James 119, Wherefore, my beloved
brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow
to wrath. Now reckon why James would be
telling us here, in this context, to open our ears and shut our
mouths. Well, two reasons. He's telling us to be swift to
hear and slow to speak and slow to wrath because we're just the
opposite. Paul said in Romans 3.19 that
the law was given. Why? That every mouth may be
stopped and everybody become guilty before God. In other words,
hush your mouth and acknowledge before God that you're guilty.
Guilty of breaking His law. Guilty of being a sinner before
God. Like the publican who said, God
be merciful to me, I'm the sinner. Now, so these gospel exhortations
are given for the same reason, aren't they? To cause us to realize
that we might acknowledge our natural tendencies. Our shortcomings
by nature. And seek God's grace to overcome
them. To not be these things, because
we are these things by nature. Without Christ, I can do nothing.
I can do all things through Christ, who strengthens me. And so we're
to pray, we're to acknowledge what we are and pray for grace.
If the law ever shows you your guilt before God, I guarantee
you, you'll seek refuge in His Son. And if these gospel exhortations
shed light on what you are, you'll seek deliverance from it. Isn't
that right? We know that it will require
His grace and power to do so. Shutting up is a rare and priceless
gift. Do we realize that? The fine
art of just shutting up. Turn to James chapter 3. Look
at this with me. I said it's a gift. Let's find
out in this same letter. Let's see what James said about
this thing. James chapter 3, verse 2. For in many things we offend
all. If any man offend not in word,
the same is a perfect mature man, and able also to bridle
the whole body. Behold, we put bits in the horse's
mouths that they may obey us, and we turn about their whole
body. Behold also the ships, which though they be so great
and are driven of fierce winds, yet are they turned about with
a very small helm. Whithersoever the governor listeth,
even so the tongue, what a picture here, even so the tongue is a
little member and boasteth great things. Behold how great a matter
a little fire kindleth. And the tongue is a fire, a world
of iniquity. So is the tongue among our members
that it defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the course
of nature, and is set on fire of hell. Oh boy, he must be talking
to unbelievers now, no? No, he not, is he? Our tongue
is a fire. See how great a matter, a little
fire. We threw a match with a flame
that tall on it on our Christmas tree when we were done with it.
And before it was through, I thought we were gonna burn Spring Hill
down. Verse seven, for every kind of
beasts and of birds and of serpents and of things in the sea is tamed
and hath been tamed of mankind, but. Now I said it's a gift. Now you see if I said right.
But the tongue can no man tame. It's not gonna happen unless
God has mercy on us. It's a gift. Pray for it. Desire
it. Seek it. Because our tongue,
oh my, it is an unruly evil full of deadly poison. Would to God
that we could just praise Him and glorify Him and be a blessing
to our brothers and sisters with our tongue. No man can tame it,
but God can. God can. I'd pray for it. That's
what I want to do. I want to pray that God would.
Was it the psalmist that said, Lord, keep the door of my lips? It's a rare and priceless gift,
and so is listening. So is listening. In Luke 8, 18,
the Lord Jesus said, take heed how you hear. We just take it
for granted, don't we? We just show up and, you know,
take heed how you hear. And then in verse 21 of that
same context, they came and told him, verse 19 they came in Luke
8 19 they told him your mother and your brother he's sitting
there teaching his disciples preaching to them and they said
your mother and your brother are outside here and they want
to talk to you right now and he answered and said verse 21
my mother and my brethren are these which hear To hush is a blessed gift from
God, and so is to hear. And you can't do both at the
same time, can you? You can't talk and hear at the
same time. You're going to have to shut
up in order to listen. And that's what he's saying,
do both. Do both. What good instruction to me. And then the second reason now
that he brings up this context here, not only does he tell us
these things because we're just the opposite of them. That's
why we're exhorted in the other direction. Because
we need to be and we need to pray and seek God in these things.
But then secondly, he just got through saying that sinners are
begotten again by the Word of Truth. What a good time to say,
shut up and listen. You see the context of it? He
just said, this is how God saves sinners now. By the Word. By
hearing the Word. And then he turns around and
says, Be slow to speak and swift to hear. Slow and swift at the
same time. What good instruction. I'm talking
to myself. I'm talking to myself here. Listen
to this verse of scripture. Now listen to this. Turn there
and look at it. I want us to, I want this to
sink in and I know it's going to take God's grace, but let's look at it and hear
it. and pray the Lord will impress this upon us. John 6, verse 63. Look at it with me. John 6, verse
63. Now listen. Remember what we're
saying. It's a gift from God and a blessed
exhortation. Something that we ought to pray
for and seek and desire from God that He might enable us to
be slow to speak and swift to hear His Word. And here's why. John 6, 63, he's
talking to his disciples. He said, it is the spirit that
quickeneth. It's the spirit that gives life.
The flesh profiteth nothing. In other words, God's spirit,
by his spirit, he gives what you need and the flesh can't
do anything for you, nothing. Now listen to the next phrase.
The words that I speak unto you, they are spirit. and they are
life. The words, be swift to hear. Swift to hear. Peter said, as newborn babes
desire the sincere milk of what? The word. Desire it. Be anxious. Be ready. Pray for that gift. Ready, swift,
anxious to hear. Desire the sincere milk of the
world that you may grow thereby And what a great exhortation
By James here, and then why this warning about anger? What does
that got to do with it that kind of seems out of place here? No,
it's not out of place Why this warning about anger let me ask
you how far back in your own experience Do you have to go
in order to answer the question why this warning about anger? I don't have to go back very
far, do you? Every sinner's natural first reaction to God's truth
to the gospel is anger. After all, a God don't want to
hear about a rival God. And that's what you are in your
own mind. You're God. You heard the serpent whisper,
you shall be his gods. And that's the best thing you
ever heard. You defied the God of heaven and earth to get it.
to get to that place. And here we are, apart from His
grace. So this warning about anger,
we still get mad, don't we? You know who you're mad at? When
you get mad about anything, really, unless it's that rare, it's not
always sinful to be mad, is it? But in my experience, it usually
is. And you know who we're mad at? We're mad at God. We can
blame the woman, or the job, or somebody at work, or we can
blame it on whoever you want to. Or you can bow, and worship,
and thank God, even in trouble, even in conflict, because He
is the God who sits on the throne, and doeth all things after the
counsel of His own will. And let me say this too, we may
not have ever read the word on the page and gotten mad. I don't
remember ever reading the Bible and saying, oh boy, that makes
me mad. But when the truth written there is actually imposed upon
us in our experience, we get mad, don't we? The natural
man gets mad. You may agree wholeheartedly
with the doctrine of God's sovereignty, But then when God actually does
as He pleases and it doesn't please you, that's another story, isn't it? I had a man grit his teeth
at me one time and say, why did God kill my child? We were out
knocking door to door. I don't ever want to do that
again, by the way. Ever. It's casting pearls before swine,
that's what it is. And he said, the Lord Jesus said,
they'll trample you underfoot along with your pearls. And that's
what they did. Why did God kill my child? Well,
I'm sorry for the man's loss. I was then, and I'm sorry for
your loss if you've lost a child or something precious to you.
If God took one of my children, it would devastate me, and I
don't pretend otherwise. But God killed your child because
he wanted to. That's why he did it. He said,
I kill and I make a lot. And I'll tell you this, too.
He did it because it's his prerogative. And if you want to blame somebody,
blame yourself. Look in the mirror, because there
wouldn't be any death in this world if it wasn't for your sin,
your sin. You can't lay it at somebody
else's door. So that's just the truth of it.
Don't get mad at God. Don't be angered and then reject
the very One who's your only hope. Paul said to Timothy, teach those
that oppose themselves. You get mad at God, He's the
only One that can help you. He's the only One that can save
you. He's the only One that can turn the light on. Don't be angry
at Him. Come before Him and ask for mercy. That's what you do.
For God, He's your only hope. He's a gracious and merciful
God. He's just going to get all the
glory. And may He bring us to the place where that's exactly
what we want. It's for Him to have all the
glory. And quit getting mad when He gets all the glory and we
don't get any. If you're not alright with Him
getting all the glory and being on the throne, it's not going
to change it. Bow! Bow, and I'm talking to
myself. I say to you from my knees before
God by His grace, bow. Let's bow at His throne and ask
for mercy. Bow to His sovereign will. His
will is good. And what does that make everything
contrary to? Evil. That's what we are when
we don't bow. When we get mad at God, somebody's
evil and it's not Him. Kiss the son, the psalmist said,
lest he be angry. Oh, you think you're mad at God?
We don't know what anger is until you've seen him angry. Kiss the son lest he be angry
and you perish from the way when his wrath is kindled but a little.
Blessed are all they that put their trust in him. When it goes
his way and not your way, trust him. He's right, you're wrong.
May God give me grace to do that. Slow to speak. Swift. Is God going to condescend to
speak to me? And slow to wrath. Verse 20,
For the wrath of man worketh not. The righteousness of God. The wrath of man. We talk about
God's wrath. And that's right to do that.
He is a God of wrath. He's expressed his wrath in this
book, and we teach concerning that. But not our wrath. Our
wrath doesn't work any good. And it's easy. I said I'm preaching
to myself. I'm not just saying that. It's
easy for preachers to get mad. Did you know that? It's the easiest
thing in the world. And anger's not always evil.
As I said, our Lord got angry one day and threw some folks
out of His temple. And there wasn't any evil in that. But
it's a whole lot easier for us to get angry for the wrong reasons.
I heard an illustration once that you may have heard before,
but it'll be a blessing to you whether you have or not. A man
asked his pastor one day to come over and talk with him. He said,
I need to talk to you about something. The preacher said, okay. And
when he got there, he said, Bill, what'd you need to see me about?
And the man said, come with me. I was just feeding my chickens.
If you don't mind walking with me, they walked together into
the chicken house. And Bill had a bag of food with him and he
began to take handfuls of food and throw it at the chickens
and say, come eat you, you dumb chickens. If you don't eat, you're
going to die. I'm good enough for you. And he was throwing
it at them and they're running all over the place. And after about a
minute or two of that chaos, Bill stopped and stood in the
middle of the chicken coop and got down on his knees and held
out a handful of food. And they all started coming.
And even the little baby chicks came and ate out of his hand.
And the preacher said, I get it. I get it. The food's not
the problem. It's how you present it. It's
how you present it. The wrath of man worketh not
the righteousness of God. And preachers aren't the only
ones that get mad. I had a man tell me once, red
in the face, veins in his neck, standing out, and said, I don't
want anything to do with a God like that. And all I did was
tell him that God saves who he wants to save. He does as he
pleases in the armies of heaven, among the inhabitants of the
earth. He said, I'll have mercy on whom I'll have mercy. Oh,
the anger. I believe he'd have killed me
if he could have gotten away with it. I really do. Don't get
mad at God. Don't get mad at His Word. Don't
get mad, believer, either, at those who won't hear it. It hadn't
been that long ago when I wouldn't hear it. Has it been so long
ago for you that you can't have compassion on somebody that's
deaf? Blessed are your ears. For they hear. Maybe the Lord
will open their ears soon, too. He can do it if He wants to.
And so we preach the Word, we witness for Christ, and we do
it with compassion, don't we? By His grace. The anger, the
wrath of man doesn't work God's righteousness. And then verse
21, look at verse 21. Wherefore, lay apart all filthiness
and superfluity of naughtiness, and receive with meekness the
engrafted word which is able to save your souls." Well, there's
a lot in that, isn't there? And we'll see some of it this
morning if the Lord is pleased. Now, if I just said this in no
context at all, if I just said out of the blue, filthiness and
superfluity of naughtiness, You'd probably think I was talking
about something other than what James is talking about here,
but don't divorce it from the context. Keep it in the context
here. To receive rightly the word of God, to receive rightly,
to hear rightly the truth of his grace and mercy in Christ,
to receive the gospel, He said, receive with meekness the engrafted
Word which is able to save your souls. In order to do that, something's
got to be laid aside. You see that here? Lay aside
some things and then receive the Word. It's got to be done. Believer, unbeliever, I don't
care who you are. There's some things that got
to be laid aside. You can't hold what you naturally think Your
thoughts about God, and your ideas about right and wrong,
and your ideas about how God saves a sinner, and embrace His
Word also, got to be laid aside. And that's what the filthiness
and superfluity of naughtiness is. It's your natural thoughts
of God, yourself, His Son, and how God saves a sinner. You can't
see anything else in this context. It's just not there. That's what
he's talking about. Lay aside yourself and everything
you think, and receive what God said. It's
simple. In order to embrace his truth,
you got to lay aside your foolishness, your naughtiness, your sinfulness,
your wretchedness. Receive it with meekness. Meekness. That's what is laid
over against anger here. Don't be angry. That word wrath,
by the way, is anger. The anger of man. Be slow to
anger. That's the word. That's the first
definition of that original word, anger. What's given here as the
opposite in this context? meekness. Turn to James chapter
four. We're staying right here in the
same letter. Now this is James still, still writing here. Meekness. This word means simply
to submit, submit, submit. Look at verse one of
chapter four from whence come wars and fightings among you. Come they not hence even of your
lusts that war in your members? Ye lust and have not, ye kill
and desire to have and cannot obtain. Ye fight and war and
ye have not because ye ask not. And that word kill there is envy,
you envy. We're not physically murdering
one another, although, spiritually speaking, if you hate somebody
in your heart, you've murdered them, the Lord Jesus said. It's
not that strong of a word when used about us, is it? But that word there is envy. And you desire to have and cannot
obtain. You fight in war. You have not
because you ask not. You ask and receive not because
you ask amiss. that you may consume it upon
your own lusts, you adulterers and adulteresses. And he's not
talking about physical adultery here. He's talking about spiritual.
He's not talking about lusts of the flesh. He's talking about
the lusts of the heart, the lusts for everything bad that we have.
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 you think that
the scripture saith in vain, the spirit that dwelleth in us
lusteth to envy? You see how the word lust there,
it's not the way the world uses it. It's lusting to envy. It's lusting to war and fight
and fight against God, his truth, his word, and against one another.
Bob, look at verse 6. But he giveth more grace. We
need more grace, don't we? I'm glad he gives more grace
because I need more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth
the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. And here's this word. This is the same word as meekness.
Receive with meekness. Same idea. Submit. Submit. 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. I thought we were supposed to
rejoice all the time. Not about ourselves. Not about
our sin. Not when we're looking like the
song we just sang. When we turn our eyes within,
quit laughing. It's time to mourn now. And then look at verse 10. This
is such a key verse. Humble yourselves in the sight
of the Lord. Come before Him. And get low. Get low, because we are low.
Let's act like it. Let's acknowledge it. Take our place in the dust before
Him. And He'll lift you up. Now it's
time to rejoice. Rejoice in Him and what He does.
Oh, when we look at ourselves and the fact that we fight and
war and ask to consume things on our own desires. Mourn. Get in the dust. Bow before Him. Submit. The word engrafted here,
he said, receive the engrafted word, which is able to save your
souls. In this context, it means implanted
by others' instruction. Engrafted. Implanted by others'
instruction. What you've been taught, in other
words. What Paul said so many times. Receive the gospel that
I preach unto you. And don't listen to any other
gospel. Receive it with meekness. And this will take grace, won't
it? And we're not meek by nature. But I'll tell you this, desire
it, pray for this, because this Word, it's able to save your
souls. That's something to pray for,
isn't it? This Word, that we might receive that which, according
to God, is able to save us. Oh, this is so, so vital. Christ
is salvation. He is a person, but he'll use
his word to save his people. That's what he said. And that's
what he means here. Submit. Submit with meekness,
receive his gospel. What do we mean by submit? Well,
submit to his sovereignty. We talked about that already.
God's on the throne. Bow. Don't fight him. Don't be
angry at what God does. Bow, submit. He doeth all things
after the counsel of his own will. Submission says, that's
the way I like it. That's the way I like it. I want
God to do exactly what he wants to do. That's why our Lord prayed,
nevertheless, thy will be done. His will is right and good. And
we submit, we submit to him. Submit to God's estimation of
you by nature. That takes some submission, doesn't
it? That'll take some laying aside our natural naughtiness
and superfluity in our thinking concerning ourselves. If the
Lord Jesus Christ says to you in his word, and he does, you're
a dog. And it wouldn't be right for
me to take the children's bread and give it to a dog like you. Receive that word with meekness
and say with that little lady in Matthew 15 27. That's the
truth Lord. If you didn't give me anything
and left me to die in my sins and go to hell. You'd be doing
the right thing. But. Even the dogs get across. The
master's table is so bountiful. Do you desire a crumb from his
table? Bow. Like this lady did to his estimation
of you. Bow. Submit to his electing grace
in Christ. Did you know that the only thing
that a sinner hates worse than God's law is God's grace? This
is the offense of the cross that Paul talked about. How can you
be offended by the fact that God came down here and died for
sinners? I'll tell you how. You don't
get any glory out of it. That's what bothers you. That's
what I have a problem with. Submit to his electing grace
in Christ. I will have mercy on whom I will. It's not of him that willeth,
nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. Truth, Lord. Truth, Lord. If
it's up to my will, no hope. If it's up to my ability to run,
my ability to please, my ability to perform, no hope. But if God
shows mercy, I'm in. I'm in. Now honestly now do you want
what's coming to you or do you want mercy? Submit To his effectual redemption
of all of his elect Did you know what we call limited atonement
the effectual successful? Redemption of God's people by
the Lord Jesus Christ by his sin atoning death. That's the
single most offensive truth in God's books You start talking
to somebody about how that Christ died for His people, His elect,
and only His elect, and you'll find out. But this is the clear
language of Scripture. Read John chapter 10. He laid
down His life for His sheep. And if you don't believe Him,
if you don't believe on Him, if you don't believe in Him,
if you don't believe His Word, it's because you're not of His
sheep. That's what He said. Submit. Say, oh Lord, have mercy, have mercy. Submit to the truth of Christ's
irresistible grace. If His grace is not irresistible,
you will resist it until He comes in power You will run from him. You will hide. You will defy
him. That's exactly what you'll do.
And that's all you'll ever do until he comes in power and has his sovereign way with
you. And then you'll praise him forever for doing it. You'll
praise him forever. Submit to the truth. of his irresistible
grace. When he says live, and not until,
you'll live. That's my Savior. When he says
come, you'll come. When he says be not faithless,
you'll believe. When he said, let there be light,
And there was, when that God shines in your heart, you'll
know him. There'll be light. That's what
Paul said. Not until then. Not until then. When he says, I will, be thou
clean. You're clean everywhere. Is that
your Savior? If and when the Son of God shall
make you free, you shall be free indeed. That's the sovereign,
irresistible grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. And my prayer and
heart's desire is that he be gracious to everyone here this
morning. His grace is sovereign and irresistible. If he says
live, you'll live. If he makes you free, you'll
be free indeed. Let's bow in prayer.