Good morning, Calvary Chapel. Well, we are the US, right?
We are, That's right. We are the US that's here this
morning. Thank God for all of you guys
who were able to make it and judge through the weather and
elements to get here. For those of you who are at home
and you're listening by way of whatever platform, Facebook,
listening by way of YouTube or whatever way, we just thank you
for being here. Those of you who are listening
to us behind prison walls, we want to thank you for joining us
this morning. Also.
You guys are a blessing to us every week.
But I have to thank you guys who were were able to come out this
morning and, and, and come through the snow and everything
else in order to get here. I thank God for you.
We appreciate you coming and for those who weren't able to make
it, we appreciate making that decision.
If it doesn't feel the right thing to do, then feel safe.
Please. It makes sense not to be here.
Our guest speaker and I have to apologize ahead of time because
we were some of you are probably here because you're expecting to
hear this guest speaker, which would have been worth it.
He has a really amazing testimony.
He wasn't able to make it this morning.
He's coming in from Pittsburgh. Don't know what's between here
and Pittsburgh and him trying to get through here.
He has young family members, young kids, and he wanted to
keep them safe, you know, But his attitude, you know, I call
him Drew. His name is Andrew, but his
attitude is, hey, you know me, brother, how you know I'm a
savage man. I'd have been there.
I know you would have, brother, but it was the right move to
make to not put your family in jeopardy if you felt that it was
not safe. So we thank God for that.
I also want to mention before we actually get into the word this
morning that we have lost a very dear sister who was a part of
this Calvary Chapel family, our sister Joyce Miskovich, who went
home to be with the Lord. In fact, it was on Friday when
Pastor Clark was did that service for them.
And she's going to be missed. She is going to be seriously
missed. I, you know, there's certain
people that come into your life and they don't have to be in
your life long in order for you to be able to recognize the gift
of God that they are and they make an impact on you.
You just, you don't have to be in your life long in order to do
that. She was one of those people for
me. She's the most real sister that
I've met in a long time. You know, whatever's on her
mind, you ain't got to wonder. She'll let you know.
Yes, she will let you know but thank God for her and she's now
with Jesus and I know that she is in the arms of our Savior and
she just would not be happier. So also want to why we do have a
little bit of time. I want to thank those of you who
came out with my sister-in-law and brother-in-law is here this
morning a friend from Indiana came She's in town with us this
morning and my three BS family is actually some members from
our 3B family is here as well. I won't embarrass nobody by
making them raise their hands or stand up and give a testimony or
anything like that, but I did just want to acknowledge that I
do thank God for you guys coming today and being with us on this
beautiful Sunday morning. So having said that, let's get
into the word now. I'm going to say it up front.
It's going to be a little shorter, OK, So we can get you
guys out of here and be home. Yeah, I know.
I know some people who know me a lot pretty well on there.
Yeah. Yeah, right.
We know we, we want to get people out of here and, and, and
not have to be snowed in. So we want to make it a little,
a little more abbreviated this morning.
But we are going to ask you to turn in your Bibles if you
would. We are going to go to the Word
of God. Let's go to James.
And we're going to pick it up at verse 11, James verse 11.
So we're going to pray and we want to go into the word of God.
OK, And it's chapter, I'm sorry, verse 11, actually chapter 4.
Thank you, honey. Thank you.
See, you know, Pastor Clark and I, we always say, well, what
will we be without our wives? Right, Pastor?
Will we be without our wives? So thank you.
Yeah, it is James chapter 4 and we're in verse 11.
OK, let's pray and let's go into the word of Godfather.
We do. Thank you once again for your
grace. We thank you for your, your
loving kindness even this morning.
Lord, you're traveling. You're, you're safe traveling
mercies that you bestowed upon us to get us here without any
hurt, harm or danger. Father, we thank you, Lord, that
you were in control of everything, even in this
situation. Lord, you knew who it was that
would be here this morning. So, Father, I just pray, as we
do all the Time, Lord, that You would be the one to speak to us
this morning, that You would just use my mind and use my body
and speak through my lips. But let this service be from
you. Let this teaching be directly
from your heart. Lord, execute the thoughts of
Your heart this morning through your servant.
And I pray that Your spirit will be manifested in here.
I pray that today would be the last day that someone who did
not know you, someone who did not give their lives to you, for
someone who may not have been trusting you for their
salvation. Let this be the last day that
they're not aware or not sure of their eternity.
But today, Lord, I pray that they would believe on the Lord
Jesus Christ and that you would be their Savior and that they
would be able to escape the wrath to come because of the
blood that you shed on Calvary and your broken body.
We ask these things in the name of our Savior and our Lord in
Jesus name we pray, Amen. So as we go into our word for
this morning, just as a short recap, one of the things that we
want to just emphasizes the fact that James, as we've said many
times, James the brother, the half brother of Jesus, who
himself was a non believer at one time until the to the
resurrection of Jesus Christ. And and then he believed and not
only did he believe, but he became a zealous believer.
He was zealous about the things of the law before Jesus, but now
he's zealous about the things of Jesus Christ, even to the point
where he gave his own life for the Gospel.
James is, you know, he is one of those nuts and bolts Christians.
He just gives it to you the, the, the true nuts and bolts of
Christianity. He doesn't cut corners about it.
He doesn't sugarcoat anything. And I can imagine him growing up
with Jesus. And he was probably the one to
say to Jesus, man, you, you, you just think you, you're just too
good. You know, you, you just don't
get in trouble. You don't do nothing, man.
You mom's, your mom's pet. He would probably be the one to
say something like that, but at the same time understanding
righteousness. And now he loves his brother,
even to the point where he gave his life for his Savior.
He doesn't even refer to him as brother.
He refers to him as his Savior, his Lord, as we should refer to
Jesus Christ. But in this particular epistle,
he says to us some very direct things.
And even though it's direct, it really is for the good of our
walk in this Christian faith. It's for our knowledge to
understand what is Jesus's heart for us as Christians living in
this world that we're living, this current world that we're
living in. What is the heart of Jesus?
And that's really what we're looking for, isn't it?
We're looking for the heart of Jesus.
Jesus gives his heart with the sermon on the mound.
You know, he says, look, you know, you've heard it said
before that you know, you know a man should not commit adultery.
But I say to you, if you look upon a woman, you know, with
lust in your heart, you've committed adultery.
You know, you, you, you should not murder, but if you hate your
brother, you have already murdered him in your heart.
So Jesus is giving, Jesus gives us his heart concerning things.
And as we go through the Scriptures, I would ask that we
always pray that the Lord Jesus Christ would give us his heart
concerning these things. Not just what we read on the
paper. It can be very superficial just
reading the Bible itself, but when we understand the heart of
what it is Jesus is saying, not what I want to say, not what I
want to say, not what I think is important to emphasize in these
things, but what is Jesus's heart?
What does he want us to leave here pondering?
So in this particular scripture, as he tells us, this is about
the backdrop of this is about worldly wisdom versus godly
wisdom. And that continues on throughout
this entire chapter. And as we spoke earlier, he he
says that it's worldly wisdom to be adulterers.
That means to be spiritually unfaithful to Jesus Christ by
going after ungodly things and going after worldly idols.
That's a that's like committing adultery against Jesus.
And then he also talks about not being a friend of the world.
That means compromising. And then when he gets a little
lower, he says, listen, we can change these things.
If this is something that we've done in the past, all we have to
do is humble ourselves. Let's humble ourselves.
What does it mean to humble ourselves?
That means acknowledge that Jesus Christ is the ultimate
authority to acknowledge that we have sinned.
To acknowledge that we have broken His heart with going
after strange gods and doing things that are of the world and
not things according to His word, and humbling ourselves and
admitting our weaknesses concerning those things and
crying out to Him and asking Him.
Lord, help me, help me. I can't do this on my own.
So he says in order to do that, he says, first of all, submit
yourself to God, submit to his word, submit to his will, which
also means to surrender. And when you look at
surrendering, it means to basically just give up your
will, give up your ways for his. I surrender.
That's why when we worship, we worship with our hands up in a,
in a position of surrender to him.
Lord, this is your, this is your life, this is your body, this is
your will. Have your will and not let me
have my will. So we surrender and we submit
ourselves to God. And in doing that, we resist the
devil. We're able to resist the things
that the devil wants us to do with our with our hands, the
sins that he wants us to commit with our hands.
We resist him when we submit to God.
Then he also says that we draw near to God.
And how do we draw near to God? What's important for us to draw
near to God? Well, first of all, we have to
cleanse our hands. That means we have to cease from
doing the sinful things with our hands.
If we were stealing, steal no more.
If you were, if you're out there and and partying is what you
were into and and and fornicating, which means having
sex outside of marriage, do it no more.
If you're participating in idle gods and things of that nature,
put down those idle gods. Do it no more.
That's what he's talking about. Cleanse your hands, you sinners,
is what he is what James says. And then he says purify your
hearts, you double minded. How do we purify our hearts?
We get rid of those ungodly things that's in our heart.
Hatred, lust, anger, dissensions, deceive,
deceitfulness. Get rid of those ugly, ungodly
things that's in our heart that causes us to have problems with
other people. He says get rid of those things,
cleanse ourselves with those things.
And we cannot do that without the help of the Holy Spirit
because we can't do it on our own.
We can't do it on our own, no matter how much we try, we
can't. So once we do that, and then he
says over in verse on verse 9, he says to lament those things.
Mourn and weep and let your laughter be turned to mourning
and your joy to gloom. After you realize the life that
we have lived, as opposed to celebrating those things and as
opposed to, you know, being proud of the things that we have
done, we should weep and and lament those things.
How could I spend so much time in my life, the days, the weeks,
the months, the years, committing ungodly things,
spending my time looking at worthless things, listening to
worthless things, participating in worthless things.
How do I spend that time doing that?
James is saying to us that as opposed to celebrating those
things, that we should lament those things and allow our
hearts to break before God so that He can come in and we can,
He can take over through His Holy Spirit and lead us in the
things of righteousness, Help us with those things.
Then he says humble yourselves in the sight of God and he will
lift you up. So what we just covered from
verses 7 to 9 to 10 are ways that we have our fellowship with
God. And for the next few minutes,
well, maybe more than a few minutes, but but for the next,
the rest of our time, we're going to be looking at what it
is to have fellowship one with another as a result of our
change of fellowship with the Lord.
So when we humble ourselves and when we submit ourselves to God,
when we cleanse our hands and we come near to God and he draws
near to us, when we when we purify our hearts through our
humility, then we can have a change of a relationship with
others. That's one of the ways that we
see it is through a change in our relationship with others.
So we start to hear verse 11 and when we and when you really
consider that, you know, this is a continuation of the fact that
we as the church, as believers in Jesus Christ, we should be
separate from the world because he called us to set us apart
from the world. And there's a lot of ways that
we can do that. But one of the main ways that
James talks about, he talks about several places in his
message is through our speech. Sure, we can do it by our
behavior, but our speech, the way we talk to and about each
other, that is one of the sure ways that people can see that we
are in Christ Jesus. What do we sound like when we
talk? Do we sound like the world or do
we sound like we're separated unto God?
James's message to the scattered believers is really about just
that. Yes, we should conduct ourselves
in the wisdom of God and not the wisdom of the world.
But in the sermon in the mound, Jesus made it clear that we
should be light and salt and that's just not being light and
sought with our actions but also with our speech.
He really drives that home. He talks about being separate.
Also in the book of Philippians chapter 2 and verse starting at
verse 14. He says, Do all things without
complaining, without disputing, that you may become blameless
and harmless children of God without fault in the midst of a
crooked and perverse generation among whom you shine as lights
in the world. How do we shine as lights in the
world? If we dispute with each other
all the time, if we talk evil of each other all the time, if we
complain about each other and to each other all the time, then we
sound more like the world than we do like the people of God.
He wants us to shine his lights like he said in in Matthew and
the sermon in the mountain, He says, look, you are salt and
light in the world. That's who we are.
We stand out. And then in first Peter, first
Peter chapter 2, he says to us starting at verse 9, he says,
but you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy
nation, his own special people that you may proclaim.
This is why he chose us out. This is why he separated us,
that we may be those who proclaim the praises of God.
We proclaim his praises. Who called you out of darkness
and into his marvelous light? He, he, we, we, we, our lives
should glorify Jesus. And that doesn't mean that we
always run around saying, look, I believe in Jesus.
Look at me, I believe in Jesus. Yeah, I like to go to church and
I believe in Jesus. That means nothing.
That really means nothing. You know, the Bible says even
the devils believe. The demons believe and they
tremble. That means nothing.
Does our lights have? Does our lives have light?
Is our life a light in a Dark World?
That's what he's looking for. That's what we're looking for.
And James talks about that here, beginning at verse 11.
He says do not speak evil, brethren.
He who speaks evil over of the brother and judges his brother,
speaks evil of the law and judges the law.
But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law, but a
judge. Verse 12 says there is one law
giver who was able to save and to destroy.
Who were you to judge another? So we see that James goes back
again to talking about the tongue several places in the
book of James, he talks about the tongue.
Let's just look at a a couple of them.
He, you know, he, he talks about the tongue over in chapter 1
over in chapter 1, verse 19. What does he say?
He says be swift to hear and slow to speak and be slow to
wrath. And then he drops down to verse
26 and he says anyone who thinks they're religious and cannot
bridle or cannot control their own tongue, they are deceiving
their hearts and their religion is useless.
It's a useless religion. If we think that we're
spiritual, we're self-righteous and we're so good.
We're we're we're better than everybody else who doesn't live
for Jesus, and yet we can't even control our own tongue.
He said. If that's you.
Then your religion is useless and you're just deceiving your
own heart. And he also mentions things
about the tongue that are very important.
He says the tongue in chapter 3, which is almost dedicated
entirely about the tongue. James chapter 3 He says that the
tongue is a small member, but it boasts great things.
And he also says that the tongue is an unruly member, full of
deadly poison. The tongue is a fire, a world of
iniquity. And then he makes a statement in
that same section, he makes a statement about the tongue.
And it's one that I still think about today when he said that
man can control and they can tame almost every deadly
creature on the face of the earth.
Almost every deadly creature on the face of the earth can be
tamed by man. And for me, what's amazing, and
I've seen men tame killer whales, they tame them to the
point that they can get in the water with them.
Now, sometimes that don't go right.
But this time I wouldn't want to be in that situation where it
didn't go right. But there's times that they can
get in there with them. You know, men change.
They, they, they, they change tigers and lions and all these
ferocious beasts. But James said no man, no man
contain the tongue. And it's so true.
We can't control our own tongues because our tongues, our tongues
are usually controlled by our emotions.
That's why we need the Holy Spirit to come and guide us and
teach us and help us to control our tongues.
Because left up to us without the Holy Spirit, who knows what
we'll say and when we'll say it because we respond based on our
emotions. So he said, so he says over
here, he says do not speak evil, brethren, do not speak evil.
Well, most of it I think like why James?
Why do you talk so much about the tongue?
And what I've heard people say that the book of James is
actually like a New Testament book of Proverbs, very similar
to the New Testament book of Proverbs.
So I went back and I looked at Proverbs and I wanted to know
like what it is that James wants to grab so hard on about the
tongue versus other things. And it didn't take me long to
find out. When you go to Proverbs chapter
6, which gives us 7 things, the Bible says that they are
abominable to God. Six things he hates, but seven
things are abominable to God. Three of those things have to
deal with the tongue. Three of those things have to
deal with the tongue. It talks about the tongue, sins
of the tongue. It's a lying tongue.
He said He hates a lying tongue. He hates a false witness who
spreads lies, and he hates the sowing of discord, which is
usually done by the tongue whispering over here about
somebody that's over there and that sows discord.
So there's three out of those seven things that that that that
the book of Proverbs. Solomon says in the book of
Proverbs that God hates. So we get to the book of James.
We see that James talk a lot about the tongue and the damage
that the tongue can cause. So he says to us, he says, look,
if you change, if you give your hearts to the Lord, you get
saved and you are transformed. That means not only your actions
are transformed, but your heart should be transformed, which
means that your tongue will change.
Also, what comes out of your mouth should change as well.
And there's several things, there's several verses that that
talk about that. Even Paul agrees that it's
important for us to not speak evil over.
In Ephesians 4, he he talks about taking off the old man and
putting on the new man. And the old man represents the
old worldly lust, the old worldly flesh.
It's the old man. But he says that once you get
saved, you take off the old man, you put on the new man, you put
on Christ Jesus. So we should speak like Christ
Jesus. We should act like Christ Jesus
because we put him on and he says here in Ephesians 4 and 31,
he says, let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor and evil
speaking be put away from you. That should be away from you.
That should go away from you. That should be off, set off far
from you. And then in first Peter 2 verse
one, Peter says to us, he says that we should lay aside malice,
we should lay aside all deceit, lay aside hypocrisy.
Envy, which is one of the things that James warned us about, is
having that bitter envy in our hearts and that selfish
ambition. And what those things 'cause
they bring about confusion and they bring about every evil
thing, yes, even evil speaking. So he says here that we put all
those things away, all deceit, all hypocrisy, all envy, and all
evil speaking. So what is evil speaking?
When I start to slander my brother or sister?
That's evil speaking. That's evil speaking.
And what's involved in, in slandering and well, first of
all, speaking unkind either to or about my brother or sister.
When I speak unkind to or about my brother and sister, that is
not godly wisdom. That is the wisdom of the world.
That's being influenced by the wisdom of the world.
It's it. And it's certainly, it's not a
heart of humility. So we speak unkind, we speak
unhelpful words. I'd like that, that, that phrase
of speaking unhelpful words. We are to encourage each other,
to love each other, to build each other up.
So the words that we speak to each other, even if we're
helping you to see something about you that you don't see in
a loving way, I should be able to share things with you that
help you. It doesn't help me if you're
speaking to someone else about me and you're just tearing me
down. And I know there's a lot that
you can say about me to tear me down.
But if you're speaking those things, that doesn't help me.
That doesn't help me. So he says you're speaking words
that are unhelpful, words that don't edify.
That means you're not building anybody up.
You're just tearing down. James is warning us of these
things. He said it spreads hurtful lies.
And we just talked about the fact that, you know, over in
Proverbs, he said that when you have when you have a false
witness or you speak lies about others, God hates that.
So when we speak evil and we slander one another, that's
usually involved. And the other thing is that he
talks about having evil thoughts.
If I have an evil thought about you, eventually I'll start
speaking evil about you because that's what's in my heart.
The Bible says out of the abundance of the heart, the
mouth speaks. So if I have evil thoughts about
you in my heart, eventually, eventually I will begin to speak
evil about you eventually. So speaking evil really, you
know, it really reveals the heart.
And there are certain times in the Old Testament that we we get
this example of people who spoke evil about another and God dealt
with them. For example, Miriam and Aaron,
they spoke evil about Moses behind his back.
Moses didn't know it, but God did and he dealt with them about
it. There were people who spoke evil
about Jesus and they even lied on him and, you know, put
together a kangaroo court, totally, totally illegal court
that they put together to try to condemn him.
They spoke evil against him. They spoke evil against Stephen.
David even said in Psalm 41, five, he said my enemies speak
evil of me, my enemies. So before we speak about
someone, if I'm holding a conversation, this is a good
example. I learned this years ago.
If I'm holding a conversation with someone and if I feel like
I need to speak about someone else, there are three things I
need to ask myself before I start speaking about that
person. The first thing I need to ask
myself is what I'm about to say about this person.
First of all, is it true? Is what I'm about to say true
and do I know that it's true? Or am I just saying what
somebody else told me and because it's negative, I like
it, so I want to share it with somebody else because I really
don't care much for this person. So I need to ask myself, is it
true? And even if it is true, there's
a second question that I need to ask myself.
And that question is, even if it's true, but is it necessary
to talk about with someone else? Is this something that I, if I
really cared about this person, rather than talking about this
with someone else, is this something I should be going to
that person myself and talking about with them in person
between me and them? Was it really necessary for me
to share this with someone else? Is it necessary?
Then the third thing is, will it edify?
What kind of light, what kind of picture am I drawing of you?
When I say what I'm about to say to someone else, What kind of
picture am I drawing? What kind of impression am I
giving this person of who you are?
Does it edify you? Does it build you up or does it
make you look like a villain? Does it make you look like
someone that they don't want to be associated with?
Do I paint you in a negative picture?
Because see, whoever got the mic is the one that can control it,
right? And if I'm talking to someone
else away from them, then I got the mic.
I can say what I want to say and I can make them look any kind of
way I want them to look. So those are three questions
that we need to ask ourselves before we talk about somebody #1
is it true? Bible says we speak the truth in
love. Number 2, Is it necessary?
Well, we know that the Bible talks about that because over in
Ephesians 429 he says, let no corrupt word proceed out of your
mouth. But what is good for necessary
edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers.
So is it necessary? And of course, the third one,
will it edify? We're supposed to edify each
other, build up one another, love that's loving one another,
Edify. Then he also says that even when
you when you speak evil people and you're judging them, you're
judging them. You're putting yourself in a
position of judging. Now I noted that word judging
can be really controversial in some aspects because you know,
when people don't want you to share truth about them, you
know, or, or share something that you see about them.
Even if you're doing the loving way, you know, people like say
don't judge me, don't judge me. You judge me.
You judge me, right? Who you judge me?
Well, not all judging is actually created equal.
What James is referring to here, when he talks about judging,
he's saying that you are criticizing or condemning the
brother, which actually goes against the law.
It goes against the law. You're judging them according to
the law, but yet you are the one that's breaking the law by
judging them. By judging them, the person who
judges actually disobeys the law.
What law? The law To love our brother and
our sister. And if I'm always trying to find
fault with you, if I'm always condemning you to somebody else,
that's not loving you, that's not sharing love with you,
that's not really caring about you.
But we know that Jesus cares about us.
And the way he speaks to us, he says, you know, he speaks to us
like we are one of his chickens, like one of his little chicks.
And he covers us with his wings and he speaks kindly with us.
Even when Jesus confronted someone about their sin, he
spoke kindly to them. He didn't compromise and, and,
and and allow themselves to to continue to keep the sin, but he
spoke kindly to him. The woman he caught in the dog
tree. Where are your accusers?
Where are are those who condemn you?
He said, Lord, there there are none.
He said, I don't condemn you either.
Go and sin no more. His love, his compassion.
It was evident when he would talk to the woman at the well,
although he called out her sin, but he spoke to her in a
compassionate way, in a loving way to let her know that the one
that you were looking for, the Messiah, He's here, I'm him, I'm
him. So he does in a loving way.
And even the way he deals with us, I mean, think about it, the
things that we do when he speaks to our heart, it's never in a
condemning way. It's in a very loving and
gracious way, he said by with loving kindness, I've drawn you.
I didn't draw you by condemning you and by complaining about you
and, and by putting you down. That's not how he drew us.
He said with by loving kindness, I've drawn you loving kindness.
So he says that the judge and somebody puts us in a position
of authority almost over that person.
To think that I'm so righteous that I can judge someone who is
dealing with multiple problems, that may be dealing with
multiple problems, but instead of being a doer of the law,
we're a judge of it. And he tells us very clearly
over in James chapter, James chapter one, that we are to be a
doer of the law. And if all I'm doing is judging
you, I'm not being a doer of the law.
In fact, I'm breaking the law, but I'm not being a doer of the
law. We're not to judge the motives
and the thoughts of other people.
Only God can do that. Only God can do that.
We look at the heart, we try to look at the harp.
Only God really sees the heart. We look at what we see on the
outside, but only God truly sees the heart.
We can't judge another one's motives.
And when we try to do that again, we put ourselves in the
position of God. So if I'm criticizing and
condemning, then I'm not unifying.
I can't both criticize and condemn you and unify at the
same time. It doesn't happen.
And if I'm judging you, then I'm not loving you.
So it was over in Chapter 7 of Matthew when Jesus himself
talked about judging. And this is where people refer
to when they talk about judging. Look, what does Matthew 7 say?
Judge not, lest you be judged. You're right, it does say that.
It does say that, but what he's talking about is US judging the
most minute, the little small details, just just really paying
attention to every single little small thing and being critical
of every little small thing about somebody and judging them
about those things. So what he's saying here is that
you know you're, you're, you're judging everyone else's issues,
but yet the most, the most glaring things about yourself,
you don't see. And that's what he's talking
about when he says, how can you remove the speck that's in my
eye, that little small speck that's in my eye?
How can you remove that? If you have a big log in your
own eye, a big plank in your own eye?
There's something about you that is so obvious that you have to
be able to see it. But yet you look past those
things about yourself and we judge someone else on the little
minor details. And these are just things that
Jesus said that we should not do because that's not loving each
other. It's not loving each other.
But when we do judge it should be a according to the word of
God. Can we judge sin whether
something is a sin or not? Yes, absolutely.
But not judging someone's motives or judging someone's
appearance. Jesus even talks about that
judging with limited information over in John Chapter 7 verse 24.
He warns us, he said, do not judge according to appearance.
We judge one person to be faithful and to be and to be
good and to be helpful to the church because they may come in
and have the appearance of someone who was righteous and
holy, haven't seen no fruit. We just look at them from the
outside and we make all these decisions about who we think
they are. And because someone comes in and
they have on tattered clothes, just like he talks about, you
know, not not being not serving the Lord with partiality,
looking at someone who has maybe tattered clothes on or maybe
someone who doesn't look like there's well off.
And we just assume that this person is not a, you know, he
can't, he can't be a righteous person.
He can't be a good Christian. He's not going to be good for
this particular ministry or that particular ministry that's
judging according to appearances.
And Jesus said that's wrong. That's wrong, but we were to do
be righteous judges. That means we judge based on the
word of God. Isn't it funny?
Back in Genesis, back in Genesis, the Bible tells us very
clearly. Back in chapter 2, He tells us
how we are actually created. Every one of us, every one of
us. We are created of the dust of
the earth. That's how we're created of the
dust of the earth. I am a pile of dust.
You are a pile of dust. That's all we are.
So imagine complaining and judging one pile of dust.
Complaining and judging another pile of dust.
It's basically what we're doing. One pile of dust speaking evil
on another pile of dust. We're all dust.
We're just dust. And not had it be not for the
breath of God that he blew into our nostrils, we would be
nothing. We would be nothing.
So in verse 12 here he says, look, there's one lawgiver.
There's only one Lawgiver and we're not it.
The only lawgiver is God himself.
He's the one. That's why he can say how we do
the things in this world, how we do marriage, how we do family,
how what we do with our bodies. As far as abortion is concerned,
we're not our own. Bible tells us that we've been
bought with a price and we were not our own.
But both our bodies and our spirit belong to him.
Both belong to him. So it's not a legitimate
argument to say it's my body and I can do whatever I want to do
with it. No, sorry, you can't.
You didn't give yourself your own body and you can't tell us.
You can't be the one to say what you do with it.
God says the Bible says that he is the one who bought us with a
price and we are not our own. It's very clearly in the Word of
God. Very clearly not everybody likes
it, but it is in the Word of God.
Now I also want to say, now I didn't write it, I didn't say
it, OK, so don't get mad at me. But it is true nonetheless.
So he says, who are you to judge another?
Who are you to judge another over in Romans chapter 414
rather and verse four, he says who are you to judge another
servant to his own master? He will stand or fall, and he
will stand because God is able to make him stand.
So who are we to judge whether someone is truly called to do
this or whether someone should be in this ministry or whether
someone should be overcharged of that, or rather someone you know
is qualified for this or qualified for that.
It is God who qualifies the unqualified and we can't judge
another manservant and he tells us that he is able to make a
stand. So let's go on to the next
section here as we get ready to come in from 13 down to 16, He
says this come now you who say tomorrow, today or tomorrow, we
will go to such a such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell
and make a profit. Whereas you do not know what
will happen tomorrow, for what is your life?
It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then it
vanishes away. Instead you ought to say, if the
Lord wills, we shall live to do this or that.
But now you're you boast in your arrogance, and all such boasting
is evil. Now for context purposes, this
is James talking about those, those scattered believers who
some of them obviously make their living by trade.
You know, they will go, they buy, they sell, you know,
getting shipments, they ship out, they do all these things.
They travel to different places and trade and and and and
whatnot so that they can make money just like traveling
salesman that we have today, right.
But what James is saying here, So you, you make these plans,
Yeah, today or tomorrow I'm going to go to such and such a
place and I'm going to do such a such a thing or such and such or
go to such and such a city. And I'm even going to tell you
how long I'm going to spend there.
I'm going to spend about a year there and I'm going to buy and
I'm going to sell and I'm going to make a profit.
So this is all about what your plans may be.
I mean, we all do this, right? We all make plans.
We all have calendars. We all have things that we plan
many days and many weeks out. But the reality of the situation
is as a believer, we have to understand something.
Every single moment, every single movement is subject to
the grace and the will and the goodness of God.
It's all in His plans. I can't.
I have so many examples of people that I know had planned
to be here at a certain time or plans to be there or to do that,
and then they go to bed at night and don't wake up in the
morning. I can't tell you how many times
I've seen that happen. It happened to my own mother
with me, and I've shared this story before.
I just left my mother on a Tuesday.
I was coming back the following week and we were going to do
this and we were going to do that when I left her in
Harrisburg and kissed her and told her I loved her goodbye.
I'll see you next week. That night she passed in her
sleep. I never got to see her again on
this side. So I know how quick things can
change in our lives. So we really should be careful
about what we say to people. We should be careful about what
we say to people because we never know what tomorrow may
bring. We never know.
There are people that I know.
I had a friend when I was in college and we had just left
Duquesne's campus. We just walked off that campus.
We had plans. We want to get together that
evening, go grab some some some fries and a hamburger somewhere
and just, you know, have fellowship with each other.
And I never heard from them again.
I'm calling them nothing calling nothing.
It was the following Monday. That was on a Friday.
It was a Monday when I saw a mutual friend who said, did you
hear about what happened? And I said, no, we what we're
talking about. He said his brother killed him
Friday night. They got into an argument in the
kitchen. His brother stabbed him to
death. Just like that, it changed his
life, changed his parents life changed just like that.
We don't know what's going to happen.
So James is saying, we make all these plans and we say we're
going to do this, we're going to do that and we want to go here,
we're going to go there. What if you don't make it till
then? But what we should say, And
since studying this, I've become a lot more conscious of this and
I need to be doing it more because I don't.
We need to say if the Lord will, I'll do this or that.
If the Lord will, I'll be here next Sunday again, if the Lord
will after service, we'll go out and we'll do this through that.
Because we used to say, you know, here today and go on
tomorrow. That's not always true.
You can be here today and gone today.
You see, the next 5 minutes is really not promised to us.
And there have been people who have left just that quick 5
minutes. They've been gone.
What is your life? Your life is like a vapor.
The Lord refers to the to a vapor several times, you know,
or or a mist or a dream or a sleep in the night.
The Lord refers to those to those things and he talks about
us being vapors. And you know, when I wanted to
mention that, you know, Paul eventually got that idea.
Paul got the idea that, you know, I can't make plans
thinking that I know that I'm in control of everything.
That's kind of a worldly humanistic thought to think that
they're control of everything. In fact, I read 1 context of a
of a preacher, Jonathan Edwards, who says that when, when, when
people even talk about hell, people who are not saved and who
hate God actually think that they can escape even a wrath to
come by their own doing. It's amazing.
But Paul understands that everything that we do in Christ
Jesus, everything that we do is really subject to God's will.
So he says in Acts chapter 18 and verse 21, he says I will
return again to you speaking to the those Corinthians at that
particular time in the Ephesians he was talking to.
He said, I will return to you, God willing over in first
Corinthians chapter 4 verse 19, he says, but I will come to you
shortly if the Lord wills. 1st Corinthians 16, seven.
He says, I hope to stay a while with you if the Lord permits.
So he understood that everything that he did was in subject was
subject to the will of God than the plans that we have.
So we have to be at his mercy all the time.
So it's not saying that we shouldn't make plans, not saying
that you shouldn't schedule things, but we should schedule
them not with the the pride that we can control whether we'll
complete those things or not. We shouldn't schedule them with
the pride that we are in control of whether or not I see you next
week or not, but we should schedule it with the with the
understanding and the humility that God is in control.
And we have to be. Subject to whatever it is that
he wills. Even Jesus was subject to what
God wills in the garden. He said, you know, he said,
Lord, look, take this cup from me.
But he understood. That it was up to God whether he
would do. That or not so he said,
nevertheless, not your will, but my.
Not my will, but your will be done nevertheless.
If it's my will, yeah, I'm not going through this.
I'm not hanging on that, on that cross.
I'm not having those nails go through my hands.
If it's my will. But if it's God's will, yeah,
Lord, have your will. Do what you will the way that
you will. We have to understand we only
see 2A corner. God sees around it, so when he
makes a decision based on his will.
It's also based on. His foreknowledge of knowing
things that we don't have Privy to, things that we don't know.
So that's why we trust him. Even though things don't come
out our way, we trust him. We trust him.
Even when we you know this. Is the way I wanted to do it,
Lord. Well, Lord, say we're going to
do it this way. We got to trust him that he's
doing. It the right way we.
Know he is not think he is. We know he is because he has
knowledge that we don't know. Just like kids got to trust
parents, right? If a parent says no, they said
no because they know something. It's not just because they want
to be mean. I'm talking to all the kids in
here now. It's not because they're just
trying to be mean. It's not because they're trying
to keep you from, you know, having fun.
It's because they know something and they're protecting you.
That's how they love you. That's how God loves us, by when
it's necessary tells us no, no. And then he says there's no, no
you. You boast in these.
Things and it's not good to boast in those things.
That's evil. Boasting in what you think you
can control. It's all evil.
And then in verse 17, and we're going to come to a close here,
praise and worship team, you can come forward.
We're going to come to a close here.
And he just simply says here, he says therefore to him who knows
to do good and does not do it, it is sin.
You know, I never thought a whole lot about the sin of
omission and the sin of Commission.
You know, I, I just looked at sin and sin, sin and sin and,
and, and quite honestly, most of us, I think we pay more
attention. We pay more attention to the,
the sins that we just shouldn't do.
You know the the sin of Commission is doing what we
should not do. OK, so it you know but but
Christianity is not just about the thou shall not do you know
when you. When you look at the the 10
commandments. It's a bunch of thou shall not
do, but then there's other places that there's things that
we are to do. So Christianity is just as much
about what it is that we shouldn't do as it is what it is
that we. Should do that.
We don't. That's a sin as well, and that's
what James is talking about when he says when you know to do good
and you don't do it, that's sin in Romans chapter, You know, in
Romans Chapter 7, Paul admits to committing both.
He admits to committing the sin of Commission and the sin of
omission, because he says here. You know.
That which I should do, I don't, and that which I should not do
that I do. So that's what I'm supposed to.
Do, but I also commit. The sin of Commission because I
do what I shouldn't do. So those are the things that.
James is looking at. Here, what sins of omission do
we have? I mean, you know, it's easy to
look at the sins that we have of Commission because we know it's
very clear, right? You shouldn't do this.
You shouldn't do that. You shouldn't do this, but what
about the sins of omission that we do when the Lord says go help
that? Person and you.
Don't over in Matthew 25 is a clear picture of a sin of
omission when he separate the goats from the sheep.
Well, it was the goats that he separated who committed the sin
of omission. Because the Bible said very
clearly, you know, he said that when you were hungry, you gave
me something to eat. But then when he talked about
the goats, he said when you were hungry, you didn't feed me.
When I was hungry, you didn't feed me.
When I was thirsty, you didn't give me anything to drink.
When I was naked, you didn't clothe me.
So he's talking about. Omission.
Things that we should have done that we didn't, so we should
concentrate on those things as well.
And we concentrate on that. But understand something.
Even if we don't understand something.
The grace of God is there for you just like it's there for me
to say, Lord, I have not been doing.
For example, I don't always pray for my leaders.
The Bible tells us that to do that and I don't always do it.
That's a sin of omission. That's a sin of omission
regardless of who the leader is, regardless of whether I voted
for them or not. The Bible didn't say just vote
for the ones that you pray. That's just pray for the ones
you vote for. That's not what it says.
It says vote for your leaders. And some of those things are
hard. Sometimes it's hard to do what
it. Is that you?
Don't want to do, Bible tells us, he said.
Listen, go and and and. And love your.
Enemies. It's hard to love your enemy,
but the Bible tells us to do it. Sins.
Of omission versus sins of. Commission, let's pray.
Father, we thank. You for your word, Lord.
That you give us strength, you give us wisdom to be able to
understand your Word, and you help us, O God, to be able to
just put it into. Our lives and to do it.
Not just to hear it, but to be doors of it.
That's what you challenge yourself every time we open your
Word, Lord, and this is Your word.
It's not the word of who's teaching it.
It's the word of the one who wrote it, the one who's who
inspired it. You are the creator of God.
You are the God of this Bible, Lord, and we thank you that your
word is available to us so that we do know what it is that you
have for us to do. And Father not only did.
You give it to. Us in written form, but even
before that, Lord, you gave it to us in the form of your Son
Jesus Christ, who came and lived these things out, all these
things that we're talking about the one who.
Never. Committed a sin of omission or
Commission. He never speak evil, a word of
evil about anybody. He didn't even revile when
people reviled against him. And even when he was persecuted,
the Bible says that he didn't threaten, but instead he
committed himself to the one who judges righteously.
So we thank you, Lord, for that sacrifice, the sacrifice, Lord,
that gives us eternal life, the sacrifice that through your
broken body, in the shedding of your blood, gave us salvation.
It gave us redemption. The.
Forgiveness of our sins. So today, Lord, we honor you, we
honor what you've done for us, Lord, and we honor who we are in
you, and we ask. O God, that you will receive.
This service that you will receive, Lord, our worship, our
praise. Receive it, Lord, as a sweet.
Smelling savour in. Your nostrils that you would be
pleased with us Lord, and you will show us what to do to be
pleased of you, Lord, we thank you for that in Jesus name.
So the night in which Jesus was. Betrayed, he took the.
Bread, and when he had given. Thanks.
He broke it and he said. Take and eat.
This is my body which is broken for you.
Eat this in remembrance of me. In the same manner, he also took
the cup. And after supper.
He said this cup. Is the new covenant in my blood
which is shed for the? Forgiveness of sins of many.
Drink this and as. Often as you drink it.
Drinking and remembrance of me. So when you drink this cup and
you eat. This bread we do show the Lord's
death till he come. Amen.
If anybody would like to ask for forgiveness for sins of omission
or Commission, the altar is open and you're welcome to come.