I've heard believers over the
years say many times that they thought things would be different
after God saved them. And what they meant by that is
that the Scriptures plainly teach, as long as I live in this body
of death, this flesh, that I'll continually fall short, I'll
continually come short of the glory of God. And friends, I
did honestly, I did honestly think that my sins would be fewer
after I came to know Christ. I thought they'd be weaker, less
burdensome, and less trouble to me. I did. But now after almost 25 years,
I've come to see that that's just not so. I wake up day after day after
day realizing that I'm still just as sinful as I ever was. I heard Brother Don say in a
message one time, and I'll never ever forget it as long as I live. He said, I never thought that
a saved man, saved woman, could love Christ so little and the
world so much. And I never thought that I could
trust God so little. and worry and fret like I do. It's difficult for me. I'm speaking
about me now. It's difficult for me to pray.
Can't seem to stay focused. It's often difficult to study. Though I enter my study every,
try to every day of the week, I find it difficult because it
seems like my mind just runs to every evil thought, every
evil thing. You don't have to raise your
hand or nod your head, but is it the same with you? Thank you. I didn't think I was the only
one. It seems like when I pray it's
usually full of selfish desires, selfish wishes. And I confess that I do love
Christ, but truly my love for Him is really kind of shameful
and embarrassing, if you get right down to it. If you could
see my heart, the things that go through my mind this morning,
I wouldn't have the courage to stand before you. I do believe that I trust God,
but my faith seems to always be mixed with unbelief. I murmur. I complain. I find that a lot of the times
I'm resentful of God's good and great providence. And that's why a true believer
has hope, one reason only, in the sovereign
free grace of God in Christ. That's our only hope is what
I meant to say. I can never, ever, ever be accepted
of God unless it's through Him, by Him, and in Him. Have you seen this for yourself? Now I know some of you have,
and I find myself asking this question often to my own heart. If I really believed, I'd do
better. If I really believed, I'd do
better. But honestly, dear friends, I've come to see also that in
my flesh dwelleth no good thing. Oh, good thing. Therefore, I
can only strive to do better. I can only desire to do better,
but I can do that by God's grace. So why am I really surprised?
Well, I guess surprised maybe shouldn't be the word I use.
Maybe disappointed. Why am I so disappointed? I had
hoped that things would get better in that sense. But this morning
I have a passage of scripture in the book of James, chapter
4, that I think very well may encourage you and I in this battle and war that goes
on within our members. And that is what God's Word does,
isn't it? It comforts. It encourages. And I pray that that's what God
by His Holy Spirit does for us this morning, comforts us. We
need comfort. Do you need comfort? And once again, friends, by grace
I see that my salvation is in no way, shape, or form a result
of my faithfulness. Have we learned that yet? But
it's His faithfulness only. That's my only hope, the fact
that He's faithful. And have you noticed in the Scriptures
that most of the time it seems that we're shown our infirmities
and our shortcomings and all before God shares the remedy
for us? That's the way it is in this
passage today. It seems like we get the bad news first. And there's a reason for that,
I believe. And then by God's grace, he shares
with us the good news of the gospel. I believe that's the
order of things because I'm convinced that you and I would never, ever
see our need, desire a remedy for our state and condition if
God didn't first show us that state and condition. Then we
say, like all of them did in Scripture, what must I do? And
we find the only answer to that is believe and trust in the Lord
Jesus Christ. It's all we can do. And even
that has to come by the grace of God. I don't think we ever fully appreciate
God's good news to us as sinners until we're made conscious of
our sin, our inability, our need. And this is how God brings sinners
to Christ. He shows them their rightful
condemnation. And then He holds before them
their only way to God. Your only way out. Look to Christ. He shows them, we talked about
it in Sunday school, that little distinctive word, thee. He shows
them the way. He shows them the gate. He shows them the life, the truth,
the Christ. Only one. In verse one of chapter four
of James, James asks a question, from whence come wars and fighting
among you? come they not hence even of your
lust that war in your members now i know you know this but
i'm going to tell you again there are many contentions within believers
and much more within those who are yet without god and i don't
really believe here that james is speaking of uh... national
wars much what we have going on overseas here. First of all, we need to remember
that these epistles were written to believers in specific. Now, I do believe that the wars
that our country are in come from within. But I believe here that he speaks
of the wars that go on within us and without us personally. The Baptist church is about ruined
in a good old hymn called Just As I Am. That's an amazing hymn,
but I hated it for years because I'd be sitting there in church
and my stomach growling, and they'd sing it through 14 times,
all five verses. But if you read the words to
that hymn, they're beautiful words. Just as I am without one
plea, that thy blood was shed for me. and that thou bidst me
come to thee, O Lamb of God." That song also speaks of fightings
within and fightings without. And that's what James is talking
about here. He's talking about a holy war.
From the moment of our new birth, regeneration, from the moment
we're born spiritually to the day we die, there's a war that
goes on in our members between the flesh and the spirit. And
those of you who know Christ know that to be so, don't you?
That's a war. We can be assured that the wars
and fightings on the outside, they always come from the wars
and the fightings on the inside between the old and the new nature.
And James says here very plainly, come they not hence? Didn't they
come this way even of your lust that wore in your members? We're sinners. because of the
sin that is within us. You've heard this said many times.
I'm not a sinner because I sin. I sin because I'm a sinner. Sin
is what I am. Therefore, it can only be what
I do. David said in Psalm 31, he said,
For my life is spent with grief, and my years with sighing. My
strength felleth because of mine iniquity, and my bones are consumed."
Friends, we're consumed with sin even to our bones. He said in Psalm 38, 3, there's
no soundness in my flesh because of thine anger, neither is there
any rest in my bones because of my sin. sin is the cause of
these wars and fightings within. And I have become quite aware,
and there again I don't speak for you, but I know that there's
not a penny's worth of difference in any sinner, that I've come
aware that my warfare and my fightings are pretty much self-inflicted. They're caused by My lust, which
wore in my members." Remember when Paul wrote in Ephesians
2, he said, among whom also we had our conversation in times
past, in the what? Lust. The lust of our flesh,
fulfilling the desires of the flesh and of the mind. And that's
what James is talking about here. And we were by nature the children
of wrath, even as others. Look at verse two. 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 hast not. Believers will be unsuccessful
in many of their desires and pursuits after worldly things
simply because God won't allow them. How many times have I prayed
for something that would have probably been to my destruction,
to my spiritual destruction? He says you lust and you have
not. Well, the Lord sees to that. One day we'll truly see that
most always the things that we asked and desired from God were
not at all in our best interest or our spiritual good. And you
know, I believe that's why a good way to pray is, Lord, if Thou
will, I talked to some of you on the
phone and said, I'll see you tomorrow. And you said, Lord
willing, I'll see you. That's a good way. That's a good way to talk.
Don't say you're going to go to a town and start a business
and do this and that. Say, if the Lord wills. That's
a man of wisdom. That's a man that God's revealed
some things to that talks that way. If the Lord wills. You know
another good way to pray? Not my will, but thy will be
done. If we prayed that way every time,
they'd be answered every time. Because we're not asking things
to consume them upon our lust. We're asking simply that God's
will be done. And you know what? God's will
is going to be done. That's a way to pray successfully, isn't it?
Lord, not my will, but your will be done. The fact of the matter
is, friends, it's just true that we lust and we covet for worldly
things. And I sure can't throw a rock
at you because I'm guilty of it myself. Let he without sin
cast the first stone. I'm not going to throw any rocks. My heart and my desires have
pretty much been all my life. I won't. And then usually what
followed that was bigger and better. Just not very content by nature,
are we? It seems like, looking back,
that I've never, ever really been content. Men by nature lust,
and they have not. We desire to have so much that
we would kill to get it. Well, now, you wouldn't kill
somebody. You'd hate somebody in your heart. You ever looked at the thing
someone else had and said, well, he don't deserve that. He's an
infidel. He's a pagan. God should have given that to
me. Hello? That's just our nature,
isn't it? Notice those words, cannot obtain. They signify that we'll never
obtain the happiness that we desire and the things that we
desire to obtain. Now that sounded wrong, didn't
it? But it's right. Let me say it
again. We'll never obtain the happiness that we desire and
the things that we desire to obtain. In other words, let me ask, have
you ever just had to have something and when you finally got it,
you were almost immediately disappointed that you got it because it didn't
bring you the happiness that you'd hoped that it would? I think I will take a hands-on
answer. That's just sinners, isn't it? That's just nature. And James
says there at the last part of verse 2, he says, you fight in
war, yet you have not because you ask not. We fight and we
don't succeed because we don't consult God in our undertakings. And whether He will allow them
or not, most always, we don't commit our way to Him. We don't
pray, as I said earlier, Lord, not my will, but Thy will be
done. When we make known our request to God, we follow usually
our own corrupt views and evil inclinations. If I just had that,
Oh, if my wife had a dollar for every time I said, if I can get
this, that would be the last thing that I ever need. Isn't
that right, Teresa? Yeah. If I could just get that,
you know, that would be all. I won't need anything else. That
would do it all. Only for a month or two later.
I got something bigger and better. I want the bigger and better
one. We don't ask according to God's
will. Therefore, we meet with continual disappointments. That's
what James says in verse 3. Look at it. You ask and receive
not, because you ask amiss wrongly. You don't ask right. And that
you may consume it upon your lust. Our lusts spoil our prayers. When we ask for things, we ask
them most of the time that we may consume them upon our lusts. And those things become an abomination
to God. May, by God's grace, we learn
to manage our daily affairs and in our prayers to God to see
that our motives and that our desires be right. I pray that for me and each one
of you. When we seek the throne of God's grace, may we check
our hearts that our petitions before Him are right. I know many businessmen that
ask God to prosper them, and when they don't receive what
they ask for, it's because they ask for the wrong desire and
intentions. They ask God to give them success,
not that they may glorify their Heavenly Father, not that they
might support the Gospel and the continuance of it, but that
they may consume it upon their lust. And friends, if we seek the things
of the world, it's just and good for God to deny them, believers. I don't know why this keeps coming
to mind, I remember, I guess it comes to mind, because it
seems like every time I go somewhere, somebody's buying a lottery ticket
in front of me. That gets frustrating, waiting
in line for all that. And then they win four or five
dollars and say, give me a pick three, a choose two, and a jackpot. And then a lot of times, they
want to scratch them off right there. You're like, I'd like
to get out of here, you know? But what I'm getting at is just
this. If God, Brother Mahan said, if
you won the lottery, I'd start praying for you right then. Sometimes
the things that we're just convinced are the best things for us are
the worst things that could happen to us, spiritually speaking. You see, if we seek anything
that we may serve God more, we can expect two things. This
is right now. He'll either give us what we
seek, or He'll give us hearts to be content without it. Look at verse four. Ye adulterers
and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world
is enmity with God, hatred with God? Whosoever therefore be a
friend of the world's the enemy of God. Now when he says ye adulterers
and adulteresses here, Paul first of all doesn't speak of an adulterer
here as a man who removes his affection from his wife and sets
it upon another woman. That's not what he's talking
about. And he does not use that term adulteress as a woman that
basically does the same thing, doesn't love her husband and
places her love upon another man. He uses the terms here as
such of men and women who instead of loving God, whom they ought to love with
all their heart, soul, mind, spirit, everything. they set
their affections upon the world and the things of it. And I believe
that's obvious from the next phrase in verse four. Know ye
not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? You see, this speaks of a love
for the good things of the world and our desire after the evil
things of it. And I know none of us pursue,
quote, evil things on purpose. Like I said, most of the time,
the worldly things that we pray for, we have no idea that they
could be the worst thing for it. But God does. He knows the
beginning from the end. He's Alpha and Omega. This love
and friendship is a delight in the things of the world and a
conformity to them. The friendship of the world is
a desire for the sinful matters and customs of the world, which
become declarations of war against God. their acts of hostility
against him. They really are. They show the
enmity of the mind against him and they're highly displeasing
to him and they're resented by him. And it's obvious again from
the next phrase which says, whosoever therefore be a friend of the
world is an enemy of God. Whosoever is servant with the
one, first of all you know that Christ said himself that man
cannot serve God and man. He can't be loved and served by the same person at the same
time. You're going to love one or the
other. You're going to love one and hate the other. That's what
Matthew 6.24 says, that the one will be loved, the other hated,
the one will be attended to, and the other neglected. To love
the world and the things of the world are to be an enemy of God.
And I believe I still love the world too much. I don't want
to be an enemy of God. In verse five, James asks us
a very important question concerning ourselves. And I promise you,
I'm about to get to the good part of this. Remember, this
was written to believers. He asks this question in verse
five. He says, do you think That the scripture saith in vain,
do you think that the scripture says this what I'm fixing to
tell you in vain? That the spirit that dwelleth
in us lusteth to envy? Do you think that's just a vain
saying that the scripture says that with no consequence? I believe the Scriptures say
with all clarity that a child of God is to love his Creator
with all his heart, with all his mind, all his soul. The Scriptures
teach, as I said a minute ago, that a man cannot serve God and
the world, for he'll love the one and hate the other. The Scriptures
do not say in vain that a double-minded man is unstable in all his ways. It doesn't say that in vain.
It says it truthfully. You and I had better not think
for a moment that the Scriptures say these things in vain. What
do the Scriptures teach, my dear friends, concerning a man by
nature? Just what James says in verse
5. The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy. Lust to envy. popular interpretations of this
verse too. Do you suppose, first of all,
that the Scripture is speaking in vain when it says the Holy
Spirit desires our whole heart? That it be dedicated to the glory
and fellowship with our Lord? Do you think it says that in
vain? Do you think He didn't mean it when He said it? When
it was written in God's Word? And second, do you think it is
vain when the Scriptures declare that our spirit of flesh and human nature, that
old fallen nature that remains in us, lust after those things
which still appeal to the flesh. Do you believe that's just talking
to be talking? I'll tell you the truth, in our
own nature, we lust to envy. We do. So, in these first five
verses, what have we seen thus far? Well, let's just quickly
reiterate that what we've seen that wars there's wars within
us and there's war wars on the outside there's fightings and
uh... they come from the lust of our
flesh we we've seen that we lust we kill we we hate a brother
we desire to do and have all evil we fight and war and we
don't call on god like we should we've seen that in these verses
When we don't have, it's because we don't ask. And when we ask, we ask wrongly. We've seen that. Because we ask
for the things so that we can consume them upon our own lust. We've seen that we're spiritual
adulterers and adulteresses. We love the world and not our
beloved husband, the Lord Jesus Christ. We're unfaithful to Him
and our love towards Him. We love the world and the things
of the world more than we love God. And in this, we make ourselves
enemies of God. The Spirit which dwells in us,
James has said, lusts to envy. It desires to envy those who
are in and of the world. It ain't looking good, is it? What shall we say to these things?
What is our hope of escape before God Almighty? Verse six, but he giveth more
grace. Now is that not the gospel? Is
that not good news? God continues to give more grace. Does He have to? Is He obligated
to? Is He bound to? God gives more
grace. This should give us an indication
of the place where we can find that shield and buckler of our
sacred war. He giveth more grace. And this
is not only a suggestion, but it appears to me it's an encouragement. It's an encouragement for continuing
in this battle that we find ourselves in, this warfare within our members. He giveth more grace. We had this grace in the beginning. When we first came to God in
Christ, We say, it's by grace. God's shown me that it's not
by works. It's by grace that He saved me. We had it in the
beginning. And it caused us to fight against
the lust of the flesh and every other sin. So now do we look
back? Do we go to another place to
escape the wickedness which continues in us? All of a sudden, are we now alarmed? Because the warfare of our spirit
has become so evident? No. He giveth more grace to continue
the struggle. Friends, as long as there's one
iota of passion in your soul, that would dare to rise, there
will be grace in your soul to rejoice." Because He'd give us
more grace. Are we so distressed that we
don't appear to be making the headway that we should against
it? That's something I battle with
often. And I know in talking to some of you, you do too. I'm
not making any headway in this thing. It ain't getting any easier. It ain't getting any better,
like I said in the beginning. If you're distressed over this,
let me tell you something, it's a blessed distress. You know
why? Because you see by His grace
that He giveth more grace. We don't ignore it. We don't
fall backwards into unbelief because God is in Christ and
He gives more grace. More and more and more and more. Well, you can count on this. There's going to be more temptation.
Yet God will give more grace. As we continue in our journey
in this life, it will bring more infirmity and more trials and
more tribulations. More! I assure you of that. But He'll always give you more
grace. As long as the fight shall last,
God's help will last. While you're in the wilderness,
dear friends, the manna from heaven is still going to fall. It will never cease to
drop. You may be thinking to yourself,
I can't overcome this sin. And it seems to me that in this
matter we have a prediction of the victory already. He giveth
more grace. I'm going to come out victorious
in this. Because he gives more, more,
more, more grace. Oh, it seems to me that he promises
a continued supply of it. And let me tell you this in closing.
That, and knowing that, will make you humble. It's all of His grace, His. We don't come to Christ proudly,
arrogantly, like that old publican in the temple, Lord I thank you
that I'm not like this man. I give alms, I do this, I do
that. Now, the believer is like that
old publican standing in the back, beating up on his chest,
his head down, wouldn't so much look into heaven, look towards
heaven. And what was his cry? God, be
merciful to me, a sinner. Well, that's why James writes
there in the last part of verse 6, he says, God resisteth the
proud. He always has. The seven things that God hates. You know what the first one is?
Proud look. Very first one. Proud look. But, notice that word there at
the end of verse six. God resisteth the proud, but he giveth grace unto them. So what are you trying to say? I'm not trying to say anything.
He gives and He gives and He gives. He gives more and more
and more. Grace, grace, marvelous grace. But He giveth more grace.