James No.10 God and My Neighbour

James, chapter four. What causes self-contempt among you? Will they come from your desires about everything new? You want something, but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want.

You crawl and seek, but you don't have because you don't have that. Then you think, fear me, that you may think your adulterous people, your adulterous people, they be made a friendship with the world, is hatred towards God, and anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God? Do you think, Scripture says, without reason, that the Spirit he calls to live in us tends towards envy, that he gives us more grace? That is why, Scripture says, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. Submit yourselves then to God.

Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come near to God, and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.

Grieve, mourn, and wail. Change your long-suffering mourning into a joy to grieve. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.

Brothers, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against his brother, or judges him, speaks against the Lord, and judges him. When you judge the Lord, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgment on it.

There is only one more giver and judge, the one who is able to save and destroy. But you, who are you to judge your neighbor? Now listen, you who say, today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money. Why? You do not even know what will happen tomorrow.

What is your life? You are a myth that appears for a little while, and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, if it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that. As it is, you boast and boast.

All such boasting is evil. Anyone, then, who knows what good he ought to do, and does not do it, sins. Amen.

Now I would be glad if you would have your Bibles open at the fourth chapter of the official agenda. Number 7 says, Submit yourselves therefore to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you.

Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be afflicted and mourn and weep. Let your lusts be turned to mourning and your joys to heaviness.

Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up. Speak not evil of one of another brethren. He that speaketh evil of his brethren, judgeth his brethren.

Speaketh evil of the Lord, and judgeth him not. But if thou judge the Lord, thou art not the doer of the Lord, but his judge. There is one Lord, who is able to serve and to destroy.

Who art thou that judgeth another? Or, better translated, who art thou that judgeth thy neighbor? We come to our ninth study from the Scripture of James. And let me remind you, as a couple of weeks have elapsed since last we were looking into the passage of Scripture, of the context before you get to the seventh verse and following that will be our subject matter for this morning. It sounds incredible that it is the case that passage of James writing from Jerusalem to the opening verses of this chapter is describing a state that exists within a Christian community.

Whether that's at Jerusalem or some other Jewish Christian group, I do not know. But what becomes very obvious as you read through these opening verses is that something pretty certain has broken out. There has been the savaging of confidence within the Church.

I suggest that the best way to comprehend James' teaching in these verses is to think in terms of a fracture, and indeed multiple fractures, which is broken out within one small part of the body of Christ. In the opening verse, reference is made to a fracture within the Church, within individual people in the Church. There is something wrong.

They are restless. They have desires within them which are not satisfied. A fractured self.

And when you move into the second verse, which becomes more obvious in the NIV, the thought there is not just of the individual but of the community, of the corporate group, of And reference is made to quarreling and fighting, killing and coveting. The cowardice of the individual heart is still greater and is affecting the relationships within the Christian community. The fractured self gets placed, the fracture, amongst the same.

And when you move down to the fourth, and to the fifth verse here, you discover that there is an interference as a result of all this with the relationship of the individual and the Christian community with the Lord God. There are those within the Church that James has in mind. Quasimodo's spiritual adultery, the very atmosphere of the world, has invaded the Church.

The God of materialism has had obeisance entered the Church. And James has to give a rough reminder, a blunt reminder, that friendship with the world is enmity with God. And as a result of fractured self, fracture amongst the same.

And their relationship with the Saviour. This, I say, is a very despondent picture with which we are confronted as we open this first chapter. But who can say that James is exaggerating? Who can say that this picture is restricted only to the first century? For the last of them, it's not to the credit of Hitchenden, that this sort of thing would happen time and time again.

Fracture within the body of Christ. The history of Hitchenden, even in this time, this day, is not exactly absent from some of the conclusions that James drew from certain chapters of an earlier era. But that is not the aim and view of Pastor James' life.

Rather, he has to be honest to on the part of his leadership. And if they will be true, and if they will be humble, when they listen to what James has to say, then he reminds them that there is an antidote, there is a remedy to this spiritual distortation, which has taken hold of the Christian community, some to the extreme. But he gives us more grace.

That's one of the best verses, if one can make such a connection, in the whole of this edition. He gives, God gives, more grace. What is James referring to? Well, look, if there are fractures that you admit within the self, amongst the saints, and towards the saviour, there is a remedy.

It's the grace of God. And he will give abundant grace to correct all these things that are wrong within the individual and within the community. J.M.R. here, in a course I gave you two weeks ago, says one of the most comforting verses in Scripture is this.

Whatever we forfeit, when we put self in place of God, we cannot forfeit our salvation. No matter what we do to Him, God is not beaten. He gives more grace.

Is there something wrong in your life, be honest. Forget whoever is sitting alongside you this morning, that sit to deal with you. Is there a fracture in your own soul? That things that you know are completely out of order, still in your life.

God can mend that fracture with His grace. In your attitude towards the saints, is there something that is dislocating fellowship? God can give grace. He can pour it into the cracks.

Not only shovel it over, but He can make it anew. Is there a lack of alignment between you and the Lord Jesus Christ? Is there a breakage there? He gives more grace. Grace is the sight-lord of heaven.

Grace is flowing like a river. Millions there have been supplied to the sales of commodities. But everyone in this church needs a generous supply of is the grace of God.

And He gives more grace. There is an unlimited supply. His resources are more than adequate.

Plenty of grace in these times. Grace to cover all my sins. Whatever our imperfections, whatever our multiple fractures might be, James not only diagnoses them, he prescribes a remedy.

Flee to God and the grace of God and cooperate with the speed of God who will apply the cement of grace to the fractures in your own life, in your own fellowship and make your home again. That is grace of God which rejuvenates, which remains, which enables individuals and communities of Christians to live for His honor and for His glory. Ah, but my friend, that grace is not easily acquired.

You see, there is only one type of person, one type of community where this grace will flow. For God will not give a discredited gift without some diagnosis, without looking into the condition of the heart of the one who requires it. That's why James dips into Proverbs and makes a quotation from Proverbs 3 and verse 34 in the sixth verse.

That is why Scripture says, God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. God will correct any situation if one will come humbly before Him and ask for this commodity to flow into one's life. Well, now, James is going to take this up and he is saying to these Christian people and to ourselves, if you really require more grace and you're humble, then I will put right what is wrong in your spirit.

I will put what is right, what is wrong, right, in your fellowship. And he says this, James, that is, in his teaching, from the seventh verse through to the twelfth, as, first of all, he makes reference to the corrective that is required, God would draw nigh to God and He will draw nigh to you, and so on. And then from the eleventh verse, he's going to make reference to the corrective that's required, man would speak not evil of one another.

Or as the NIV puts it, brothers do not slander one another. It's in these two areas, upward towards God, outward towards our fellow, that most problems come, obviously, but all problems come in the Christian life. So here is a community of people, let's say, who are honest enough to realize that what James has been spelling out in those opening six verses have direct relevance to themselves.

Now here's a prescription. Here's a statement. A corrective, God would draw nigh to God and He will draw nigh to you.

Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be afflicted and mourn and weep. Let your lusts be turned to mourning and your joy to heaviness.

And again, humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord and He shall lift you up. Here is a cry for submission. So we are talking about the seven.

Here is an appeal to cleansing, if you like to at least cleanse your hands, you sinners. Here is an appeal to communion. Draw nigh to God and He will draw nigh to you.

Here is a plea for confession. Be afflicted and mourn and weep. Let your lusts be turned to mourning.

Because when we do so, we take the whole thing. Lift yourselves to God. Join together.

When you resist the devil, you come near to the Lord. When you resist the devil, to your heavenly Father. That's an effective prescription.

You know, I don't mean to do anything about it. I just sort of sit down in the chair and question of resisting the devil, fighting the devil. And if you resist temptation, so we are resistant fighting.

And the more we are caught in a struggle with the devil, and the more we are strong in overcoming him, so the more we struggle. The Lord Jesus, He is an illustration. And ultimately He goes away.

But He only goes for a season. One of the correct communion. Communion.

Look at the 8th verse now. Come near to God. And He will come near to you.

There are some who perhaps wait until they feel the presence of God before they will engage in such a quiet time. But that's putting the promise before the command. No, we are to know that in the act of obedience, the Lord God will come near to you.

The illustration is well put from the story of the prodigal. Then he was in the far country. And do you remember he got sick of the life that he was living.

And so he determined that he will return to his father. I will rise and I will say to my father, come near to me as one of you has. And when his father and the Lord drove near, come near to God.

And He will come near to you. Time's gone by. Constance, must I be in as I present myself before you devil minded? That's the idea of the resolution.

It's a technical word. Indeed, this word in the original, you can take it right back to the early chapter. And there you've got a picture of the priest.

They're engaged in the employ and they read the New Testament, the Old Testament. You discover that all this concern for purity and cleanliness regarding clothes was for the Hebrews a vigil aid. God was more concerned with a clean heart than a clean cup.

More concerned with clean than having carefully preserved. But by the time you get to the mid Old Testament, you discover that the emphasis on purity, the man of unclean lips, will get a significant toll of spiritual ablutions. Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? Jesus.

All men have been returning. God wants submission. God wants from us a desirable commandment.

The ninth verse. Grieve, mourn, and wail. Shame your lap.

Humble yourselves. Well you see, these are laps. They have not forfeited their salvation.

Fires off a salvo of command. Humble yourselves. You have to be in shame for mourning.

Letting down the testimony of Christianity, and full of glory, to which I made reference in the preface of that, is almost an inward abhorrence of yourself. Because of the shame, you've got to go around. Active relationship towards the Savior, but he gives no grace.

You really want to benefit from it. Humility is registered by graces of our faithful spirits. There's grace, my friend.

Graces. There's a corrective God that I must pass it on. There's also another corrective that needs to be applied if we're going to be people.

Through to the twelfth reference James itemizes. Four ways in which we show our humility towards our fellow believers. The first has to do with our understanding of the Christian faith.

The second, our grasp of what is the royal law. The third, what it means to recognize that God is a true person. First of all, recognize the meaning of verse 11.

Slander one another. Anyone who speaks against him again, A.V., he the evil of the law. Within the Christian, terrible, not within the Christian circle, it interferes, obviously, and he goes on.

And when, in that second sentence, you get he that speaks of evil of his brother, the idea there in the original is speaking down to. Here is this self-opinionated Christian person who looks down. Here is an issue with the grace of God.

Relationships. That interferes, man would, with the fellowship that we should be enjoying. Don't you recognize that wrongly of the person that you're criticizing is your brother for whom you cry.

What you do when you see a neighbor in distress, a man who was in difficulty, and so he came to him and here I am as a Christian. My heart is sensitive. As a Samaritan being, and I recognize that this is one of my, logically, from the next, is recognizing the royal law.

Again, come to that 11th verse. Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges the law, and why do I call it, we'll look back at that. If you fulfill the royal law, according to the scripture, thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, ye do well.

The law of God is summarized in this statement that we are to love our neighbors. If I scandalize my neighbor, if I libel him, if I engage in a disharmony way, in speaking of my neighbor, then I reject the royal law. So again, bring that to our attention.

And following very quickly on that, he makes reference to the supreme judge. Look again into the 11th verse. Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges him, speaks against the law and judges it.

When you judge the law, you are not eating it, but sitting in judgment on it. There is only one lawgiver and judge, the one who is able to say and discuss the law. What is the height of the law? Jesus told us, thou shalt love the law as thy God, with all thy heart and so forth, and thy neighbor as thyself.

Here is my neighbor. He's in difficulty. She's in difficulty.

What do I do? I use my tongues evictively against them. In effect, I'm not only rejecting my neighbor, I'm rejecting God's law, and moreover, I am rejecting God. You know, the Bible puts a great premium on the way that relationships sometimes are destroyed by it.

I've said this before from this pulpit, and in no way am I excused by the very height and the wrong use of the tongue. The other is not so serious. God in virtue tells us that his royal law is to love our neighbor all that God would take all kitties, all that God would give as a love for one another.

Not only does James bring to our attention in a man with corrective the notion of the Christian family and the royal law and the supreme judge, he says, look, examine yourself, recognize yourself. Verse 12 of the authorized version, who art thou than the satire. The withersome way that John, that James uses this is well put in the NIV.

There is only one lawgiver and judge, the one who is able to save and destroy. But you, who are you to judge your neighbor? You who have been guilty of so many things that I have had to correct you. You who meet attention in regard to confession and communion and your cleansing before the Lord.

Who are you? What are you? So often, my friends, man is depicted as a very vile individual. And in our hymns, we sometimes sing naked, vile, and wretched we. As we come to the man and we sing that we love.

But should someone come along and offer a little corrective, we get so hot. We feel we have a right to criticize. And yet God says in His word, Who art thou that judges thy neighbor? Saved by grace.

A worm. A no man. Don't judge yourself.

when God sees that humility and it remakes, it covers up, it completely does away with the fracture that there may have been in our spiritual relationship. Look, I preach feelingly, but the message burns in my heart. I leave poor Mexico during a speech.

I want you to take this word with you. If in any way your relationship is fractured with God, if in any way your relationship is fractured amongst your fellows, be honest and deal with it. And realize that God when He sees the humility of your heart, will give you more strength and more confidence and more confidence and more confidence and more confidence and and more confidence confidence and more confidence confidence and