Roses, you know, and there's
always thorns on the roses. And we're going to be having
a talk shoot tomorrow night, and the topic of it is, it's
not all coming up roses. And there's a big part of society
and Christian culture that teaches that, you know, if you're having
challenges, then you're not blessed with God, and you don't have
enough faith. You know, when we go through
afflictions, we know that it's sent to strengthen us in our
faith, but yet also, when I was talking to Brother Michael this
week, and when we come back to health, when God brings us back
to health and gives us in glory, I was talking to her, it gives
us tremendous thanksgiving for our health. I knew when we realized
how sick we've been, and now we're restored to it. I don't know if I can find this
or not, but I should have been more prepared. But one morning,
I woke up real early in the morning, and I was thinking on this thing
about roses. And I was thinking about how
that there's a song that I like a lot. It's called, He Was a
Rose Among the Thorns. And Christ was down here, and
he was You know, there's been many metaphors attributed to
Christ, the lily of the valley and the bright and morning star
and all that. But he was he was amongst the thorns. I mean, he
was he was among. He is there, and He, underneath
us, are the everlasting arms of God. And so I'm thankful this
morning for the fact that we can rely upon His unfailing kindness
and His unfailing mercy. I can't find it, so I'll postpone
that for later. That's good, brother. Anybody
else? Mark, you got anything you'd
like to share this morning? Well, turn with me then, if you
would, over to James chapter 4. James chapter 4. Brother Larry's
right. You know, we talked last week
and the week before last when we was meeting together about
how there is a positive side to our suffering and affliction. If anything, it makes us thankful
whenever that burden and that heaviness is lifted. It makes
us thankful. And, uh, uh, I was just thinking
it was the song that Larry requested that his grace is sufficient.
You know, Paul prayed. many times that the thorn be
removed from his side and the Lord chose not to do that and
you know today's modern Christianity quote-unquote Christianity would
say well like brother Larry said you just don't have enough faith
you didn't you know you're not Something's wrong, you know,
either you're in sin or you don't have enough faith or something
because God doesn't want you to be stuck like that. But yet
the Lord chose to leave Paul in that state. And the only answer
that he gave Paul was that his grace was sufficient for him.
And a lot of times in our lives, brethren, we're gonna go through
times, and it may not be, I mean, two weeks of having this bronchitis
has been very wearisome. but whether it's two weeks or
two months or two years with that affliction as we sung earlier
one of these days we're going to step on past that shore and
we're going to be with Christ we're going to see him we're
going to be with him and all of that is so much worth all
the turmoil and life that we have to experience down here
But all of that is for our good. All of that is conforming us
to the image of Christ. And so His grace is always gonna
be sufficient for us. That's the wonderful truth of
God's word. That's the wonderful... Part
of the good news of the gospel is that it's all about what he
has done and is doing and not about the conditions that we
have to continually meet, that he has promised to keep us to
the end. That doesn't mean that we're
not going to falter and fail, but he's going to keep us to
the end. He's going to keep us from walking away. He's going
to keep us from turning from him completely. We may have times
where we turn our back. We may have times where we look
another way. We may have times where we seek
the world, but he will always bring us back. He always does
that so that we will experience that, just like we talked about
in church discipline a few weeks ago. You know, one of the things
with turning somebody out from the fellowship if they're truly
a child of grace, is that that is the time and the way that
the Lord has designed to chasten them and to bring them back.
And so what a wonderful thing it is to see that even in our
hardships that the Lord is working to conform us to the image of
Christ, but we have that hope one day that we will be rid of
all these things. Today I'd like to speak about
a couple of things that I'm sure never happens. James chapter four, if you would,
and I'm gonna read the first 10 verses, and we're gonna look
at these passages this morning as the Lord leads us. It says,
from whence come wars and fighting among you? Come they not hence
even of your lust that war in your members? Ye lust and ye
have not, ye kill and desire to have and cannot obtain. Ye fight and war, yet ye have
not because ye ask not. Ye ask and receive not, because
ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts. Ye adulterers
and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world
is enmity with God? Whosoever therefore will be a
friend of the world is the enemy of God. Do ye think that the
scripture saith in vain that the spirit that dwelleth in us
lusteth to envy? but he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth
the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. Submit yourselves
therefore to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from
you. Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse
your hands, ye sinners, and purify your hearts, ye double-minded.
Be afflicted and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to
mourning and your joy to heaviness. Humble yourselves in the sight
of the Lord and He shall lift you up. Father, we ask now, Lord,
that you might be with us today as we gather around your word.
I thank you for these brothers and sisters that you've gathered
here today. Lord, I thank you for the healing that you've given
us and the time of sickness that you've brought us through the
last couple of weeks of all of us, Lord. And I'm glad to see
us all here today. And Father, Lord, we know that
you have your ways and your purposes to bring us through these times.
And Father, we are thankful for that. We're thankful for what
we learn. We're thankful for Christ who is faithful. But more
importantly, Father, we thank you for the work of salvation
that you've done in glorifying yourself by saving sinners. And
Lord, we just ask now that you might be with us in our midst
today. You say where two or three are gathered in your name, there
you are in our midst. And we pray that that promise will be
kept today by you. We need you to hear today, Lord.
We need you to speak through us. We need you to give us understanding. We need you, Father, to make
real these things that we speak of. We need the Holy Spirit to
convict of sin, to show us and to take us into the understanding
of these things in the spiritual way. Father, we need you in all
points, in all places, in all ways. And so, Father, we as a
needy people ask today that you just might be to your people
what we need, what you desire for us. And so, Father, we again
ask that you might exalt and glorify your Son, Jesus, through
our worship today. I pray for all those listening
or watching. Lord, I pray that they too be
edified and they might be built up in the most holy faith. That
your son Jesus will be glorified in all that we do. In Jesus'
name we pray, amen. When Christians quarrel, now, like I said, I'm probably
sure that it just, it never happens, it's just kind of, the Lord probably
put this in here, just something for us to read, that there's
probably never a time that there's ever a quarrel that ever happens
in the church, huh? I know all of us has come through
many different churches quote-unquote churches in our lifetime, right?
And I'm sure we've all experienced a quarrel or two. What about
sister, whether you ever had a quarrel in any of the churches
that brother Howard's pastored? Some pretty bitter quarrels,
I'm sure if it's like most of them. What about you brother
Larry? I've heard some of the We don't want to think about
that, do we? I mean, even here, we're a very small group and
we're a very close group. But even in just the time since
I've been here, you know, we've had our times of disagreement
and quarrels and maybe have harbored feelings. We may not have lashed
out at each other. There has been a few times that
we've had to lash out at each other. We've maybe not expressed
that outwardly, but maybe we went home and harbored ill feelings
towards one another because of something that was done or said
or something than that. And James here writes by the
leadership of the Holy Spirit about some things that isn't
uncommon. It's very common. Anytime you
get a group of people of the flesh together, there's going
to be conflict, there's gonna be quarrels. Matter of fact,
the Bible says that sometimes the conflicts have to come. And
it shows those or approves those who are truly God's people. But the question here is, from
whence come wars and fightings among you? Why is there quarrels
or fights among God's people, and specifically in the gathered
assembly, whenever we gather as a church, why are there quarrels
and fights? If we have the love of God shed
abroad in our heart, If we are commanded to love our neighbor
as ourself, if we're commanded to have love for the brethren,
then why is there quarrels? Aren't we changed people? Aren't
we people that have been born from above and we have that love
of Christ in us? And aren't we supposed to love
each other? I mean, why do we still have
fights and quarrels? Where do those things come from?
Well, I think if we sit down and we begin to like write down
a list of why these things come, we're going to find out that
we're going to start writing a bunch of external issues, okay? We're going to write a bunch
of external issues down. But if we look here at these
first 10 verses, it looks like James kind of isn't dealing with
the quarrels necessarily, except here in the first one or two
verses. And then he just starts skipping
around. Then he starts talking about other things besides the
quarrels. But if you look at this systematically
as we go through these verses, you'll see that James is talking
about and continues to talk about a quarreling church. And as he
has written this thing to churches, he is explaining some stuff.
Matter of fact, if we look at the third chapter, coming out
of the third chapter, what was the third chapter of James all
about? It's about that wicked tongue that no one can control
that wreaks havoc, right? I mean, the tongue is a wicked
thing. I mean, it is, no one can tame it, the Bible says.
No one can tame the tongue. And we all know that. How often
does our mouth get ahead of our head? A lot of times we speak
our mind before our mind is ready to speak, I think. You know,
there's a lot of times that my tongue lashes out, and then as
soon as it comes out of my mouth, I'm like, I probably should not
have said that. That's probably not what should
have went on. So James is coming off and talking
about how there is a lot of harshness and bitterness in the way that
we talk to each other, speak to each other. And so to say,
well, my church doesn't have quarrels, then there's something
wrong. You're either completely blind to anything, a liar, or
you probably just don't go to church. You just say you go to
church, but you don't because Whenever people get together,
there's going to be quarrels here. But James isn't just dumping
a bunch of unrelated topics to ourselves. He is very much talking
about this business of quarrels. And whenever we look at that,
and even though it may not happen very often, we have to, and I
believe the reason the Holy Spirit puts us in here, is because it
prepares our heart and our mind for whenever these times do come.
You know, we may experience several months or years without ever
having quarrels, but that may come up and we need to be prepared
with what God's word says about these things and how to deal
with them in a scriptural way and not in a fleshly way. We're
so easy and prone to take it into the fleshly way, but yet
we need to take it into the biblical way, brother Larry. Did a talk
show or did a devotion just a Week or so ago. I can't remember how
long it's been I've lost track of the days over the last few
weeks, but he did one about you know Does do you get in the flesh?
And a lot of people don't want to admit that they get in the
flesh, but we all get in the flesh. As long as we're in this
house of clay, this fleshly tent, we're going to get into the flesh
occasionally. And this is one of those things
is, This is a preparation. The Holy Spirit has given us
guidance for whenever these times come up. You know, the Bible
says that we shouldn't sin, but it says if you sin, we have an
advocate with the Father, right? It's giving us preparation. It's
telling us things that this is going to happen. And whenever
it does, this is how you are to prepare for that and how to
handle these things. So a lot of times the scripture
gives us admonitions in the word of God on how to handle these
things in a spiritual way and not in a fleshly way. Now, whenever
we come up and we have quarrels, a lot of times the first thing
we want to do is we want to state our position and why it is that
we feel offended. Okay, if you remember just not
too long ago, we had, and I won't mention any names or anything,
but I think we all know who this is, but we had some members that
was here who easily got offended at a couple of things, and we
thought we was gonna work through it biblically. We came, and me
and Brother Howard and Brother Igor, we came together, and we
was gonna sit down with the scriptures, and we was gonna try to scripturally
go through these things, But what happened is the folks got
out a laundry list of how they've been offended and why they were
mad and said their piece and got up and left and didn't want
to listen to anything that the scriptures are handling thing
the way the scriptures say to handle that. Now, that's a great
example and I don't fault them because all of us tend to have
that in us. We want to say how we feel, how
we're wronged and then we want to hopefully persuade the others
to get jump on board with this okay but what does it say here
says from whence come wars and fightings among you come they
not hence even of your lust that war in your members see it sounds like it's a rhetorical
question but james gives us the source of the quarrels among
us see We may say there's no corals, but the corals are going
to come. The corals are going to be there. And it doesn't take
much to produce a coral in a church. I've seen people argue about
the color of rug that's put down in the church, where to put the
water fountain in a church. Listen, we had some arguments
in the church one time because of a, a lot of church used to
do this. I don't know if they still do
it anymore, but back in the old days they used to have a church
directory and every year they would put out a new church directory.
and they would take everybody's picture of the families together,
and that way everybody knew who everybody was, and their names,
and who belonged to who, and all that kind of stuff, and they
would put out a church directory. I seen that tear a church up
one time because the people was trying to argue on this person
had a divorce and this person was married together, and now
they're apart, and they're still members of the church, And who
was going to take the pictures with the kids? And then there
was some that was like upset because, yeah, they're a member
of the church, but they hadn't been here in, you know, 15 years. They shouldn't even be in there.
I mean, there was all kinds of stuff that came out. All of a
sudden, a loving church became a church at war with each other
over a stupid directory. And so you think, well, it ain't
going to happen here, brethren. It can happen. Anywhere. And the reason it happens is
not because of that person. The reason that it happens here,
according to the scripture, is because of your lusts. See, we can lay blame on each
other all the day long. Well, that person said this and
made me this way. That person did this and made
me feel this way. You know, I wanted to do that.
I wanted to do this. When it all come down to it,
there was a lot of I, I, I, I's. And so it comes down in the scriptures,
I believe, has shown a spotlight on us in the fact that it comes
from your lust. Look at verse two. It says, ye
lust and have not, ye kill and desire to have and cannot obtain,
ye fight and war, yet ye have not because ye ask not. Now,
the reason that quarrels come in churches is because of our
own lusts, what we want. We have a picture and an idea
of how it should be, and that's what we want. And whenever we
don't get what we want, then we get upset. And when we get
upset, then we come in here and we kill and desire to have. Now, I was kind of looking at
that passage some this week. I even consulted, believe it
or not, with some commentators just to kind of get an idea of
what some other thoughts was on this. I didn't really think
that James was thinking that there was actually people killing
each other. the people that he was writing to. But, uh, and
a lot of the other commentators that I read, they said the same
thing, but that doesn't mean that it's definitely true. But,
um, I believe that, you know, whenever Jesus said, whenever
you hate your brother, you've committed murder. I definitely
can see where that can happen in a church, uh, gathering that
we become so in, in, in, in fueled, uh, because of, uh, uh, not getting
our way, that we can hate our brother. And the Bible says whenever
you've hated a brother in your heart, you've murdered him. It's
the same as murdering him. And so that might be what James
has in mind here whenever he says, you kill and desire to
have, who knows, maybe there was actually some people that
was killing each other, I don't know. But it says that it was
a pretty harsh environment that was going
on here. Ye lust and have not, And we
all know how that gets. Whenever you really want something,
you get something in your mind. You know, I'm like that at work.
I kind of have a way of, you know, whenever I go in to do
a demo at some place, I have a set way that I do it. I start
at a certain point, and I know all the ground that I have to
cover in that demo, and I have a certain order in which I do
that. And so whenever I go out and
do that, I follow my little thing. I get to my desired end. And most of the time, everything
goes well. Well, once in a while, my boss comes with me. And my
boss, as good as he is and I love him to death and everything,
but he doesn't know the products sometimes as well as I do or
how they work like I do. But he has a few quips and quotes
and he has a few, you know, facts about the thing. And so while
I'm doing my demo and following my little train of how I do everything,
Occasionally he'll jump in and he'll start throwing his two
cents in and saying stuff or he'll try to he'll say well You
need to tell them about that. Well, I haven't got to that yet
It's down here in my present day. And so then we kind of well
all of a sudden in me riles up a little irritation Because I
have it all pictured out. This is the way this needs to
go yet. He throws his stuff into the
mix and it just kind of messes it up well then I get upset sometimes
because he is veering things off in the course that I think
that they should go because we all know that what I think is
best ain't that how it is we think our way is the best right
and if anybody has anything deviating from that then there's a deficiency
on their end not ours And so, whenever that happens, then there's
a little bit of lusting of the flesh that pops up. And I'm upset
with my boss because he's deviating from my perfect demo plan. Well, sometimes that can happen
in the church as well, brethren. We have an idea of the way things
should be and should be done. And the lust of our heart gets
offended because somebody either does it different or thinks your
way is not right. And so then that wells up. And
so we desire to have, and sometimes it's so bad we can't obtain it. And so we begin to hate our brother.
We begin to go back into chapter three of James and we begin to
lash out and our tongue gets loose and we say things. And
even though we go back and we repent and we ask forgiveness
and we say, we serve, we all know that once somebody says
something that always lingers in the back of our mind. Unless
God just gives us complete and total turning and forgiveness
and a complete restoration of fellowship with each other. Brethren,
you know, if you're like me, those things, I may not hold
a grudge, but that lingers back there somewhere and it's easily
brought forward whenever it happens again. Anybody that's been married
for any amount of time knows that's the case, you know. We
say we're sorry. We say all is forgiven. We kiss
and make up and go about the deal. But as soon as that arises
again, we get out the card catalog and we pull it up. Remember that?
You did it that time, okay? James has given us the facts
of who we are in our flesh. And he says, the problem isn't
always somebody else. The problem is you. The problem
is you have lusts that you want fulfilled They have lusts that
they want fulfilled, and these lusts are warring against each
other. Look at verse three says, ye ask and receive not because
ye ask amiss. He tells us in verse two, he
said, You have not because you asked not. Instead of, and this
is how a church ought to do this. This is one of the reasons why
when I first came and a lot of times we were talking, at that
time we were talking about our statement of faith and different
things like that. And one of the things that I
brought up, that to me influenced me as I was listening and taking
counsel from other pastors that have been down the road a lot
longer than I have, is this whole thing of unity among the brethren. You know, if we know that there's
an issue that there is a disagreement about, that if we bring that
up and we know, well, I know this brother doesn't agree with
this and this brother doesn't agree with this, then we need
to work through that scripturally, spiritually, before we ever bring
that to a vote among the people with each other. So we all talk
about it. There's a reason why has not
the Lord brought us into unity? And so we'll discuss that and
in a loving way, if it's gonna bring disunity, then let's not
go that direction. Let's not go in the direction
that will cause disunity. And so a lot of times what we
do is instead of gathering together as a church and praying over
matters, and I think that's one of the things that, and I'm probably
as guilty as this as anybody else, is we have kind of, put
prayer out in the cold anymore. You know, we don't do as much
praying over things as we should. And I kind of know one of the
reasons is because People who believe in predestination and
election and God's sovereignty and all that kind of stuff, we
tend to have that, you know, because we think, well, you know,
God has already purposed everything out, my prayer's not gonna change
anything. See, that's not the purpose of prayer, though. See,
the purpose of prayer is for us. is to bring us into tune
with the will of God. We pray to Him and come to Him
and pray and He speaks and ministers to us and reveals to us His purpose. His Spirit guides us and directs
us. And I'll just say, man, Baptists
have been, have shut out prayer and the Holy Spirit in a lot
of their gatherings and a lot of the congregation work. Whenever we come together and
gather, it's either one man or a group of men running the whole
show. Instead of the way the Bible
teaches it, the Holy Spirit is the one who guides and directs
through the whole gathered assembly. And so while a pastor may be
an overseer, he is not the dictator. And so James here is saying,
listen, the reason this happens is because we get our lust propped
up on a pedestal and we don't think about each other and we
don't go to the Lord and we don't pray about these matters. A lot
of times if we would just pray about these matters, the Holy
Spirit would lead us in the direction that we ought to go. But a lot
of times the Lord leaves us out because of our flesh, leaves
us out to learn. Okay, you're gonna learn the
hard way about how to go through this situation then. He says,
ye ask and receive not. And I'm sure he wrote this down
because some people say, well, I pray, I pray about things.
I prayed about that. Whenever I prayed about it, you
know, I prayed about it and I felt that my way was right. What does
he say here? He says, ye ask and receive not. Okay, for those who are asking,
he says, the reason you're asking but not receiving what you're
asking for is because when you ask, you're asking amiss. He
said, you're asking that you may consume it upon your lust.
He said, yeah, you're coming and praying to me, but you're
coming and praying to me, Lord, give me what I want. Instead
of Lord, lead us into unity. Lord, lead me into what you want. Not my will be done, but thy
will be done, right? A lot of times that's hard for
us to pray, even though we have the head knowledge that Jesus
told us to pray, not my will be done, but thy will be done.
Jesus prayed, not my will be done, but thy will be done. But
sometimes we just can't get it in our mind when we come to pray.
Well, isn't that what prayer is about? Is that I bring my
petitions to the Lord? Well, yes, we do. But our petitions
should be governed by this right here, right? Our petitions to
the Lord ought to become to ask Him of things that He's told
us to ask for, not things that we want, necessarily. Now that
doesn't mean, you know, I wanted my family to be healed. I wanted
all you brethren, when you were sick this week, to be healed,
and so I asked the Lord, if it be Your will, would You please
bring us through this quickly, immediately. If it be Your will,
though. I'll never forget one time praying
in a hospital, This was not long. One of the things that I learned
going through Caitlin's ordeal when she was in the hospital
that one time, and I was studying the book of Job at the same time,
the Lord had been preparing me, I guess, for that and had brought
me into the book of Job before all that took place. But one
of the things I was praying with somebody after that, and I can't,
to be honest, I don't even remember now who it was. But anyway, I
remember we were sitting there praying, and I prayed, and we
were praying for the people to get well. And instead of saying,
Lord, I ask that you will heal them, I said, Father, if it be
your will to heal them, but if it's your will not to heal them,
to give them grace through this time. And when I was done, one
of the family members said, well, why did you not ask for healing? I mean, ain't that what we're
supposed to do, is to ask for healing? And I just said, you know, what
if the Lord's design and purpose for this is to grow them and
mature them in the Lord? And it had to come through this.
Why would we want to deviate that? You know, why would we
want that deviated? Why would we want that changed?
That may be God's purpose. If that's God's, well, we know
it's God's purpose. It's happening, but that's God's purpose. Why would we want anything different
than what God wants? And so when we come here, he
says, he asked and received not because he asked amiss that you
may consume it upon our lust. Whenever we come and we have
issues and there may be internal turmoil because of a brother
and sister, or there's quarrels among us, we need to come to
the Lord and we need to ask that the Lord guide us in that. Not
that the Lord changed their mind, okay? Now there's gonna be conflict
in churches And conflicts are going to have to happen, as I
mentioned a while ago, especially when it comes to doctrinal things.
You know, someone may come in among us and they have a completely
different doctrinal understanding of the scripture that doesn't
coincide with the word of God. And at that point, we have to
have conflict. And at that point, we're going
to pray that that person's mind be changed. But if it comes down
to personal preference things, brethren, different ways of doing
things, you know what I mean, then we need to ask the Holy
Spirit to guide us. And instead of asking for what's
the lust of our heart, ask, Lord, what's your will? Change me.
If your will is something else, then change my heart. See, I'm
wanting to go this way. But if you're wanting us to go
this way, then change my heart so that I want to go that way
and not this way. And see, that's where unity comes
whenever the Holy Spirit in all of us, as we seek his guidance
and his direction and his empowerment. He'll bring us into unity on
those things. He will change our hearts. He
will give us the love to say, okay, well, if my lust and what
I want is going to cause confusion and cause discord among the brethren,
then I pray that the Lord give me the ability to put my desires
down and seek the good of the other brother. Matter of fact,
is that what we learn in Corinthians? That we're to seek the good of
those that God has given us gifts for the edification of others.
And we're always to seek the good and the edification of the
other one and not ourselves. And if we all have that attitude,
Where is the quarreling gonna come from? If I'm always looking
out for your good and doing whatever's best for you, and you're doing
the same for me, then there's always gonna be love and unity
among ourselves. Look at verse four. He says,
ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship
of the world is enmity with God? It seems like he almost shifts
gears and gets away from the quarreling and goes into something
else. But brethren, what he's saying here is this. He says,
you're lusting after things and the things that you're lusting
out are worldly things. See, you're lusting after worldly
things and not after spiritual things. See, we should be lusting
after spiritual things. Not just spiritual gifts, but
we're to lust after spiritual things. Love, unity, hope, our worship of God together. These are spiritual things that
we should be, whenever we gather together and meet together, we
should lust after fellowship. love, harmony, joy, peace, worship. All these things are the things
that we should be lusting at. But if we're here and we're lusting
after worldly things, then those are going to be easily things
that are going to cause quarrels. And he says, ye adulterers and
adulteresses. Now again, remember James, Jewish
James, and speaking to mostly Jewish people at this time. A minister to the Jews. going
back and reaching back into the Old Testament on things how they
understood things. If you remember, those people
who sought after the things of the world were called adulterers
and adulteresses. There is spiritual adultery that
we can commit, brethren, whenever we seek after worldly things
or when we seek religious things that are not of God's Word. We
can commit spiritual adultery. That's why it's important to,
as we've seen a few weeks ago, to teach them all things whatsoever
Christ commanded. See, it isn't about liturgy. It isn't about religion. It's
about what does the word of God say. And so he's saying, ye adulterers
and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world
is enmity with God. Whenever you have desires and
lusts for the things of the world and not the things of God, here
he says that you're at enmity with God. He says, whosoever
therefore will be a friend of the world is an enemy of God. If your desire is to be more
friendly with the world, the desires of the world than it
is with God, he says, you're an enemy of God. And you say,
well, wait a minute, that's not going to happen in churches,
is it? Absolutely it can. Absolutely it can. Look at verse
five. Do you think that the scripture
saith in vain, the spirit that dwells in us lusted to envy?
See, the Bible tells us that the spirit is going to lust to
envy. It's going to desire those worldly
things. Paul even said that, remember,
in Romans 7. He said, you know, I find that
I'm doing the things that I don't want to do. And the things that
I don't want to do, those are the things that I'm going to
do. And he said, I find that within myself there's this principle,
that in the flesh I'm going to serve the law of sin. That's
what we're talking about. The spirit that is in us, lust
in the fleshly man, in that Adamic man, lust to envy, for what it
wants. My grandpa used to always say,
he used to always says, you know, the flesh will do anything to
get its way, even be religious. And that's true. It'll do whatever
it takes just to get its way. Why? Because it lusted to envy. It wants its way. And so it lusts
and desires after everything it can get to get its way. But
look at verse six. He says, but he, speaking of
God, giveth more grace. So you think you're finding what
you need and lusting after your desires, but God gives you more
grace. He gives you more grace. He is
our spiritual food. He's our spiritual wine. Jesus
said, I am the bread of life. If a man eats of me, he's not
gonna be hungry. See, the spiritual man doesn't
feed off the things of the world. The spiritual man feeds off the
things of God. And we find that there is more grace there. The
things that we need and desire, we're gonna find more of in grace
and not in quarrels and fighting and bickering and lusting after
the things of the world. Listen, we can implore all the
things of the world that we think are best, but that's never gonna
bring more grace here. It might be, as we were talking
about earlier, it might bring these big edifices of buildings
and coliseums that people build and fill them full with people
coming to see a guy smiley telling them how great they are and how
wonderful their life can be. And if you'll just give me this
much money, it's going to make you healthier and happier. But
brethren, whenever it comes down to spiritual life within a church,
following God's Word, being spiritual people, The lust and the lust
of the flesh is never going to make anything here work. We are fed, we are edified, we
are built up by God and spiritual things. We are built up by his
word, we are built up by his spirit, we are built up by the
gifts that God has given each one of us if we are children
of grace as we exercise those things one towards another. See,
we are edified by the things of Christ. He says, but He giveth
more grace. Wherefore He saith, God resisteth
the proud, but giveth grace to the humble. Submit yourselves
therefore to God, Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
So the Bible says that God resists us the proud Well, where does
that come in? Well, the proud person is the
one who? Lust to envy the one who says well my ways better
though my ways better I think the way that I want to do it
is the best way and I as I lust after those things and continue
to seek those things more than I seek the unity and the love
and the harmony with my brothers and sisters in Christ, that's
pride. That's all that is, is pridefulness.
And it's easy for like a preacher to have a lot of pride because
he thinks that he's something. And it's easy for, you know,
a deacon to think that they're something. It's easy for the
husband to think that he's something because he's the head of the
household. It's easy for the parent to think they're something
because they're the parent and their children are just children.
See, it can work down every level of the way God has set up order
and roles, whether it's within the church or within the family.
But brethren, for the child of grace, either way, it works out
the same. The reason that there's quarrels
is because of the lust within our heart of worldly things. And so God says he resisteth
the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. If you want to have
a church or a family that gets along and doesn't have quarrels,
then everybody should be humble. Pray that God make you humble
because it's not natural. We surely ain't gonna just say,
well, I'm gonna be humble today. That's a prideful thing to say,
right? I mean, that right there is the height of pride. Well,
I wanna be humble. Have you ever met somebody who acts humble
and you can tell they're acting humble? You know, they put on this facade
to make themselves, that's pride. A truly humble person doesn't
really know they're humble. It says, submit yourself, therefore,
to God. How do you become humble? Submit
yourself, therefore, to God. Then he says, resist the devil.
How do you resist the devil? Anybody know how to resist the
devil? Do we call him down? I resist you. Do we bind him? Satan, in the name of Jesus,
I bind you. We see that on TV and hear it
on the radio a lot, don't we? It's a bunch of hogwash. Bunch of hogwash. You think you
can control the devil? You think you can boss the devil
around? The devil is at the instant bidding
of God and God alone. You ain't gonna control the devil
and do anything. It says, resist the devil and
he will flee. Well, how do we do that then?
We don't call Benny Hinn and ask him to do it for us. He tells
us in verse eight, how do you resist the devil? Draw nigh to
God and God will draw nigh to you. See, the devil's gonna flee
whenever God draws nigh. The devil will flee whenever
God draws nigh. He says, draw nigh unto God,
and God will draw nigh to you. See, we ought to seek God, seek
His will, seek His desires, search the scriptures, see what they
have to say, come to Him in prayer, admitting our failures, admitting
our wrongful thoughts and desires. Come to Him and draw nigh to
Him. And the Bible says that He'll
draw nigh to us. Whenever that happens, the devil
will flee. James drops back in to give us
illustrations of things that they knew from the Old Testament.
He says, cleanse your hands, ye sinners, and purify ye hearts,
ye double-minded. Be afflicted and mourn and weep.
Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to heaviness. That can all be summed up in
one word. Can anybody sum that up in one word? Repent. See, that's what in the Old Testament
whenever they were talking about washings. It says, Be afflicted
and mourn. Let your laughter be turned to
mourning and your joy to heaviness. Cleanse your hands. Purify your
hearts. See, He's not telling us to go
out and wash our hands. There ain't no way that we can
purify our hearts. There ain't no way that we can
do these things that He's saying. What's He telling us to do? He's
saying repent. He's saying repent. Be afflicted and mourn. Let your
joy turn to heaven. Humble yourselves in the sight
of the Lord and He shall lift you up. He's saying whenever
these times of quarreling come, when you're lusting after the
lust of your own heart, the worldliness that you desire of your own thoughts
and lust and desires, and not the oneness and the edification
and the unity of the brethren and each other, whenever you
begin to see these things arise in your heart, go to Him and
ask Him. to show you His will, to guide
you, to lead you and direct you into what's right. Humble yourself
before the Lord and repent of you wanting your own way. And that's how quarrels cease
within churches. That's how the Lord has designed
for quarrels to cease. And He says in verse 10, He says,
Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord and He shall lift
you up. He shall lift us up. I pray, and my prayer is that
we don't ever experience quarrels. But brethren, whenever we do,
we must know where the quarrels come from. It comes from the
lust of our own heart. Whenever I get mad at you about
something that didn't go my way, it's because I'm mad because
I didn't get my way. And I have to deal with that.
I have to repent of that and seek your good more than mine. Anybody got anything to add to
that? Anything, brother? Would you
like to add to that? Any other thoughts on these verses?
Well, I pray that it doesn't happen
here. But may the Lord prepare us if it ever does. lead us into
unity by causing us to seek His face. A lot of times we seek
Dr. Spock and Dr. Phil and all these
other psychologists. We'll end our message today. Gracious Heavenly Father, again
we thank You for Your love and salvation. We thank You for Your
Word. We thank You, Father, for the
Spirit of God. And forgive us, Father, for oftentimes
neglecting the Spirit of God and the Word of God, seeking
out our own inventions and our own devices, trying to do things
in our own way. Lord, we thank You for these
words that You've given to us, not easily digested because of
our pride, Father, we need to hear these things to know that
these quarrels that may come up among us come from selfishness
and from pride. So, Lord, I just pray that You
would help us in those areas, that You would keep us from that.
That whenever those times do come, Lord, that we might be
mindful of these words that You've given us from James. That we
might seek Your face and that we might put aside our own ways
I thank you for these brothers and sisters again, Father. And
I do thank you for the many times of joy and happiness and unity
that you've brought to our church, that we've really not had much
struggle and hardships in that area. Father, I'm grateful that
you are giving us these passages like this to instruct us, even
in times of goodness, and not turmoil, so that we would be
prepared if you choose to bring us through those times. Father,
Lord, I ask that You be with these brethren as they go home
this week, that You might use them wherever they're at to speak
Your Word. Father, we thank You for the
food that You've given to us to eat right now, and we ask
You to bless it. To the nourishment of our bodies for those who prepared
it, Lord, we thank You for them and their service to us. And
we are just grateful again for Jesus Christ, for the blood that
has cleansed us of every sin. The reconciliation we have with
God and the justification that we have before the lawgiver,
the one who is holy and righteous. We thank You for imputed righteousness
that we have, not because of anything that we can condition
or do of ourselves, but because it's been freely given. Lord,
we thank You for Your free and sovereign grace. May you be honored
and glorified in everything that we've done today and that we
will continue to do together in this time of fellowship. May
it be pleasing to you. May your son be glorified. In
Jesus' name we pray. Amen.