Grasping God's Purpose – "Suit Up!" – Exodus 39

When I was young, my parents had a house full of kids, and a limited budget. I remember a time, though my concept of how long it was is probably inaccurate, that we didn’t have a television. The old one had broken and we didn’t have the money at that time for a replacement. I recall the short-lived joy we shared when my grandmother gave the money for us to buy a little black and white set to put on a table top in the place of the old set. I thought having a TV was great, but I couldn’t really understand the value of watching football on a TV set that was so very small and without any color. The problem was that in those days, the TV broadcasters loved to show the whole stadium from above, or show a long shot of an action play. When you have under 13” of diagonal viewing space, and that real estate on the screen is a palor of colorless grey- things are going to be difficult to see. Add to that, when it is being viewed by a room full of people so that you cannot get within ten feet of the set – and what you have is a hopelessly bad viewing experience. You can’t tell where the ball is. You can’t tell who has it. If you could, you couldn’t tell what they were doing with it.

The ONLY hope you could possibly have of trying to follow the game was found in paying some attention to the depth of the grey on the uniforms worn by each of the teams, and recalling which side of the field was which team. In those long bygone days I was (and I cannot emphasize the WAS more) – a Philadelphia Eagles fan. Remember, I was but a child – unaccustomed to the nuances of the game, like playing fair, etc. I would look at the beginning of the game to see who was wearing the LIGHTER grey uniform, and who was wearing the DARKER grey uniform – and that is how I would be able to figure out which team had possession of the ball…it was my only hope to follow the game.

If you look closely at the uniforms of NFL teams, you will see they are not only decorative – they are also functional. The pads are strategically placed – not so much to scare the opponent, as to protect various parts of the body of the wearing player. In some cases, pads are reduced, or even missing, according to the work each man had on the team. Every part of the uniform design is for the purpose of making the work more possible and easier to complete. The uniforms are fitted to the player, and designed for maximum movement within their assigned task.

Why do I mention this? Because the same truth applied to God’s ministry team in the Tabernacle long ago. The uniform was carefully described in the Word because God wanted to reveal and explain the FUNCTION of the offices, while allowing creative people to reflect beauty and skill in their workmanship. God’s servants needed to be prepared to FUNCTION in their role, enabled by special provisions of God.

The text of Exodus 39 is divided into two parts, each with their own lessons:

  • First, the bulk of the text is dedicated to the record of the making of garments for the priests – all made according to God’s instructed design (39:1-31). God wanted to explain the role of the priests by recording the clothing of the priests.
  • Second, the inspection of Moses was performed on each of the Tabernacle furnishings and coverings (39:32-43). God wanted to remind us of three important end points for preparing people to accomplish a ministry for God.

Key Principle: Though assets make things possible – people make things happen. God used parts and pieces to enable worship and praise, but in the end PEOPLE do ministry.

1: The garments were beautiful and meaningful to the men who wore them (39:1a,5)

Exodus 39:1a “Moreover, from the blue and purple and scarlet material, they made finely woven garments… 5 The skillfully woven band which was on it was like its workmanship, of the same material: of gold and of blue and purple and scarlet material, and fine twisted linen, just as the LORD had commanded Moses.

It is much harder to appreciate the uniqueness and beauty of the colorful garments of the priests today, then it would have been in the Sinai desert long ago. When you first visit the deserts of Sin, Paran and Zin – you can easily see them as lifeless and dull looking. With time in the region, if you are able to camp out in those desert areas, you will see the magnificence of the colors of the rising and setting sun, and you can appreciate how it impacts the landscape color as well.

When I was young I loved the Galilee, with its beauty and well-watered lushness. With each passing year I appreciated the desert more. Its stark midday sun was only one cast of the images of it could show. There is a very special purple color that you can only see in the mountains near Wadi Ram on the east side of the Aravah. There are slight shades of brown, red and blue in the morning twilight. About the time you think you have seen the beauty of it all, get a snorkel and mask and look beneath the Red Sea at the astounding colors that abound on the coral reefs. The plainness of the mountains contrasts with the kaleidoscope of colors as you raise and lower your head – above the sea and below the sea.

My point is that ten generations of Israel lived in a desert rim of Egypt. The next generation walked the dusty plains of the wilderness of Sin, Paran and eventually Zin. In all that time, the colors were beautiful in the early morning – but they were limited to the desert palate. The tents were not colorful. The clothes were largely plain. The sashes on some garments were about as color-filled as people were willing to expend the effort to make in the intense heat of the long desert days. These uniforms for the priests were both colorful and specially made to reflect the honor of the office and the importance of the task of these men. The work that God called them to was an honor to them. The needs of the people were real, and their tasks were nothing less than spiritually essential.

Can you hear the honor of the priest in the words of Peter directed at believers of the church? Peter said:

1 Peter 2:9 But you are A CHOSEN RACE, A royal PRIESTHOOD, A HOLY NATION, A PEOPLE FOR God’s OWN POSSESSION, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; 10 for you once were NOT A PEOPLE, but now you are THE PEOPLE OF GOD; you had NOT RECEIVED MERCY, but now you have RECEIVED MERCY. 11 Beloved, I urge you as aliens and strangers to abstain from fleshly lusts which wage war against the soul. 12 Keep your behavior excellent among the Gentiles, so that in the thing in which they slander you as evildoers, they may because of your good deeds, as they observe them, glorify God in the day of visitation.

God calls believers to be His priests. The passage is rich, and cannot be brushed off. The church is made up of people that were called by God from many peoples and nations. No one saw us as a cohesive group before God made us a family. We were brought in – not because of our outstanding nature or humble holiness – quite the opposite. We were given undeserved mercy of God and placed in His priestly ranks. We should feel HONORED to be called and HONORED to serve. Our service is specifically requested in testimony before a lost world. It is a service of RIGHT BEHAVIOR. It is a service of abstention from the indulgence of the lusts of lost men. It is a service active in DOING GOOD, so that our testimony will secure us from false accusations of an enemy. We are to HONOR GOD by pointing to His character is OUR LIFESTYLE.

None of these acts is to earn our place, they are merely to HONOR our King, who gave us our place!

Here is the job of the priests of our time: Live distinctly. Walk honorably. Give Generously. Treat the setting aside of old habits as a badge of honor and privilege. Priests of the Tabernacle dressed with honor and view the uniform as a reminder that the work was special – we should do no less.

2: The garments were patterned for the work of the men who wore them (39:1b)

Exodus 39:1b: “…for ministering in the holy place as well as the holy garments which were for Aaron, just as the LORD had commanded Moses.

The priests did not use the garments for tending sheep or daily chores – but for the specific work in the service of the King. God commanded that His workers LOOK THE PART to serve Him. One important aspect, from the day the priest was inaugurated into ministry, was the idea that they were to be circumspect about their appearance. They were to wear the uniform for HOLY WORK in a HOLY PLACE where people came to deal with their distance from God.

Can you imagine how important it was for them to keep their garments spotless? Can you imagine how carefully they hung up, stored and moved the garments when not on their body? Can you imagine how meaningful it was to carefully dress in a garment with the label “Designed by GOD” on the inside! The pattern of the garment was distinct – just as God says the look of the believer is to be. We aren’t called to BLEND IN. Jesus said it in the Sermon on the Mount – a follower of His is forced to become a city set on a hill, and a lamp that is lighted. Our work isn’t to comfortably blend but to boldly stick out. Our peculiarity is our secure and growing relationship with God in a world that has their spiritual umbilical cord severed from the Fall in the Garden that left man utterly depraved.

Do people see a distinct pattern in your life? Can they tell by what you spend your money on, that you are NOT at home in this world, and care more for lost men than your own comforts? Can they see a difference in your sense of humor, your caring nature, your life choices? If not, what happened to your garment that it became so much like all others?

3: The garments were functional in the work of the men who wore them (39:2,4,7-10a).

Priests were not men with no jobs, standing around haphazardly waiting for people to sin so they could help them. They were men that functioned in the daily work of the society on a number of different levels. One of their important roles was HELPING PEOPLE FIND GOD’S DIRECTION FOR THEIR LIVES. How do I know? Look at the description of their garments:

Exodus 39:2 He made the ephod of gold, and of blue and purple and scarlet material, and fine twisted linen…4 They made attaching shoulder pieces for the ephod; it was attached at its two upper ends…7 And he placed them on the shoulder pieces of the ephod, as memorial stones for the sons of Israel, just as the LORD had commanded Moses. 8 He made the breast piece, the work of a skillful workman, like the workmanship of the ephod: of gold and of blue and purple and scarlet material and fine twisted linen. 9 It was square; they made the breast piece folded double, a span long and a span wide when folded double. 10 And they mounted four rows of stones on it… 14 The stones were corresponding to the names of the sons of Israel; they were twelve, corresponding to their names, engraved with the engravings of a signet, each with its name for the twelve tribes. 15 They made on the breast piece chains like cords, of twisted cordage work in pure gold. 16 They made two gold filigree settings and two gold rings, and put the two rings on the two ends of the breast piece. 17 Then they put the two gold cords in the two rings at the ends of the breast piece. 18 They put the other two ends of the two cords on the two filigree settings, and put them on the shoulder pieces of the ephod at the front of it. 19 They made two gold rings and placed them on the two ends of the breast piece, on its inner edge which was next to the ephod. 20 Furthermore, they made two gold rings and placed them on the bottom of the two shoulder pieces of the ephod, on the front of it, close to the place where it joined, above the woven band of the ephod. 21 They bound the breast piece by its rings to the rings of the ephod with a blue cord, so that it would be on the woven band of the ephod, and that the breast piece would not come loose from the ephod, just as the LORD had commanded Moses.

A profoundly beautiful part of the uniform of the High Priest was the breast plate, with an embroidered flap covered with twelve precious stones. The High Priest was, on the appropriate occasions, to wear this in conjunction with the work he was charged to do. The gold, purple and blue weaving onto the linen six stranded cloth base was fastened to the outer garment by should straps and rings. The stones were etched with the names of the tribes and used to tell specific directions from God, as He used them to lead His people.

Be careful when you read the term ephod in the Hebrew Scriptures. The term is used differently in Judges and kings than in Exodus in relationship to the Tabernacle. The term in the historical books refers to an idol or talisman – whereas here it is an item of holy clothing. When Micah the Levite in Judges 18 had one made of gold, it was not like this one – it was a free standing idol of a sorts. The one in the Tabernacle was a kind of “chest bib” with a fixture of the breastplate over it and a pocket beneath that stored the Urim and Thumim – two stones used by God to help direct people.

Vital to the life of the community is the priestly work of offering God’s direction to people. We have no bib and no stones – but we possess as God’s priests the marvelous principles of God’s Holy Word today. Here is the problem: people won’t ask YOU to help them with a marriage if you are unhappily in YOUR MARRIAGE. People won’t see God’s directions through you if they don’t see Him living IN you. They won’t ask YOU how to follow God in issues of work if you are lazy, money if you are borrowing and drowning in debt, faithfulness if you are falsely calling in sick, positive outlook if you are incessantly complaining… you get the idea. A priest has to walk like a priest to be of any value to God in caring for the community.

We have strayed too far in leadership without character. We have thought that we could tolerate loose living in one area while demanding discipline in another. If a President couldn’t stay away from lust and be faithful to his wife, should he be trusted with the nuclear launch codes? Why do we think that someone who will not tell the truth in one area to those closest to him will remain faithful in other areas? We need to rethink the value of character over pedigree when selecting leaders in our country. The same is true in the priestly offices of the modern believer.

4: The garments were valuable to denote the work of the men who wore them (39:3,6).

Exodus 39:3 Then they hammered out gold sheets and cut them into threads to be woven in with the blue and the purple and the scarlet material, and the fine linen, the work of a skillful workman…6 They made the onyx stones, set in gold filigree settings; they were engraved like the engravings of a signet, according to the names of the sons of Israel….10b The first row was a row of ruby, topaz, and emerald; 11 and the second row, a turquoise, a sapphire and a diamond; 12 and the third row, a jacinth, an agate, and an amethyst; 13 and the fourth row, a beryl, an onyx, and a jasper. They were set in gold filigree settings when they were mounted.

Look at the money the people put into the making of priestly garments! Look at the value of those stones and the delicate beauty of the gold filigree. These were precious by any definition! God wanted the men to KNOW they were of essential value to their people. He also wanted the people to value them.

If this were about clergy, you would think I sounded self-serving – but it is NOT. The priests I am referring to today are all over my town – believers called by God to intercede in prayer for their neighbors, their office partners, their co-workers and their friends. They are called to represent God’s Word in their life choices. They are to be loving, caring examples of a God follower and Jesus lover to people who know little of either. Do you recognize the VALUABLE ASSET that God has placed in your plant, office, apartment complex or family by placing YOU there as a believer? You are HIS emissary, His ambassador, His example and His servant. You are not a salesman as much as a healer. Your life is His display case in which He can show how He lavishes on undeserving men and women His mercy and love!

5: The garments were distinctive to the men who wore them (39:22-31)

22 Then he made the robe of the ephod of woven work, all of blue; 23 and the opening of the robe was at the top in the center, as the opening of a coat of mail, with a binding all around its opening, so that it would not be torn. 24 They made pomegranates of blue and purple and scarlet material and twisted linen on the hem of the robe. 25 They also made bells of pure gold, and put the bells between the pomegranates all around on the hem of the robe, 26 alternating a bell and a pomegranate all around on the hem of the robe for the service, just as the LORD had commanded Moses. 27 They made the tunics of finely woven linen for Aaron and his sons, 28 and the turban of fine linen, and the decorated caps of fine linen, and the linen breeches of fine twisted linen, 29 and the sash of fine twisted linen, and blue and purple and scarlet material, the work of the weaver, just as the LORD had commanded Moses. 30 They made the plate of the holy crown of pure gold, and inscribed it like the engravings of a signet, “Holy to the LORD.” 31 They fastened a blue cord to it, to fasten it on the turban above, just as the LORD had commanded Moses.

The garb of the priests included a turban, a torsel, trousers and a tunic. The trousers allowed the men to move up and down the steps in appropriate modesty. The turban held their hair back from the hooks of draining sacrifices. The tunic covered the upper body. The torsel – or sash, held the clothing close to allow for the work of sacrifice without getting the garment stained with blood.

The High Priest had bells and decorative pomegranates sewn to the garment – making a noise that warned people of his approach. The whole community would have cleared a path for High Priest, and nothing untoward would have come into his path or in his line of sight. People WANTED him to maintain a high walk with God. People NEEDED him to keep himself clean and ready for the work of intercession.

People counted on their priests to walk distinctly, and to be careful in their choices. Do we do that? Do we feel the pressure of making decisions knowing that a lost world is watching us? Do we feel we are free to make any decision we want in what we read, or what we entertain ourselves with, or what we wear? Every garment reminded the priest that they were to be careful, and that God had a special work for them in their community. They were BORN into that role…. And so were YOU.

After the garment completion, the final presentation of the Tabernacle was made to Moses – and all was as it was supposed to be.

39:32 Thus all the work of the tabernacle of the tent of meeting was completed; and the sons of Israel did according to all that the LORD had commanded Moses; so they did. 33 They brought the tabernacle to Moses, the tent and all its furnishings: its clasps, its boards, its bars, and its pillars and its sockets; 34 and the covering of rams’ skins dyed red, and the covering of porpoise skins, and the screening veil; 35 the ark of the testimony and its poles and the mercy seat; 36 the table, all its utensils, and the bread of the Presence; 37 the pure gold lampstand, with its arrangement of lamps and all its utensils, and the oil for the light; 38 and the gold altar, and the anointing oil and the fragrant incense, and the veil for the doorway of the tent; 39 the bronze altar and its bronze grating, its poles and all its utensils, the laver and its stand; 40 the hangings for the court, its pillars and its sockets, and the screen for the gate of the court, its cords and its pegs and all the equipment for the service of the tabernacle, for the tent of meeting; 41 the woven garments for ministering in the holy place and the holy garments for Aaron the priest and the garments of his sons, to minister as priests. 42 So the sons of Israel did all the work according to all that the LORD had commanded Moses. 43 And Moses examined all the work and behold, they had done it; just as the LORD had commanded, this they had done. So Moses blessed them.

God wanted to remind us of three important end points for preparing people to accomplish a ministry for God:

  • Accountability: Before the work commenced – leaders needed to be careful to see that God’s commands were followed in assembling of the team. Short cuts in building the team will show up in the ministry functions. Short cuts in laying out the work according to God’s commands will cause problems of function and repair. The text says they brought the work for inspection –and it was all done as God commanded. Ministry leaders don’t flinch at the idea of accountability – they seek to be held to a standard – provided the standard used is the Word of God. If people chose by preferences – there would be a never ending battle that had no real Biblical resolution.

One of the most important parts of shaping ministry is inspecting the work of others, and yet it is clear to me that fewer and fewer men in ministry WANT someone looking over their shoulder. Mentoring is a two way process. People have to both WANT someone to offer them direction, and the one giving the direction has to WANT to be personally engaged in the process.

I fear that we have, all too often, rewarded headstrong stubbornness and called it “strong leadership”. We have placed ministry people in key positions without making sure they were properly accountable to others in their life. It is a dangerous trend. Accountability is not simply someone who you can tell that you failed – but someone who can “tag you out” of ministry for a time if you are going off the rails. Fewer and fewer men seem to appreciate the need for that kind of relationship – but it is both helpful and necessary.

  • Inspection: Moses carefully examined all the workmanship and saw it was done well. That was no small statement. The men prepared everything as they were told – but the leader took the responsibility to see to it that instructions were carefully followed. No leader can EXPECT what he does not INSPECT. Proper inspections took the leader TIME and CONCERTED EFFORT – more than a simple quick look.

No general would take men into battle simply by assembling a rabble and lining them up to move forward. To be effective, they must be divided into smaller numbers, and given specific functions. They need to understand the specific objectives they are given. They need to recognize who is in authority over each situation they will engage. Most of all, they need to learn THE BOOK – the rules used by their respective branch of service. The same is true of those God is using to fight against the enemy’s darkness and reach lovingly to rescue lost men and women. They must learn the BOOK – and they must be organized to follow its commands.

The BOOK will give them ways of advancing, armor to wear, ways to resupply the lines and even proper ways to flee in retreat – should that be strategically necessary. Failure to learn the BOOK leaves the force open to heavy damage, and can sap the energy from a sharp advance in wasted effort of tumultuous confusion. If we want people to know the book, we will have to teach them the book – and we will have to test their knowledge of it. We dare not place people in strategic ministry and assume they have built what they were instructed without inspection.

Let me be clear: If you are working in a ministry – expect someone to be checking on what you are doing. That isn’t because you aren’t trusted – it is because that is the Biblical way to build, advance and sustain God’s work. Inspection is part of the ministry, just as it was with Moses.

  • Affirmation: Moses blessed the workers for both the product, and their faithfulness. He acknowledged the obedience, care and quality of the work of the men. His words were not fluff – because he spent time really looking at their handicraft. It was essential that everything be sized correctly, made in appropriate numbers, and made from the proper materials. When he saw that they were – he didn’t hesitate to call the work ready by offering a blessing to the workers.

The inauguration of a new work is always a sensitive time. God’s inspection would follow Moses – and God missed nothing! Think about the beginning of the Temple in 1 Kings 8, or the beginnings of the church in Acts 1-5. There is a sweetness about the purity of those days – but there is a stark truth of God’s inspection – ask Ananias and Sapphira about trying to scrape by cutting corners on one of God’s inspections.

I believe that we affirm too little in ministry in our day. Faithfulness is tough in a distracting world like ours. Deliberate verbal blessing is often too little too late. Let me take a minute and say out loud what we should say often as part of the family of God.

To those of you who are working HARD at honoring Jesus in your daily decisions – THANK YOU for serving the Master and honoring Him according to His Word.

For those who are staying married, working out your struggles and facing your difficulties rather than shattering your children and hanging out a testimony that God can save you, but he cannot sufficiently change two people to reconcile their differences… THANK YOU. Thanks for being an example of a believer when you could easily find a way out and a group to affirm your unbiblical choices.

To those of you who believe that signing your name means something and you refuse to simply toss away your credit commitments because of the change of home values – THANK YOU for standing by your word. Plenty will tell you that your yes didn’t need to be a yes, but from those of us who are steadily paying our way back out of upside down mortgages because we believe integrity demands living up to our word in contracts – THANK YOU.

For those who go out of their way to pray for brothers and sisters who serve Jesus at home and on foreign fields, in missionary and chaplain services, in local churches and clinics – THANK YOU for your prayers, your sacrificial gifts and your loving care.

The Tabernacle was beautiful but useless without the priesthood. Though assets make things possible – people make things happen. God used parts and pieces to enable worship and praise, but in the end PEOPLE do ministry.

The Faith Work Out: "Leading Role" – James 3:1-12

Every actor wants one – the leading role in the movie. It is a time when their talent as an actor will be showcased. They will be the hero or heroine of the show – and all eyes will watch them. It is heady stuff. We understand, because we all grew up in a fame hungry world. Most of us, at least at one point, played “air guitar” in front of the mirror, and imagined ourselves playing before thousands of adoring and applauding fans. We know WHY people want to be up front, and what part of their ego fame feeds.

Before we know the Lord, many of us had our favorite music group, and perhaps even our favorite actors in posters on the wall. When we came to Christ, we may have left the world of lost celebrities– because they lost their appeal. We took down our old posters, put away our old CDs, and deleted some of our favs off the iPod music directory. Sadly, in a short time, we probably found that Christians had celebrities too. They had their own posters; their own heroes. If we were gifted to be “up front” people – teachers, leaders and the like – we probably started to want to be ONE of them – the noticed Christian famed leaders. We may have become enamored with the idea of leading people. Among youth, they often express the desire to lead a ministry among young people – perhaps as a Youth Pastor or Worship leader

There is no problem with wanting to use our gifts – that is as it should be. The problem comes when we misunderstand the nature of the gifts, and misplace the value of certain kinds of service to the Lord. An immature believer can easily end up thinking that what we SAY is the most important part of our testimony… when it is NOT. Speaking that isn’t backed up by living detracts from the clarity of the Gospel message to a lost world.

Key Principle: Serving Jesus is about how we discipline our lives- especially in the area of the tongue. The grand mark of maturity is the consistent ability to control the use of their tongue. Since the old man is ever within, mature believers limit the old man’s access to the microphone of the mouth.

Taming the tongue has always been a struggle, and James is clear to express it is a necessary one for maturity and testimony. We dare not think that our appetite for fame and affirmation will not creep up at a moment’s notice to grab control of our words – it will. How many of us were already embarrassed as we heard the words leaving our mouths on more than one occasion?

James has been addressing “thing people say” all the way through his letter – and this page will be no different. This short book has merely five short chapters but offers powerful and practical wisdom for life in “sound bite” style. As we have seen up to this point in our study of this letter, James was a man on a mission. God directed him to deal with loose lips of early believers. Reports were brought to his attention of the types of problems that came up in the early church, and God used his simple candor to communicate both the issues and the principles that would answer the problems caused, at least in part, by the tongue.

  • Reading through the first part of the Epistle, it appeared that there may have been some bitter complaining about the troubles that surrounded the early Jewish believers scattered in the Roman world. Reading even further, some in the congregations were apparently beaten down to the point that they even blamed God for enticement in the intense temptations they experienced – as though He was willing to test them to the point of entrapping them. They were beat, and their mouths bore evidence of the pain. James pressed the believers to understand that trouble was not an enemy, nor was it always sent from one. Trouble could have been a sculpting tool of God to prepare and condition them for the future He planned for them. On the other hand, not a word of blame, said James, could rightly be aimed at God for the issue of succumbing to temptation – that was surrendering to the old man, or the flesh inside. God didn’t tempt them – He never does that.
  • By what we now call chapter two, James showed another way their mouths were a window to their needy and fallen hearts. He exposed the inner root of preferential treatment of people. Privileged treatment of people was a thinly veiled manipulative behavior – verbally trying to “curry favor” with people they believed had the means of adding to things their flesh hungered for – fortune, fame, power and pleasure. (James 2:1-13). Because of that inner fleshly hunger, their mouth offered favor to one, but distance to another – and that just wasn’t right.
  • In our last lesson we concluded the mouth also exposed the fake faith of some. James argued those who decided to speak one way but live another were not authentically part of the Kingdom. As in so many cases – the words didn’t CAUSE the problem – they illustrated where the heart already was.  Over and over we see it illustrated… the mouth is the window to the heart and its condition.

As we open James 3, we find another example of the things people were saying that exposed a heart problem. In fact, on quick inspection, it sounds in James 3:1, like the author was somehow discouraging people from being teachers of the faith because there was something wrong. James wrote: “Let not many of you become teachers, my brethren, knowing that as such we will incur a stricter judgment. 2 For we all stumble in many ways. If anyone does not stumble in what he says, he is a perfect man, able to bridle the whole body as well.”

When we look carefully at the letter, we can easily see that James was not ANTI-TEACHER. He wasn’t trying to stop the exercise of the teaching gift that God gave to some believers as a byproduct of the Spirit’s indwelling. Teaching God’s truth is a deep privilege – but it is also a definite responsibility. It is paired with a discipline that is very hard to master, which is what James emphasized. Perhaps a clearer reading of the text would be something like this:

Do not be so quick to desire to be teachers, for they will be judged under more stringent rules. The more you say to others, the more possibility you offer to cause them error – and that can be devastating. The one who is able to harness every word that they utter is completely mature, since the hardest discipline of the body is the tongue.”

James highlighted is a critical truth: we must be careful about the way we consistently communicate so that we converse in a Christ-like way. In his world, that was PRIMARILY VERBAL. In our world, words are more often shared in writing. In either case, we must take full responsibility for our words.

When we say things like, “I only said that because I was under pressure” or “You made me so mad, that is why I yelled that!” we betray our own lack of discipline, and perhaps even our own desire to relieve personal responsibility. We are ALWAYS responsible for the words that come from our mouths. When the flesh tugs downward at the heart to share some bit of dirt about someone else – we are responsible. When outbursts of anger flare up within the flesh and we blurt out some hurtful sentence – we are responsible. The tongue is the window to the heart – and the heart shares the voices of both the Spirit of God and the old man within.

Let me apply this idea even further: Only recently did I begin to understand that some in the next-gen culture view words on a page in an entirely different way than the generations that preceded them. As I was growing up, we placed much more emphasis on anything you WROTE, even to the point that we avoided signing papers that were not thoroughly a representation of what we believed to be true. Yet, I am discovering that for some that sense has been badly eroded and is no longer a given. I confronted someone about a post they put on their Facebook page that did not represent what I thought they truly wanted to show to the world. They replied: I ONLY wrote that – it isn’t like I SAID it. I was stunned. You WROTE it but you thought that was LESS WEIGHTY than your words. “Of course” they replied.

When I thought more carefully about it, I think I began to understand where they could get that mistaken behavior. You see, my wife and I get a periodic updates to our credit cards in no less than eight pages, sometimes greater than sixteen pages – usually drafted in a number five font (small writing) to describe the routine changes my bank or lender is making to the terms of our agreement. Every software I install gives me  an “I agree” checkbox to pages of legal agreements as if I had any idea of what they may be truly saying. I sign my name entering a hospital claiming I will take ‘FULL RESPONSIBILITY’ when I don’t have a clue whether the bill will be $1000 or $1,000,000,000. We regularly are forced to sign things that are beyond our comprehension just to keep vital services in our lives. The written word has been diminished in its importance, and the younger people of our time have noticed.

Let me say this clearly: Whether in writing of in speech – your words are, as best as you are possibly able – to reflect a heart surrendered to Jesus Christ. To the extent that is NOT happening – there is a submission issue that must be dealt with before God. James illustrated the need carefully as he shared examples of one truth found in James 3:5a: “So also the tongue is a small part of the body, and yet it boasts of great things.

James offered three mistakes we make about our tongue that are perhaps more clearly seen through visual examples. He wants to focus on underlying mistakes of judgment that keep us from dealing with discipline of the tongue:

Example #1: The bridled horse (James 3:3)

James 3:3 Now if we put the bits into the horses’ mouths so that they will obey us, we direct their entire body as well.

Misunderstanding of destructive power: When we don’t discipline our tongue we demonstrate that we don’t understand how powerful a weapon it can be in the old man’s control.

The sheer size and strength of the weapon is aptly illustrated in the HORSE. Many people in the ancient world were familiar with few machines, but they knew of the damage a frightened runaway horse could cause in a marketplace. We can easily forget what a damaging effect our words can have on the heart of another – and it comes from an unbridled tongue. Controlling the outcome is made possible by controlling the tongue.

Example #2: The ship’s rudder (James 3:4)

Jame 3:4 Look at the ships also, though they are so great and are driven by strong winds, are still directed by a very small rudder wherever the inclination of the pilot desires.

Miscalculation of directive power: When we don’t discipline our tongue we demonstrate that we don’t really understand the significant effect our tongue can be on changing the direction of our lives or other’s lives.

The effectiveness of a tiny rudder against what seemed a limitless sea was highlighted in this argument. We can be duped into thinking that our words, because they are so small and come from one who is not so important, don’t matter much. We don’t take seriously their power to direct our thinking, other’s thinking and our collective direction. Future direction can often be charted by present speech.

Example #3: The forest fire (James 3:5b)

5b “…See how great a forest is set aflame by such a small fire! 6 And the tongue is a fire, the very world of iniquity; the tongue is set among our members as that which defiles the entire body, and sets on fire the course of our life, and is set on fire by hell.

Misjudgment of distinct purpose: We don’t discipline our tongue because we don’t truly recognize what it was made for and how its usefulness is also its greatest danger.

The tongue is in its nature a match. It was designed not only to express our thoughts, but to illicit assistance, evoke response, and even gain a reaction. It is the verbal equivalent to a lighter or match.

James completed the essay on the tongue with two ideals that form the goal of every believer:

Principle #1: The tongue requires…Absolute Control:

We seem to be able to subdue the earth and its animal kingdom, but not the tongue. The tongue requires complete control because it can do enormous destructive damage.

James 3:7 For every species of beasts and birds, of reptiles and creatures of the sea, is tamed and has been tamed by the human race. 8 But no one can tame the tongue; it is a restless evil and full of deadly poison.

It is clear in these verses that the tongue can be terribly destructive, and that it is incredibly hard to get control over. How can we get control of our tongue? Are there any truths from the Word that will help us? Fortunately there are:

First, fear a loose lip – respect the power of your words.

I don’t mean one should fear that in speaking something it will come true – you don’t have the power to create reality with your voice. If you said a harsh word to a friend, only to have harmed in an accident, you didn’t cause the accident by your words. You cannot do that, and you musn’t walk around with that guilt in your heart. At the same time, you do have the power to create a perception in someone’s mind with your words. Your tongue is but three inches long, yet it can reduce to tears a man more than six feet tall.

Whoever taught us, “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me?” was an idiot! It is a statement disconnected from reality – what the word “idiot” originally meant in Greek. Words can break our hearts. Broken bones can heal with time, but a broken spirit caused by words of death, is not quickly repaired. David never had a stone more deadly than the sling some people have for a tongue – don’t forget that.

A child can be built up or torn down with your words. A struggling friend can be lifted with a few simple and honest encouragements. A room of strangers can be cleared quickly with the shout of “Fire!” People DO respond to our words, and we need to remember that. We must learn to have a healthy respect for the damage we can cause will we be careful about what we say, how we say it, and who we say it to.

Proverbs 18:21 reminds: “Death and life are in the power of the tongue, and those who love it will eat its fruit.” Don’t simply fixate on the negative – the statement concerning death – because the author is trying to say something positive. He argues: “People who love the power of the word will use it to create positive fruit and enjoy that!” Words don’t only KILL… they also BUILD.

The tongue can express or repress; release or restrain; enlighten or obscure; adore or abhor; offend or befriend; affirm or alienate; build or belittle; comfort or criticize; delight or destroy; be sincere or sinister. The tongue can Xerox the good or X-ray the bad. (sermon central illustrations).

You have the power to encourage someone today with your words. You can keep someone from making a wrong decision that will scar them forever with a confident and loving word to them.

After Karen Carpenter died of heart failure at the age of 32 brought on by years of fighting an eating disorder, it came out that her fatal obsession with her weight was triggered by a single reviewer’s comment. When referring to Karen, this man called her “Richard’s chubby sister.” While I’m sure there were other factors attributing to Karen Carpenter’s struggles, this one comment unleashed a flurry of self-doubt, which led to her eventual disease and death. (sermon central illustrations).

In fact, I wonder if you ever considered that your words can make you guilty of MURDER. Jesus made that point in Matthew 5:21

You have heard that the ancients were told, ‘YOU SHALL NOT COMMIT MURDER’ and ‘Whoever commits murder shall be liable to the court.’ 22 “But I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother shall be guilty before the court; and whoever says to his brother, ‘You good-for-nothing,’ shall be guilty before the supreme court; and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ shall be guilty enough to go into the fiery hell. 23 “Therefore if you are presenting your offering at the altar, and there remember that your brother has something against you, 24 leave your offering there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother, and then come and present your offering.

Jesus was on a mountain north of the Sea of Galilee, early one morning. I know it was early, because you can fry an egg on a rock in midday out there, so if people sat down, it was early in the day. He argued that an disciple of His would need to recognize His call back to the Law in its original context. He did not desire to uproot the Law of Moses (since He wrote it 1400 years before), but rather to set it back in context with His original design. The passage above shows that WORDS were part of the formula for keeping that law. He argued: You would like to think you avoid violating the design standard of murder, but you cannot make that claim if you assassinate others with our mouth and leave destruction in your wake.” What we say matters in life and death – just as Proverbs reminds us.

Jesus said it many ways in His teaching: Matthew 12:34 and 15:19: “For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks…for out of the heart come evil thoughts, murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, lies and slander.” The tongue is no friend when not monitored constantly and carefully.

Here is a practical tip I got from a Sunday school teacher and wrote down years ago: THINK before you speak by asking these five questions in an acrostic before you speak.

  • Is it Truth? Especially in this political season – don’t pass it on if you are not sure.

A bus load of politicians were driving down a country road when the bus suddenly ran off the road and crashed into an old farmer’s field. The old farmer heard the tragic crash so he rushed over to investigate. He then began digging a large grave to bury the politicians. A few hours later, the local sheriff was driving past the farmer’s field and noticed the bus wreck. He approached the old farmer and asked where all the politicians had gone. The old farmer explained that he’d gone ahead and buried all of them. “Were they ALL dead?” asked the puzzled sheriff. “Well, some of them said they weren’t,” said the old farmer, “but you know how them politicians lie.” (Sermon central illustrations).

A little girl asked her father, “Daddy? Do all Fairy Tales begin with ’Once Upon A Time’?” He replied, “No, there is a whole series of Fairy Tales that begin with ’If elected I promise’.” (Sermon central illustrations).

  • Is it Helpful? Will your words offer a solution to their problem?
  • Is it Inspirational? Will your words lift someone to think in a new way?
  • Is it Necessary? Do we have to respond?
  • Is it Kind? Is it based on a desire to genuinely help?

Second, limit your words.

Talk less than you do now in the future. Mature believers know that our chances of misusing the tongue are directly proportional to the amount of time we keep our mouths open. Former presidents have recognized the need to limit their words:

  • Abe Lincoln said, “It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.”
  • Calvin Coolidge said, “I have never been hurt by anything I did not say.”

Proverbs 10:19 puts it this way: “When words are many, sin is not absent, but he who holds his tongue is wise.”

One Pastor wrote a simple story that helped me:

A woman had a very serious throat condition. The doctor told her that her vocal cords needed total rest ­ she was forbidden to talk for 6 months! With a husband and 6 kids, this seemed impossible, but she did what she was told. When she needed the kids she blew a whistle. Whenever she needed to communicate she wrote things on pads of paper. After six months, her voice came back. When asked what it was like to communicate only in writing, she said this: “You’d be surprised how many notes I crumpled up and threw into the trash before I gave them to anyone. Seeing my words before anyone heard them had an effect that I don’t think I can ever forget.

Remember, “If you don’t say it — they can’t repeat it.”

Third, choose your words.

I loved this story:

Pianist Arthur Rubenstein, who could speak in eight languages, once told this story on himself: Some years ago he had a stubborn case of hoarseness. The newspapers were full of reports about smoking and cancer; so he decided to consult a throat specialist. “I searched his face for a clue during the 30 minute examination,” Rubenstein said, “but it was expressionless. He told me to come back the next day. I went home full of fears, and I didn’t sleep that night.” The next day there was another long examination and again an ominous silence. “Tell me,” the pianist exclaimed. “I can stand the truth. I’ve lived a full, rich life. What’s wrong with me?” The physician said, “You talk too much.”

Sometimes we MUST speak. The mouth was a GIFT of God that we share to move hearts. It can be beneficial, and we should actively seek to use it that way! James 1:19, 26: “…Take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak, and slow to become angry…if anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight reign on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless.” He couldn’t be clearer – our faith’s power hangs on our ability to control our tongue- and we are on the planet to share our faith with others.

Proverbs 12:18 says: “Reckless words pierce like a sword, but the tongue of the wise brings healing.” Who can I heal with words today – because I want to do it! The world is wounded and hurting people. They have been wounded by the verbal arrows shot from the bow of angry hearts. The pliers of truth can remove the arrows of harm. The salve of encouragement can ease the sting of past wounds. The bandage of loving and inspiring comment can cover the scars and keep them from becoming scabs. I want my breath to heal, my words to comfort, my verse to inspire.

Remember that it is not simply the words you choose, but the relationship you have had that gives the words power. If you know someone well, the words of encouragement root more deeply. Your richest appreciation should be liberally poured into the heart of the people closest to you. Don’t let someone else tell your parent how much you love them – YOU tell them. Don’t let someone else share how much your spouse means to you based on the things you say about them when they aren’t around – YOU say them direct to the person that you love. If they aren’t near, get a phone. Buy a card. Send a text. Tell them. Everyone needs sincere cheerleading in life. Encouragement is being drowned out by loud voices of blame, guilt, doom and despair. YOU have the power to help someone by verbalizing encouragement.

Years ago I heard Chuck Swindoll preaching on the tongue. He told a story that I am sure I will not get all the details perfect on – but it was a powerful story to me. He spoke of a friend he had who had a son with a large birth mark that was embedded across his face. It was an unmistakable mark that made Mikhail Gorbachev’s purple mark look tiny. There was no hiding it, and the boy didn’t seem to mind a bit. One day Pastor Chuck spoke to the young man about the mark, and asked him directly why it seemed to have so little negative effect on his self-esteem – although it was different than everyone in school. The boy told him that ever since he could remember, his father told him: “Son, that birthmark is where an angel kissed your face. You have it so that I can always pick you out of the crowd.” The young man surprised him as he continued, “You know, I almost feel sorry for those who don’t have a birthmark.” There was a dad who breathed life into a situation that could have devastated his son. Acceptance is powerful. Affirmation is securing. Love verbalized is empowering.

Fourth, improve your thinking – since that is where the words come from.

I once heard someone say “the first screw that gets loose in a person’s head is the one that controls the tongue” – and he longer I live, the more I am beginning to believe it. It is sad, in my view, that some who have known the Lord for many years still regularly lose to a wagging tongue. We can try to keep quiet, but for some of us, that probably won’t happen. Maybe a better strategy is to fill our minds with greater vision. Maybe by learning and growing, we will be more apt to speak words of positive encouragement.

Someone has said that “great minds discuss ideas, average minds discuss events, and small minds discuss people.” I want to be known as an IDEA GUY. I want to lift those who listen to greater aspirations of following God and walking in truth. I want to pull people up – not push them down.

William A. Ward wrote: “The mediocre teacher tells. The good teacher explains. The superior teacher demonstrates. The great teacher inspires.” That has surely been true of the best of my teachers. They inspired me because they helped me to see from a higher plane. They helped me recognize areas of danger in my choices without robbing me of the choices themselves. They offered positive reinforcement but were not warm and fuzzy –they were crisp thinking and they wanted me to be as well.

The best way to grow others around us is to keep growing ourselves. Don’t get stale. Read things that are hard for you to grasp at first. Flex the mind muscles. Learn… Dr. Howard Hendricks told of a professor who made an impact on his life. He passed his home many times, early in the morning and late at night, and often saw him pouring over his books. One day, Hendricks asked him, “Doctor, I’d like to know, what is it that keeps you studying? You never cease to learn.” His answer: “Son, I would rather have my students drink from a running stream than from a stagnant pool.”

The plain fact is this: We do what we do because we think what we think. If we want to change what we do, we should change how, and about what, we are thinking. When pressure comes upon us, the inner well of thoughts springs forth – for better or worse. What are you reading? What are you studying? What are you watching? A lazy mind will lead to a barren life.

James closed the passage with another important principle that we are all sure to agree is essential in relation to our mouths…

Principle #2: The tongue requires…Absolute Consistency:

We seem to be able to use it well at times, but not consistently. The tongue requires complete consistency because God didn’t make it for both good and evil.

James 3:9 With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the likeness of God; 10 from the same mouth come both blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be this way. 11 Does a fountain send out from the same opening both fresh and bitter water? 12 Can a fig tree, my brethren, produce olives, or a vine produce figs? Nor can salt water produce fresh.

God created trees and plants to bear singular fruits. An apple tree was not designed to produce an orange. Grafting aside, the natural process is clear – God made things distinct from one another. Just as there are olives from an olive tree, grapes from a grape vine, figs from a fig tree, fresh water from a fresh spring – MIXED is not God’s way. The same truth should be applied to our mouths.

When a child is raised in an environment that is inconsistent – one day encouragement, the next day biting sarcasm and hurtful slander – they are misshapen by the sheer duplicity of it all. They don’t know what to expect when the parent begins to speak. Reliability is about predictability.

What do they hear us say? Do we bless people to their faces and bad mouth them at their backs? What should our child believe about us when that is what they see and hear?

Years ago I was at a party for a man retiring from a long time teaching in a Bible school. I did not know the man well, but I was impressed with his humility, especially in light of the way his teaching had dramatically impacted so many people I knew. He was teary and quite during tributes of his colleagues. It wasn’t until his son spoke that I saw him truly begin to cry. His son got up and simply offered this tribute to his dad:

You all know a man that wears a public face. He teaches with authority and humility. I am here to tell you of another man – the one at home. He sounds, in every moment that I can recall – exactly the same. There is no guile in him. He is a man of integrity at home and authenticity outside – and I have never met another man like him. When I was young, I was proud of him. Now, I am a man that must begin to measure up to the standard he has lived before me.” I remember the room went quiet. We were all touched. We were all probably also a bit challenged. “Is that what my children would say of me?” I thought.

Serving Jesus is about how we discipline our lives- especially in the area of the tongue. The grand mark of maturity is the consistent ability to control the use of their tongue. Since the old man is ever within, mature believers limit the old man’s access to the microphone of the mouth.

Facing a New Day: "When God Replaces Leaders" – 2 Kings 2

Change is never easy – but it can be even more difficult when God decides to change the leader over our ministry, and we have to follow the replacement.

There came about a time, when God decided to change the chief servant He placed to work among the prophets of the day. Like many brothers and sisters have experienced in service to the King, God was bringing one ministry service to an end and beginning another man’s leadership responsibilities – a changing of the guard was near. Elijah came from a mysterious background – a man of Gilead who had the reputation of popping up and disappearing – though a careful reading of the text shows that he was actually just a man that God called for specific tasks, and then told to retreat in obscurity until called for another time. He spent his life beside brooks, in borrowed quarters or in caves. His idea of the school of the prophets was the shade beneath a tree on the slope of Mt. Carmel. He was a simple man, and he had simple tastes.

Elisha was not like Elijah. Elisha was a rich kid from a spur off of the Jordan Valley that stretched westward into the hills of Samaria. He worked a family farm until he met Elijah, and killed the yoked oxen and burned their carcasses on the wood of the yoke – showing his seriousness in pursuit of following God and training under Elijah. It also told us something of the wealth of his family – you don’t kill oxen you can’t afford to own! Elisha initiated a building program just after he took the reins. Caves were quaint – but serious prophets needed to be educated in a serious school environment. He may have appreciated the simplicity of Elijah, but he did not mimic it when the mantle of leadership fell from Elijah onto his shoulders.

Those of us who have served God for many years have seen it dozens of times – changing of the guard of leadership. It is hard on everyone.

To the retiring leader, they find themselves reflecting on the things left undone, or the things they have not done well – all the while hearing the affirmation of those they have served. Their heart is divided – loving people but weary of some of the conflicts that come with leadership.

To the new leader, they find themselves measuring what they see in the work. They are deciding what they will continue, and what they will change. They are observing the love the people have for the outgoing servant of God, and quietly wondering if people will feel that way about them when they are complete their work. Their heart is divided between the exhilaration of starting the new and the concern to respect the past.

To the followers the change is also difficult. We are creatures of habit – some more than others. We have come to rely on the way things have been done. We have trust in the old way, confidence in the tried and true. There is already far too much change in our lives, and this signals yet one more adjustment we need to make in an already dizzying set of changes of life. Things seem to move faster around us, and we struggle to keep up. Resistance is meaningless, since it is all going to happen anyway. Still, there is some resistance in our hearts.

I want to take you back to the transfer of leadership responsibilities from Elijah to Elisha – from poor and scrappy to rich and refined. I want to walk the Jordan Valleys serpentine trail of dust with a group of servants of the Lord, and see the change through their eyes. Then I want to highlight God’s expectations and promises to the servants who pass through the process.

The key principle of the passage is this: Transition is usually hard, but God is working changes in an ever darkening world, saving one at a time – on the way to transforming EVERYTHING to serve His glory.

The test opens in 2 Kings 2:1 with the setting: “And it came about when the LORD was about to take up Elijah by a whirlwind to heaven, that Elijah went with Elisha from Gilgal.”

Transition Time

For a time, God placed the new guy alongside the retiring leader. God knew that filling another man’s sandals is not easy – and often a new leader is somewhat hesitant to take over. Though not often, sometimes in leadership transfers I find the outgoing leader may be somewhat hesitant to let go – though that has been much less the case in my experience. Yet, there is an awkward struggle when the two are paired together for a season. You can sort of feel the awkwardness as Elijah tries to shake off his incessant companion during the process.

I count three times in 2 Kings 2 the request of Elijah to GO ALONE to complete his last moments with those he had served for a generation. Look at the verses closely:

  • 2 Kings 2:2 Elijah said to Elisha, “Stay here please, for the LORD has sent me as far as Bethel.” But Elisha said, “As the LORD lives and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So they went down to Bethel.

I cannot say why God sent Elijah to Bethel, but I can recall with you what Bethel was. It was the place where God started all the promises to the Jewish people. In the heart of the spine like mountain chain that runs north and south through the land of Samaria and down into Judea – atop these hills ran a mountain path used by Father Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and his growing tribe, and Joseph heading toward Dothan to find his brothers. The well-worn pathway was the chief route through the region, and Bethel sat beside it, not far from the ancient Canaanite ruin called Ai. Could it be that Elijah went to see the Bethel campus of the school of the prophets and also to recall God’s promises of long ago?

One of the things outgoing leaders do if REFLECT, and we need to let them do that. The incoming man should be quiet and observe the past with respect – we stand on the shoulders of our fathers in the faith. We didn’t invent the problems or the solutions – we (if we did well) simply played our role in the move called God’s Story. It began before us, and it will continue after us until the Savior rights all wrongs and settles all disruptions.

If I were a betting man, I would wager that watching the process was not easy on Elisha. I suspect that it was PERSONAL to Elijah, and he didn’t want an audience. For a solitary leader that was used to doing things his own way – I suspect he didn’t really want an audience for any of the places God was sending him…Yet, the awkwardness of the a constant companion was his lot….

  • 2 Kings 2:4 Elijah said to him, “Elisha, please stay here, for the LORD has sent me to Jericho.” But he said, “As the LORD lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So they came to Jericho.

Again I cannot say for sure why God sent Elijah to the ruined city of Joshua’s conquest some 700 years before. Obviously he was meeting men from that oasis campus of the school of the prophets, but there may be another reason. Just like God’s promises to Abraham and the altar of the fathers at Bethel, Jericho had to evoke the glorious work of God on behalf of Joshua.

I wonder if you have ever stopped to consider this truth: the men who followed Joshua didn’t really prefer him – they wished they had Moses back. They LIKED Moses. They KNEW Moses. They TRUSTED Moses. As Elijah was preparing to move off the scene of serving them, God gave him instructions to go first to the place of His promise to a Father long gone, then to a place where God showed victory through the hands of the replacement Joshua. I don’t know what was going through the mind of Elijah, but I wonder from his words if he wasn’t struggling as he was heading out the door of ministry – thinking the next leader may not fare as well. Maybe God sent him to Jericho to remind him that our work is NOT OUR WORK. God was doing this BEFORE us, and He can effectively do it AFTER US. Our competence is not the reason things worked well – the purpose and power of God is! There at Jericho, God led Elijah past the place where HE leveled a city in the hands of the new leader, after he retired the older leader. I doubt the imagery escaped him! Yet, God wasn’t done yet…

  • 2 Kings 2:6 Then Elijah said to him, “Please stay here, for the LORD has sent me to the Jordan.” And he said, “As the LORD lives, and as you yourself live, I will not leave you.” So the two of them went on.

God called Elijah to cross the Jordan back to the east – the side he was BORN ON. Elijah knew the time had come. There was no school of prophets he was to see – he was going “home”. He was crossing the Jordan the way the old negro spirituals used the term – “I’m just a goin’ over Jordan, I’m just a goin’ over home.” His time was finished.

End Resistance

Why not take Elisha with him? The Hebrew of the passage suggested that Elijah may have sounded more annoyed than we have in English. In the text, 2 Kings 2:9 When they had crossed over, Elijah said to Elisha, “Ask what I shall do for you before I am taken from you.” -may have not been as patient a statement as one reads on the surface. In fact, the text continues: “And Elisha said, “Please, let a double portion of your spirit be upon me.” 10 He said, “You have asked a hard thing. Nevertheless, if you see me when I am taken from you, it shall be so for you; but if not, it shall not be so.” 11 As they were going along and talking, behold, there appeared a chariot of fire and horses of fire which separated the two of them. And Elijah went up by a whirlwind to heaven.

How was making Elisha the spiritual son of Elijah a HARD THING? It was as simple as Elijah offering his mantle to the younger man, and completing the work. Yet, Elijah didn’t argue that it was legally hard – simply that it was EMOTIONALLY DIFFICULT. It is never easy to turn over your hard fought, well-nurtured vision of ministry. It takes something out of a servant. It is HARD.

Though God brought both men to the place of transfer – he opened the river for them both, there may still have been doubts about the new guy in Elijah’s heart. It would have been perfectly natural for Elijah to believe that Elisha had much to learn about navigating the work with these old prophets. There may have been doubts about Elijah’s way of doing things in Elisha’s heart. A cave was fine – why would they need a building? In any case, they had to let this happen – and the Elisha awkwardly had to verbalize his desire to take over. When the sound of “replacement” hit Elijah’s ears, the reality of his termination was difficult to hear. He was heading for his next assignment before God – and that was great. At the same time, heart strings aren’t easily cut without inner pain.

Elijah postponed giving the mantle, and still wasn’t completely sure the new guy was ready. He would leave the timing and conditions up to God. God spoke in the form of response with a “pickup” chariot, and the mantle fell to the ground. It was not handed off – it was PICKED UP. In some ways, that is what it HAS to be. Elijah’s stature wasn’t easy to match, and Elisha had to feel like God answered the call in his heart, but Elijah didn’t leave him very affirmed in the work.

Resistance in the Followers

Now Elisha had to go back to the men he was about to lead. TWO times they showed they were not as sure about his prophetic understanding as they were about their own. Everywhere Elisha went before Elijah was taken up, the prophets felt they needed to “show him the ropes” and tell him what was going on:

  • 2 Kings 2:3 Then the sons of the prophets who were at Bethel came out to Elisha and said to him, “Do you know that the LORD will take away your master from over you today?” And he said, “Yes, I know; be still.”
  • and again in 2 Kings 2:5 The sons of the prophets who were at Jericho approached Elisha and said to him, “Do you know that the LORD will take away your master from over you today?” And he answered, “Yes, I know; be still.”

It kept happening. The men made it clear that Elisha, in their opinion, needed their clarity and coaching to recognize the time. Elisha kept reassuring them – “I know, be still.” What else could he say?

One of the most awkward conversations the replacement has with people is this one – where they try to HELP him, but inadvertently express their lack of confidence in his abilities. I am sure many people don’t MEAN it that way – but it can easily feel that way to the replacement. Smart new guys just keep quiet, and ride out the storm until people gain confidence that you do actually know what you are doing. A quiet and gentle reasonableness, along with a track record, will get the results that nothing else will. Leadership is not conferred – it is earned. Trust is not bestowed – it is gained from a track record. A title can be given to anyone – but some will earn the right to exercise it by handling the title well. Elisha had to do that in order to gain the trust of the men… but it wasn’t easy.

You see, there are stages of leadership transition.

  • There is the CALL while you are out plowing the ground – because God doesn’t want to call people who don’t work hard.
  • There is the MENTORING process – because God doesn’t entrust leadership to unseasoned men – only PEOPLE make that mistake.
  • Then there is the TITLING of leadership – the picking up of the mantle.
  • Finally there is LEADING – that is when people can confidently follow.

Though Elisha recognized how special Elijah was, I SUSPECT it was never as clear to him as when Elijah got his Divine taxi, and God’s stamp of approval on him was clear. You hear the reality set into the voice of Elisha: 2 Kings 2:12 “Elisha saw it and cried out, “My father, my father, the chariots of Israel and its horsemen!” And he saw Elijah no more….”

The weight of ministry sets in after the former leader is gone. There is not one else to blame. All eyes will be cast on Elisha. He WANTED to lead, and now he was forced to live with that decision. In order for Elisha to lead, he needed to put his past behind him and focus on picking up the responsibility that Elijah had borne before. He did it simply: 2 Kings 2:12b… Then he took hold of his own clothes and tore them in two pieces. 13 He also took up the mantle of Elijah that fell from him and returned and stood by the bank of the Jordan.

For a time, he needed to operate in the power and reputation of Elijah, for he had not yet been tested apart from him. He needed the public symbolic title, the tacit endorsement of the now gone leader. He had the mantle of board approval, and he knew he got it from God’s design. Yet, the hardest part wasn’t GETTING the job by DOING the job.

Smart new leaders know that they need to operate, at least at first, in Elijah’s mantle. They need to take off their clothing, as Elisha did, and put on the well-worn clothing of their mentor.

Today I counsel young leaders who see Elijah’s generation as disposable. Some even express they are an OBSTACLE to the future. Young leaders feel the energy of the new, but cannot sense the wisdom of the older – because it sounds like resistance. Often it is not – it is a TRUST ISSUE. Well-meaning but inexperienced leaders take the preferences of the young and ignore the blessing of the more traditional approaches – they want EDGY not STODGY. They are quick to throw out the work that went before them and try to build new – but often it is easier to tear down than build up.

We cannot toss out history to reach for destiny. We can’t navigate our future without consulting our past.

At the same time, we cannot underestimate Elijah’s generation and their ability to make changes. They know change is upon them – they own a mirror on the medicine cabinet. They see the conditions of the world around them and recognize the need to move forward in God’s power. They need to be WON to trust. Getting Elijah’s generation on board is about building trust and communicating that the new leader DOES know about the former days, and does not desire to trample the past to get to the future. Once Elijah’s generation is on board, there will be funding and emotional support to move the work forward – but they need to be brought on board.

Elisha tested the power of the mantle before the Lord: 2 Kings 2:14 “He took the mantle of Elijah that fell from him and struck the waters and said, “Where is the LORD, the God of Elijah?” And when he also had struck the waters, they were divided here and there; and Elisha crossed over.” It worked – he got across the first obstacle, but you can hear in the text the ring of the man uncertain. He ASKED God, assuming nothing. Wearing the mantle was not the same as moving the water.

How did the people respond to the change? Here is the most important part of the process. Nothing good would happen, from that day forward, if the followers failed to follow. It was, admittedly, a rocky start. Expect one, it happens. The public recognition was fine: 2 Kings 2:15 Now when the sons of the prophets who were at Jericho opposite him saw him, they said, “The spirit of Elijah rests on Elisha.” And they came to meet him and bowed themselves to the ground before him. So far, so good. They see God’s choice. They acknowledge God’s choice – then the fun begins.

What choices do followers have when a replacement takes over?

#1: Go over his head – try to call the old leader

In short order, the honeymoon was over, and people wanted to reach out and take back the older way of doing things…They pressed to have the familiar, not seeking to change anything or take into account that God may have a new experience for them through the new man. It will show up most vividly, when the new guy asks them to follow him in something they DON’T WANT TO DO. Everyone is in favor of leadership in theory, but many of us think we know better than the next generation of leaders in practice. Maybe we do, but we won’t be there to do it forever – so resistance isn’t going to do much good. The VERY NEXT VERSE showed the people looking to go after the old leader. 2 Kings 2:16 They said to him, “Behold now, there are with your servants fifty strong men, please let them go and search for your master; perhaps the Spirit of the LORD has taken him up and cast him on some mountain or into some valley.” …

The search for the old leader is sometimes physical – a phone call to get the old leader to weigh in on a problem. Sometimes the search is emotional – the silent wearing of the “What Would Elijah Do” bracelets on the hearts of people who remember the “good old days”. We must be careful not to deny a new leader the right to do what God has placed on his shoulders. We can help more effectively if we are open-hearted and not reaching back behind the scenes.

#2 Push the replacement around

Elisha was clear that he didn’t want them to do what they intended. 2 Kings 2:16b: “…And he said, “You shall not send.”

The prophet sounded clear enough, but Elisha’s tone of uncertainly betrayed him. New leaders can be pushed back, embarrassed into allowing things they don’t want – because they don’t want to seem pushy doing the job God gave them. After all, Elisha wanted this – and that didn’t mean everyone else thought he was qualified. The line between counsel and pressure is easy to breach with a new leader. The text continues: 2 Kings 2:17 But when they urged him until he was ashamed, he said, “Send.” They sent therefore fifty men; and they searched three days but did not find him. 18 They returned to him while he was staying at Jericho; and he said to them, “Did I not say to you, ‘Do not go’?

#3: Watch for God’s stamp of approval

God will often bring a situation about to verify His choice of leader. He did it with Joshua at Jericho, when every military leader probably thought Moses should be stuffed and returned to duty. Walking around a city wasn’t brilliant strategy – but it was obedience – and that is what God empowers.

Here God did it again. Some trouble will rippled the water, and God empowered the new man – offering people a visual picture of the truth of the replacement choice. 2 Kings 2:19 Then the men of the city said to Elisha, “Behold now, the situation of this city is pleasant, as my lord sees; but the water is bad and the land is unfruitful.

When trouble arises and the new guy begins to take the reins as leader, people have a choice – follow or not. If he is following God and they follow him, they will get restoration and blessing. Remember, the central issue of the work is submission to God’s Word not popular preference of those who have supported the work the longest.

If the followers kept the focus of the replacement on his own inadequacies, the people of the village would have still suffered, and he would have to work doubly hard to care for the real problems of ministry.

Elisha stepped up. 2 Kings 2:20 He said, “Bring me a new jar, and put salt in it.” So they brought it to him. He could wear the coat, but he needed to do more. He needed his own walk with God to see God’s power work through his ministry. Fortunately, he had one. 2 Kings 2:21 He went out to the spring of water and threw salt in it and said, “Thus says the LORD, ‘I have purified these waters; there shall not be from there death or unfruitfulness any longer.’” 22 So the waters have been purified to this day, according to the word of Elisha which he spoke.

There it was – problem solved. It wasn’t simply that God solved it – Elisha cooperated with God to show the Holy One’s relationship and approval. The followers saw it and must have reconsidered. God used the new guy, even when the seasoned school of the prophets doubted his ability and his understanding. God asked Elisha to submit his will and trust Him, but he also asked something of the followers – “Watch ME work!” said the Lord. They learned a critical lesson: We need to be more generous with praise, and less lavish with criticism.

We are often tempted in the changes to go over the new leader’s head, or push the new guy into doing something we want… but that isn’t God’s way. His way is for us to watch God work through the next generation to renew the hope of the last one.

  • When we cheer the good in the young, we encourage them to put away timidity – and the world they are facing in our own country is much more hostile to the Lord than the one we grew up in. They must find REFUGE in us before they will seek DIRECTION from us. The criticized seldom seek more pain from the critic.
  • When we celebrate the past but speak of the future with HOPE, we affirm that God’s power isn’t a YESTERDAY thing, but that He is an EVER PRESENT God. The next generation must hear more than the good of the past. Blame and guilt cannot replace blessing and guidance – or the young will stumble on without a sense of positive destiny. I encourage you to testify of the past work that God has done loudly, and pray vigorously for the work ahead. Jesus is not finished, because the trumpet is not sounded. God is not done with you, because you are still in His earth movie.

The follower’s role is to encourage – to become the cheerleader for every good thing you see. You will delight those around you, because everyone needs affirmation. Your ability to complain will only put distance between you and others.

The follower’s role is to be a reference – because where God has worked in the past and where the enemy has attacked in the past has everything to do with how both work. Your knowledge of the battle is invaluable. If leaders don’t know that, pray they will hear God’s voice in that area.

The follower’s role is to be a resource – because many of you have only small material goods this side of glory, but you know what it means to be supported by many for even a few dollars a month and an occasional card of encouragement. My terms on the field taught me that most people don’t remember us for very long when we are gone. Send the cards of encouragement and remind those who are serving that they are remembered. You know why better than they do.

The follower’s role is to pray – and I encourage you to do so with all of your might! Cut the veil between the spiritual world and the physical. Fall before God and cry out for the next generation.

Transition is usually hard, but God is working changes in an ever darkening world, saving one at a time – on the way to transforming EVERYTHING to serve His glory.

The Faith Work Out: "Faking Faith" – James 2:14-26

The longer I live, the more I become skeptical of “imitation” products. The breakfast cereal box claims it tastes like a berry – but had to get that flavor from a chemically created imitation. The desk I sit at is made from “imitation oak”. What exactly IS imitation oak? Is it pine, dressed up in an oak design? I don’t know. What I do know is that we often buy “imitation” because the price of the real seems too high. In more recent days I have begun to wonder about what sounds like imitation faith from the mouths of some popular “Christian” personalities. They SAY the speak God’s Word, but the lifestyle choices suggest something entirely different. It occurs to me that a purely theological Christianity has always been susceptible to fakery. People can SAY they believe anything, but that may not align with what they do in the daily practice of their life. In fact, ask the political pollsters for either campaign right now, and you will be informed that polls can be wildly inaccurate, and exit polls are wholly unreliable. In our country, the majority of people would like to keep the lever they pull in the ballot box a private affair – and so they tell a story different than reality. There are vocal exceptions, but most prefer to be left un-harassed by opponents, and keep their actual opinions to themselves. There is significant evidence that what happens in our political life has spilled over into our religious life as well. Shockingly, there are not only people that want to keep their beliefs private, but also some who are saying the exact opposite of what they believe inside.

I want to read an unsettling clip from the news team at the blog “Cloudblazer” who wrote an article, based on NPR and Time Magazine’s article:

What do you do when you find yourself preaching a message you don’t believe in? Besides the credibility gap that may be obvious to those closest to you, there is the question of lying to yourself. How do you rationalize living a double life?  For ministers who have professed Christianity but have become atheists, the challenges are numerous. Explaining matters to family, friends and others can make the transition so prohibitive, many who are atheists continue to live a lie in front of others, pretending to be ministers of the gospel. Not so anymore for Jerry DeWitt. “If you don’t believe, then you will be like me – you’ll suddenly find yourself where you only have two choices,” the preacher-turned-atheist said, as reported by Time magazine. “You can either be honest that you don’t believe … or you can pretend that you do”. He is now preaching against the faith he once professed to belief in. DeWitt now heads an organization “Recovering from Religion”, founded 2009 and committed to helping people get out of religion. The work of his organization reflects what may be a growing trend featuring multiple groups and organizations that are reportedly working to provide a community for atheists. One such effort focuses on ministers… “The program’s ultimate goal: to help unbelieving preachers to “come out” in real life”. DeWitt’s story contrasts interestingly with that of another minister-turned-atheist. “I’m currently an active pastor and I’m also an atheist,” Teresa MacBain told NPR, in an April 30, 2012 story. “I live a double life. I feel pretty good on Monday, but by Thursday — when Sunday’s right around the corner — I start having stomachaches, headaches, just knowing that I got to stand up and say things that I no longer believe in and portray myself in a way that’s totally false.”

The fact that some people are Speaking “Christian-eze” but are not Christians is not new – it is as old as the movement itself.

The Book of Acts demonstrates there have always been fakers. As American follows the path of the European Union – from Christian Heritage to Post-Christian and even Anti-Christian public stands, the church is shaking off the fakers of faith. They aren’t leaving because we got better at spotting them, but because they have founded their own communities to feel secure in their unbelief. I think it would be great for them to have a community and feel better, if there weren’t any ultimate judge at the end of their lives. There should be little consolation in the warm huddle of the perishing, especially when they bolster one another’s sense of security in a false look ahead.

When we take into account that some will be faking it, and that both the Apostle Paul and the Apostle Peter warned about the increase of such an attack on truth in the last days, we are forced to raise a question: “How can we tell the difference between real faith and fake faith?” That is the question posed in our text for this lesson.

The Context of the Question

As we have looked at the Epistle of James, perhaps the earliest of the Epistles of a church leader sent to fledgling group of first century believers, we have seen ample evidence that the writer was a direct and confrontational type of man. He didn’t pull his punches, but landed them in power and precision.

  • He opened the letter and told first century Jewish believers that God may choose to use the tool of trouble as a weight to build up our endurance for the future plan He has for us. Even though that is true, he reminded, God will never tempt us to do wrong. God uses WEIGHT, but never BAIT. Temptation is the work of the old man or “flesh” within us (James 1), applauded by the fallen world and enticed by the enemy of God.
  • James exposed one way the “flesh” that baits us by grabbing our hearts beneath the surface of our lives – by showing in our preferential treatment of people. Privileged treatment of people is a thinly veiled manipulative behavior – trying to “curry favor” with people we believe have the means of adding to things our flesh hungers for – fortune, fame, power and pleasure. (James 2:1-13).

When we pick up our reading in the next section of the letter, it should come as no surprise that James is equally stiff and vocal concerning the subject of FAKE FAITH – where he opened with a direct assault on those who decide to speak one way but live another. He wrote:

James 2:14 What use is it, my brethren, if someone says he has faith but he has no works? Can that faith save him?

What a great question! Is there any eternal value to a theoretical faith that isn’t backed up by life choices? Obviously, James sought in his rhetorical question a hearty “No!” from his audience. Verses like this help us understand the popular statement: “Talk is cheap!”

Key Principle: Real faith changes not only our speech, but our behavior. Belief that doesn’t guide our action isn’t real belief – it is a half-hearted mental exercise with little or no value.

James tried to make the case clear – real faith produces change. Real faith surrenders old ideas, old habits, and old desires to the will of the Master. When the Bible uses the term FAITH, that is the intended meaning – truth that changes behavior by surrender of the will to God’s perspective and purpose. With the truth, James offers three examples to guide our understanding of both the NEED and the LOOK of faith:

Example #1: Hungry believers

James 2:15 If a brother or sister is without clothing and in need of daily food, 16 and one of you says to them, “Go in peace, be warmed and be filled,” and yet you do not give them what is necessary for their body, what use is that? 17 Even so faith, if it has no works, is dead, being by itself.

The point is very simple: eloquent words don’t fill up empty bellies.

  • The example begins with an observable need – a brother or sister is hungry.
  • The example includes a behavior – speak instead of acting to meet a need.
  • The example poses a question – were your words without food of any value?
  • The example ends with a proverb – faith without practical outworking is dead theory.

In this example, James focused the attention of the readers to brothers and sisters in Christ. This wasn’t a late night TV commercial about giving money for starving children on another continent – it was a live example of real deprivation played out right in front of a believer. That believer took the time to respond VERBALLY, but offered no practical help. They were like the people who slow down to shout advice about your stalled car on the side of the road. Even if shouted insights are correct, they feel unwelcome and uncaring. The example lead to the question – “Were the words to the starving of any real help?” Finally, James offers the proverbial point: Real faith MUST change behavior. Real faith is ACTION FOCUSED, not cerebral theory.

What does that mean? It means that if you KNOW ABOUT Jesus – that doesn’t make you a believer. If you ABSOLUTELY BELIEVE that Jesus is the Messiah, sent to save men and women – that doesn’t change your hell bound destiny. If you TOTALLY ACCEPT that Jesus came as God in human skin to die for the sins of the world and give us access to Heaven – that doesn’t mean you are going there. There is only ONE CONDITION in which you are saved: When you surrender your life in practical terms to follow the commands of Jesus. Knowledge without submission is NOT salvation – because your faith changed NOTHING about your life and your choices.

Because of the emphasis of Paul on making sure that we understand that we CANNOT WORK FOR SALVATION, men like Martin Luther didn’t like James. He didn’t think it equal to the lofty work of Ephesians – and he was WRONG. Paul wasn’t saying something DIFFERENT than James, he was saying something based on the understanding James made clear. The Holy Spirit, the author of BOTH James and Ephesians was not in conflict.

The words of Ephesians 2, may seem in conflict, but a closer look will answer the problem:

Ephesians 2:1 And you were dead in your trespasses and sins, 2 in which you formerly walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that is now working in the sons of disobedience. 3 Among them we too all formerly lived in the lusts of our flesh, indulging the desires of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest.

The salvation you have came by God’s direction, and God’s work – since you were dead spiritually and needed His work to be made alive. Your spiritual death, the domination of the enemy, and the lust filled selfish life made your initiating a walk with God IMPOSSIBLE –so God started it.

James 2:4 But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, 5 even when we were dead in our transgressions, made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved), 6 and raised us up with Him, and seated us with Him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, 7 so that in the ages to come He might show the surpassing riches of His grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus.

When God initiated your salvation experience, He did it with LOVE and ETERNAL PURPOSE, and did all things necessary to make the way for us.

Ephesians 2:8 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; 9 not as a result of works, so that no one may boast. 10 For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.

The whole point of the passage is not to suggest that someone can live like they want to call themselves Christian because of a prayer they prayed or an idea they embraced. Paul nowhere argues that God’s intent was anything less than our change – and there is simply no way Ephesians 2 can be stripped of that context. Would anything less than real faith tear us away from the flesh pursuits that dominated us before salvation (2:3)? Would anything less than real surrender make us an example of His workmanship? (2:10). The notion that God wanted to stamp us SAVED while leaving us SELF WILLED doesn’t square with God’s purposes in Ephesians, and is UTTERLY ELIMINATED BY James’ clear statements about working faith.

If faith without works is dead – there is no such thing as salvation without surrender. If faith without works is dead – my salvation must not be measured simply by my words, but rather by my lifestyle.

Woe to the church that convinces men and women that God has truly saved them and they can be secure – yet walk in disobedience and defiance of the Spirit and the Word. I am not saying that any disobedience disqualifies you from a walk with God – since the Bible is replete with examples of people who KNEW GOD and made terrible sinful choices. I am saying that you need to examine your CHOICES to see that you know God – not just inventory the STATEMENTS of your doctrine. That is why Paul told the Philippians:

Philippians 2:12 So then, my beloved, just as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your salvation with fear and trembling; 13 for it is God who is at work in you, both to will and to work for His good pleasure.

Let me continue that idea, but head to the second example of James’ lesson in James 2:18ff:

Example #2: A theoretical theologian

James 2:18 But someone may well say, “You have faith and I have works; show me your faith without the works, and I will show you my faith by my works.” 19 You believe that God is one. You do well; the demons also believe, and shudder. 20 But are you willing to recognize, you foolish fellow, that faith without works is useless?

Again the point is very simple: Believing requires more than a cognitive change. Real belief shows in the hands and feet, not just the recesses of the mind.

  • The example began with a claim –faith can be solely inside requiring no external action.
  • The example continues with an exclamation – “My faith can be seen in what I do!”
  • The example offers an encouragement – It is valuable to believe correctly.
  • The example bids a warning – even demons recognize some truths.
  • The example ends with a question – “Is your internal thought of any practical value to the Kingdom?”

Though one must know the facts of the Gospel to surrender to the truth of it – knowing the Gospel is not what is REQUIRED; surrender to Jesus is what is required. In every presentation of the Gospel the notion of REPENTANCE was not simply feeling badly about sin – but about having a change of heart concerning the WILL. Perhaps the third example will make that even clearer…

Example #3: Father Abraham

James 2:21 Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up Isaac his son on the altar? 22 You see that faith was working with his works, and as a result of the works, faith was perfected; 23 and the Scripture was fulfilled which says, “AND ABRAHAM BELIEVED GOD, AND IT WAS RECKONED TO HIM AS RIGHTEOUSNESS,” and he was called the friend of God. 24 You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone.

The point is unmistakable: a proper world view isn’t enough – we need to act on it for real completion!

  • The example began with a picture – Abraham holding a knife over Isaac in the land of Moriah.
  • The example continued with an observation – faith that worked out in behavior was completed or authenticated faith.
  • The example offered Scriptural support – that Abraham’s belief was accepted when he ACTED on that belief.
  • The example was finished with a declaration – justification is by working faith that changes behavior, not theoretical mental ascent that accepts the plausibility of the Word as the truth

Not long ago a man left the church where I teach after about a year in the local body. He did so because he truly believed that the Gospel that required surrender was a Gospel of works. He tried on a number of occasions to pose that Paul taught pagans that they only needed to know that Jesus died for them. I disagreed. I traced the movement of Paul in the Book of Acts, and showed that the Apostles bound the followers of Jesus to behaviors in Acts 15 – or WOULD NOT LET THEM BE A PART of the movement. I do not know what goes on in the human heart – but I do know that real submission in the heart can be seen in one’s life. I am not naïve enough to believe that a specific act of sin holds one out of heaven – but I fully believe that the Bible teaches that failing to submit practically to Jesus as Master of their choices DOES hold one out of Heaven. If I can believe theoretically but not live practically –then please explain what James is truly saying here. He left calling my Associate Pastor a heretic – which is better, I suppose, than being called one myself. (Just kidding!). Seriously, there are whole schools of theology dedicated to theoretical faith and the salvation of the self-willed. I just cannot grasp it. Spurgeon said it this way in a commentary on the story of Joab hiding by the horns of the altar in 1 Kings 2:

OUTWARD ORDINANCES AVAIL NOT. The laying hold upon the literal horns of an altar, which can be handled, availed not Joab. There are many—oh, how many still!—that are hoping to be saved, because they lay hold, as they think, upon the horns of the sacraments. Men of unhallowed life, nevertheless, come to the sacramental table, looking for a blessing. Do they not know that they pollute it? Do they not know that they are committing a high sin, and a great misdemeanour against God, by coming amongst his people, where they have no right to be? And yet they think that by committing this atrocity they are securing to themselves safety. How common it is to find in this city, when an irreligious man is dying, that someone will say, “Oh, he is all right; for a clergyman has been, and given him the sacrament.” I often marvel how men calling themselves the servants of God can dare thus to profane the ordinance of the Lord. Did he ever intend the blessed memorial of the Lord’s supper to be a kind of superstitious vialicum, a something upon which ungodly men may depend in their last hour, as if it could put away sin. I do not one half so much blame the poor ignorant and superstitious persons who seek after the sacrament in their dying hours, as I do the men who ought to know better…. Do they conceive that grace comes to men by bits of bread and drops of wine? These things are meant to put us in memory of the Lord Jesus Christ, and, as far as they do that, and quicken our thoughts of him, they are useful to us; but there is no wizardry or witchcraft linked with these two emblems, so they convey as form of grace…

You cannot decide to choose to have Jesus and be your own Master – the two choices are in opposite directions. Lapses of judgment and failure to the flesh aside – there is simply no argument to be made for the “self-willed” follower. It is the act of surrender played out in the choices of life that shows the validity of real faith. The last example shows that well…

Example #4: Rahab

James 2:25 In the same way, was not Rahab the harlot also justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way? 26 For just as the body without the spirit is dead, so also faith without works is dead.

  • The example focused on another story – the Canaanite woman at Jericho hid the spies to her own peril.
  • The example asserted a truth – that she was justified before God only when she responded with the actions she took on behalf of God’s people.
  • The example ended with a final proverb – a Biblical world view without the accompanying lifestyle choices is as useless as a body devoid of life.

In the end, we need to recognize that God needs no army of lawyers to parse our words and argue for the reality of your belief in your heart and mind. He requires, rather, that real belief show itself in the actions of one’s hands and feet. There are times when that action is quite limited – the thief on the cross had only his words of belief and defense of the Savior – for he was a cross-bound and dying convert. Yet this is the exception. Too much has been made of his death-moment confession to Christ – as if it somehow became a standard of the normal Christian. James argued that normal believers need BOTH a Biblical world view (using the term “faith”) AND the actions that show one has truly adopted such a view.

Biblical belief requires a change of mind, but does not allow for the reality of such a mind change without a change in life choices.

With the coming of the Spirit into the new believer, new desires fill them. Old hungers are not destroyed – a point that James made in the last chapter – but new desires are noticed and begin to assert themselves.

Submission IS required for salvation – and that is NOT considered a WORK in Paul’s Epistles, but should not be ignored in Paul’s intent. It is WRONG to believe that one can simply ‘believe’ in the mind without ‘surrender’ in one’s life. If “faith without works is DEAD” means anything, it means that one must bear the actions of a surrendered heart to show the truth of inner ownership change. Jesus cannot be simply a Savior – He must be the new owner of my heart. I must be actively making effort to remove every obstacle to full service to Him! The tension that exists between heart and hands is a false distinction, since James argued that without the outworking – the theory was ineffective, unhelpful and altogether dead.

Real faith changes not only our speech, but our behavior. Belief that doesn’t guide our action isn’t real belief – it is a half hearted mental exercise with little or no value.

Grasping God's Purpose: "The Beauty of the Bunker" – Exodus 37:25-29

In 1982 I served for a few months, as an independent reporter in the press corps during a war. I reported from southern Lebanon and northern Israel during a terrible conflict that gripped the Near East for a time. The government of Israel crossed into Lebanon with a huge fighting force, after sustained shelling from Lebanon by the PLO backed by Syrian forces. They decided to aid a group called the Southern Lebanese Christian Militia (the Phalange) by crossing into Lebanon and routing as much of the PLO and the supporting Islamic force as possible. The spark that lit the fuse was the brazen nature of the Abu Nidal Organization’s assassination attempt against Israel’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, Shlomo Argov.

In the wake of this conflict, Beirut lay in ruins, and Israel and its allied militia force occupied the southern part of Lebanon. The PLO fled Lebanon to Tripoli by June of 1982. Stains like the massacres committed at places like Sabra and Shatilla haunted Israel, who, it appears, naively armed a beaten down Southern  Lebanese population that was filled with revenge against their neighbors.  Israel hoped, according to the late Menachem Begin, to sign a treaty of “forty years of peace”  – but it was not to be. Like all things in war, when the smoke cleared and the rubble was exposed, the damage was greater than any such gain.

One of the things that became a daily part of the experience of Israelis living in the north in places like Qiryat Shmona, Metulla and along the Naftali Ridge was that of shelter living. Day and night, Israelis lived under the constant barrage of ‘Ketusha rockets’, that fell in the dozens on their schools, town squares, clinics and shops. They became adept at maintaining some level of normalcy underground, building a network of tunnels and shelters in their cities. Not content to let the children hold up like moles, they decorated the shelters both inside and out. Even today the shelters of the north are the most colorful and ornate in the country. They showed that shelters are practical in a war zone – but they can be beautiful!

Why do I mention this little “blast from my personal past” today? I want to talk about a shelter that each of us must learn to take advantage of. You may not realize it – but you need a shelter. This is a time of war. If you are one who has submitted your heart to following Jesus, you were born into a SPIRITUAL WAR. You may not realize it right now, but you are in desperate need of a SHELTER, and God has provided a beautiful one in which you can HIDE when the attack of the enemy closes in. He is trying to advance, but the battle belongs to the Lord. God’s victory is sure. Our posture is to be ready at arms with our armor on, and to be sheltered in Him until He calls for us in the moment of battle. The deliberate sheltering in Him is what believer’s refer to as a “prayer life”.

Key Principle: Prayer is not the fleshly action of closing my eyes and speaking well learned words. It is the deliberate hiding of my vulnerable self in His powerful grasp. It is an exercise of submission.

Before we go further, let’s admit a sad truth about Christians in the modern era: “The fastest way to empty a room is declare a prayer meeting.” The quickest way to add to guilt and make even some of the most active believers cringe is to speak about our individual prayer lives. None of us are satisfied, I suspect, with this aspect of our walk with God! It may be that way because we have been convinced that the battle is not truly going on, or it may be because we haven’t been feeling the darkness coming on us. It may be a problem of immature thinking, or it may be simple forgetfulness. Yet, the Bible makes clear that prayer is not a flesh action – it is much more. Prayer is like a retreat to shelter. It is a hiding place in communion with God Himself.

Today I want to both encourage you and speak about your prayer life – and the two subjects should not be at odds with each other.

Let’s establish the problematic backdrop for those who may not have looked closely… Something is very wrong with the self-powered church of our time. Our planning sessions have overtaken our praying sessions. We have lost our edge in many believing circles, to the reality of the spiritual nature of the battle for the hearts of men, women and children. We have advertised instead of asked of God. We have programmed and planned what should have been prayed over and pleaded for.  We have worked in the flesh to contest a battle fought over on spiritual grounds… and many have been wounded, left tired and disillusioned by the fight.

Frankly, it requires much less of the spirit to throw myself into the involvement of the activities of my church, but much more to pull close to the Lord and hide in His will. It is far easier to build a bridge than nurture a relationship, and many of us have taken the easier path – activism over intimacy. As a result, for many believers, their church – the very vehicle that was made to help them grow – became the very place where their energy was sapped away and they worked on – often with an empty spiritual tank. It is time to find our place of intimate refuge in our Heavenly Father, before the empty tank starves all forward progress from our spiritual journey. It is time to reassess our journey and do the hard thing. Eternity will not be spent simply accomplishing for God – but celebrating Who God is, and recognizing His greatness and power. It will be more awe then accomplishment – and, believe it or not, it can be that way NOW.

Pastor Tim Boal, a friend and colleague, spoke recently about the history of prayer and its power at the recent Vision 20/20 conference in California. He read an illustration that will serve as my beginning point today, as we look at the incense altar in the Tabernacle – the place of the “prayer altar” of the Bible.

Six hundred years ago in about 1400 CE, John Huss started in Moravia, close to the Czech Republic. Huss taught the Bible, but was eventually burned at the stake by the church leadership under Papal authority. Before his martyrdom, Huss predicted that the seed of the Word planted in that community would one day spring up in a powerful revival. Two hundred years passed before the fruit of that work dramatically showed itself. In about 1600, a revival occurred under the ministry of God through John Amos Comenius, who led the Moravian Christians out of their native land, where they were suffering extreme persecutions. He sought for a safe haven for them to live within, and for about the next 100 years they bounced from place to place, looking for a safe home. Just before Comenius died, he referenced the prophecy of John Huss from 200 years before and said:”Within one hundred years the prophecy of Huss will unfold in the Moravian community providing a revival to all the western world.” Comenius died, and so – it appeared – did his dream. The next generation completely forgot about those words. It wasn’t until 1700, when German Count Ludvig Von Zinzendorf was born into a wealthy aristocratic family, and turned his heart to Christ in his native Lutheran Church. At age 27, he took in a single Moravian refugee. In time, he took in 300 more refugees on his estate, and began to lead them. Under Zinzendorf’s leadership, they prayed together, studied together, and worshipped together. As he studied, Zinzendorf came across Comenius’ prophecy about the Moravians made one hundred years before to the very week he found that prophecy, He called the Moravians together in mid – August of 1727 to his house for an all-night prayer meeting – one hundred years to the day after the death of Comenius. The next day is referred to by church historians as the Moravian Pentecost, August 13, 1727. The Spirit moved in a very significant way, and though the Acts 2 work was not wholly repeated, it was clear to everyone God was there, and God was at work. They decided to match the awesome days’ events by beginning another prayer vigil. They designated a place of prayer in the village, broke into groups of three, and each group took one hour of prayer in succession. In the 168 hours that make up a week, every hour, three people were praying. That prayer meeting went for 110 consecutive years – three people each hour, 24 hours a day, 110 years long! What happened to this small group of Moravians? Over the next 15 years, 70 of their number left the group to go to a mission of unreached peoples, learning other languages and sharing the Gospel. They became the first group to begin a modern foreign missions movement that lasts to this day. Moravians would today be the largest denomination, many feel, but they most often gave away any church founded to another fellowship after it was established. John Wesley was converted by the testimony of the Moravians – and the movement of Methodism is traceable back to them.” Tim closed the story by asking a poignant question: “What will extraordinary prayer accomplish?”

We are all stirred by such stories, but that is just the beginning. Prayer offers more than Kingdom advancement. It offers battlefield survival strategy. It offers a blanket of warmth in a cold world…It offers peace amid tumult. Some reading this are perhaps experiencing a POUNDING of their life by the enemy right now. They aren’t trying to fulfill a prophecy or reach a continent – they are trying to get through the month in one piece! What can prayer do to make that possible? How can my prayer life become a source of solace and power instead of a place of fault and guilt? The Scriptures have some words on the subject that are critical to grasping God’s purpose for us. Look at the small altar that God ordered made and covered with gold for the celebration of the time of prayer by the people. It was called the altar of incense:

Exodus 37:25 Then he made the altar of incense of acacia wood: a cubit long and a cubit wide, square, and two cubits high; its horns were of one piece with it. 26 He overlaid it with pure gold, its top and its sides all around, and its horns; and he made a gold molding for it all around. 27 He made two golden rings for it under its molding, on its two sides—on opposite sides—as holders for poles with which to carry it. 28 He made the poles of acacia wood and overlaid them with gold. 29 And he made the holy anointing oil and the pure, fragrant incense of spices, the work of a perfumer.

What does this short reading offer to help us?

First, the inclusion of this altar in the holy furnishings reminds us that God desires His people to gather in prayer – it has a Divine purpose. The incense would allow God to participate with them because GOD WANTS TO HEAR OUR VOICES and God wants to enjoy our prayers.

This incense provided a smell for the delight of GOD ALONE. That God loved the smell of the sacrifice is well documented (see Leviticus 3:16, 6:21). But God also waited to SMELL the prayers that were so well embraced by the aroma of the sweet-smelling incense.  The time of prayer was marked by the time of the incense burning and the two were mixed together into the “nostrils” of God. This assumption is part of the background of the opening of Luke’s Gospel, in a the story at the time of incense burning:

Luke 1:8 “Now it happened that while he was performing his priestly service before God in the appointed order of his division, 9 according to the custom of the priestly office, he was chosen by lot to enter the temple of the Lord and burn incense. 10 And the whole multitude of the people were in prayer outside at the hour of the incense offering.”

Second, the uniqueness of prayer, its many facets of comfort and its role in driving into God’s arms is recognized by the process of making the incense. This was a special moment before God –a time when God perceived in a special way the needs and presentation of His people. It was a pleasing aroma to Him:

Exodus 30:34 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Take for yourself spices, stacte and onycha and galbanum, spices with pure frankincense; there shall be an equal part of each. 35 “With it you shall make incense, a perfume, the work of a perfumer, salted, pure, and holy. 36 “You shall beat some of it very fine, and put part of it before the testimony in the tent of meeting where I will meet with you; it shall be most holy to you. 37 “The incense which you shall make, you shall not make in the same proportions for yourselves; it shall be holy to you for the LORD. 38 “Whoever shall make any like it, to use as perfume, shall be cut off from his people.”

Simply put, verse 36 sets the whole passage – the place of prayer was the intimate meeting place with God. There was a time, preparation and a pattern – and people met with their God. The whole environment of the Mishkan (meeting place) was marked by a unique fragrance – never used in other times or places in life. Like God’s name – it was sacred and guarded. Look closely at the ingredients. We don’t know if God intended us to see anything in them, but the rabbis of old certainly did – all in relation to PRAYER. I cannot say this was God’s intent on these fragrances – maybe He just delighted in the combination as a Personal preference – but I love the imagery the rabbis reminded us of:

  • Stacte – is Nataf in Hebrew, a bitter gum resin that naturally oozes to the surface. Some rabbis noted in sermons long ago that it appeared on the face of the tree forced out of the inner heart of the tree by some stress or pressure, causing it to be abundant on the outside of the tree. Still others noted that God made the tree with so much sap that it always had much to “give away”. What is clear is that it was a resin that oozed out of the tree – as some of our prayers do from our heart because of stress and pressures that we need to pour out willingly to God, or our abundance from which it flows.
  • Onycha – is shekh-ay’-leth in Hebrew, (an unused root in association with a lion’s roar). The word likely refers to the operculum (closing flap of gill in fish, but a special gland in some shell fish). This comes from below the surface of the Red Sea and may be representative of prayers from the “depths”… Some prayer comes from the depths of our lives that need to be carefully rooted out of the encased shells of our lives, and shared with the God who loves us. It is the only way deep issues can be healed!
  • Galbanum – (Chelbanum from cheleb or fat – drawn out) – is a word used for a number of differing processes – as in being tapped from the commiphora tree like Maple Syrup. A tap is burrowed from the outside into the tree, piercing the exterior and “wounding the tree” to get the bitterness inside out. Some prayer, the rabbis taught, was to empty our souls of the bitterness trapped within us before God, who alone could handle it. (The word is now more commonly associated with the sap extraction from “Ferula gummosa – a low shrub of Persian slopes. Galbanum of this type is used in the making of modern perfume – the ingredient which gives the distinctive smell to the fragrances “Must” by Cartier, and “Chanel No. 19″).
  • Frankencense – is tapped from Boswellia trees and is milky white in color.  Frankencense is “levonah” in Hebrew, (lavan=white). It is not only white in color, it makes a thick whitened smoke when it burns. Many Old City shops carry it and Catholic Churches use it in the liturgical incense burners to this day. The point is that addition to the incense was that, like the prayers of God’s people, that which made an impact or a change that was evident to all. Prayer changes people and the spiritual atmosphere with a noticeable fragrance and color.

Regardless of whether God wanted us to know something of prayer through the ingredients or not, don’t miss the big picture – GOD LOVES THE PRAYER TIME.

When it is hard to do, remember this – It is loved by your Father. It is a joy to Him.

  • We have seen that God desires prayer to be a part of worship and celebration.
  • We have seen that God LOVES the time His people meet with Him. Yet, there is more…

Third, the beauty, value and position of the altar reinforced the importance of the actions performed on it. The altar was made of precious gold. It was crowned with beauty, and placed just outside the curtain that blocked the view of the Ark with the Mercy Seat. It was, for all practical purposes – at the access point to the holiest place before God.

Fourth, the mercy involved in the altar is underscored by the horns that were places of refuge for men and women to receive the mercy of God. I am thinking of the story in 1 Kings 2, where Benaiah was sent by Solomon to kill Joab in the Tabernacle. He held fast to the horns of the outer altar, because they were a place of mercy – and another set was found on this altar as well. Horns denoted strength in the time, but they also denoted God’s mercy in the worship setting.

Fifth, the incense altar was made with transport poles and rings on two corners, keeping it flexible and with the people on the move – as our prayer life should be. We are not given ONE WAY to pray, stilted, read and memorized –but a whole array of presentations and examples. I want to take time to observe one of them found in the heart of the Psalter. Listen to this rich expression of love for God and the place of His shelter in prayer:

Psalm 91:1 He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. 2 I will say to the LORD, “My refuge and my fortress, My God, in whom I trust!” 3 For it is He who delivers you from the snare of the trapper and from the deadly pestilence. 4 He will cover you with His pinions, and under His wings you may seek refuge; His faithfulness is a shield and bulwark. 5 You will not be afraid of the terror by night, or of the arrow that flies by day; 6 Of the pestilence that stalks in darkness, or of the destruction that lays waste at noon. 7 A thousand may fall at your side and ten thousand at your right hand, but it shall not approach you. 8 You will only look on with your eyes and see the recompense of the wicked. 9 For you have made the LORD, my refuge, even the Most High, your dwelling place. 10 No evil will befall you, nor will any plague come near your tent. 11 For He will give His angels charge concerning you, to guard you in all your ways. 12 They will bear you up in their hands, that you do not strike your foot against a stone. 13 You will tread upon the lion and cobra, the young lion and the serpent you will trample down. 14 “Because he has loved Me, therefore I will deliver him; I will set him securely on high, because he has known My name. 15 “He will call upon Me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble; I will rescue him and honor him. 16 “With a long life I will satisfy him and let him see My salvation.”

Truth #1: The writer shares that there is a place where I can find God’s protection, but I must both SEEK it and STAY in it. It is not beside God – it is within the place of His very nature (91:1,9).

Psalm 91:1 He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. The translation reads: “I can hide in the shadow of the Great One if I stay in His secret place.” God has a place, beyond any enemy’s grasp, where I can find shelter and security. It is with Him. It is in His Holy Presence. Where exactly is this place? Is the place something God created? How can I find it?

Psalm 91:9 can be read two ways – that God has created the refuge place, or that God Himself IS the refuge place – that it is WITHIN HIM. Dr. Martin Luther understood it in the second way. The statement is this: “For you have made the LORD, my refuge, even the Most High, your dwelling place.” Why read it in such an awkward way (that God Himself is the very shelter in Whom I should dwell)? Because other places in Scripture make that same point. In the Psalm of Moses (Psalm 90), he opens with “Lord, YOU have been my home.” The point is this: I can find refuge in God when I intentionally move to the place of shelter, and my commitment to stay there when tempted to emerge and defend myself.

Truth #2: There is a prayer that helps me recognize my Protector (91:2).

Psalm 91:2 I will say to the LORD, “[You are] My refuge and my fortress, My God, in whom I trust!” In essence, the text declares: “I will proclaim aloud before God from inside His shadow that I KNOW He is my protector – I trust Him! No information coming from my lips will teach God anything. I am not speaking for His benefit – but for MINE. I must constantly recite the protection of the Lord to appropriate in the Spirit what I cannot see with my eyes. The prayer that I recite helps ME to recall the work that God is doing on my behalf. One of the great helps in prayer is the aspect of reminder that I NEED in my daily walk. If you don’t know what to pray for, celebrate what God’s Word says He is doing right now for you!

He is your Shepherd. He is your Rock. He is your Fortress. He is your Strong Tower. He is you Salvation and Rescue. He is your Source. He is your Destination. He is your Journey. He is all that you truly need, and He provides all you truly have…

Truth #3: There is a provision in His presence! (Psalm 91:3).

Psalm 91:3 For it is He who delivers you from the snare of the trapper and from the deadly pestilence. God protects those who place their trust in Him. The writer exclaims “I constantly recall His protection while He loots the traps my enemy has set before me, and gives me the proceeds from the looting.”  God plunders the enemy snares, cashes in on them and offers me the spoils! God isn’t just One Who delivers – He takes the things meant for EVIL and TURNS them into valuable things that help me! Joseph learned this – King Asa experienced this!

That provision of protection has a tender image behind it. Psalm 91:4 He will cover you with His pinions, and under His wings you may seek refuge; His faithfulness is a shield and bulwark. The poetry of the song is rich in image. The writer says: “His (ebrah) beautiful feathers cover me, His wings (kaw-nawf’) shield me”. His faithfulness (or more properly His absolute reliability in terms of truth “emet”) is both my front guard and my rear protector (so-khay-raw’: bulwark or buckler, used only here in the Hebrew terminology of the Bible). Don’t miss that God’s wing is always there to cover us, but only the one who SEEKS refuge beneath its impenetrable shield senses that protection. Life lived apart from prayer is uncertain life – vulnerable and ambiguous. His reliability in protection and His revealed nature in truthful exposure do not change – but we are often distracted, reaching for solace in places other than the ones provided for by our Heavenly Father. Time spent in prayer adds surety to your walk and reinforces God’s protection over you.

If you drop your eyes further down in the song, the Psalmist continues this theme: Psalm 91:10 “No evil will befall you, nor will any plague come near your tent. 11 For He will give His angels charge concerning you, to guard you in all your ways. 12 They will bear you up in their hands, that you do not strike your foot against a stone. 13 You will tread upon the lion and cobra, the young lion and the serpent you will trample down.” Be careful with these verses about protection. Loud voices argue that because of texts like these, God has made an eternal promise that nothing that hurts me will enter my life – but that just isn’t so. This is a truth about a man in a battle that has been given a grand vision of victory – but battles leave many good men and women wounded. If that is the case, what is the value of these verses? What do they promise, if anything, to the believer who is seeking God’s protection.

First, recall this is a song of celebration by a warrior who has been shown protection by God amidst the pain of battle. Look very closely at both the prerequisite and at the promises! To be eligible for this extreme protection, the warrior had to deliberately place himself in the shelter of God Himself. The place of shelter was not simply a place God dwelt in for communion- it was the very place of God’s nature and person (Psalm 91:9, more below).

In other words, the one who wraps their life in the truth of God’s attributes and cloaks themselves with God’s purposes with intent to glorify God – that is the one who will see life from God’s perspective.

Now examine the promises. In the midst of their assignment by God, evil will be unable to wound them, for God will use them to gain the victory. Wounds (nehgah) will not enter their covering, for God will dispatch mighty unseen protectors, angels from His side, to stand beside us. We may retreat from the battle, but our feet will be protected from the damaging stones beneath. The terrifying serpent, the roaring young lion, the slithering cobra – will all be unable to stop our march and mighty trampling. Our timidity will dissipate in God’s grip. Our strength will increase, our promises certain – for we will know that we serve God’s ends and be assured that no power is His match.

When all is said about the Psalmists words, one truth remains: Clutched in the grip of the power of God, cloaked in the beauty of His Divine presence, I can stand with confidence in the face of the foe.

I need not quiver at the whistling of his arrows, nor quake at the pounding of the footsteps of his advancing army. Confidence comes as my walk with God envelopes more of my vision than my earthly view. God is BIGGER than the foe. God is GREATER than his weaponry. God’s TEAM is vastly larger than the mere men and women I can see around me. I must be able to hide in Him to truly get His perspective on the darkness descending. I need to intentionally pull the cloak of His holy goodness over me to find His protection. Spiritual life cannot be nurtured by fleshly pursuit – only time in His covering will sustain when the battle draws near. Prayer isn’t an abstract reality when the shells fall and bullets of battle are all around me – it is the shelter of protection. It is the foundation of confidence. Yet, it is something more… it is the wellspring of peace….

Truth #4: There is a peace that accompanies my closeness. (Psalm 91:5-8)

Psalm 91:5 You will not be afraid of the terror by night, or of the arrow that flies by day; 6 Of the pestilence that stalks in darkness, or of the destruction that lays waste at noon. 7 A thousand may fall at your side and ten thousand at your right hand, but it shall not approach you. 8 You will only look on with your eyes and see the recompense of the wicked.

The peace of the one who hides constantly in the Father is noticeable. Restlessness is the stuff of the wanderer, but enduring security is the way of the man or woman that has deliberately pulled the cover of God’s protection over them. The Psalmist iterates sources of fear in couplets first from the night, then from the day:

  • The dread of a night’s disaster (91:5a) and the plague of the darkness (91:6a): Pain often intensifies at night. With the decent of darkness, uncertainty rises. Since the language here is one of a man or woman of God under attack – the imagery is even more vivid. It is the anxiousness of the foxhole on the night battle field. It is the soldier dug in on the front, nervous of every movement from the enemy opposite them. In the darkness, the enemy’s movement is far less discernible, and fear plays on the mind and heart. Memories of the fight from days’ past flood the mind. Lost comrades and fallen friends fill up the mind as the cold and quiet night provides the unnerving isolation from others. It is here that reciting God’s protection will become critical to keep peace reigning in the heart.
  • The assault of weapons in the day (91:5b) the withering of the noonday sun (91:6b): Not only the dark of night, but the terror of the fight and the scorching of the midday sun give rise to fear. The sound of the weaponry and the sight of the fallen fellow soldier raises any warrior’s anxiety. In the heat of daytime battle a soldier fights thirst and heat as much as enemy and arrow – all seems poised to destroy him. Yet, the constant call to God’s shield of protection can provide cool shade from the sun, and powerful protection from the arrow!

Sit with the soldier in the bunker who calls continually on the Lord – the prayer warrior who covers himself or herself with the beautiful expanse of the wings of the Protector of Heaven. Watch the battle from their eyes.

It is not bloodless – a thousand may fall around them. It is not distant – ten thousand may fall at their own right hand. The destruction, nevertheless, will not overtake you (the term “nawgash” suggests both approach and overtake). The warrior sees the fall of the foe, and recognizes the victory of the Lord.

The idea of 91:8 is not that the warrior does not see the losses of good men and women in the battle – it is one of perspective. The losses are real, but the gains are eternal and powerful. The pains of fallen friends don’t dominate the thinking of the warrior sheltered under God’s protection – the advances of his King are foremost in His mind. The recompense to the wicked foe is more vivid than any cost of the battle. Victory is assured and the glory of his King is certain. No cost is too great for right to triumph. No payment is too demanding for evil to be vanquished. With such a perspective, the hidden warrior watches, not with blindness to the cost – but with assurance that all of our struggle is worth the doing of it.

Truth #5: The proclamation of God is heard from the hiding place. (Psalm 91:14-15)

Psalm 91:14 “Because he has loved Me, therefore I will deliver him; I will set him securely on high, because he has known My name. 15 “He will call upon Me, and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble; I will rescue him and honor him. 16 “With a long life I will satisfy him and let him see My salvation.”

The Psalmist hears the gentle voice of God. He is proclaiming promises over His beloved ones. He recognizes their submission and love – and He promises deliverance. He acknowledges the believer’s cry out to Him – and He promises to answer that cry. He sees the troubles of His people – and offers them His presence amid the pain and toil. He promises rescue, and He alone can deliver it.

Prayer is not the fleshly action of closing my eyes and speaking well learned words. It is the deliberate hiding of my vulnerable self in His powerful grasp. It is an exercise of submission.

Prayer is the air tank of the diver. It is the life line to the climber. It is the ship’s hull – holding fast in the storm. It is no luxury, no part-time, half-hearted pursuit. It is the difference between understanding the world from God’s perspective, and being disillusioned – even in the presence of His greatness.

 

Grasping God's Purpose: "Hiding in the Shadows" – Exodus 37:17-24

I thank God for all my senses, but chief among them, in my opinion, is the sight of my eyes. I love viewing rich colors in carefully constructed images of either photography or graphic art. I recognize the depth that a shadow brings to a picture – but I confess that I don’t like shadows in real life. Shadows play tricks on your mind. Darkness is not warm and inviting. Recently staying in center city Philadelphia, I found myself constantly looking over my shoulder as I walked at night in the streets from the parking garage to my hotel. Soon after I got back in Florida, I found myself up in an attic making repairs for someone, I found myself highly sensitive to every sound up in the dark crawl space, as I was worried that critters might jump out at me and bite me. I should never have watched the movie “Ben” as a youth – it has given me the “willies” about rats attacking me ever since! Needless to say, I didn’t see any man-eating rats, but still I find the darkness and shadows unnerving.

My daughter was taking out trash two nights ago, and she stepped on a snake in the back yard, that took off slithering into the bushes – darkness is unsettling! You know, you can walk down any dark street, right here in our little town, and your senses will tingle if you hear noise coming from behind bushes or rustling in trees above. If only you could see clearly! Shadows can be frightening, and darkness is never desired because it HIDES THINGS. Light is comforting because it EXPOSES THE HIDDEN. It helps us identify the familiar face of a coming friend, and strikes a warning posture in us when the oncoming person is unfamiliar and a possible threat. Our lesson today is about the light exposure involved in God’s worship center, and why God planned to have a lamp in the room. It isn’t a lighting seminar – but a look at what God intended us to LEARN about Him from His instructions through Moses.

Key Principle: God instructed a carefully prepared ornate lampstand in the Holy Place to bring light to the ministry of worship and to expose anything that would harm the sanctity and dignity of the work.  

Let’s drop in on the description of the Holy Place, already in progress in Exodus 37:17: “Then he made the lampstand of pure gold. He made the lampstand of hammered work, its base and its shaft; its cups, its bulbs and its flowers were of one piece with it. 18 There were six branches going out of its sides; three branches of the lampstand from the one side of it and three branches of the lampstand from the other side of it; 19 three cups shaped like almond blossoms, a bulb and a flower in one branch, and three cups shaped like almond blossoms, a bulb and a flower in the other branch—so for the six branches going out of the lampstand. 20 In the lampstand there were four cups shaped like almond blossoms, its bulbs and its flowers; 21 and a bulb was under the first pair of branches coming out of it, and a bulb under the second pair of branches coming out of it, and a bulb under the third pair of branches coming out of it, for the six branches coming out of the lampstand. 22 Their bulbs and their branches were of one piece with it; the whole of it was a single hammered work of pure gold. 23 He made its seven lamps with its snuffers and its trays of pure gold. 24 He made it and all its utensils from a talent of pure gold.

As we open our reading of the text of the Word, once again we are back in the Tabernacle, “sweating to the oldies” with Moses. It has been a hot journey through a long, hot summer. The one difference we have with the text is rain – something the children of Israel would have paid to see! Moses was more familiar with the drought afflicting Kansas than any torrential rains raising Lake Jackson. Even with the differences, the study of the trip is deeply rewarding. Why? Because the tabernacle has been a study in prudently constructed symbols – parts and pieces of the only complete worship center ever designed by God for placement on earth. Every part of His choice has been cataloged in the Word, and we have the option of looking quite closely at each piece He instructed, and unfolding the meaning of the piece by looking at the record.

  • The precinct of the Tabernacle was closed – because proper worship must be set aside from the everyday walk in life. It affects everything, but it is distinct and planned.
  • The position of the Tabernacle was in the center of the camp – because the place of God in our midst is not a peripheral issue.
  • The prominent impression of the Tabernacle was that it was a killing place. Just inside the outer court of the Tabernacle was the killing place for the sacrificial animals and beside it the altar of sacrifice – because we don’t get anywhere near approaching God’s holy presence without addressing our sinfulness first.
  • The restricted buildings of the Holy Place and Holy of Holies were closed off from the courtyard, a separate and distinct building within the linen fenced court – because priests alone were to interface between God and man. God’s transcendence is not a new concept to us. Even now, we access God in Heavenly places by our Great High Priest’s word.
  • Outside the curtain that marked entry to the building of the Holy Place stood a Laver made of the melted mirrors taken from Egypt – a washing place for the priests who handled animals, blood and ash pans. Even a priest needs a daily cleansing experience to be ready to serve God well – and we as priests have that in the confession of our sin to our Savior. Our 1 John 1:9 need for daily confession does not negate the priesthood of the believer today.
  • Inside the Holy Place there is a table near the north wall that has twelve loaves of bread – reminding of God’s provision of manna through the wilderness and the priests daily need of Him.
  • Near a curtain that divided the Holy Place and Holy of Holies was a small golden altar of incense – because God loved to smell the prayers of men and women in the wafting of the distinct odor given at the hour of prayer.
  • Deep within the Tabernacle was a golden ark – a box to carry the Word of God as given to Moses, and some of the implements of the journey – because the people of God are nothing without the promises of God.

Finally, lighting the entire room of the Holy Place was an ornate seven branched candelabra called the Menorah – because light revealed what darkness concealed. God’s desire was a clean, ordered and appropriate sacred area. That is where our text focuses our attention today – on the light source inside the Holy Place. The lampstand offered light to help the priests do their job – because they could SEE what they were doing – blending the spices for the incense altar in the offering of the prayers of the people or placing the bread and frankincense in remembrance on the table – all that had to be done within the fifteen foot by thirty foot otherwise completely dark enclosure.

The area was sacred, so they couldn’t simply throw open the front curtain for extra light. The area was to be dignified, clean and ordered. Much of what the priests did was keep it that way. In an area so small, that sounds easier to pull off then it really was – as anyone who has been tent camping for a long time in the desert can attest. Dust is a daily reality of life in the desert. You can feel it on your skin, and taste it in your sandwich. In fact, living in Jerusalem on the edge of the desert, you give up on dusting the first week – it is ever present. Add to that, there are other problems unique to desert camping that make the whole experience less than sanitary and challenging to keep dignified and sacred space set apart.

When people think of the Bible characters like Moses, they forget the smell of the Israelite camp, the constant problem of scorpions, mice, rats and desert foxes trying to get into the foodstuffs. Roaches are the same the world around – disgusting and pervasive.

The flannel graph version of the Bible leaves us with the impression that the people smelled of perfume, and the lands were idyllic and vermin free. I assure you having lived there that this is a grievous error. Moses contended with critters and bugs, and so did the priests of the Tabernacle – apart from some Divine intervention to keep the place clean, which is wholly unmentioned in the text. In fact, there were only four things that could keep the Holy place free of blemishes: the direct intervention of God, the natural barrier made by the building, the priests in daily and diligent service of God, and the light that made dirt and bugs vulnerable to the priests’ traps. Light has everything to do with keeping the sacred clean and useful to God.

Go back to the description of the six features of the lamp were given in the text:

The Value of lamp in worship – Pure Gold (17).

Gold was precious, and the lampstand was made of precious materials because its purpose was critically important. The light uncovered the hidden, exposed the truth, and made the work of the priests possible. The lamp brought light to the worship in the Holy Place for the priests, since God required none in the Holy of Holies – it was for the men. Think for a moment about how the term “light” is used in the Bible. It was, in the very beginning, used to “separate” things. In the Genesis 1:3 account of God’s creation, the Bible records: “Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good; and God separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light day, and the darkness He called night. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.”

The term separated is from the Hebrew verb “baw-dal’” a term for dividing or partitioning. The purpose of God’s demarcation of light and darkness was to divide the time. This was prior to the making of the sun, and it was to highlight the difference between good and evil. How do I know? Note that the light was called GOOD. The darkness was simply its opposite. Brightness is associated with God, and darkness with His enemy. It does not mean that all dark places are evil – since there was no light source inside the Holy of Holies because God had no need of it to see everything. It does mean that light was supposed to be a help to US to see what could not otherwise be detected.

Remember, when Jesus said in the Gospel of John “I am the Light of the World” (John 5:12), the context was a lie that was being perpetrated in His midst. He wouldn’t stand for it. He is the light, and that light shines in every hidden corner – and exposes every blemish.

We live in a day when believers in the west often have more Bibles in their homes than people. The problem isn’t that we don’t have a lamp to see the blemishes, vermin and dirt in our lives – we do. The problem may be that we don’t turn on the lamp – don’t open the pages of God’s powerful Word to allow the light to touch the shadowed areas of our heart. The problem may be that we shield the light from making its way into corners reserved for self carefully protected inside us. The problem may be that we get haphazard in the use of the light, using it in a way that doesn’t identify and illuminate our real problem areas.

When I was a boy, my father generally asked my older brother to come and help him work on the car. I didn’t feel slighted. In fact, I really didn’t WANT to go outside in the cold and dark, and hold the light for my dad while he was under the car or inside the hood, working on a broken part. It wasn’t that interesting, and it certainly wasn’t that comfortable. On occasion, the lot fell on me to help out. I found what dad was doing to be very interesting… for about one minute. Then my mind wandered. That wasn’t a problem, but the fact that the light wandered with my mind was a problem. Periodically, dad would simply say the word: “SON!” I would drop back to attention and aim the light back on my dad’s hands at work. Light undirected doesn’t help the work. Ask any lighthouse manager. It must be focused on the real problem areas. So must the Word of God be. We can’t simply quote verses about salvation in the midst of the inner turmoil created by lust’s grab at our hearts. The Word is a SWORD, and with all such weapons we must learn to aim before we use it well.

Though once bathed in Bible, our little portion of the world is increasingly hostile to it. Some of the hostility is open – but much of it is thinly veiled. Take, for instance, the CNN headline that read: “Pregnant teen dies after abortion ban delays her chemo treatment for leukemia”. The story went on to reveal:

The 16-year-old’s plight attracted worldwide attention after she had to wait for chemotherapy because of an abortion ban in the Dominican Republic. Doctors were hesitant to give her chemotherapy because such treatment could terminate the pregnancy — a violation of the Dominican Constitution, which bans abortion. Some 20 days after she was admitted to the hospital, she finally started receiving treatment. She died Friday, a hospital official said.”

Did you carefully note the position of the moral statements in the writing?  Once again a writer trotted out the emotional and exceptional to defeat the norm. Obviously, the entire blame fell on the abortion laws. They must be bad – they let a girl die! Some of what they said was very true. I think it was terrible that a youth lost her life. What a terrible loss. Yet, there were questions no one was asking that would have shed significant light on the situation. Why was a sixteen year old young woman pregnant? Why was that assumed to be a proper condition for her? Did she know thirteen weeks before, when she conceived that she had leukemia? Would the chemotherapy two weeks earlier have guaranteed her more time? Did that very law they were impugning preserve many lives in recent days?

The point is this: when we select one feature of Biblical morality (do not kill) but drop all the other tenets of it (like sexual purity outside of marriage)– we are simply making up right and wrong and depending on emotions to fill in the gaps of logic. Emotions are wholly unreliable for that esteemed purpose. We live in days that need the light turned on. The darkness of society is now darkening the minds of even believers – and it is time to fill in the picture with TRUTH. If we walk only by every other command of God – we will cause terrible troubles and reap horrid consequences. If we want to “freedom” to blow off the Word of God – then we get the awful consequences of doing so. Even the illness itself was caused by sin, generations ago, all the way back to a garden. I do not here attempt to judge the young woman. My comment is about the content of the writer’s report that is reprehensible and morally bankrupt. We are being duped in poorly constructed and thinly veiled arguments. My concern is the number of young believers that are surrendering ground to such nonsense.

The Work to construct the lamp– Hammered and fashioned (17b):

The description of this carefully fashioned lamp indicated that it was also to be a symbol. The light was brought in because of hard work on the part of a gifted leader of God. Bezalel, in conjunction with Moses, the team of workers, and the supply of the congregation – was able to create the stand in obedience to God.

It is critical that God’s people understand the need for the light of truth, but equally important that they recognize the WORK involved in getting to the truth. It takes serious examination to get to the heart of God’s view of things. We must deliberately learn to study God’s Word in a consistent way. The haphazard “this is what I feel about the passage in the Bible” type of study must simply DIE. If our lampstand of truth is God’s Word – we must carefully fashion our work with it so that we can confidently see the foot path God has laid out for us. The Word will expose lies.  Careful and consistent study of it will cut apart the motivations and intents of the heart. Just as Hebrews 4:12 reminds:

For the word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.”

The Shape of the lamp – it was made to resemble an ALMOND tree (17b-19).

The branches were to be shaped as the flowering almond branch – something that God repeated several times in the original design of Exodus 25 and 37. The name of the almond is “shaqed” in Hebrew. It comes from the word “shaqad”, the word for “to watch over, to keep watch or lie awake.” In the Bible, the almond is like our “ground hog”. It is the first to appear in the early Spring – in February usually. It blossomed, but took half a year to produce its fruit – six months of hard labor. Jeremiah 31:37 speaks of the coming New Covenant to the Jewish people, and says that as God “watched over them to break them down” so He will one day “watch over them to build and plant”. The One who watches His people is recalled in the play on words with the Almond. The light not only helped the priests see, it reminded them WHO ELSE WAS WATCHING OVER THEM.

Part of the objective of the Word of God in our lives is to remind us that God is the “shaqad” over us. We are called to meditate on it “day and night” – not only because it will offer us correction and direction – but because it will remind us of God’s protection over us. It is what allows believers to sleep well in the midst of the political, moral and ethical storms that sweep our land. We rest peacefully, for God is keeping watch. His eyes are ever upon His purposes, and I am here to play a role in the story He wants to tell. My part may not be the one I would have selected for me – but it is the part for which I was created. It is the part I will sing about in eternity. Knowing that, I am peaceful about the world. God is in control. That may not help me have an easier time of it – I simply don’t know. Many an Apostle died for the Gospel, but none would complain inside Heaven’s gate. God IS watching over you… and the lamp’s glow is just a reminder.

The Number on the lamp – Seven (18, 20-21).

There were to be three branches on either side of a center branch – making seven in all. From the account of Creation with the completion in seven days, to the 54 times the word seven shows up in the closing book of the Bible – Revelation – the number seven has been synonymous with completion. The number occurs 700 times in the Bible, and often in the sense of completion. The word translated “finished” in Koine Greek (teléo) generally means to bring to a close or to fulfill. Take, for example, Revelation 15:1 which reveals the reason for seven angels with seven plagues: “And I saw another sign in heaven, great and marvelous, seven angels having the seven last plagues; because in them is filled up (teléo) the wrath of God.” In other words, the lamp brought seven lights, or COMPLETE light to the place of worship. You can’t hide in God’s presence – He knows what you aren’t saying. He sees inside. The last place to try to hide sin is in the presence of a Holy and all seeing God.

Don’t hide. Don’t run. Don’t shrink away. Draw near. Confess to Him what you both already know. Ask Him for intense strength to break the grip of sin and guilt. Ask Him to remove a hook from your heart if you don’t have the strength to do it. You will find that He isn’t lighting up sin in you to bring condemnation – but to bring you comfort in the return to Him. He will not call wrong –“right”. He will not excuse rebellion. Humble before Him and be blessed anew by Him!

The Unity of the lamp – one piece (22).

The lampstand could easily have been assembled in parts. It didn’t need to me one piece, apart from the fact that God specifically commanded that it be made that way. Have you ever wondered WHY? We can’t know for sure, but we DO know that God told Bezalel to follow the pattern given, and that was from the Tabernacle of Heaven.

It was many times harder to make the whole frame as a single piece. Though gold is malleable, it is also heavy and not terribly sturdy. This piece would have been the most difficult to construct of all for that reason alone. I don’t want to go too far afield with the analogy, but stop and think about the unity involved in the TRUTH of God’s Word – the lamp to our feet and light to our path.

One Bible teacher wrote it this way:

The various Bible writers lived at different times, some separated by hundreds of years. In many cases they were complete strangers to one another. Some were businessmen or traders, others were shepherds, fishermen, soldiers, physicians, preachers, kings—human beings from all walks of life. They served under different governments, and lived within contrasting cultures and systems of philosophy. But here is the wonder of it all: When the 66 books of the Bible with their 1,189 chapters made up of 31,173 verses are brought together, we find perfect harmony in the message they convey. As the great scholar F. F. Bruce noted: “The Bible is not simply an anthology; there is a unity which binds the whole together.”

Suppose a man should knock at your door and, when invited in, place an oddly shaped piece of marble on your living room floor, then leave without a word. Other visitors follow in succession until about 40 individuals have each deposited their numbered marble piece into place. When the last one has gone, you see with surprise that a beautiful statue stands before you. Then you learn that most of the “sculptors” had never met each other, coming, as they did, from South America, China, Russia, Africa, and other parts of the world. What would you have to conclude? That someone had planned the statue and had sent to each man accurate specifications for his particular piece of marble. The Bible as a whole communicates one coherent message—just like a perfect marble statue. One mind planned it all, the mind of God. Scripture’s remarkable unity gives evidence that it is not simply human literature but indeed the Word of God. Human beings wrote down the thoughts and words, but they were “God-breathed,” inspired by God Himself.” (excerpted from “Exploring the Word” website).

The Weight of the lamp – approaching one talent (24).

The ancient Egyptian talent of the Pharaohs weighed sixty pounds, and most of it was used to make the lampstand – with a small amount partitioned for other utensils. The size of the lamp, but estimation of the Jerusalem Institute when we were building the replica in the Judean Desert was about five feet tall with a large base equal to a third of the height. We were looking for a way to hold it together without the weight of one branch drooping to downward. It was difficult for the Kohathites camped south of the Tabernalce to carry from one place to another when the camp moved. It had no handles, and was somewhat fragile because of its build.

If you haven’t caught the imagery yet, the light was the agency of the truth exposed to those who would serve God. It was intended to be both precious and heavy. It was not intended to be easy to carry in life. God’s chief desire is NOT our COMFORT, but our CONSECRATION. We are made to be ready to serve God, and that can only work if we are CAREFUL to keep His Word doing its work in us – cleaning us and checking us.

Can I make the point anew that this is not an EASY task? The presentation of the Bible as a simple “Plan of Salvation” is well below the point of the Book. Most of the Bible is NOT about FINDING GOD – it is about FOLLOWING GOD. Why do I meet so many believers that know the FINDING GOD sections, but are only barely familiar with the FOLLOWING GOD sections? Let me offer this plea:

  • In the Law, we learn of what moves the Father’s heart. We learn what He cares about, and what bugs Him in His people. We learn about the patterns of His judicial thinking, and why a relationship with Him is not as simple as “doing the best we can”. He wants our allegiance, our careful obedience to a vast array of areas of life’s choices. He wants to be part of the everyday.
  • In the Prophets, we hear the warnings of a God that must bring pain to His people if they refuse to walk with Him. He pays careful attention to all the things His people are doing. When the cousins in the Northern Kingdom fell to the world, the warnings became even sharper and more pronounced. When sin was not abandoned, the fall of the people in the Southern Kingdom gave rise to a new kind of prophecy – the cautions of living out of place with God’s intention, in an exile brought on by stubbornness.
  • In the writings we hear of God’s wisdom – His intended standards for how things were supposed to work. The norm is established and the life of praise is rooted in song and anthem. Our ability to lift up worship and praise is enhanced, while our inner pains are eased.
  • In the Gospels we read the example of God in human skin – a Perfect answer to man’s sin problem and a Perfect specimen of One that pleases His Father in Heaven.
  • In the Book of Acts we see that Risen One acting through His chosen servants, beginning the process of exposing the dark world to the light of the truth.
  • In the Epistles we read the instructions based on sample problems, and examine the principles of how to solve the issues the people of God will face as the message is transported around the world to all cultures and peoples.
  • In Revelation we read of the end of God’s program. His careful plan is played out to the defeat of His enemies and the Perfection of His Forever Kingdom.

Every part of God’s Word is relevant. The notion that only SOME of it is FOR US, flies directly in the face of 2 Timothy 3:16: “All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; 17 so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.”

Paul wrote that God’s Word is from God’s breath, powerful to change God’s people, and planned out to fully prepare God’s work force. Much of it is detail, and all of it takes careful study. Timothy was urged not to slack off in his study but “to show himself a workman that need not be ashamed.” (2 Tim. 2:15). It was intended to TAKE WORK.

If we think that we can simply slide by on sermons prepared by others, listen to a few jingles from Christian radio, and occasionally crack open our Bible and really develop the ability to filter the truth from the nonsense said in God’s name – we are kidding ourselves. We are enveloping laziness in a cloak of spirituality that is bound to fail. Let me say it plainly: Your understanding of God’s Word is the foundation of your ability to serve and please Him. If you had no ability to read and learn – God would make a way. Since you do – God’s way is in the Book.

  • Don’t look for victory without practice.
  • Don’t expect power without plugging in to the outlet.
  • Don’t put off til tomorrow what might be vital information for today.

God’s Word is POWERFUL, but a sword still sheathed scares no enemy.

1. The Word brought the message of salvation when I was lost: “…from childhood you have known the sacred writings which are able to give you the wisdom that leads to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.” (2 Timothy 3:15).

2. The Word nursed me through the tender years of infancy in Christ: “…like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation…” (1 Peter 2:2).

3. The Word bulks me up to stand as a man of God and give me a home to build on: “And now I commend you to God and to the word of His grace, which is able to build you up and to give you the inheritance among all those who are sanctified.” (Acts 20:32)

4. The Word can give me power over the enemy when he assaults me: “…I have written to you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abides in you, and you have overcome the evil one.”

5. The Word comforts me with assurance when life wears out my confidence: “…These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life.” (1 John 5:13).

6. The Word can keep me from sin: “…Your word I have treasured in my heart, That I may not sin against You.” (Psalm 119:11).

7. The Word can keep me from the wrong conclusions: “Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God” (Matthew 22:29).

The Bible offers commands to obey, promises to believe, sins to avoid, examples to follow and warning to heed. Can the movie I watched last night do that for me? Can the novel I have plunged into do that for me? Can more time with my favorite sport offer that to me?

God instructed a carefully prepared ornate lamp stand in the Holy Place to bring light and to expose anything that would harm the sanctity and dignity of His work among His people.  

The Faith Work Out: "The Masks we Wear" – James 2:1-13

Some of the most elegant masks I have ever seen are in storefront windows in the alleyways between the “Piazza San Marco” and the “Canal Grande” in the island city of Venice. They are wildly colorful and complex designs – because they have been making sophisticated party masks for centuries. Historians believe it began all the way back in the year 1162, following a loss in war that caused the island city its dominance over several other small maritime city states. The famed “Republica della Serenisima” or “Serene Republic” was displaced in a war by a rival city, and the response of the Venetian masses was extreme overreaction – inaugurating the annual practice of “Carnivale” –a sort of street party like the “Festival of Fools” held each Spring in Paris. The masks for the festival were outrageous, and the behaviors often worse – but the idea was simple: hide behind ornate masks while behaving badly – the masks would conceal the real identity of the wearer anyway. It was about as anonymous as some mistaken moderns considered their rude comments in an internet chat room, hidden under the cloak of a made up “avatar”. Finding someone’s real identity has never been that hard, but people love an illusion of anonymity. The interesting truth of that historical setting is this: we often act differently outside than we are inside. We act differently when people will hold us accountable for our actions than when we think they cannot find out the actions were ours. For some, it is a stark difference. For others, it is a much more slight one. Read the internet. Anonymous comments are seldom the deeply encouraging ones.

It is true that etiquette sometimes demands that mature people don’t say or do what they are thinking. That often isn’t as much hypocrisy, as it is simple tact and decency. At the same time, in some cases it can be a sign of a subtle form of manipulation. We may be trying to GET something from someone else – be it favor, or material reward. This is one example of the grasp of the flesh’s tentacles in our daily life. Our lesson today is about that grip.

Key Principle: When believers treat people better based on their ability to help us or our cause, we show ourselves to be fleshly and manipulative.

Our partiality comes from our immoral and base nature, and is rooted in greed…

When James faced the scattered flock of Jewish believers of the diaspora (dispersion), he knew some of them were deeply confused and badly shaken at the level of conflict they were facing both within and without. He took the time to explain that God DID in fact use WEIGHT TRAINING to build them up – in the form of daily troubles, but never used BAIT TRAINING in the form of dangling temptations to entice lustful responses. The confusion came because the pounding of troubles takes its toll, so he clarified that the TEMPTATIONS we face were NEVER part of God’s training, but rather the enticement of the flesh WITHIN – the old man. He warned the beleaguered believers that temptation grabs hold by highlighting the benefits of sinful behaviors while masking the devastating effects of evil choices in our lives. The truth of the first chapter was this: God uses WEIGHTS to build us up – but never BAIT to pull us down. Temptation is from the flesh, whereas pressure and trouble MAY BE from God. The two must be seen differently, and addressed differently. As he continued writing his letter, James identified another problem that believers face that is an offshoot of the flesh – the problem of manipulative behavior in relationships. The line between our actions and our motivations is often not straight, it is curved. Sometimes it is opaque even to us – we aren’t conscious of WHY we do what we do. Yet, on closer inspection, the motivation to care for some people over others may be more about selfishness than anything else.

Let me explain: deep within us, in our natural fallen state, we are drawn to favor people that we believe will help us accumulate more of the things of the flesh that we have learned to treasure – fortune, fame, power or pleasure. Anyone we assess to have no ability to add to these desired treasures of the flesh can be treated in a less delicate way by us, because our behavior is the outworking of something much more sinister – our manipulative flesh within. We aren’t simply nicer to people who HAVE MORE, but rather people who we assess on some level may be able and willing to ADD MORE TO US… if we can somehow manage to get them to do it. At its base, our treatment of others is often a reflection of our inner greed to have more of someone else’s things or to be lauded more by others.

It is the truth: we hunger for greater public affirmation. We pine for more material goods. We thirst for more sensually delighting pleasures. We long for impact producing power. In the process, we may be tempted to feed the urges of the flesh as we make friends and find new acquaintances. This happens in the business world, in the political world, in the local country club, and sadly – in the local church. When James saw the tendency in the early congregations of Jewish believers, he wrote this by the direction of the Spirit:

James 2:1 My brethren, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism. 2 For if a man comes into your assembly with a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and there also comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, 3 and you pay special attention to the one who is wearing the fine clothes, and say, “You sit here in a good place,” and you say to the poor man, “You stand over there, or sit down by my footstool,” 4 have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil motives? 5 Listen, my beloved brethren: did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him? 6 But you have dishonored the poor man. Is it not the rich who oppress you and personally drag you into court? 7 Do they not blaspheme the fair name by which you have been called? 8 If, however, you are fulfilling the royal law according to the Scripture, “YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF,” you are doing well. 9 But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. 10 For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all. 11 For He who said, “DO NOT COMMIT ADULTERY,” also said, “DO NOT COMMIT MURDER.” Now if you do not commit adultery, but do commit murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. 12 So speak and so act as those who are to be judged by the law of liberty. 13 For judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy; mercy triumphs over judgment.

An instruction to observe

The passage opens with an instruction – because James is not a “beat around the bush” type of guy. He is a Galilean Jew – and they have been noted as both direct and confrontational. The disciples were not chosen because of their politeness and tact, but because the message of salvation was to be passed to the world from the children of Abraham through Isaac and Jacob. It was their destiny. At the same time, they were not the most TACTFUL of vessels when it came to interpersonal relationships. A careful look at the Gospels show some lack of eloquence and subtlety when it came to getting along with each other.

James put it out there in 2:1: “My brethren, do not hold your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of personal favoritism.” He instructed those who held the truth of the Gospel and the submission to the Glorious Savior in their hearts to intentionally SHUT DOWN any inner attitude that was connected to the behavior of favoritism. He didn’t tell them to simply stop acting is out – like a MASK CHANGE. He told them to kill the attitude beneath it!

Evidence to recognize

In order to be effective at addressing a bad attitude, he had to PROVE its existence – because people with behavior masks don’t always realize they are wearing one. He offered a situation as a symptomatic sample in James 2:2: “For if a man comes into your assembly with a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and there also comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, 3 and you pay special attention to the one who is wearing the fine clothes, and say, “You sit here in a good place,” and you say to the poor man, “You stand over there, or sit down by my footstool,”…

The proof of their fleshly attitude was this: they treated congregational visitors differently based on their apparent ability to bring greater wealth and standing to the beaten down community of Jewish believers. When a person of both means and potential generosity visited, they offered them a more prominent seat. When a person with little material means arrived, he was set aside. The issue wasn’t just how they treated people – but WHY they treated them differently. The Spirit of God wanted them to draw a line back to their attitude and its roots in the fallen flesh.

A motivation to expose

The fourth verse draws out in written form the whole of the line between attitude and action in this case: “…have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil motives? It is important that you read the verse carefully to understand the problem properly. In English, it looks like they may have conspired together to treat people partially – but that is not the case. The phrase “distinctions among yourselves” should better be translated: “divided judgments inside yourselves”. The issue wasn’t collusion, it was inner personal attitude. Individuals in the congregation behaved this way because of the power of the flesh playing out within them – and James called them on the behavior.

In order to address both attitude and action, James first argued they had not been well served by their instincts to act in this way. In fact, the flesh was leading them on a path away from God’s way fo doing things. God used the poor to spread the Gospel much more than those of means in the time James was writing. He said: “5 Listen, my beloved brethren: did not God choose the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom which He promised to those who love Him? Because God had been using the poor to add such strength and reliability to the foundation of the early Messianic community, it only made sense that they should respond by recognizing the potential SPIRITUAL TREASURE found in the person with little MATERIAL TREASURE.

When believers see their work on earth in fleshly terms, they measure the work of a congregation by the number of “people of means”. They rate the effectiveness to reach out by the size and beauty of their physical properties. They use a physical scale for a spiritual dynamic – and that is wholly unreliable. It doesn’t work in congregations, and it doesn’t even work in individuals. God may be doing His mightiest work in the most unassuming packages! Hasn’t God repeatedly surprised us by using people men would not have chosen? Even the most cursory look at Scripture reminds us not to look at the outward appearance to see what God sees and to evaluate what God is doing.

  • You would not have chosen a single family to build a huge boat and wait for rain – but God did.
  • You would not have chosen an eighty year old ex-con to lead your people out of slavery to redemption – but God did.
  • You would not have chosen an unwed young woman to bring forth the Messiah – but God did.

You see, God enjoys choosing the “foolish” things of the world to show the clear working of His power. He delights in using weak physical materials while making them effective by spiritual means. What does that mean? Be careful about the judgments you make about the people around you. Some of the people you meet that appear weakest in flesh around may be the mightiest in spirit. Those in ministry who shy away from the aged believers in favor of the younger and more physically energetic crowd are missing something. For most young people, the flesh is still very strong the things of the spirit are still quite faint. They will grow in time, but youth has both inexperience and distraction to contend with. While the body is still strong and the energy level of the physique seems unlimited – the young find it hard to peer through the veil of the physical world and maintain concentration on the spiritual world. Few are the young ones that can see life clearly: that we are not primarily flesh – but only on the earth for a brief moment in this vestibule of eternity. For more seasoned believers, the flesh has shown itself to be fickle and its power fleeting. They know control is an illusion, and hope cannot be placed in the body. They learn of God in the quiet of the midnight hours. God has drawn close as others have drifted away. It is not always so – but it can be so. Be careful not to judge the might of the heart by the sound of the voice – one is flesh and the other spirit.

Underlying challenges to overcome

When we judge one’s importance based on flesh standards, we dishonor God’s work inside them. We discount their worth to both Him and us – in exchange for another who may not be helpful at all! James continued in 2:6 “But you have dishonored the poor man…” He argues, the man is WORSE OFF because of the engagement with us. Why do we continue to act in such a way? Good question! James outlines three problems that may account for our behavior.

Problem #1: Repetition of failed strategies

Not content with the convicting argument that they harmed the poor man in some way, James continued to assail their choice by noting that it lacked the logic of their own past experiences with wealthy people. In short, people of means had not been good to them in the past. Note James 2:6b: “Is it not the rich who oppress you and personally drag you into court? 7 Do they not blaspheme the fair name by which you have been called?” This may not be true of wealthy people in YOUR life, but it was true of the people in theirs. When we seek the principle behind such a statement should consider a broader perspective. If our choice in some area of attitude and action has produced bad results in our past, but we keep limping back to that choice – it is a marker that the choice is rooted in the beckoning of the flesh. One of the ways to expose the flesh’s hold on us is to mark carefully the way it drags us back to failed strategies time and again.

Think of some besetting sin. Maybe you are often tempted to lose your temper. Based on the “works of the flesh” list we noted in our last study from Galatians 5, this is a siren temptation of the flesh. The Devil may use anger to get a foothold in our lives (as the letter to the Ephesians notes), but the outbursts of anger are a work of the flesh. Think back: the last time you burst out in anger it left a hole in the wall and a broken place in the heart of your loved one. You felt terribly guilty and had to go back and both confess your sin, and fix your wall. Yet, that same powerful wave of desire will come back. It will promise release of all the pent up frustration (a good feeling) while hiding all the problems that result from that wrong choice. James simply applies the logic to the situation of caring for the wealthy with greater zeal. He asks them to look back. In first century diaspora experience, has that really worked? One good test of whether something is the beckoning of the flesh or the direction of the Spirit is this: Has this produced God honoring results in the past? It is not the ONLY test, but it is A TEST that should be consulted. When something fails that test – stop repeating the behavior or attitude and re-measure the outcome.

Problem #2: The sin rating game

In addition to looking back at the track record of past choices, James introduced the idea that we must not be blinded by minimizing the size of some sinful choices. When we get drawn into “rating” sin in SMALL SINS and BIG SINS, it is another form of justification for flesh pandering. We aren’t thinking the way God thinks. God’s standards are not mottled in a haze of complexity – they are straightforward. We are to treat people as we desire to be treated, just as Jesus taught. In James 2:8 he reminds: “If, however, you are fulfilling the royal law according to the Scripture, “YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF,” you are doing well. 9 But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors.” That is clear enough – treat people impartially or be guilty of SIN. Yet, he continues: 2:10 “For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all. 11 For He who said, “DO NOT COMMIT ADULTERY,” also said, “DO NOT COMMIT MURDER.” Now if you do not commit adultery, but do commit murder, you have become a transgressor of the law.” James argues that when we allow the sins we think are not as IMPORTANT as other sins – we “rate” sin, and that isn’t God’s plan for us at all.

Before I address the principle involved in SIN RATING, I want to take a moment to correct a commonly held view that I believe is unbiblical. I have heard this verse quoted in any number of settings to suggest that God doesn’t distinguish between types of sin, but has only two classifications – guilty and innocent. The emphasis of that teaching is to make all sin heinous – and that is a good thing. However, that isn’t James’ point in this context. James isn’t arguing that ALL SIN IS EQUAL in weight, but rather that ALL SIN IS SIGNIFICANT TO GOD.

It simply isn’t true to suggest that all sin is equal in its weight before God. There are clear differences in punishments – both temporal and eternal in Scripture. Lost men will all spend eternity – time without time – in Hell. The Bible purports it to be a literal, terrible and cataclysmic reality of those who do not accept the sin payment made on their behalf by the Savior. At the same time, there are degrees of punishment in hell. Jesus told Chorazin, Bethsaida and Capernaum that it will be “better for Sodom and Gomorrah” than for those who rejected Him face to face. The suggestion that Hitler will spend eternity in hell beside the lost little boy that’s major crime was stealing a cookie from the jar is ludicrous and unbiblical. They may both be in hell as an eternal banishment for unpaid sin, but their experience will be quite different from one another. Neither is good, but one is much worse.

James is arguing that all sin is significant to God, and nothing that violates His holiness should be passed over as a slight infraction. There are no “white lies” – only lies. We are people of the TRUTH standing against the Father of Lies. There isn’t room for gray in such exchanges. In the specific context, it is important that we recognize this idea: God LOVES people. God often chooses to USE people mightily in the spiritual realm that are not physically successful in appearance. Because God is doing this, any harm we bring to those people is SIN, and should be taken very seriously. SIN RATING is the sin of minimizing wrong on our part by softening the heinous nature of our wrong choice. It is the reason we have adapted our language to words like “fib” and “affair” from the more startling Biblical terms of LIE and ADULTERY. Believers must soften their heart toward people, but harden their resolve against tolerating sin in their lives. We must remember that one tear on a precious piece of artwork diminishes its value significantly. Our intrinsic value doesn’t change – but our usefulness to God’s holy purpose changes drastically with tolerated sinful practices left to roam freely in our life.

Problem #3: Living the wrong life

James completed the passage with an instruction on treating others well with these words in 2:12 “So speak and so act as those who are to be judged by the law of liberty. 13 For judgment will be merciless to one who has shown no mercy; mercy triumphs over judgment.”

He closed in on a problem that still besets believers to this day – the problem of living like a slave to sin, when they are no longer bound to do so. Look closely as James reminds us of a very important rule of the believer’s life – what is sometimes called the “Law of Liberty”. We have seen this phrase before in the book, in James 1:25 “But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does.” Don’t miss that James made note that we would be soon judged on this basis.

Here’s my question: If I am going to be judged soon based on the “Law of Liberty”, what exactly is the “Law of Liberty”? In the time James lived, there were two laws from which he could draw imagery easily. First, the legal system was controlled by Rome – and the manumission laws – standards of setting people free from slavery were ultimately under their control. But beyond Roman law, remember James grew up as a Galilean Jew. When he used the term “The Law” he more often than not was referring to the Mosaic Law of Hebrew life, the familiar Torah lifestyle, and its rabbinic emendations of daily life. They also contained manumission laws – laws to set slaves free.

The slavery we are referring to in the image MUST BE in relation to conduct. Remember the context of the “Law of Liberty” in James is that of DELIBERATE BEHAVIOR CHANGE. In chapter 1 it is a change of behavior when identified, like a man who looks in the mirror and makes changes. In chapter 2 it is a change of behavior regarding partiality. James picked up on a theme from the teaching of Jesus not long before, during His earth mission. It was a major point of contention with Jewish leadership during His ministry, and it was still a point that needed clarification in the Jewish community.

Jesus spoke about the freeing slaves in John 8. The writer records in John 8:31 “So Jesus was saying to those Jews who had believed Him, “If you continue in My word, then you are truly disciples of Mine; 32 and you will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” The Master taught that continuous following in His teaching would set free those previously enslaved. Such a statement was deeply offensive to Jerusalemite Jews who thought themselves FREE AGENTS (as opposed to the Essene community with their determinism) and the reaction of His audience was swift: 8:33 “They answered Him, “We are Abraham’s descendants and have never yet been enslaved to anyone; how is it that You say, ‘You will become free’?” How odd. Had they forgotten about BOTH the Egyptian and Babylonian bondages? No! To a Jew, they remained free in their heart to behave as Jews, because their practical distinctives were not broken by their captors – they remained Jews even in captivity. That resistance was one reason that so many LOVED the tales of Daniel and his friends!

Jesus replied with the truth He wanted them to recognize in 8:34 “Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is the slave of sin. 35 “The slave does not remain in the house forever; the son does remain forever. 36“So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed. 37 “I know that you are Abraham’s descendants; yet you seek to kill Me, because My word has no place in you. 38 “I speak the things which I have seen with My Father; therefore you also do the things which you heard from your father.”

Jesus argued that a life of sinful behavior is an enslaved life. In addition, he argued they were temporarily enslaved while a son – an heir of the household – had the power to set a slave free permanently from their bondage. He came to do just that very work. Often in the period, slaves were released with the reading of a will, and the action of releasing of slaves was performed by a son. It was a familiar scene to the hearer. Jesus went on to explain that ONLY those who took His word as a Son seriously would recognize His right to set slaves of the household free. The argument for the rest of John 8 is essentially this – “Will you believe I am Who I say I am? If you do, you will hear the call to freedom and walk after My teaching. If not, you will remain enslaved and follow your family head – the Devil.” It is no surprise the end of the passage zooms in to stones held in the hands of Jewish reactionaries, as they angrily looked for a way to eliminate Jesus.

The point is that Jesus’ law of manumission – of setting slaves free – is rooted in His position as a SON. He read God’s Holy will and disclosed this: The Son’s followers are FREE to please God. They are FREE AGENTS in their behavior, and have been released from the “Adamic bondage” that locked the lost into acts and attitudes that fall short of pleasing God. I am not saying that lost people cannot try to be good. I am saying that every attempt will still fall short. They may make some good choices, but like the Olympic athlete that fails to qualify, they will spend their eternity looking back on the ONE DECISION that kept them from the gold – all other “good” decisions will be forgotten.

We have the JOY of God’s Manumission provision – but saying it that way doesn’t sound very exciting, except for those who have a legal expertise. Here is the exciting truth: we are SET FREE from the bondage of failure before God. We can, and SHOULD be attempting to please HIM! The COMPLETE LAW OF FREEDOM (the term “telion” translated “PERFECT” also means purposed and complete) is a finished a work of God to deliver us from the servitude of enslaving passions and lusts. We don’t have to serve SIN anymore – we can freely CHOOSE behaviors that please God.

Christians are the only ones that are able to behave in a manner pleasing to the Lord. Before I was saved, I had no ability to please God, because I was like a criminal in jail trying to impress a judge that would not even consider my behavior. My classification as a convict forbade consideration of daily acceptable behavior. By the release of the Savior, I am not a convict now – I have been released from the prison of sin, and I am in full view of the Righteous Judge – with the honor of pleasing Him with my choices. Paul said it eloquently in Romans 12:2. He remarked that surrendering my body with its fallen fleshly desires, and being transformed by different thinking than the world around me allows me to seek ways to put a smile on my Father’s face, and please Him. My life can be gratifying to my Creator, a delight to my Savior, a song to His Holy Spirit. I am free to change, and I am free to please Him! What freedom is mine!

Let’s be extremely practical. The transformation of my behavior will take two steps. First, I must recognize the change in my status – simple acknowledgement that this is what the Word of God teaches what we have seen in this lesson. Following that it will take a CHANGE IN GOAL.  I have to deliberately, consciously change the goal of my decision making process. In the flesh, the goal is always the same: what will PLEASE ME MORE in the end. Now, my goal is changed to this singular one: what will PLEASE MY HEAVENLY FATHER.

Is your marriage not working out? Thinking that someone else might suit you better? Here is the question: Is that what the Word of God says will please a Father who HATES DIVORCE?

Is your family not making enough money to do the things you dream of? Thinking of changing to another position? Ask yourself this: Will I have greater opportunity to minister eternal values with a different job? Can I please my Father more if I serve Him in a different office or occupation? Think eternally, this month will be over before you know it.

We need to treat people as God sees them, in order to please Him. When believers treat people better based on their ability to help us or our cause, we show ourselves to be fleshly and manipulative. It is time for us to live on the outside, and seek on the inside the pleasing smile of our Father.

Grasping God's Purpose: "It's Time to Set the Table!" – Exodus 37:10-16

A recent commercial highlighted one of the most important pieces of furniture in our homes – the kitchen table. I have to admit, their words struck a chord in me. You see, not only is our table the centerpiece of the mealtime discussions of my family, but it is the place, often over an espresso, where many of our most critical family decisions have been made. It has been the center stage for more than one family “discussion” when a problem arose between members of our normally happy home. It has been an altar for prayer, when worries surrounded us and we were unsure of God’s direction. It has been a safe haven when we were experiencing the enemy’s attack on our children. It has been a place of sweet desert, and a place of bitter tears. Our table, perhaps more than any other place, has symbolized the communion of the Smith family.  As we read today from the story of the Tabernacle’s construction, it is nice to know that God included in His design, a simple table upon which priests would place bread.  God has a table, and He left particular instruction as to its design and setting. That table was meant to lead His people into a better understanding of Who He is. Today we want to focus on what God revealed about Himself by the instructions and references to His table of bread.

Key Principle: God instructed a table be made to keep His ongoing provision in front of His people and remind them of His enduring holy attention to them!

This isn’t a dry study of furnishings, it is a glimpse into their Divine designer and what He wanted known of Himself.

A Brief Look Back

Step back and look at the road behind us for a moment. It has been a long road through the wilderness, and the thin trail traversed by our camels and caravan extends as far as the eye can see. We have tasting the sand and wiping the sweat from our faces as we have been following Moses and the children of Israel out of their former slave tents in Goshen to the Promised Land  – all the way through our study in the book of Exodus. The book contains the unfolding of God’s redemption from slavery of the people of Israel. It begins with a sense of abandonment – a ringing in the ears of the cries of bitter bondage. It ends, in complete contrast, with the peaceful settling of the glory of the Lord on the Tabernacle in the last lines of the book. It began in stone and mud brick cities built with the trembling hands of mal nourished slaves. It ends with the woven tent and golden furnishings of a moveable structure of worship – made by the Spirit-empowered hands of craftsmen on a mission. What began in a haze of brown dust, ended in a golden glow of glory. They that sowed in tears reaped in joy.

As we pick up our reading in the middle of Exodus 37:10, the Tabernacle building has already been erected. The gold laden ark (the box that held the promises and Law of God) was set up for use. Our lesson focuses our attention on the next piece of furniture handed down from God’s design studio from above called “the Table of Shewbread” in older English translations. Technically, there is no proper word in English like “shewbread”, but the word was forced into the text by the translators of the King James Bible long ago to identify this unique item. The Hebrew “lechem haPānīm” is literally: “the bread of the Presence” – a name that showed something of its importance and function. Take a moment and look at the account as Moses related it:

Exodus 37:10 “Then he made the table of acacia wood, two cubits long and a cubit wide and one and a half cubits high. 11 He overlaid it with pure gold, and made a gold molding for it all around. 12 He made a rim for it of a handbreadth all around, and made a gold molding for its rim all around. 13 He cast four gold rings for it and put the rings on the four corners that were on its four feet. 14 Close by the rim were the rings, the holders for the poles to carry the table. 15 He made the poles of acacia wood and overlaid them with gold, to carry the table. 16 He made the utensils which were on the table, its dishes and its pans and its bowls and its jars, with which to pour out drink offerings, of pure gold.”

The table was beautifully constructed and carefully designed as a symbolic message of God’s presence with and provision for His people. God was ever with them, meeting their needs. People who don’t walk with God, don’t know what that feels like. They don’t even know what they are missing. It reminds me of an old story:

One Sunday morning an old cowboy entered a church just before services were to begin. Although the old man and his clothes were spotlessly clean, he wore jeans, a denim shirt and boots that were very worn and ragged. In his hand he carried a worn out old hat and an equally worn out Bible. The church he entered was in a very upscale and exclusive part of the city. It was the largest and most beautiful church the old cowboy had ever seen. The people of the congregation were all dressed with expensive clothes and accessories. As the cowboy took a seat, the others moved away from him. No one greeted, spoke to, or welcomed him. They were all appalled at his appearance and did not attempt to hide it. The preacher gave a long sermon filled with fire and brimstone and a stern lecture on how much money the church needed to do God’s work. As the old cowboy was leaving the church, the preacher approached him and asked the cowboy to do him a favor. “Before you come back in here again, have a talk with God and ask him what He thinks would be appropriate attire for worship.” The old cowboy assured the preacher he would. The next Sunday, he showed back up for the services wearing the same ragged jeans, shirt, boots, and hat. Once again he was completely shunned and ignored. The preacher approached the man and said, “I thought I asked you to speak to God about what you should wear before you came back to our church.” “I did,” replied the old cowboy. “If you spoke to God, what did he tell you the proper attire should be for worshiping in here?” asked the preacher. “Well, sir, God told me that He didn’t have a clue what I should wear. He says He’s never been here before.” (sermon central illustrations).

Men and women, people were never designed to handle life disconnected from God. Believers, who have tasted intimacy with God and then wander off, find themselves to be some of the most miserable people in the world. God has some important words about WALKING IN HIS PRESENCE from that little golden table, and we want to look at those words in this lesson.

First a word about the table

Scripture says that Bezalel took the acacia wood from the sparse groves of the Sinai Peninsula, and cut them into plates of wood. Distilling the sap into thick glue and perhaps using mortise and tenon joints, he assembled the table. The legs were set into the corners with a top height of about twenty-seven inches. The surface of the table was about eighteen inches wide by about thirty-six inches long (37:10).

After that, Bezalel took the purest smelted gold and heated it to the perfect temperature to allow all of the dross and impurity to float to the liquid surface. He probably poured the molten gold into a framed area on flat rock, using some oils and pastes that would help the gold separate from the rock for pounding, shaping and framing. When still malleable but cooled sufficiently, he placed the thinned sheet of gold over the wood surfaces and worked them with a combination of hammer and heat, to bond them to the surface. Some pins were probably installed into the wood to allow the fixing of the gold plate to set properly and securely. In the end, a delicately decorated border lined the top of the table, near the edge and about one hand breadth in height, to hold the bread in place and keep it from sliding off the slick gold surface (37:11-12).

Near the rim at the top of the table, and affixed to the four vertical legs rings were mounted at the corners, like that of the ark – for this was a table for a journey. Poles were lathed and shaped, covered with gold and slid into position (37:13-15). Then came the fine work needed for the table setting. Utensils were fashioned, including some flat dishes, pans with handles, bowls and jars for liquid. All of them were shaped and buffed to a shiny and slick surface, allowing them to be more easily kept polished and clean (37:16).

That is the simple description of the piece of furniture that God ordered to REPRESENT HIS DAILY PROVISION and HIS ACTIVE PRESENCE among His people. God commanded in Exodus 25:30 “You shall set the bread of the Presence on the table before Me at all times.”

Here is a question: “How do we know that was the message God was trying to give them?” A careful look at Scriptures about the table will unfold the story:

First, the table was made to place baked bread loaves – and those loaves had a very SPECIAL MEANING to Israel.

Bread was the symbol of their daily needs. Bread in Hebrew culture was an idiom for the basic needs to sustain life. When Jesus taught the disciples to pray, “Give us this day our daily bread”, He was teaching them to ask for all their basic needs – not just cooked dough. In addition, in the harsh and barren desert, God miraculously supplied bread for the people when they had no way to grow and harvest crops. Exodus 16:35 reminds: “The sons of Israel ate the manna forty years, until they came to an inhabited land; they ate the manna until they came to the border of the land of Canaan.” What we are looking at was a table to remind Israel that God was present because their needs were met in the daily manna ingredients of the bread.

Tabernacle “manna bread” was a symbol of God’s miraculous daily provision and people’s daily attention to His commands. Do you recall the passage where God instructed the making of the table? In the heart of the book of Exodus, back in chapter 16, there were a series of tests presented by God to the people. The instructions to build the table came from that passage. The test, you may recall from earlier studies, was what we simply referred to as “The Consistency Test (Exodus 16:4 and 16:27). When we read the passage some time back, we reminded ourselves that God offered Israel a “use only as directed” test. The text shares: Exodus 16:4 Then the LORD said to Moses, “Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a day’s portion every day, that I may test them, whether or not they will walk in My instruction. The clear point of the Consistency Test is obedience – not once, but ongoing and continual obedience.

Tabernacle bread was a symbol of God’s participation with the priestly meal. Look a bit deeper into the Bible and the picture of the bread as a symbol is even richer. Leviticus 24:5 “Then you shall take fine flour and bake twelve cakes with it; two-tenths of an ephah shall be in each cake. 6 “You shall set them in two rows, six to a row, on the pure gold table before the LORD. 7 “You shall put pure frankincense on each row that it may be a memorial portion for the bread, even an offering by fire to the LORD. 8 “Every Sabbath day he shall set it in order before the LORD continually; it is an everlasting covenant for the sons of Israel. 9 “It shall be for Aaron and his sons, and they shall eat it in a holy place; for it is most holy to him from the LORD’S offerings by fire, his portion forever.”

The frankincense was most likely cast upon the altar-fire as “an offering made by fire unto the Lord,” when the bread was removed from the table on the Sabbath-day, and represented the offering of fire – without burning up the bread itself. (cp. Leviticus 24:8; 1 Samuel 21:6). The frankincense represented the part the Lord enjoyed, as He could inhale the white smoke into His nostrils (poetically speaking), while the priests were able to eat the bread. God participated in the consumption, and they all delighted together!

What is clear is this: the bread was a symbol of need, and collection of that manna ingredient was a symbol both of daily obedience and God’s participation with His people.

The bread from the table had to be replaced every Sabbath, with the collected manna from that week’s provision. What a picture! Every week, the continual GRIND of following God’s plan was required. Serving another’s plans goes against our nature, but it is the PROPER position of a servant of God. Those who master this are remembered as great men and women by God. God doesn’t simply want us to have moments of contact and growth followed by long walks alone. Our life with Him must, as we mature, become more steady and continuous – a walk hand in Hand. With that in mind, let me ask you something: “Are you steady in your walk with God?” Are you finding that you seek Him daily and hourly or more like Sunday and perhaps when you are in trouble? Maturity can be measured by consistency – and it is worth taking a moment to measure ourselves.

In another less personal way, we should step back and address a problem that we face on a greater scale than ourselves as well. We live in times where God’s placing of such tests like the provision that needed to be collected would be considered by some both unfair and even cruel. Our world has somehow communicated the notion that wealth should be WON not EARNED, and that work is a PENALTY not a BLESSING. We are in danger of raising a generation to believe that a JOB is for the stupid while gain without work is the WAGE of the CLEVER. God’s economy for people in a dangerous and tough situation was a WORK PROGRAM. He required them to get up DAILY, collect manna DAILY, and learn the pattern that would pay off greatly when they entered the land and needed to work a farm for crops to feed their family. Can you imagine what would have happened if God simply delivered the manna in pots to their door each day? What if he delivered the manna in a pot once a month and called it a FOOD PROGRAM. I am not arguing that our country should not help those who struggle – no decent human being could watch others go hungry without caring. I am arguing that such programs come with inherent dangers that we need to be aware of. If we increase the payments for those unwed mothers who have more children, we keep those children alive and perhaps healthy. At the same time, the perverse effect is that we reward people for making unhealthy and ungodly choices. God’s sensible solution was to offer people the opportunity to help themselves – and that pattern has some merit even now.

What about the people that couldn’t help themselves? Surely the blind or lame couldn’t collect manna. That must be true. I have traveled that desert, and it simply would have been unsafe. How did they get cared for? The answer is as simple and un-dramatic as this: the people around them collected what they needed. Neighbors helped each other. God allowed people to gather extra to help others – just not to hoard for themselves. Why didn’t they simply establish a council to care for such things? Because the further away from the need the decisions are made, the less efficient and accurate the meeting of that need. When local people meet local needs, people who are milking the system get found out quickly. We have steadily moved from that premise for more than fifty years, and LBJ’s “Great Society” has become an institutionalized form of limitation – holding people DOWN instead of bringing them up. They have neither seen a model of work, nor have a MINDSET to work or now even the OPPORTUNITY to work. Our national HELP has literally crippled a generation. We need to spread manna in the daily field and let people have a way back to work. Our future as a country depends on it.

Are you feeling victimized? Don’t be! Let me say it plainly: in the church, we must teach that WORK IS GOOD. Our youth need to be taught to work hard, and to take God’s provision seriously. We are not ENTITLED to excess – we have greater responsibility with God’s greater provision. “To whom much is given, much is therefore required.” One of the ways we should recognize God’s hand is PROVISION.

A desire to do something is not the same as a CALL to do something. If you want it, but God is not providing, perhaps God does not WANT YOU TO HAVE IT. Perhaps He is not leading you to go where you cannot afford to go. We need to stop assuming that God wants us to have whatever we want to have, and work hard. We need be thankful for the provision He has made. In the first Epistle of Paul that we have in the record of the New Testament, Paul argued for believers to show their faith by their WORK ETHIC. It is time for us to assert this anew: Real followers of Jesus aren’t trying to get something for nothing – they work to honor their Savior. They follow His provision. They celebrate His goodness and sleep well at night from a hard day’s labors. The bread of the table has had much to say.

Second, the table was surrounded with a protecting crown – a rim that held the bread from sliding off of the table.

The symbol of God’s presence demanded protection, because God’s presence is a privilege and an honor that must be both cherished and guarded. The rim was a gold fence, creating a space between those moving around in the room as they passed the edge of the table, and the bread that was carefully prepared and placed inside the inner rim. The rim also had a second purpose. The table was never to be emptyEven when they moved the table. The bread had to be “ever present” – and the rim showed that it needed to be ever protected.

Without stretching the point, it may be worth asking a question right about now….Are you carefully protecting your time with God? Do you value His presence enough, and live in the conscious presence of God so as to be carefully protecting your walk with Him?

Many believers act like it is God’s privilege to have OUR attendance. They act as though God should be sitting in Heaven waiting on them, whenever they get around to worshipping, praising or praying. We need to check our hearts to be sure that we know the difference between a genie and our God. The Lord God does not sit within a bottle waiting for the warm hand to rub and summon Him. He is not at our beck and call – we are to be at HIS.

Third, rings were mounted on the table because it was to be carried, joining the people where ever the camp went.

God’s people were not to go where God did not direct, and where God did not join. If God wasn’t comfortable there, they shouldn’t have been there. How about that as a rule for our lives? Believers were meant to follow His lead and constantly acknowledge, through the bread on the table, His accompaniment. Though we all live in the presence of God’s face continually, many of us don’t live like we realize it. We act as though God didn’t hear the gossip we spread yesterday, or the lie we told last night. We forget His presence – but they were called to continually mark it out.

Fourth, every bowl, pan or utensil associated with the table was to be fashioned of pure gold.

Walking in the conscious presence of God was, and is, to be the highest value of our lives. Gold was not only beautiful, it was precious. God’s utensils were made of gold. How we treat God is reflected in every attitude of our lives, every relationship with other people, and even our reflective relationship within our own hearts. Our values are shaped by our desire to please a very present God, and walk through life with Him. Our biggest failure is not to do or say something that displeases Him – it is to live life without caring about His presence. As Dietrich Bonheoffer brilliantly said: “When we sin, we don’t hate God, we forget God.

Fifth, the command was made that the table was never to be empty- but full at all times.

It was to be kept supplied even during a journey, because it represented the people’s knowledge of the unfailing presence of the Holy One with them. Bread took work to make, and so it takes work to constantly recall God is very present with man. it is easy to forget God. It is easy to live life with God on the periphery of important decisions. He is always there, but many of us only think about Him at times of pain, trouble or distress.  After the Fall of man in the Garden of Eden, the default position of fallen man is independence from God – living in the deception of self-reliance. Walking with God takes effort, and it takes practice.

Hebrews 9 underscored the idea that the place for the table was a holy place: Hebrews 9:2 For there was a tabernacle prepared, the outer one, in which were the lampstand and the table and the sacred bread; this is called the holy place. Any place where I thankfully acknowledge God’s provision and celebrate God’s goodness is a holy place.

True communion with God is worship. True worship requires constant and deliberate effort. True worship is holy and as such was always guarded. It was to be treasured, but had to be forcibly recalled in a life that defaults to self-reliance. It isn’t simply an emotional response – it is a deliberate call to truth, whether I feel warm and fuzzy toward God or not. God IS great, when I feel it, and when I don’t. True worship demands that I face the facts. One of the things it cannot truly be – it must never be – is BORING. Boring worship is an oxymoron – a self-contradicting phrase. I remember a Pastor sharing this little story:

A little boy asked his mother if she could remember the highest number she ever counted to. The mother didn’t know so she asked him about his highest number. He answered, “5,372.” The mother was puzzled and asked him why he stopped at that particular one. The boy responded, “Well…church was over.” (A-Z sermon illustrations).

Our world is filled with contradictory statements and oxymorons: Jumbo shrimp, Freezer burn, White chocolate, Plastic silverware, Airline food, Sanitary landfill, Truthful tabloids, Professional wrestling – and we have learned to accept them all. There is one that is entirely unacceptable: boring worship. Worship is about emptying myself of self-reliance and self-dependence and wholly leaning on God. Worship is about thanking God for His gentle presence in spite of my unworthiness. It is about crying out to Him in recognition of His constant goodness.

Around the table of God we can see His provision and celebrate His presence. We can sing of His redemption and look forward to our Promised Land. We are on the journey, but we are NOT ALONE.

Can I ask you another question? How fresh is the bread of God’s presence in you? Martin Luther has said, “Christ is now as fresh unto me as if He had shed His blood but this very hour.” Is that true of YOU? Is time with Him sweet and fresh or stale and frozen? If you are cold toward God, let me call you to a new and fresh loaf of bread. Let me share with you a word of excitement…

Stand before God and worship Him in great amazement. We live in a marvelous hour! Stop hanging your head because you feel darkness closing in. Let the night fall. It has all been done before – and Jesus’ reign in the Heavenly places still remains secure. We have the great privilege to exalt His Name as we extend His Kingdom. No one will stop His love from reaching through us into the darkest places – if we will but allow His power to work through us. We can express His Greatness as we sing praises through the day. We can wait with anticipation as we expect His Coming. Lift up your eyes to the Exalted One. Hear the song of the Heavens as His Presence fills this place!

Psalm 96 says: 1 “Sing to the LORD a new song; Sing to the LORD, all the earth. 2 Sing to the LORD, bless His name; Proclaim good tidings of His salvation from day to day. 3 Tell of His glory among the nations, His wonderful deeds among all the peoples. 4 For great is the LORD and greatly to be praised…6 Splendor and majesty are before Him, Strength and beauty are in His sanctuary…9 Worship the LORD in holy attire; Tremble before Him, all the earth. 10 Say among the nations, “The LORD reigns; Indeed, the world is firmly established, it will not be moved…12 Let the field exult, and all that is in it. Then all the trees of the forest will sing for joy 13 Before the LORD, for He is coming, For He is coming to judge the earth. He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples in His faithfulness.”

God designed a little gold table to remind His people of His ongoing provision in front of His people and His enduring holy attention to them! Aren’t you glad He did!

The Faith Work Out: "The Voices Within" – James 1:13-27

If you walk into a psychiatrist’s office today and say, “I am hearing voices in my head!” They will likely lock you in a rubber room. Yet, after a careful study of the scriptures, I have a message for you. I don’t know how to break the news to you, so I will just be blunt. By their definition – You are a sick person. You may look and feel well, but you have a severe illness that is increasingly showing itself in your behavior. It is not a physical illness – it is a mental one. I know, this is hard to hear, but it is true. When you came to know Jesus Christ as your Savior, and you surrendered your life to Him, you joined the ranks of the millions that carry within them a second personality. You have, what psychologists have termed, a “dissociative identity disorder” – also popularly known as “multiple personality disorder”.  Before you leave in a panic – I should tell you that it is not fatal. In fact, the lack of it is fatal.

You see, in your case, this is both NORMAL and EXPECTED in everyday life. A multiple personality disorder is characterized by at least two distinct and relatively enduring identities that alternately control one’s behavior, while (at times) omitting important information to the other personality not completely explained by ordinary forgetfulness. I don’t know if you have been made aware of this disorder – but knowing about it is essential to your long term success as a believer. Failure to understand that you have multiple voices within you can lead you to fail in following Christ.

What am I talking about? Let me pose it this way:

The first voice: the fallen conscience

Before you came to know Jesus, the Bible says that you were physically alive, but spiritually dead. Ephesians 2 recalls that believers were dead in sin, but God made them alive to Him when they surrendered to Jesus. The Bible defines “spiritual death” as disconnection from God – a state that happened when Adam and Eve severed the spiritual umbilical cord of constant spiritual living giving sustenance to God at the Fall in the Garden. Physical death occurred in them because spiritual death already too place in them. Their children, as a result of their sin, filled the world with many spiritually dead people (the human default position) that are walking about us every day – with no living connection to God as their Lord and Master – yet! They still have the chance to submit, but they have not yet done so. Yet, those people still have a voice within them called a “conscience”.

The “conscience” is that echo within of both the latent memory of a long ago relationship with God through Adam – kind of an impression stamp of right and wrong on a subliminal level , and the faint voice of those influenced by a real walk with God in more recent times (the faint echo of a grandma that walked with Jesus). That conscience is not wholly formed, and often can be seared into believing wrong assumptions of an ever-changing world view. It is therefore wholly unreliable and often superstitious and naïve. It was probably best pictured in my youth by two little men that hung out on the shoulders of the cartoon character Fred Flintstone, when he was trying to make a decision. One work a red suit and held a pitchfork – like the classic devil image. Another possessed a halo. In any case, the cartoon underscored that inside a man are several voices – a call to do “right” and a call to do “wrong” as seen through a fallen world view, disconnected from God in spiritual death.

The second voice: the Spirit of God

When you and I came to Christ, we invited the voice of God to re-establish Himself within us. We asked God to re-connect the umbilical cord of life, pictured by Jesus in His “vine and branches” saying of John 15:

John 15:1 “I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. 2 “Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit, He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit, He prunes it so that it may bear more fruit. 3 “You are already clean because of the word which I have spoken to you. 4 “Abide in Me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abides in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in Me. 5 “I am the vine, you are the branches; he who abides in Me and I in him, he bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing.

In that short selection of Jesus’ words from the night in which He was betrayed and faced the Cross, we see a simple truth. We are re-connected to God by our choice to serve and submit to Him. Later Christians would learn that the voice of God inside was accomplished by the provision of the Spirit sent after the Ascension of Jesus. Believers draw our spiritual vitality and sustenance from the Spirit, and cannot live a godly life apart from His Divine connection. We need our life to come from His life connected like an electric cord powers a device. Unplugged, we become spiritually useless. Plugged in, we have power as a conduit for whatever purpose our maker intends. Yet, here is the startling truth: That connection adds an entirely new personality to the mix of our being. The voice of the Spirit of God is not the voice of our fallen man, nor the echo of the conscience – though the Spirit can prompt the conscience at will.

The third voice: The old man of flesh

Adding to the confusion within us as the Spirit cleans up the rooms of our life and encourages us to walk vigorously in our faith, a third voice emerges within us. This voice is indelibly linked to the conscience, but is much, much more. It is the voice the Bible refers to in various ways. Sometimes it is called the “flesh”. Other times is it referred to as the “old man” within each believer. This voice is the inner part of us, left over from our days in the fallen state, and still in the process of becoming like Christ through a lifelong battle. Believers identify the process as “sanctification” – the process of truly becoming practically what the Bible says I already have become positionally in Christ. Through the whole of that process, the third voice shouts to be heard, and is a constant distraction. Paul fought this, in spite of his strengths and triumphs in Christ. He wrote about it Romans 7:

Romans 7:14 “For we know that the Law is spiritual, but I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin. 15 For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate.

Here I stand, with the voice of a fallen conscience, the voice of an inner fleshly and debased sinner, and the beckoning and sustaining words of the Spirit. Add to the inner cacophony the outer wooing of the fallen world to do what dead men are doing in their current reveling, and the shouts of the Devil and his fallen angels in their insidious deceiving words – and you will see why walking with God is not as simple of reading the Bible and believing it.  What can I do? James was addressing that very distress in the second half of his Epistle to scattered Jewish believers in the first century Roman world. He offered them a three problems believers needed to confront (and still do), and then solutions to deal with each.

Key Principle: You cannot subdue a foe you do not identify. Identifying the voices within is essential to developing both a defense and a counter-attack that will lead to godly living.

James was carefully instructing the early followers of Jesus that they were incorrect if they thought that following God would be easy. In fact, he argued, God uses “weight training” in the form of troubles to build up a follower and add to them greater endurance for an even greater future work. Troubles are one of the tools of God’s toolbox. They are not always caused by our sin, and not necessarily a reflection that God is unhappy with us. They can be a deliberate weight, placed by a training God, to prepare us for an exciting future.

The problem with trouble is that all the voices within are responding at the same time – and they aren’t all beckoning the same directions. Have you ever been driving in a city you were not familiar with? As you concentrate on both the traffic zipping past you and the road ahead, you are confused by the signs while several friends are urging you to listen to their directions – even when they don’t seem to agree with the signage, or each other. Your frustration builds quickly. In the face of constant troubles and mixed signals, we are tempted to gripe, complain, snap and become very agitated. Troubles exhaust our defenses and leave us in a weakened and vulnerable state. The early believer cried out: “Is God responsible for dangling fleshly desires and enticing our lusts in that hour?” James addresses that in the end of the first chapter. He argued that our misreading of the situation came from a lack of understanding of three critical areas of our spiritual life:

James 1:13 Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone. 14 But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust. 15 Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death. 16 Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren.

When you look very carefully at the short passage, you will not that James breaks down the siren call to sin and explains our misunderstanding about God, our nature and the process.

First, James said we don’t understand God’s nature– so we thing that God is entrapping us to see us fail. James made the case that God trains us by WEIGHT, but now makes clear that He does not train us by BAIT. God doesn’t dangle the fleshly temptations in front of us to test us – that isn’t His way of TRAINING us, and He has no interest in TRAPPING us. James says in 1:13: Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil, and He Himself does not tempt anyone.

Second, James explained we don’t recognize our OWN nature– so we don’t respond properly to temptation’s enticement. In 1:14: “But each one is tempted when he is carried away and enticed by his own lust”, James makes clear the problem isn’t God’s dangling of temptation, but a strong magnetic pull within toward the wrong. We hunger to do wrong – even as believers. The Devil need not speak, the world need not call – I WANT to do wrong. The old man, the flesh within is still tugging on the rope to pull me toward what I must refuse.

Third, James suggested that we are unconscious of the PROCESS of temptation – so we allow a thought to grow and give birth to an action. In 1:15: “Then when lust has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and when sin is accomplished, it brings forth death.” This short sentence offers words of process. Temptation begins as a thought. It can be encouraged by the world or the Devil, but it need not be. It can be a leftover of the fallen thought life. It is nothing more than an appeal in seed form. Here is where we go wrong. We nurture the thought. We allow it to develop and grow. We let it keep us transfixed and attentive to the wrong. As we let it grow, its power over us seems invincible. Yet, if we were to snap away our attention – say by a ringtone of our phone – its power over us would seem to dissipate. Here is the key: Temptation saps from us the will to resist by deceiving us with the promise of pleasure while hiding adverse results that will come from our action. It is a rouse, and that is why James completes the sentences with: “Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren”.

There it is. I am ignorant of God’s real nature – so I blame Him when He isn’t doing it. I am unaware of my own inner nature – so I don’t properly identify the voice I am hearing. I am ignorant of the process of temptation, so I allow myself to be tricked instead of putting up a proper defense.

Let’s get very practical with these three problems:

In Galatians 5, Paul offered early believers an abbreviated list of the fifteen works of the flesh or the old man within. He explained the kinds of things we STILL WANT TO DO in spite of the fact that we are indwelt with God’s spirit.

Galatians 5:19 Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, 20 idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, 21 envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these, of which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

  • Impurity (akatharsia) uncleanness in a spiritual sense
  • Sensuality (aselgia) license to indulge
  • Idolatry (eidolatoria) worship of other than God
  • Sorcery (pharmakia) drug use for pleasure
  • Enmities (echthra) hostility
  • Strife (eris) quarreling
  • Jealousy (zelos) heated rage
  • Outbursts of anger (thumos) passionate boiling over
  • Disputes (erithea) from a day laborer meaning ‘overly ambitious’
  • Dissension (dichostasia) standing apart
  • Factions (heiresis) creating parties or sects
  • Envying (phthonos) burning desire for another’s property
  • Drunkeness (methe) desire to dull mind to refuse pains
  • Carousing (komos) hunger to party and revel

Here is James’ point: The world may beckon to you to do the things on that list. Satan may dangle the supposed benefits of participating in some of these deeds – but the central problem in the believer’s life as it regards these things is NEVER GOD baiting you, and is MOST OFTEN your own INNER FLESH.

James answers the three problems with three answers.

If we think God is BAITING us, we need only recognize the Bible’s revelation of God’s true nature in James 1:17 “Every good thing given and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shifting shadow.” God’s nature is always GOOD, never changing, ever offering us gifts that will COMPLETE us – not harm us.

If we fail to recognize the voice within us beckoning us to do wrong, we let temptation grow to produce sin – and that kills the good things in our future. We need only remember that God has answered that tempting siren with the implanted TRUTH of His Spirit. James 1:18 says: “In the exercise of His will He brought us forth by the word of truth, so that we would be a kind of first fruits among His creatures.” God began a new birth process in us with the words of truth He has planted deep within us. As we nurture the truth by careful study of His Word, truth will grow in strength inside us. God deliberately responded to the growth of lust and powerful temptation within us by planting the seed of yet another growth process to overtake the first one. He has planted truth to shout down temptation’s lies. Within us is the beginning of God’s retaking of His lost creation. The first paint touches within us bear the changing tints toward perfection that God will one day use to repaint the whole of creation. Within us, the Great Artist has begun His final masterpiece – and it is one of TRUTH. God BEGAN in us – but will recolor His entire world, covering over every stain of the deceivers foul colors.”

James doesn’t just leave us with facts, he leaves this essential subject with the process of victory over temptation.

He lays out steps and warnings that will help us face tomorrow with more effectiveness than we had yesterday. Look at his words:

First, to overcome temptation, I must slow down my response so that I can hear God’s truth voice, and not default to my flesh. He says: James 1:19 This you know, my beloved brethren. But everyone must be quick to hear, slow to speak and slow to anger; 20 for the anger of man does not achieve the righteousness of God.

Second, to overcome temptation, I must change what I surround my life with on the outside, and deliberately starve out the flesh within. I must go on an internal witch hunt for evil – routing all lies and deceptions, and turning the light on to the shadows of my heart. James 1:21 says it this way: “Therefore, putting aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness…”

Third, to overcome temptation, I must recognize the answer isn’t within me naturally, but it is a spiritual growth process of truth that was seeded in me by God Himself at my salvation. I must nurture truth while cutting back lies. I must listen to words of truth, study words of truth, and allow the word of God to grow in me.  James 1:21b says it this way: “…in humility receive the word implanted, which is able to save your souls.

Let me be very clear: Believers that starve themselves from the Word, that eat only the “pre-chewed” words of our favorite preacher, or revel in the pabulum of popular sentiment will not stand up to the powerful pull toward temptation. The world is beckoning your lusts within. The enemy is fanning the flames of the fallen system. The flesh hungers to have the old feelings back and ignores the damage old practices had in your life. The word implanted in you is your defense. It is a God-given shield to repulse temptation’s power. Yet, if it is starved, it will become ineffective. Feed the Word within, or suffer the walk without.

Fourth, to overcome temptation, I must demand in myself the need to ACT on the truth, not just ascribe to the theory of it. I must challenge the temptation to be satisfied by a mind change that doesn’t lead to a change in behavior. James 1:22 But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves. 23 For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his natural face in a mirror; 24 for once he has looked at himself and gone away, he has immediately forgotten what kind of person he was.

It is important that our walk with God be more than just a theory. At the close of the chapter James included some tests to make sure this wasn’t happening. He wrote: James 1:26 “If anyone thinks himself to be religious, and yet does not bridle his tongue but deceives his own heart, this man’s religion is worthless. 27 Pure and undefiled religion in the sight of our God and Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.”

Look at those words carefully and three practices emerge that will help you evaluate if you are living out the truth.

  • First, my mouth must change if temptation is being mastered. Loose lips sink lives. If I am gaining victory in my heart by allowing the Word of Truth to overcome the deception default settings, it will sound out on my lips.
  • Second, my hands will get busy to help those who are in need if temptation is being marginalized. I will show a change of heart by a change of priorities. I will desire to be other person centered and not self-centered. The flesh champions SELF – the surrendered to God champion the WEAK.
  • Third, my clothing will be unstained if temptation is being routed. I will show that God’s truth is cleaning me, displacing the errors, by the lack of enduring stains I walk around displaying. God has a way of cleaning us up that shows to anyone who will take the time to truly observe. The best way to avoid getting more stains on ourselves is to be particularly careful about where we are and what we are doing. If I am in a place that is terribly dirty – I must walk all the more carefully, paying attention not to move to closely to the surfaces of things that will stain. If I am handling people who are dirty, as sometimes God calls me to, I must be careful how I handle them. The desire to help must not cause us to drop our guard from the possibility to be disqualified. Many a man or woman in ministry has made that terrible mistake.

Finally, to overcome temptation, I must study carefully the Word of God and daily walk in it. Nothing will displace deception like truth. I cannot clean out deception; I can only fill my heart with truth and allow the deception to be displaced by the filling process. In truth terms, ignorant Christians are easily defeated Christians.  James 1:25 says:  But one who looks intently at the perfect law, the law of liberty, and abides by it, not having become a forgetful hearer but an effectual doer, this man will be blessed in what he does.

Here is the painful truth. I am called to walk with God and be His emissary in a fallen world. On the outside I will confront the enemy and gird on my armor. Around me, I will face a constant onslaught of spiritual zombies – dead men and women walking toward me. If that isn’t enough to cause me to want to quit, I must face these foes with multiple personality disorder. I will hear the powerful voice of the flesh – the old man within – beckoning me to my past life. I will trip over a confused and seared conscience that has been badly warped by the ungodly world view I was brought up inside. Should I quit? Well, if left to myself – yes, definitely.

But then, I have not been left to myself. I have been impregnated with the word of truth. It is growing inside me. God’s Spirit has entered my being. I have His Word in my hands, and I can have it in my heart. I have fellow brothers and sisters in Christ that are willing to lock arms and struggle in the fight with me. I have two thousand years of history of family that was doing just what I am doing. I have the active participation of the angelic world blocking for me, and moving in support of God’s work. I have the promises of God’s Holy and unchanging Word – which cannot be nullified or blunted. I have the King of all creation – the Lord above all power – the Supreme Master above all authority pulling for me. Should I quit? No, not at all.

It is true: You cannot subdue a foe you do not identify. But I have spotted the foe. I have heard his voice both within and without. I know where truth is found – and so do you.

  • Need we fear an enemy that has far less power than our Father?
  • Need we despair at a foe that can be washed from our heart by the steady and deliberate pouring in of truth?
  • Need we feel overwhelmed by inner beckoning when we know it is a deceiving voice?
  • Need we fall helplessly to old sinful patterns when we have been granted a way to escape into the truth?

It is time for believers to make the choice to stop pandering themselves. We will not become what God desires while shifted into “spiritual neutral”, living out our lives like the time for obedience has not yet arrived. We must immediately, actively and passionately to pursue holiness. It is nothing more or less than separation from defiling things. We must remember that God is watching – not just in church – but on the job, in the living room, and through our computer screen.

The world is hell bent on destroying all fibers of morality in short order. What was obviously wrong yesterday is questionable today and on its way to being hailed as an inalienable right tomorrow. We all see the dark clouds forming, but I know something the lost world does not know! The clouds of darkness have a pure and beautiful SUN above them. They are not the final future – they are another marker that man has no answers apart from His Creator. They will all see His face soon enough.

Though there are significant voices that would disagree with me, I am forced to conclude that, practically speaking, we have as much of God as we choose to have. I am obliged to conclude that God is able to do anything in us that we will allow Him to do. In our limited earthly terms, He appears to have limited Himself to only one restriction in working inside us – our will. If we choose not to allow Him to work – He will respect our desire and allow us to flounder and fail. His work in us is, in effect, our choice. It is not that He is not able to do it all, it is that He is not willing to force our submission. He has left that part up to us. No amount of theological posturing can make God responsible for my submission to Him. I must take responsibility for my decision in taking up His Cross and following Him. Every lesson I learn that weakens that resolve serves to build in me the sense of victimization – but does nothing to make me more like Christ. I am called to choose because I can choose. I am called to follow because I must follow. I am called to submit because I can submit. The bottom line is not His willingness or His ability – it is mine.

If you don’t think you have what it takes to overcome sin – you are wrong. God is within you. Truth has been embedded within you. If you are a Christ follower, you KNOW it is there. Water the seed with the Word. Prop it up with the stakes of spiritually encouraging examples. Ask God for the continued nutrients of affirmation and guidance of wise counselors. He has not begun a good work in you to cut it off and let it wither. He will perform it in you if you will not stubbornly block the work of His Word and the power of His Spirit.

The Faith Work Out: "The Trouble with Troubles" – James 1:1-12

As I write this study, the city of London is flooded with people as the teams assemble for the 2012 Olympic Games. Much talk has been about security, and in light of the terrible carnage of recent days, it is obvious to most of us that keeping both the competitors and the audiences safe is of primary importance. I doubt sincerely, however, that security is on the minds of those who are about to compete. To enter the games and to qualify requires a vast and relentless commitment. Hundreds of thousands of hours of preparation are the norm for this level of competition. The smell of sweat, the cries of agony and the smells of Ben Gay are the common cocktail of preparation.

Take, for instance, a gymnast. From the time a young girl is identified as particularly gifted by a trainer until the time of her grand competition is normally a minimum of five years. In those intervening years, the child is subjected to extreme diet conditions, extensive workouts and painful stretches. They are poked, prodded, tested and pushed by people who are tremendously driven to bring them to success. In the first part of the training, it is NORMAL for them to dislike deeply both the trainer, and the parents that put them in the training. As a result, the training includes – not just a strengthening of the body and stretching of the skills – but training of the mind. The competitor has to be made to understand that those who are causing her pain are doing it for her own coming victory. There truly can be no gain without pain.

Athletes get it. They know to build up the body, we tear into its abilities and create short term pain – but the result is the sculpting of the body’s muscles, the greater efficiency of the body’s systems, and the great ability of the body’s accomplishments. What is true in the physical realm, often highlights a spiritual truth. Trouble, like a weight-loaded exercise, can fall into our lives in a very painful and unwelcome way. When it does, it may cause us to pull back and doubt God’s goodness – just as the young athlete doubts the trainer’s intent. Deeply rooted inside us is the desire to gain pleasure and shun pain. Our society, even in the modern Christian world, has come to see pleasure and ease as blessing, and pain as the Devil’s hindrance… but that is not the Biblical view. The Bible doesn’t explain away all pain as an attack of the evil one.

Key Principle: God is often behind the weight of my troubles, teaching me endurance and offering me an opportunity to grow, excel and accomplish things I didn’t know I could.

He is training me for a better future by challenging me in the present – and it is not done in vengeance. It is His way of preparing us in love. Look at the way James instructs us about TROUBLE.

I want to look at the short reading twice in this study – first in Peterson’s paraphrase called The Message, then in the NASB I normally teach from. The first reading is for general flavor, the second is to try and taste each ingredient as we take the revealed truths apart.

The Message (James 1:1-12):

1:1 I, James, am a slave of God and the Master Jesus, writing to the twelve tribes scattered to Kingdom Come: Hello! 2-4 Consider it a sheer gift, friends, when tests and challenges come at you from all sides. You know that under pressure, your faith-life is forced into the open and shows its true colors. So don’t try to get out of anything prematurely. Let it do its work so you become mature and well-developed, not deficient in any way. 5-8 If you don’t know what you’re doing, pray to the Father. He loves to help. You’ll get his help, and won’t be condescended to when you ask for it. Ask boldly, believingly, without a second thought. People who “worry their prayers” are like wind-whipped waves. Don’t think you’re going to get anything from the Master that way, adrift at sea, keeping all your options open. 9-11 When down-and-outers get a break, cheer! And when the arrogant rich are brought down to size, cheer! Prosperity is as short-lived as a wildflower, so don’t ever count on it. You know that as soon as the sun rises, pouring down its scorching heat, the flower withers. Its petals wilt and, before you know it, that beautiful face is a barren stem. Well, that’s a picture of the “prosperous life.” At the very moment everyone is looking on in admiration, it fades away to nothing. 12 Anyone who meets a testing challenge head-on and manages to stick it out is mighty fortunate. For such persons loyally in love with God, the reward is life and more life.

What a fascinating way to paraphrase this little portion! It is earthy, simple and straight. I love the challenge at the heart of the message of the text – “Don’t shrink from trouble!” While the flavor is still being spiritually savored, let’s take a closer look at each verse, in hopes to really take apart the ingredients. Why? Because troubles come. They are a constant companion. Some of us go through seasons of trouble in our lives, and others, like “Pig-Pen” (the old Peanuts character) seem to be surrounded by clouds of dusty struggles. Let’s turn back to verse 1, this time in the New American Standard Version which is noted for its accuracy in noun and verb translation, because that accuracy will be critical to our understanding.

A Word about the Writer and Original Readers

1:1 James, a bond-servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ – To the twelve tribes who are dispersed abroad: Greetings.

To open the letter of James, we peer into someone else’s mail. Understanding a bit about the writer and the people whose letter we just cut open may help us grasp why the letter was so CRUCIAL to these early believers, and may even offer us a clue or two as to why the letter’s principles are critical to us as well. The letter opens with a short and pointed greeting that identifies both the author and the recipient.

First, who is this James?

The name James in Hebrew is Ya’acov or Jacob – and it was terribly common in the period of the New Testament. Jesus had two disciples that carried the name – the brother of John and one called “James the Less”. I always felt bad about the second one… I mean, do you really want to be known by having less than someone else? (For those boasting at Weight Watchers – perhaps the answer is YES!). In addition, Jesus had a half-brother named James – and I think this is the one who wrote the letter, though the Epistle doesn’t really say it is him. Why?

  • First, the brother of John died a martyr in Acts 12, and that was so soon after the beginnings of the church, that it seems unlikely there was already a circular letter to send out to the Jewish world in the diaspora – or dispersion. He was a disciple, and therefore important, but his life span puts him in the suspect category for me.
  • Some scholars muddy the waters even further by suggesting it wasn’t someone actually named James, but someone using the well-established practice of a pseudonym – a “pen name”. I find that argument really weak – since the writer left WHICH James ambiguous at best. The lack of any real follow up on the authority beyond the first line of the Epistle makes that really far-fetched in my view.

We have another alternative found in James, the half-brother of Jesus.

  • If you read about the early church, you will find that Jesus’ brother was the most prominent leader in Jerusalem by the time of the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15. Clearly, as the Bishop of the church at Jerusalem (the speaking elder) his Jewish flavor would permeate the early writing from a time before the rise of the Gentile movement. The epistle of James is full of Jewish flavor written in “clear and elegant Koine Greek.”
  • He saw the resurrected Jesus in a special appearance, and became prominent among the disciples.
  • James other brother was also an Epistle writer – the one named Jude (likely a shortened form of Yehudah or Judah). Look at the beginning of the two letters and there is a distinct similarity. The Epistle of James identifies the writer as “a slave of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ,”. Jude, introduced the letter of Jude by calling himself “a slave of Jesus Christ, but a brother of James.” (Jas 1:1; Jude 1).
  • Furthermore, if you look closely at the letter that was circulated on Paul’s second missionary journey in Acts (following the council of Acts 15) the salutation of James’ letter (the author of the circulated letter) includes the term “Greetings!” in the same way as did the letter concerning circumcision that was sent to the congregations.

It looks to me like the evidence upholds an old tradition that James was the legal “half-brother” of Jesus, probably from the union of Joseph before his first wife died (if the fragmentary Protoevangelium is to be believed). He was a respected teaching elder at Jerusalem. And the default voice of the Apostle’s meeting in Jerusalem at the Council of Acts 15. His words were eloquent, and seriously understood. He needed to offer little more than his name to the document to make it authoritative in the minds of the first hearers.

Who were the recipients of the original letter?

They were first century dispersed Jews that were increasingly coming to Jesus as Messiah and Lord. They were not in the land of Israel when Jesus walked there, and heard about His coming from the testimony of others. They were under pressure that would only increase as the century waned, and James was trying to encourage them. It was early in the movement, and they were still meeting in “synagogues” (James 2:2 the word “assembly” is synagogue in the Greek text).

Why does that matter? Some in church history have had difficulty with the letter because the flavor of this text sounds very JEWISH. It presumes that what you BELIEVE is what you ACT UPON. It is written to people who cannot separate the THEORY from the PRACTICE. The honorable sixteenth century scholar Dr. Martin Luther didn’t like it – because his rich understanding of “salvation by grace through faith” sometimes approached a theoretical belief. You have all met them – people who SPEAK CHRISTIANEZE but live STREET LIFE. James didn’t accept the premise that your faith was real if you didn’t live it, any more than your spouse would accept that your live ws real if they caught you in bed with another. I am being graphic to help you understand the extremity of the problem. Many people think they can SAY they belong to Jesus – and that erases their daily life.

The gospel is about surrender, not simply about word games and theological posturing.

Deep in the heart of the Jewish tradition is the notion that you really believe what you DO, not what you SAY. That is very thoroughly reflected in this Epistle. The first issue James tackled, under the guiding hand of the Spirit was the constant companion of troubles that flooded the life of a Jewish follower of Jesus. His first subject was – “THE TROUBLE WITH TROUBLES”.

Trouble 1: When troubles come, my heart sours – because I don’t see the point (1:2-3).

James 1:2 Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, 3 knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance.

A painfully literal reading of this text from its original language may help push our understanding beyond what we read in the English. James says something like this:

Lead the way in moving your mind toward delight my dear family, particularly at the time when an array of proving tests are dropped into your life. When you rejoice in these things, you show that you have grown in certainty and prove you have gained a truly Biblical world view. It demonstrates that you have come to understand what God is doing to you is FOR YOU. The heavy weight of trouble is God’s way of building up your ability to remain under great stress.

James called on believers to SEE THE POINT of their troubles. People can endure incredible pain and suffering – if they see the point. Discomfort for a purpose is somehow less crushing. The believer must unmask underlying attitudes about life that are both unhealthy and ungodly:

  • Myth: If I am walking with God, my life will be easier. If that is true, then the Bible is filled with inaccurate accounts. From David to Moses, from John the Baptizer to Paul – the book is filled with accounts of people that had tough times WHEN THEY FOLLOWED GOD. I am not arguing that God will not be there for you – you know better than that. I am deliberately and forcefully opposing the highly circulated view that Jesus is about making my life easier. If you came to Him because you want LESS, you came for the wrong reason. Satan never knew your name until you became obedient to Christ. You were no threat until your heart possessed the Gospel and your lips were committed to share its truth. God does not want to hurt you, but the byproduct of walking with Him is the need for armor you didn’t even know existed before. Akin to this myth are a host of others like:

God is interested in making my life easier.

Easier is better.

If God is in the plan, it will work easier.

Let me stretch this a bit further. Many of us have the “mommy myth” about God. We think that it is only logical that since our mom loved us and her love was profoundly shown in her keeping us from pain and discomfort – that care is shown only in tenderness, providing comfort, and guarding against or clearing away pain. The Biblical truth is this: God is your Heavenly Father, not your Heavenly Mother.

Most dads have a different way about them. When a little guy falls down, most don’t take their boo-boo to be kissed to their dad. Why? He is a parent. Isn’t he? Yes, but he is not mom. He is not all about comfort. He has a different view of life than mom. He may feel that to prepare for big problems, a boy must overcome little problems. He may truly want to see the boy suck it up and take the pain. It isn’t that dad doesn’t care – it is that his care isn’t shown in automatically trying to remove pain and trouble.

Does God comfort? Sure He does. I am not a little boy, and my pain is not from some little scrape. At the same time, we must face a truth: God is highly interested in preparing you for greater use by Him in the future – and that may be best served by letting the pain and weight of trouble do a work inside us. Escape from all pain is not His chief goal – preparation and transformation are.

James wrote – first, deal with your attitude about trouble. If you don’t, nothing else will help.

Trouble 2: When trouble comes, I seek escape – not strengthening (1:4).

James 1:4 And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.

Once I believe that God is preparing me for something, I have the ability to look at strains and troubles like the training athlete. If I avoid the workout, I rob myself of the eventual gold medal. If I cheat on repetitions with the weights, it will show up later in the performance of my sport. I don’t want to press the image, because my life and your life is NO GAME – it is much more serious. At the same time, the idea of FLEEING the workout is natural.

I don’t like what hurts, no matter why it hurts. I know when I NEED a NEEDLE – but I don’t go looking for reasons to NEED one. I avoid people who give them! Escape from pain is a natural reflex. Only people numbed by serious delusion need pain to motivate them. At the same time, pain can be a GOAD to do something. The constant load can build me up!

Some years ago I found that I was getting sluggish (read: FAT). I wanted to trim a few pounds and get some endurance. The way I did that was strap on weights to my arms and legs and keep doing what I was already doing in my daily routine. The extra pressure built up muscles and increased endurance in my body. It works in the spirit as well. Running from the weight, fleeing the pressure will only rob your future usefulness to God.

James argues that I must deal with my patience about trouble if I want to be ready to be used by God for greater things.

Trouble 3: When trouble comes, I run from God – because I don’t understand why He let it happen (1:5).

James 1:5 But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given to him.

It is one thing to RUN from PAIN, it is another thing to RUN FROM GOD. I am not sure why this is the case, but I have observed that in our fallen state – when we are hurt deeply, we often turn away from God rather than seek His face. We may cry “WHY?” but often our tears seem to block our ears from listening – if God chooses to tell us.

James says something worth remembering: When you are getting pummeled by life and you don’t understand why – God is the right Person to ask about it.

We live in a time when people don’t understand the boundaries of privacy very well. I have noticed that among the younger set in particular, things that were once considered inappropriate to share in mixed company are no longer considered that way. We are a connected and sharing culture. I can look on twitter and see what breakfast cereal my friend in California ate this morning – though I can’t tell you WHY I would want to know, or WHY he would want to tell me. When troubles unjustly rain down on us, we must admit that more of us are likely to Facebook than PRAY. We are much more likely to pick up a cell phone rather than drop to our knees. There is something desperately wrong in the life of a believer that allows troubles to pummel them without seeking God about what He may be saying.

Not all trouble comes from God directly.

  • Sometimes bad things happen because I live in a fallen world, and it is groaning to be redeemed. Tornadoes and Hurricanes aren’t all directed specifically at YOU – they are part of a larger process.
  • Sometimes bad things happen because I live on a planet filled with rebellious men and women. They want to do what they want to do. If they want to drink too much and then drive – their choices may affect the course of my life. It is part of living in a fallen community.
  • Sometimes bad things happen because I have been careless in preparations. If you don’t fill your gas tank, don’t get mad at God when the car stops on the highway late at night.

The fact is there are MANY reasons why troubles are introduced into our lives besides that of training for the future. At the same time, I have a lifeline to God that allows me to ASK THE QUESTION to Him about why they are dropping on me. The one thing I must NOT do, is assume God is somehow uninterested in me, or even MAD at me. God’s normal way of calling me to repentance is not THUNDERBOLTS that scare me – it is in KINDNESS.

Paul wrote to the Roman believers about God’s work in the specific context of passing judgment on other people and said:

Romans 2:1 You, therefore, have no excuse, you who pass judgment on someone else, for at whatever point you judge the other, you are condemning yourself, because you who pass judgment do the same things.

In other words, watch what you say about others. The standard we judge other by, will be the standard we get judged by. Then he continued…

Romans 2:2 Now we know that God’s judgment against those who do such things is based on truth. 3 So when you, a mere man, pass judgment on them and yet do the same things, do you think you will escape God’s judgment?

He argues that God doesn’t change HIS standards, but those standards are always rooted in the absolute TRUTH. Since that is the case, if we judge someone else and our standard is right – the sword of truth will cut both ways. We cannot expect in others what we do not live ourselves. Now for the reason we are looking at this passage…

Romans 2:4 Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, tolerance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness leads you toward repentance? 5 But because of your stubbornness and your unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of God’s wrath, when his righteous judgment will be revealed.

Troubles apparently aren’t God’s preferred method of communicating to the believer.

The problem is that many of us don’t get it. God blesses, so we feel ok about doing wrong. God blesses more to get us to blush with embarrassment over how we are mistreating Him, and we feel more deeply justified. In the end, the judgment against us is compounded because our heart was hard and head was thick. Here’s the point: Don’t look at all trouble like a WOODSHED moment, where God is giving you a licking for being bad – that just isn’t the case. ASK GOD if you want to know, and then become very sensitive and quiet – and He will open the door of answers.

James argues that I must set aside my doubt about trouble and ask God if I want God’s work to be effective in me.

Trouble 4: When trouble comes, my prayer wobbles – because I am not certain I can trust God (1:6-7).

James 1:6 But he must ask in faith without any doubting, for the one who doubts is like the surf of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind. 7 For that man ought not to expect that he will receive anything from the Lord, 8 being a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

James doesn’t only address the fact that we need to ASK GOD, but he adds a few words about HOW WE ASK. God isn’t in the business of dealing openly with people who “hedge their bets” on Him with other possible answers. When you think about it – that behavior is specifically demeaning to the Lord of the Universe. We aren’t to “TRY GOD” while we keep our other options open. Doubts about prayer are doubts about God. When we aren’t sure our “prayers are getting through” we are essentially addressing God’s ability to HEAR US – and that is a reflection of what we believe about HIM.

Have you ever tried to stand up in a small boat in rough seas? You stumble and cling to the sides just to move about! That is James’ point: When we don’t really count on God to come through, we dishonor God. We act like He isn’t where we should put our trust. We treat Him as untrustworthy. Can you imagine? The God that created everything from DNA strands to rainbow light refraction should wait for me to believe that HE is enough?

James argues that I must directly address my prayer life if I want troubles to sculpt my life into something pleasing to the Lord.

Trouble 5: When trouble comes, an unwanted reminder surfaces – my control is an illusion (1:9-11).

James 1:9 But the brother of humble circumstances is to glory in his high position; 10 and the rich man is to glory in his humiliation, because like flowering grass he will pass away. 11 For the sun rises with a scorching wind and withers the grass; and its flower falls off and the beauty of its appearance is destroyed; so too the rich man in the midst of his pursuits will fade away.

The text does not argue for me to feel good about other’s misfortune, nor cheer another’s pain. It can sound like that – but on close examination that whole behavior is ungodly. What James is driving at here is the reality that we live a life of illusion. The young think they can stay up all night, mistreat their bodies and push their limitations – because they are in control. Soon gravity and wrinkles do their work. The first half of life we are willing to press out every ounce of energy to get ahead in a job that provides a good salary and retirement benefits. The second half of our lives we are ready to spend any amount of money to have back half the body we destroyed in the first half.

Here’s my point: I am not in control. My life is not in my hands. My wealth, and the wealth of my nation is not all up to our abilities and our cunning. We live in a world that is operated by greater power than ourselves. I didn’t choose the day of my birth, and if all goes well, I will not choose the day of my death. I have no control over what sex, color or nationality I was born. I do not know to what extent my genes play into illness or wellness. What I know is that I am not in control – and that control is an illusion in this life. With each passing year, that lesson comes home to me in a more powerful way.

James argues I must see clearly in the midst of my troubles if I want them to perform their work in me.

Trouble 6: When trouble comes, I feel it is a penalty or curse – I fail to see the opportunity to please God with my life (1:12).

James 1:12 Blessed is a man who perseveres under trial; for once he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him.

James says that some people can be trounced upon by troubles and still be blessed. The key is perseverance until proof emerges that God is pleased – even if that comes in the life after this life. We must remember that God never misses a tear cried in the pain of injustice. He never overlooks a heart robbed of innocence and cruelly abused. He is an all seeing and ever-present God – and He will one day make sense of it all.

Do not be deceived into thinking that life will make sense now, should make sense now, or NEEDS to make sense now.

We see the tapestry from the bottom side, where the threads are mangled and hang in a thoughtless pattern. God views from above, where the beauty of the threads have woven into a tapestry to tell His story. Stop looking for an explanation of everything this side of Heaven. Man doesn’t know. Experts don’t know. Doctors don’t know. Sometimes the answers will be delayed all the way until Heaven – but they ARE known there.

James argues I must look past this life to see the real benefit of troubles.

God is often behind the weight of my troubles, teaching me endurance and offering me an opportunity to grow, excel and accomplish things I didn’t know I could. Even when I don’t understand what He is doing, I can deliberately place my confidence and trust in Who He is!