foundation that is immovable,
unshakable, inseparable. Beloved, and that's our lives,
isn't it? I can juggle four things. Can't juggle five. I can't juggle
two. But I can juggle four things.
Balls, round things, blocks. Can't do the knives and all that
kind of stuff. Never had the gall. But only for so long. You can't keep that up. Somebody throws something at
you, I've been the master of jugglers, can drop stuff. Beloved,
we don't want to be in charge of our own wisdom. We need to
see Christ. This is by faith. And sometimes
we find ourselves doubting because we prayed yesterday and today
we don't have an answer. We must be patient, beloved.
Anyone who says that God answers them and gives them wisdom the
second they pray is lying to you. That's a self-righteous
statement. They're saying that God answers
them in their timing. No, God answers in His timing.
Part of trusting in the wisdom of God is waiting on the wisdom
of God. And until we know, we don't do. Until we know, we don't go. Until
we know, we don't speak. Until we know, we don't respond.
We need wisdom. When we think of the wisdom literature
of the scripture, what does it say? Keep your mouth shut. Keep your
ears open. Stop talking. Listen. Ask questions and inquire. Be reasonable. Don't tell everybody
what you know. Shut your mouth and listen to
what other people are trying to say. You see, it's always
wait, wait, just wait, just wait. 30 years Jesus hid in obscurity. We can't wait 30 minutes at a
fast food restaurant without losing our minds. God gives and
we receive wisdom in His timing for the trials of life by the
Word through prayer with patience without doubting that in due
time God will give us wisdom and it will bring about the completion,
the wholeness, the fullness of the wisdom of Christ in our lives
in trials. And what does it ultimately do?
And by the way, that was 12 points. You didn't hear them, but in
my mind those were 12 things. that are true about how wisdom is
given and received. The results of wisdom in the
context of James' letter and even Paul's and Peter's and everybody
else's is patient love for one another. As God is patient with
his people, so should we be. As God is patient with us to
give us regenerative truth by the Spirit in His timing, so
should we be patient with unbelievers who possibly may be our elect
brothers and sisters. In 2 Timothy 3, we all know these
texts, right? We all know these texts. We know
what Paul says to this young boy. I mean, it's just what it
is. In 2 Timothy 3, it's the text
I was in on Sunday night at Theology on Call. We see that in verse
1 that there are a lot of things that are antithetical to the
wisdom of God here. Understand this, Paul says, in
the last days are going to come times of difficulty. Four, people
are going to be lovers of self, lovers of money. They're going
to be proud, they're going to be arrogant, abusive, and disobedient
to parents. They're going to be very ungrateful,
and they're going to be unholy. They're going to be heartless,
unpeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving
good. They're going to be treacherous
and reckless, swollen with pride and conceit, lovers of pleasure
rather than lovers of God. And they may have the appearance
of godliness, but they will deny its power. Paul tells Timothy
to avoid these people. Because what they do is they
wreck households. And eventually, just as John
and John opposed Moses and were found out, eventually these people
who lack wisdom will tell on themselves. And everybody who
joins their bandwagon will tell on them. They will all be seen. In Philippians, Paul gives a
focused look at wisdom. What does he say there? In Philippians
chapter one, he says these words. I thank
my God in all my remembrance of you, always in every prayer
of mine for you all making my prayer with joy. Why? Because
of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now.
And then he says in verse six, a very powerful statement, I
am sure of this. I am confident of this. That
He, God, who began a good work in you will bring it to completion
at the day of Jesus Christ. It is right for me to feel this
way about you all, because I hold you in my heart, for you are
all partakers with me of grace, both in my imprisonment and in
the defense and confirmation of the gospel. For God is my
witness, how I yearn for you all with affection of Christ,
and it is my prayer that your love may abound more and more
with knowledge and all discernment wisdom so that you may approve
what is excellent and so be pure and blameless for the day of
Christ, filled with the fruit of righteousness that comes through
Jesus Christ to the glory and the praise of God." Same thing. 1 Thessalonians chapter
5. This is a self-serving text.
So now concerning the times and all that, Paul says, where am
I? I want to go here. Oh, verse 12, we ask you, brothers,
to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord
and admonish you and to esteem them very highly in love because
of their work. Be at peace amongst yourselves. And we urge you, brothers, admonish
the idle. That means warn them. Encourage
the faint-hearted. Help the weak. Be patient with
them all. See that no one repays evil for
evil, but always seek to do good to one another and to everyone.
Rejoice always and pray without ceasing. Give thanks in all circumstances,
for this is the will of God and Christ for you." He goes on and
talks over and over and over again. 2 Peter talks about steadfastness
as well. We see that continually. I'm just showing the comparisons
or the continuation, the cohesion, the cohesiveness of the Apostles'
teaching on this matter. This is the epitome of wisdom. Look, verse 14 of chapter 3 of
2 Peter says, Therefore, beloved, since you
are waiting for these things, be diligent to be found by Him
without spot or blemish and at peace. And count the patience
of our Lord as salvation, just as our beloved brother Paul also
wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does
in all his letters when he speaks of these matters. There are some
things that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable
twist to their own destruction as they do with other scriptures.
You, therefore, beloved, knowing this beforehand, take care that
you are not carried away by the air of lawless people and lose
your own stability, but grow in the grace and knowledge of
our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To Him be the glory now and to
the day of eternity forever. Amen. So God is trusted by faith
that He grants us to believe and the promises that He has
proclaimed to us concerning salvation. So faith in Christ for salvation
is also equally graciously granted to us to have faith in the wisdom
of God. That He will grant us wisdom. That we will live out
our lives in this way so that we might be beneficial to the
kingdom. God is trusted in trials equally
as He is trusted in salvation. The manner of faith in God's
promises of eternal life is the same manner of faith that also
rests in the promises of the Word of God and practical things.
And both of them wane, don't they? But to not trust in one
is truly to say, in a real way, I don't trust in the first. So
what do we do when we're faithless? Where is our hope? In the faithfulness
of Christ, who cannot deny himself. Paul tells that to Timothy. So
the Spirit, through wisdom, grants the grace to rest in the sufficiency
of God's power under trial? And then the question again is
always the same. What trials? What trials are
we looking at here if we go back to the book of James? Well, I've
already answered that. I was going to close with that, but I open with
that. All trials. But the wisdom of God teaches
us to understand the foundation, understand the immovable gospel
of grace that is sovereign and free, that we walk then according
to the promises of God found in the Word, the same place and
the same revelation that teaches us the relationship that we have
with God by grace in the finished work of Christ. So if we do not
walk as God's Word instructs us in these trials, then for
all intents and purposes it's like saying we don't trust Him
because His promises are yes and amen. So in asking God for
wisdom we should not be caught off guard. when the Lord does
not give us immediate resolution. We should not be caught off guard
when we don't have immediate peace in our circumstances. We
should not be caught off guard when the restoration does not
happen in trials. We should rest in the sufficiency
and the joy of knowing that the trials will continue to come,
but that in these trials we are never put away. That we are never,
ever put away. Colossians comes to mind as Paul
would write these things. And he says to the church of
Colossae, he says, I pray, let me find it so that I don't misquote
it, that I may fill up, I rejoice,
verse 24 of chapter 1, in my sufferings for your sake. See,
this is the wisdom of God Paul asked for and was granted. Was
Paul always steadfast? No. He labored over his trials,
he labored over his fears, he labored over his flesh. I rejoice in my sufferings for
your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in
Christ's afflictions for the sake of His body, that is, the
church of which I became a minister. He became a minister to meet
the needs of the church. and what kind of minister, to
what end, from what foundation was Paul a minister according
to the stewardship from God that was given to me for you to make
the Word of God fully known, that is the mystery hidden of
ages, for ages and generations, but now revealed to His saints.
To them, to you, God chose to make known how great among the
Gentiles are the riches of the glory of this mystery, which
is Christ in you, the hope of glory. Him we proclaim. everyone and teaching everyone
with all wisdom that we may present everyone mature in Christ. Now
is this not the same thing James is saying? Rejoice beloved in
all trials. Rejoice. Don't you know that
the testing of your faith, that trials produce testing and testing
produces steadfastness and steadfastness produces the completeness of
your joy, the completeness of the foundation of what Christ
is in you who is the hope of your glory? And ultimately one day as we
mature, we will all ultimately stand perfect anew in Him as we now stand perfect
and righteous in Him before the Father. Paul says in verse 29
of chapter 1 of Colossians, and I'll close, he says, for this
I toil, for this I work, for this I struggle with all, and
I love this text, For this I toil, struggling with all His energy,
with all His power that He powerfully works within me." So is it up
to us to find the power of God? No. It's God's power. So when
we ask for wisdom, when we find ourselves doubting, we must just
continue to wait in the wisdom of God that He will empower us
to withstand and steadfast because He will see us through. Though
it may seem as though we are messing up God's sovereign plan,
we are not messing up His plan. We are walking in the hand of
God and cannot leave it. And Paul says, I work and struggle. with all of the energy of God
that He powerfully works within me. And I could preach a whole
other hour on the power of God in me, you, and one another. But beloved, Paul's labors were
for the saints. James' labors were for the saints. John's labors were for the saints.
Our labors are for one another. Our trials help one another.
And most of all, our trials are opportunities to thank God in
the midst of all of them for the sake of his glorious name.
Let's pray. We thank you, Lord, for the teaching
of James. We know that it is not James,
except that it is his word and his personality coming through
the page. But, Father, we know that the
truth therein comes from you and that God the Spirit has written
this text for us through him. Help us to hear what it is that
you've taught us and not to try to worm our way around the simple
application of praying for you to give us wisdom and then trusting
for you to work that wisdom in us in the time that you've allotted.
Lord, help us to rest in the finished work of Christ, not
to be restless, but to be still. We are not the commissioned soldiers
of your justice. We are the sheep of your pasture. We are the ones whom the great
shepherd has laid down his own life for. So God, our great father,
holy in all your ways. Lord, let your will be done in
our lives as it is in heaven this day. And give us the wisdom
to wait upon you. In Jesus name. Amen.