7.14 - James 5, Seeing Ourselves

In this episode, Paul and Noah discuss some of the applications we can make from James' final admonitions to his readers.

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Paul and Noah both preach and teach with the Cedar Park church of Christ in Cedar Park, TX. You can visit our site at: https://www.cedarparkchurchofchrist.org/

Transcript

Noah: 0:30

Well, good morning and welcome back to the Stand Strong podcast. We're here today finishing up James chapter five. We've got this episode and then we'll have one more, no more than four, and we will have wrapped the book of James. It's been quite a journey Paul, but I am, I'm really glad that we've taken it. I am too,

Paul: 0:49

and I'm looking forward to. Trying to see ourselves here in chapter five. There's so much here and trying to get it in one

Noah: 0:56

podcast, but it's very, very rich. Yes. James five is not a very long chapter at all. But there is, there's a lot to cover at, at least If we were gonna try to get any, any depth in there at all. You know, last time we started, by observing that James five can't be separated from James four, you know that that chapter break is not necessary for our understanding. In fact, sometimes it gets in the way of our understanding. I. So if you think about the end of chapter four, you have that section on, you know come now you who say today or tomorrow, you know, we'll go into such a town and spend a year there. And there's this idea of this confidence in ourselves or boasting in ourselves. And in that context, I. Verse one makes a whole lot of sense. James, chapter five, verse one. When he says, come now, you rich, weep and howl for the miseries that are coming upon you. You know, there's this warning right here out of the gate in, in chapter five, against pride, against selfishness, against injustice. This is a warning that ought to strike at our very hearts. This is something that we, we ought to take some level of, of kind of a sober self-reflective moment. Because while, yes, we're gonna get to when we are oppressed, we need to be patient, but we also have to recognize that sometimes we have been lulled into this. This sense of pride and selfishness where we're actually the ones that are being warned here at the beginning of chapter five.

Paul: 2:32

Yeah. And, and whatever, whatever was going on here with the wealthy. The, the, the issue as I understand it was not in regards to the amount. Right. And the issue was, how they were gaining their wealth in terms of the abuse and taking advantage of others. The corruption comes when they were keeping back wages by fraud. Verse four, living on the earth and pleasure and luxury. He says, in such a way, your heart is fat. And leading to the slaughter, they were condemning others. They were murdering the just in pursuit of their own selfish agenda, very heartless injustice. Even murder.

Noah: 3:10

Mm-hmm. Was

Paul: 3:11

coming out of their covetousness and their greed just. A huge rampant self-indulgence where they were getting their hands on money any way they could to pursue a fleshly lifestyle with no concern at all for whoever was injured or put to death. Obviously there was no reverence for God, no love for Christ, absolutely no love for other people. That's why James uses the, the language that he uses.

Noah: 3:37

Yeah.

Paul: 3:37

And you know, we can just make an application for us. Self selfishness, self-indulgence can cause us to do some awful things and treat people in some horrific ways.

Noah: 3:53

Yeah. The more focused we become on ourselves, the the risk is the less we see other people. For their humanity and as, as the creation of God and this image bearers. Mm-hmm. We, we do unthink. We have the capacity to do unthinkable things to one another. Out of selfishness. Mm-hmm. Out of self-indulgence. So the more we think about ourselves, the less we think about other people. And that may seem like a Okay. A pretty simple, okay. One-to-one sort of comparison, but when we look at where those paths lead, when we look at where the path of self-indulgence leads versus a path of. For instance of service, the results are so radically different that even if we feel like we started in a similar place mm-hmm. One leads us to oftentimes completely disregard the very the per very personhood of the people around us and the other. Elevates them. Right. As, as we follow the, the mind of Christ so that we can start in similar places and end up in very, very different places, different trajectories.

Paul: 5:10

Right. I don't want us to, to miss God has given some very strong admonitions against rich people in this world.

Noah: 5:17

Yeah.

Paul: 5:17

I mean, you, you can get outside of James, and, and see that in a lot of different places, his, his admonitions concerning the attitudes of the rich, they're, they're all over the New Testament. Jesus talks about that a, a good bit. But also attitudes about the poor. So he, he, you know, poor, those of us who do not have the wealth we can have some bad attitudes too.

Noah: 5:43

Yeah.

Paul: 5:44

And, and so attitudes are important and how we respond to other people, very important. And that's why I think he brings up. And we talked about last podcast in verses seven and eight, and following those who were being oppressed, those who were being taken advantage of he enjoins in verses seven and eight, at least three things. Be patient like the farmer.

Noah: 6:09

Mm-hmm.

Paul: 6:09

Keep your heart strong. And the idea of trusting in the Lord. That is, know that the Lord's gonna take care of these matters. Be patient like the farmer. You have to let things develop in their own time.

Noah: 6:22

Mm-hmm.

Paul: 6:23

And those of us who get impatient don't want to let things develop in their own time. We want it, we wanna let this thing get fixed yesterday.

Noah: 6:33

Right. Exactly. Well, I, I was reading as I was preparing for, for James chapter five, and I was I was reading one, one person's thoughts on it. I I believe it was int Wright that said something along the lines of. Our frantic modern society has done its best to obliterate the need for patients. And his observation is, it's all the more important that we who follow Jesus should learn it and practice it.

Paul: 6:58

Hmm.

Noah: 6:59

And I, I do think that that's true. The, the less we have to wait for things, the less capable we become of waiting for things. And yet the image that James uses here of the farmer of, of this agricultural thing, you think about how long it takes for, for a seed. To produce anything of value, you know to, to really see any of the fruit, to, to reap any of what you have sown in an agricultural context. It takes time. And in, in agriculture there's maybe some predictability to that. You become familiar with how long different plants take to mature and bear fruit, but nonetheless. You have to wait. Mm-hmm. And, and in that context, there's all the uncertainty of the conditions that can bring, can affect what fruit is born and what fruit is not. And in this case we're, we're being ad admonished to be patient waiting for the coming of the Lord. His time. Right. He'll take care of it in his time.

Paul: 8:03

Yeah. Establish your hearts verse, say just the language in the new King James is, that's what is in the ESV.

Noah: 8:09

Yes. Establish your hearts

Paul: 8:11

again. I, I said what he's saying there is keep your heart strong. And that is true, but there's depth there, Noah. There's a lot of depth when, when you're dealing with adversity, when you're dealing with mistreatment, and this was a very cruel kind of mistreatment. And someone says, you, you know, just keep your heart strong. You may think, well, yeah, that's easy. Easy to say. And. But it, it is hard to do. So he's, he's trying to get them to become settled, to become strong in their faith as they wait on the Lord and trust in the Lord to take care of this abuse as he sees fit, sees fit in his time. And then he says this, that may appear somewhat strange. Verse nine, do not grumble against one another. Brethren, lest you be condemned.

Noah: 9:01

Mm-hmm.

Paul: 9:02

Behold. The judge is standing at the door. He reminds him again. The judge, he's standing at the door, the coming of the Lord. It's near, but you gotta wait.

Noah: 9:14

Yeah.

Paul: 9:14

The judge is standing. He's gonna take care of this. Establish your hearts and be strong. There is a tendency in us when we're going through very difficult, stressful times in our life of great abuse and, and we don't know why the Lord is letting us suffer the way he's letting us suffer to start to grumble. Mm-hmm. To become dissatisfied. Discontented in our hearts. And then because of this discontent and, and this discouragement, we begin to express it in ways that are verbal and very hurtful to other people.

Noah: 9:56

Yeah, yeah. Well, and this all comes back to this idea of being established or being steadfast. Because the question is what? That, that idea of being established gives me the picture of, of whether it be. A, a tree with well established roots or a, a building that has been established on a foundation. The question is, where are those roots digging in, right? Mm-hmm. What's that foundation built on in? What are we established? And in the context, it's very clear that he's saying that has to be. The Lord, it has to be in his character and his purpose. Like we talked about last episode, it has to be establishing in a confidence in, in God's power and God's action. And that's especially impactful in this context because, so I've, I've heard it said, is materialism more of a temptation for the rich or the poor, and. Depending on where our minds are at, we might be inclined, more inclined to answer one than the other. But the fact is, oftentimes it can be an equal temptation because those who have much want more and those who have none also oftentimes want more. And so sometimes we get this idea in our heads that well or maybe we'll hear this refrain among our, our peers and the people around us. Well, you just wait. What goes around comes around or mm-hmm. They'll get their comeuppance or, or you just wait and you, you, you hammer, you keep doing, you keep working hard and you'll then, you'll be in that position. You'll, you'll see the wealth. You'll see the prosperity, et cetera, et cetera. Well, the fact is, all of those kinds of attitudes are not coming from the perspective of we're waiting on the judge. We're waiting on him. And in his time, he'll take care of it. All of that is trying to somehow manipulate you know, our own prosperity and the, and the world around us so that we finally for once get to be on top. And that's not what James is about here. James. What James is saying here is you establish yourself on the Lord and you find steadfastness and assurance in him. And you don't have to worry about any of that.

Paul: 12:17

Yeah. You know, he says indeed, verse 11, we count them blessed who endure. Mm-hmm. You know, we, we count, we count them happy. Who endure that? That's not a good translation. Blessed is the better. Because the concept there is those who endure have the Lord's approval. What are we seeking? Are we seeking vengeance or are we looking for God to settle the account now in our time? Right. Or are we just saying, I just want the approval of the Lord? I, I, I just want to know that the Lord considers me and sees me this way. I'm, I belong to him. I, I want his approval. And so to receive his approval means, you know. We're not always going to be treated the way we would like to be treated. Things are not always gonna go our way. We live in a fallen world,

Noah: 13:18

right?

Paul: 13:19

So he brings up the prophets, he brings up job. I think there's a reason why he does that, but, but he keeps reminding these people about a constancy or a staying power that's needed among God's people. This patience and, and this endurance. We need to learn the value of testing and proving our faith. I don't know that we really like to hear that. I.

Noah: 13:43

Yeah,

Paul: 13:43

the, the value of our faith being tested and proven. I love what CS Lewis says about this concept of seeing the value of your faith being tested. CS Lewis says, you can't just go on being a good egg, you've gotta hatch out or go bad. And when, when you, when you think just knowing CS Lewis and some of his writings, I mean there's depth there. But we, we need to be keenly aware of the wisdom. Of our faith being perfected, of it being tested so as to produce an US endurance.

Noah: 14:17

Yeah. And I think that there's a, there's a simplicity to that that again, requires, we brought up humility on a number of occasions. I think there's a simplicity there that requires a humility. When we get to verse 12, James says, but above all, my brothers do not swear either by heaven or by earth. Or by any other oath, but let your yes, be yes and your no no, so that you may not fall under condemnation. Of course, that echoes words of Jesus during his ministry on earth. But the, there's a, when we are able to be steadfast in the Lord and established in the Lord, there is a simplicity that comes with that. And in this case, his, his admonition is. Your character and your words need to align and you don't, you don't need to swear oaths, you don't need to make grand statements of intent. Mm-hmm. You, you just need to do. What God wants you to do. And you need to be honest about what you're gonna do. And again, there's this simplicity, this humility that's communicated in that because our assurance isn't found in our own ability, we don't have to say, I'm gonna do that. And I, I swear upon, you know, the hairs in my head or, or anything like that. No, I'm gonna do this because I'm, I'm in Christ and I'm gonna do it by his power. I'm gonna do what I can by his power and he's gonna take care of the rest.

Paul: 15:44

Yeah, there's a, there's a lot of good, applications that can come, come out of what we're talking about here with endurance. Trouble does promote trust. When we go through difficult times hardships, it sharpens our focus and increases our dependency upon God. All of our feeble attempts to deliver ourself. We're fully aware that they do not work. We're forced to fall to our knees and trust in the only one who can ultimately deliver and nothing else can take us to that point or grow our faith. To a point a degree, it needs to be grown like hardship. Yeah. And so James says some things that he says and, and necessarily so because of those who had become very disheartened as they were dealing with extreme circumstances. Keep your heart, Strongs. Wait on the Lord, trust in him. Trouble just brings us closer to God.

Noah: 16:38

Yeah.

Paul: 16:38

I, I like the song near to the Heart of God. That's, that's the place of rest.

Noah: 16:43

Mm-hmm.

Paul: 16:44

And, and there's, there's no place like near to the heart of God,

Noah: 16:47

right? Yeah. The, the concept of trust is one that is, I think, seen throughout James, but I. When we get to the end of the book here in chapter five, I feel like it is a refrain that is brought back into the limelight of what James is talking about, that in humility we trust, in humility, we find steadfastness in God. We are patient waiting for his for his judgment and for his coming, for his salvation. All of this comes back to putting trust in him and his power. I think the idea of trust even comes out in the later, verses of chapter five, when, like we talked about last time, God is the one who saves or raises up, when, when a, a sinner or a wanderer is brought back. That is by. The power of God's word working through us. It's, it's because God cares about those people. Even in the best of times, even in the best of our actions. Ultimately, we have to, in humility say this, this is happening because. God because of who he is and his power and his ability, and we trust that he will produce the fruit that he needs to produce. Yeah.

Paul: 18:04

You know, I keep coming back to,'cause maybe, maybe I'm the only one, but I remember when, when I was first teaching James and I was going through chapter five. And all that we've talked about here about the, the importance of James telling him, be patient. Be patient. Establish your hearts. Be patient. Wait on the Lord. Remember the former, remember the former behold, the judge is standing at the door and sandwiched in there. He just says, oh, don't grumble against one another.

Noah: 18:32

Yeah.

Paul: 18:32

And, and having lived life for a while, I begin to realize our patience in waiting for, for the Lord, for the Lord to do what he can do. But not on our timetable. On his, is matched by positive relationships with other people who are going through hard times and they're enduring to, they're having the same kind of faith and trust, the same kinda heart to wet on the Lord that I'm trying to have. It's one thing to get along with other Christians when things are going well. It's quite another when we're all under stress.

Noah: 19:09

Yeah.

Paul: 19:10

And that can happen in a family had three kids.

Noah: 19:15

Yeah.

Paul: 19:16

And one of'em has had a bad day and then, then two days later, the other has a bad day and they're all under stress. And then dad had a bad day and now dad's under stress. And within two weeks everybody in the family just, you know, snapping at each other.

Noah: 19:29

Right,

Paul: 19:30

and I'm not trying to minimize light, getting hard and knocking us to our knees. We need the Lord. We've gotta trust in the Lord. He's at the door, he can deliver. He's full of compassion and mercy. He is the Lord of host. He's got the power. He'll take care of this. But what he's saying is, look, relationships. You've got others. Lean on them, let them help you. But if we're all stressed to the max and we're all on edge all the time, then we're gonna start picking and devouring one another. And that's only gonna make things worse.

Noah: 20:06

Yeah, yeah. And in the end, we are, we're building off the same foundation. We're waiting on the same Lord. We have every good reason to find encouragement in one another, but the temptation is still there. To begin to grumble. And ultimately what that betrays is, is a, a mind that's turned inward, that has, that has become centered on self and the hardships that we've had this day, that day, this week, next week. And instead of finding strength in the fact that we have brothers and sisters who are, are serving the same God and waiting on the same Lord. We decide we're gonna take it out on them.

Paul: 20:49

Mm-hmm.

Noah: 20:50

And unfortunately that's just a very real temptation, but that's, that's why James talks about it here.

Paul: 20:55

Yeah.

Noah: 20:57

Well, I think we're getting close to the end of our, our time for this episode. There's so much like you mentioned in James chapter five, and thankfully we get one more shot at James chapter five next week when we talk about our no more than four. So. I'll, I look forward to seeing what what two applications you wanna bring from James chapter five. I'm looking forward to getting to discuss those with you and and hopefully my, my prayer is that as we come here to the end of the book of James, that. The people who have taken this journey with us have benefited to, to some, some degree in the same way that I have. I know that this has been a very it's been very fulfilling to get to work through the text this closely and, and take in the words of the Holy Spirit and, and just really benefit from those. So I've enjoyed it. I'm looking forward to next week.

Paul: 21:44

I have too. And, and maybe for those who have followed us through the journey who have waited all the way to the point of chapter five, and they're still wondering who in the room is gonna deal with this anointing, someone with oil in the name of the Lord or who is, what is the sickness there? Mm-hmm. And the Lord will raise him up, is his physical sickness, is his spiritual sickness and. What is this? Calling for the elders and anointing them with oil in the name of the Lord. I do plan to talk about that. So for those who have followed us through the journey and have waited all of these weeks, I. For that conversation. You may disagree, but at least we need to talk about it is in James chapter five. So Noah and I decided we're not gonna avoid that. Yeah. So we plan, Lord willing to talk about that next week.

Noah: 22:32

Absolutely. Looking forward to it. For those listening, I pray that your, your week goes well. As you walk with the Lord, I pray that you can be lights in a dark world, that you can show the trust and reliance in the Lord that James advocates here in James chapter five. And until we see in one another, again, my prayers that you continue to stand strong.