If you would open your Bibles to the book of James as we continue
our study in this this letter that the the apostle James has
written to the churches and the dispersion James chapter 4.
And this morning we're going to be in verses 7:00 and 8:00.
Last week we looked at just two verses, and this morning again,
we'll just be looking at 2 verses.
We're getting to a dense section of James, and there is a lot of
material here, so we're going to jump right into James 4, verses
7 and 8. Let's read the text, open us in
a word of prayer, and then we'll jump into the sermon this
morning, James 4, beginning in verse 7.
Submit yourselves, therefore to God.
Resist the devil and flee from you.
Draw near to God and he will draw near to you.
Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts.
You double minded. Let's pray.
Father, we pray for this new journey that you have brought us
on. We recognize God that we are
here by grace and grace alone in many ways.
Lord, as Christians, as members, as even people who are here
seeking that they are here by your grace.
And so, Lord, this morning, would you help us to be keenly
aware and submitted to this grace, Lord, to recognize that
we can. We can do nothing apart from
you, Lord, we can do nothing apart from your grace.
We need your grace. And so this morning as we look
at a text that tells us how we can be given this grace, that
you, you give grace to the humble and you oppose the proud.
This morning as we look to see how can we receive this grace, I
pray Lord, that you would give us the strength and the the
discipline to be able to receive this.
Or we know Lord that this year we won't make it.
None of us individually or corporately will make it apart
from you, Lord. So God, please come and give us
what we need to to persevere this year.
I pray in Jesus name, Amen. I have never that I know of made
New Year's resolutions in my life.
If you do, I, I, I don't want to just, you know, denigrate that
at all. I, I think that they are
wonderful for many people. I just personally have never
made them because I always thought they were doomed to
fail. I always felt like if you're
going to make a change, you just make it right then and there.
You don't wait for New Year's. But today is not just the first
church service of the new year. It is also the first church
service of Grace and Truth Baptist Church.
We didn't necessarily plan it that way.
That's just how it worked out by God's grace that that this first
Sunday of 2026 is also our first Sunday service as our new Church
of Grace and Truth Baptist Church.
And so while I will not be making New Year's resolutions, I
will make one church resolution for 2026.
And if I had to pick one, if I had to pick one resolution for
our new church, it would be this, that we would draw near to
God corporately and individually, that we would draw
near to God in 2026. And that's what the text is
about this morning. It's drawing near to God.
Normally I segregate exposition application.
This morning I'm going to be weaving them together.
There won't be separate sections.
So exposition application of the text together.
We're going to look at this phrase by phrase because we're
only getting into two verses. There's a lot here.
So let's jump right in to James 4 verse 7 a the first part where
James says submit yourselves therefore to God.
Now in the 2 verses that we are going to be looking at this
morning, James gives the churches 5 imperatives, 5
commands, and we're going to look at them individually.
The first imperative that we're going to look at is this submit
yourselves therefore to God. Now I had four questions
regarding this imperative. Here they are #1 what does it
mean to submit? James says to submit yourselves.
And we we may all have an idea of what that means, but what
does it actually mean to submit? The Greek word here is hoopoe
tasso. It's it's used multiple times in
the New Testament. Here's a Greek definition to
cause to be in a submissive relationship to subject to
subordinate. It essentially means to come
under the authority of someone. To submit means that you come
under their authority. This is the same Greek word that
is used of Jesus being submissive to his parents.
Demons being subject to the disciples.
Christians being subject to governing authorities.
Women being at submission in the church.
Jesus being subjected to the father.
Christian submitting to one another in the church, The
church submitting to Christ. Wives submitting to their
husbands bond, servants being submissive to their masters, The
younger being subject to elders. All of those examples use the
exact same Greek word, hupo tasso.
Now I point that out is because often people want to highlight a
few of these. They want to highlight, you
know, that maybe the inequality of wives, we just submit to
their husbands, or maybe women having to submit in the church
or perhaps members having to submit to elders.
And yet the reality we see from this list is that everybody
except God the Father is called to submit to someone.
The only person that does not submit to anyone is God the
Father. Everybody else, including Jesus,
including the Holy Spirit, including you, including me, we
all are called to submit to someone.
Even Jesus, who is fully God, submits to the Father.
Question #2 How does one do this?
How does one, how do we practically submit to God?
You know, that can just kind of be an idea of like, you know,
submit to God. Well, what does that practically
mean? I want you to notice how James
words this. He words that he says submit
yourselves, submit yourselves. The Greek verb is passive.
It's not active. That's telling.
What does that tell us? In fact, every time that the
imperative is used with Hupa Tasso, every time it's used and
in the imperative mood, it's passive.
What does that mean? It implies that submission is
not something we do by sheer willpower, nor is it something
that God typically forces us to do.
God commands us to be submitted to Him, but we are charged to
willingly bring ourselves under this submission.
We are charged to willingly submit to the authority of God.
And the reason this is important is that submission must be
willing because submission must be internal as well as external.
It must be both external and internal.
Let me give an example. Suppose I tell my children to
clean their room. I tell them as their father, go
clean your room. But as they go to clean it, so
they go upstairs, they go to clean it.
As they go to clean it, they're dragging their feet and they're
complaining about how oppressive of a father I am.
Oh my God, dad. So always telling us to clean
our room. Why don't we clean his room?
They resent me telling them to clean their room.
They clean it. Now here's the question, did
they submit to me? Here's the question.
Did they submit to me? In one sense they did and
another sense they didn't. Externally, they submitted.
They cleaned their room, they did what they were commanded to
do. But internally they miss the
heart of what submission is. Internally, they missed it.
Let me give you another way to think about it.
What if Jesus went to the cross complaining?
What if as he was carrying the cross, he said, why do I have to
be the one that has to die? Why couldn't you have sent the
Holy Spirit? Or what about you Father?
Why couldn't the Father be the one to die?
Why do I have to be the one to do it?
Jesus died on the cross. He he, he did.
He died on the cross, but he did so begrudgingly.
Here's the question. Did he submit to the father?
If he dies on the cross, but he does so begrudgingly, did he
submit to the father? Externally, Yes.
Internally, no. Submission is willingly or it's
not truly submission #3 what does the therefore tell us?
James says submit yourselves. Therefore what is the therefore
tell us? James writes.
And and therefore typically is a reference to what has just been
said right. Whenever you see the word
therefore, you should read the previous verse.
That's how that's how they're connected.
James had just said God opposes the proud, but he gives grace to
the humble. So what's the connection here?
James is connecting humility and submission.
He's connecting these two. In other words, the humble
person submits themselves and the submissive person is humble.
And So what James is saying is this is that if we desire to
receive grace from God, we must submit ourselves to God.
If we want God to give us grace, then we must be humble.
And the primary way that we humble ourselves is by
submitting ourselves to God. And #4 fourth question I had is
why do we have a hard time submitting ourselves?
The fact that James is commanding the church to do this
tells us that some were not. In fact, we all struggle with
this. Everybody in this room struggles
with submitting themselves to God.
Everybody. Why?
Well, the answer lies in verse 6.
The answer lies in verse 6. And here's the here it is
because we are proud. Why do we have trouble
submitting ourselves to God? Because we are all proud.
The root of all sin is pride. You can trace all sin back to
pride. If we were to like existentially
breakdown, what is sin, right? Like what what existentially
what is sin? Here's that.
What we can break it down to sin is essentially looking at God
and saying, no, I don't need to submit to you right now.
I'm going to submit to my desires, my will, my plans, my
passions, my decisions, my agenda, my goals, my wisdom.
I'm not going to submit to you right now.
I do submit to you, God, but right now I'm not going to
submit to you. That is the the essence of sin.
On the flip side of this, what is the essence of practical
righteousness? Not positional righteousness.
What is the essence of practical righteousness?
Practical righteousness, the essence of it is this man, I
really want to do this. I really want to look at this.
I really want to say this, or I really don't want to do this.
I don't want to do this or that, but I'm going to choose right
now to submit to you, God. I'm going to choose to choose
what you have commanded me, and I'm going to choose to submit to
you right now. That is the essence of practical
righteousness. Look at 7D submit yourselves
therefore to God resist the devil, resist the devil.
The second period of James mentions is this resist the
devil. Now three questions with this
imperative number one, who is the devil?
I I know that kind of goes without saying, but I don't want
to assume that everybody knows this right.
You know, we we may have somebody walking off the street
who's never heard of Christian sermon before.
They may only know what they see in the movies or you know, so
forth. So who is the devil?
The devil goes by many names in the Bible.
He's called Satan, the Evil 1 the enemy, Beelzebub, a serpent,
a dragon, the rule of the world, the God of this world, the
Prince of the power of the air, the accuser, the tempter, father
of lies, the deceiver. He goes by many names, and these
names tell us who this figure is.
He is our enemy. He is the false God of this
world. He accuses us night and day.
He tempts us, He lies to us, he deceives us.
And because of all of this, James tells the churches resist
him. Resist him.
Which means this brings up the second question.
What does it mean to resist him? What does it actually mean to
resist the devil? What's interesting is that this
verb is active. So the first one was passive.
This verb is active. So this is something we are
charged to actively be doing. The verb can mean to be in
opposition to, to set oneself against, to oppose, or to be
resistant and power. It is the verb here is the same
word that's used of elimus, the magician opposing the apostles.
Paul talking about our inability to resist God's will.
Paul opposing Peter to his face or resisting Peter to his face.
Taking up the armor of God, that we might withstand the evil day
or resist the evil day. Yanis and Yombres opposing
Moses. Alexander the coppersmith
opposing the apostles message. They all use this exact same
verb. I want to point out the
aggressive nature of this verb. It is an aggressive verb.
It has an aggressive nature. James says resist the devil.
He doesn't say reason with the devil.
He doesn't say to reason with the devil.
This is exactly what Eve did in the garden.
She reasoned with him and she lost.
She fell into sin. He says resist.
You don't reason with a lion, you fight a lion.
You don't reason with a dragon, you fight a dragon.
Which then brings up #3 how do we practically do that?
How do we practically resist the devil?
Part of my childhood, I grew up in charismatic circles, and they
often have some interesting ways to resist the devil.
They, you know, they will give Satan commands.
I command you Satan. Name calling.
They'll call them names. They'll tell angels to fight or
restrain Satan to claim something for God.
They'll use the phrase I plead the blood.
Now, I don't want to endorse any of those means, nor do I want to
belittle them. But what I do want to do is to
give you some biblical means of how to do this.
I think a lot of those means they're just not found in the
Bible. I want to give you some biblical
means to do this and I'll give you 3 biblical means.
They're very simple, right? Sometimes we can over complicate
things. They are very simple.
I've alliterated them for you to remember.
Here they are a word, B watch C worship word, watch worship a
word. We resist the devil with the
word of God. Now notice this is exactly what
Jesus did in the desert. If you remember, when Jesus went
into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan, what was
recorded was just three temptations.
But Luke tells us that he was attempted everyday.
We are recorded with three but all three temptations that Satan
given. What did Jesus do?
He quoted Scripture to him. Jesus quotes the word of God to
Satan. We memorize the word of God so
that in the moment of temptation we can pull out the sword of the
spirit and fight this dragon. There was an article written
this past week entitled We have smartphones.
Why memorize scripture? You ever thought about that?
Why why memorize scripture? I've we got smartphones.
I can just look this up right? We even have AI now where if you
know, if you don't even know how to look it up, you can just type
something in AI, it'll pull it up for you, right?
Why memorize this? This is not what the article
said. This is my argument.
What did David write in Psalm 119?
I have hidden your word in my iPhone that I might not sin
against you. No, no, I have hidden your word
in my heart that I might not sin against you.
Every time you read this book, you are sharpening your sword.
The Watch. Word Watch.
We resist the devil with watchful prayer, prayerful
watchfulness. Jesus told the disciples in the
garden, What did he say? Watch and pray that you may not
enter temptation. Watch and pray.
Now we might subconsciously think that when Jesus was
tempted, when he was on this earth by the devil, that he just
hit the God button to defeat the temptation right then come to
tempt him. He goes beep and then he's like
defeats. That's not the picture we get of
Jesus. The gospel said Jesus would
often retreat to desolate places.
To do what? To pray in the garden.
Jesus was praying. Jesus resisted Satan with
prayer. Brothers and sisters, when Satan
talks to you, you talk to God and C worship, Word, watch
worship. The third way that we resist the
devil is worship. Remember when Satan attacked
Job? Satan was so convinced that if
he took away Job's possessions and his children that he would
curse God, and he didn't. And then he's like, OK, fine,
skin for skin, bone for bone, but take away his health, let me
touch his body. And he did.
He struggled with boils all throughout his body.
And he was so confident. He says he will curse you to
your face, but he didn't. How did Joe resist the
temptation to not curse God? The Job arose, tore his robe,
shaved his head, fell on the ground and worshipped.
There have been so many times in my life where I have been home
alone and I am tempted to say, and often I need to just go for
a walk and worship. It is very difficult to give in
to sin when you're listening to worship music for quoting
scripture in your head. Word, watch worship.
Look at 7C. Resist the devil and he will
flee from you. What a powerful thought.
He will flee from you Want to draw your attention to two
aspects of this statement. Number one, this is a promise.
This is a promise. Resist the devil and he will
flee. Flee is in the indicative mood,
which is the mood of reality. It's not subjunctive.
Subjunctive would resist the devil and he might flee from
you. It's it's not a subjunctive,
it's indicative. He will from you.
That is a promise, brothers and sisters.
One side point I want to make is this.
When you read that, be careful. You don't over apply this
promise. What do I mean by that?
James is not suggesting that if we resist the devil, we will
never be tempted. He's not suggesting that.
Why? Because there are three sources
of temptation. There is the devil, there is the
flesh, and there is the world. Resisting the devil is just one
third of the equation. A man cannot place himself neck
deep in the world, resist the devil and expect that he won't
fall into sin. A man cannot feed his flesh,
resist Satan and expect he will not fall into sin.
Resisting Satan goes hand in hand with making no provision
for the flesh and not being friends with the world #2 James
says the devil will flee. The devil will flee.
Why is that important that it says he will flee?
Because it's not as though that when we resist Satan, we're
simply just pushing back against him.
It's not as though, like it's tempting me and I'm just
resisting him to keep him like, you know, like, but he's just
going to keep pushing. I'm just kind of keeping him at
Bay. That's not what it says.
James writes resist him and he will flee.
The Greek word typically means to run away.
When Jesus resisted the devil in the desert, the text says that
the devil departed from him, left him.
Now here's why this matters. Here's why this matters.
Let me give a basketball analogy.
I have done very little coaching in my life, but the little bit
that I have done, I tell players is one of my favorite things to
tell players. Guys, you have a right to this
spot. You have a right to this spot,
and just because the other player is trying to take your
spot, you don't have to give it to them.
Don't be kind. You do not have to give him the
spot. You can hold your ground.
So if you've got position, put your forearm up, get down low
and hold your spot. Don't give it to them.
Push back, don't extend the forearm.
That's a foul. But you can hold your ground.
So if a guy's coming to try to post up, I don't have to let
him. I don't have to put a red carpet
and be like, please come post up on me.
I can jam him and not let him have that spot.
The same is true in the Christian life.
You see, the devil's game is trench warfare.
That's the game the devil plays. It's trench warfare.
He will take a slow and steady approach in your life, inch by
inch, minute by minute. He has all the time in the
world. He doesn't have to get you to
fall like that. He will take a slow, slow,
steady approach. Brothers and sisters, resist
him. Do not let him gain ground in
your life. Don't let him get that ground.
Why? Because once you give up ground
to him, it is very difficult to get it back.
We all know this. You get addicted to alcohol,
it's very difficult to to get off it.
You get addicted to social media, it's very difficult to
get off of it. You get addicted to prescription
drugs, it's very difficult to get off of it.
You get addicted to shopping and spending.
It's very difficult to get off of it.
You get addicted to your job. It's very difficult to undo
that. Don't give him ground.
Resist him. Look at 8:00.
A draw near to God. The third imperative that James
mentions is this draw near to God.
So first James says to submit to God.
Now he says to draw near to God. What is the difference between
submitting to God and drawing near?
Are these synonyms? Are they the same thing?
Is there a difference? There is.
Let's think about all the context of submission that I
mentioned earlier. A child can submit to their
parents but not be close with their parents.
A wife can submit to her husband but not have a close
relationship with husband. A church member can submit to
the elders but not be close with the elders.
We can submit to governing authorities but not be close
with those governing authorities.
A bondservant can submit to their master but not be close
with their master, and the same is true with God.
We can submit to God and actually not be close to God.
James exhorts the church not just to submit to God, but to
also draw near to God. Don't submit to God.
Draw neither to God. Now I want to point out three
aspects of this command. Number one, this is an active
command. This is an active command.
In other words, we are not to passively sit by and wait for
God to draw near to us. In other words, we are exhorted
to draw near to God. When I first became a Christian,
my best friend was the guy who discipled me.
We, we, we spent pretty much every week together, sometimes
every day for like a good two years.
I think the only reason we actually became friends and
actually were as close as we were is because he pursued me so
diligently. Because if we're up to him, I
would have rarely ever initiated to him.
It was, I'm not saying that's right, but it was really one
sided. It was always him initiating to
me. Always we must not take this
stance with God, where we basically wait for God to call
us, where we wait for God to initiate to us.
We are to pursue God. We are to draw near to God, draw
near to God. 2nd aspect I want to point out is that Jesus and
Jesus alone makes this command possible.
One of the reasons I love the Old Testament I I I love the I
used to take all the Old Testament classes I could find
at seminary because I love the Old Testament.
One of the reasons I love the Old Testament is because it puts
the New Testament into right perspective.
As New Testament Christians see, all we know is the ability to
draw near to God. All of us in this room, that's
all we've known is that once we got saved, we could draw near to
God. I always do it every day of my
life. I could draw near to him.
I always had that privilege. I always had that right.
That's all we've ever known. But for thousands of years,
God's people did not enjoy this privilege.
There was a curtain, There was a veil that separated the people
from the presence of God. Only the high priest would come
into the presence of God, and that only once a year.
But when Jesus died on the cross, this veil was torn,
making it possible for us to draw near to God.
And it's strange that this is a command, right?
You can read this as a command, but how you really should read
this is an invitation. An invitation Lawrence brother
came in town to visit us for Christmas and so we took him out
to a with the gift card that the team leaders they've given us.
You're not sure what that is. It's like a Brazilian
steakhouse. It's like a buffet of of meat.
I I love meat. My favorite sides that go with
meat is more meat. As we sat at this buffet of
meat, nobody had to command me to eat this meat.
When they walked around with the filet mignon and they put it on
to the skew on the table, it was the command.
Eat it. The guy can come and say eat
this. It was an invitation.
He came and he said would you like some?
Yes, I would thank you taste and see that the Lord is good.
The same is true with this command.
It is a command to draw near to God.
But church family, this is primarily an invitation.
It's an invitation to enjoy the presence of God.
Drawn near to God. Would you like some?
Yes, Lord, I would #3 How does one actually draw near to God?
I've been asked that question so many times by you church family.
I think a large part culturally. How do I, how do I do this?
How do I draw near to God? Typically, when this Greek word
is used, it's referred to physically drawing near, like as
Jesus drew near to Jerusalem, right?
It's physically drawn. But there, there is a, there's a
physical way to draw near to God, but but we can't do that,
right? I can't go, I can't find him
physically. So how do I do this?
How do I, how do I actually draw near to God?
Let me give an earthly analogy from marriage.
A husband can eat dinner with his wife every night.
He can sit right next to her at the table and not be near her.
He can sleep in the same bed as her every night and not be near
her. He can go for a walk with her
every weekend and not be near her.
If you are married, you know this to be true because to be
close requires intimacy, transparency, vulnerability,
trust, listening, patience. And the same is true with God.
We can go to church every week, read our Bibles every week,
pray, sing, serve, give, and not actually be close with God.
Brothers and sisters, this is an invitation to be intimate with
God, to be vulnerable with God. It's funny because I don't have
this in the sermon, but I just want to say this.
Through the years, I have asked so many people in the church,
where are you with God? You know what, I always get the
answer. I always get church disciplines.
Well, I'm reading my Bible. I hadn't been reading my Bible
that in my head I always think, I didn't ask you if you're
reading the Bible. I didn't ask if you've been
praying. I didn't ask if you've been
serving the church. I didn't ask that.
I asked, where are you with God? It's like if somebody says,
how's your marriage doing? And I said, well, I've been
washing the dishes. What's that got to do with my
marriage? Where are you with God?
How close are you with God? Do you even know how to
calculate that? The verse 8B and he will draw
near to you. I love the contrast here.
Resist the devil and he will flee from you.
Draw near to God and he will draw near to you.
You've got God and the devil once coming at you.
Resist him and then with God, draw near to him and he will
draw near to you. I want to point out two aspects
of this statement. Number one, God doesn't wait for
us to all the drawing near. He doesn't wait for us to do all
the drawing, even though we are exported to initiate this
drawing. The text doesn't say draw near
to God and He will let you draw near to Him.
That's not what it says. It says draw near to God and He
will draw near to you. In other words, if this is God
and this is me, it's not that I am committed just to draw near
to Him. And God is this immovable object
and He just waits till we get close to Him.
No, the text says draw near to God.
And as we begin to draw near, He begins to draw near to us.
This is beautifully illustrated and the parable of the prodigal
son. This son asked his dad for an
inheritance, his inheritance. He quickly squanders it in sin.
He decides to repent and to return to his father's house.
And as he is drawing near to his father, what does his dad do?
Does his dad sit on the front porch and his rocking chair just
tapping his foot? All right, let's see.
Let's see what your story is. The text says while he was a
long way off, his father saw him and felt compassion and ran to
him and embraced him and kissed him.
This is what our father does. When we draw near to him, he
draws near to us. He doesn't wait for us to get to
him. He says, you initiated, but I
will draw near to you. I will meet you in your
weakness. Our efforts may be very small,
we may be very imperfect. Draw mirrors, but God will meet
us and #2 this is a promise. Just as James promises, resist
the devil and he will flee from you, James also promises draw
near to God and he will draw near to you.
It's not as though, well, if God's having a good day, you
know how it's, it's it, it, it you ever like wanted to
reconcile with somebody, but you realize like man, like it's only
if, if, if they're ready. What is your spouse or a friend?
It's like, and and they may not be ready, right?
Why? Because they're sinful.
You may initiate the reconciliation, but it's like
it's whenever they're ready. It's never like that with God.
You, we don't have to wait. Like, well, I wonder if it's the
right timing with God. It's always the right timing.
Always. He is always willing to draw
you. Always.
Doesn't matter what you've done. If you are ready to draw near to
Him, He will draw near to you. It's a promise. 8C Cleanse your
hands you sinners man, you got to love James.
James is People say they love the book of James and I do too.
I always find it funny though, because James is pretty brutal.
He's got some brutal phrases here.
Cleanse your hands, you sinners. 3 questions arise from this
statement #1 Why does James call them sinners and what does that
mean? Be careful this right because
like I I, I've never called you sinners.
We, we, we are like listen up you sinners.
Why does James call them sinners?
What does that mean? This word for sinners is used 47
times in the Testament and almost every usage of the word
it is used of the world, the lost world.
That's the what the term means. It's the lost world.
So how do we reconcile the fact that James has previously called
them brothers, Dear brothers, beloved brothers, I always
calling them. How do we reconcile that?
Well, James uses this term one other time and it sheds light on
how he's using this term. It's the last verse and James
where he writes this, let him know that whoever brings back a
Sinner from his wandering will save his soul from death and
will cover a multitude of sins. Now what does that tell us?
It tells us that James is seemingly using this term for
professing Christians who are living like the world.
He's using this term for professing Christians who are
living like the world. And I think he calls them
sinners because he wants them to feel the urgency that if they
continue to be friends with the world, they will make themselves
an enemy of God. They will go from being called
Saints to being called sinners. They're on the fence.
And you're like, well, you're on the fence.
Is it a 5050? No, it's, it's, you're either a
St. or Sinner. If you're on the fence, James is
like, I'm going to call you a Center for now #2 what does it
mean to cleanse your hands? Well, let's be clear that hands
is being used as a synecdoche for all the person's actions.
So he's not literally mean like, you know, cleanse like he's
talking about your whole life. But then what does that mean?
What does it mean to cleanse your life?
Let's be clear what it doesn't mean.
It doesn't mean to cleanse your life.
And the positional sense doesn't mean that only Jesus can do
that. What can wash away my sins?
Nothing but the blood of Jesus. So it doesn't mean that.
But what does it mean then? Let me give an illustration.
Tattoo removal is a relatively new invention.
Before the way we do remove tattoos today, There were there
were other ways to remove tattoos, but it would leave
scarring. It would it would leave really
bad scar. So all you did was trade a
tattoo for a scar. Either way, you were still
marked. You're either marked with a
tattoo or you're marked with a scar.
But suppose someone came along and they had a way to remove the
tattoo with no scarring. Suppose it was on your hands.
So now you have clean hands, no tattoos, no scarring.
But you can still get your hands dirty, can't you?
You can still get your hands dirty.
What does this mean? Only Jesus can remove the tattoo
of our sin, the scar of our sin. Only Jesus can remove that.
But we must remove the dirt. We must remove the dirt #3 how
do we practically do this? James will partially answer this
in verse 9, which we'll look at next week.
But what's interesting is that in another passage by Paul where
the same Greek verb is used, here's what he writes.
Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse
ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit.
That same verb is used. Cleanse ourselves the passage
right before that and send Corinthians 6.
What does it talk about? Paul says do not be unequally
yoked with unbelievers. Interesting.
That's the exact same argument that James is making.
Do not be friends with the world.
In other words, the best way to have clean hands is to not play
in the dirt. If your friends are constantly
in a mud hole, don't join them. Don't join them AD last section.
The 5th and final imperative we're looking at this morning is
this purify your hearts. You double minded.
Now, this is virtually synonymous with what James just
said. It's firstly synonymous, but
I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll discuss the nuance difference.
Purify your hearts is paralleling.
Cleanse your hands. All right, you see that it's
it's paralleling. The nuance difference is that
hands most likely refers to our outward actions, right?
But the heart refers to our inward thoughts, our inward
intentions and motives and emotions.
Now that's important. What?
Why? Because think of it like this.
A person may never commit adultery or sexual immorality,
but we must cleanse our lust as well.
A person may never commit murder or assault, but we must cleanse
the anger in our heart as well. A person may not steal, but we
must cleanse the greed or the covetousness that exists in our
heart. A person may not lie, but we
must kill the hypocrisy that lives in our heart as well.
I think This is why James says that we're not just to cleanse
our hands, we also to purify our hearts.
In addition, double minded is paralleling sinners.
So that's paralleling double minded sinners.
They're paralleling each other. This also confirms with what I
said about how James is using the term sinners.
He calls them double minded because they have one foot in
the Kingdom and another foot in the world.
They are attempting to serve 2 masters and we all know this to
be true. You cannot date 2 girls at once.
And you can, but unless you're dating some really strange
girls, they're going to have a problem with it.
You can't work 2 full time corporate jobs at the same time.
You can't work for Amazon and Google unless you're like the
smartest person that ever lived. You can't live a married life
and a single life at the same time unless you're going to have
a bad marriage. And we can't abide in Christ and
abide in the world at the same time, as Joshua said to the
people of Israel, and we've talked about this earlier, not,
not planned. Choose this day whom you will
serve. That's great.