HOW HUMILITY CURES WORLDLINESS

Submissiveness, humbly patient. Submitting to God and waiting on God. This is not a standard the world sets for us. This is the standard set by the bible. Our world doesn’t honor meekness. They mistake meekness for weakness. No, our world honors other things such as pride and ingenuity. Having self-confidence and self-esteem, a sense of self-worth. Showing initiative and resourcefulness. These things create success. On the other hand, the bible tells us we’re all sinners, all have fallen short, there is none righteous, no not one! The bible reminds us our confidence instead is found in Christ not ourselves. James 3 tells us to show off your works in the meekness of wisdom. You can be a show-off, but only in submissive, humbly patient wisdom. What? The wisdom from above is pure, peacable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere.

As we have been studying James you might notice that it is sort of a New Testament version of Proverbs. Many verses we covered in James reinforce the ideas found in the OT Proverbs.
Proverbs are concise, memorable sayings. A good proverb not only states an insight but actually compels insight. And the book of James is full of these short sweet bites of wisdom. The goal is to instill right thinking and correct behavior. Faith AND works. What matters to God is a faith that works. Faith that works in trials and in temptations (James 1:2-4 Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing). Faith that works in response to God’s word (James 1:22 But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves). Faith that works in using the tongue to bless instead of curse. James is full of these great verses.
Now with proverbs and parables in the bible, you often see the use of either comparison or contrast. Last week James was contrasting true wisdom to false wisdom. True wisdom involves submission to trust God, commit to God, and wait for God. True wisdom says, God is God. I am not God. Therefore, why don’t I live according to God’s plan, ask what is God’s will, and leave God’s responsibility to him. I’m going to live according to the truth, according to reality. False wisdom on the other hand is selfish, boastful, and jealous. False wisdom says that things are all about me. If there is a God, he exists for me. When I pray to “bless my meal”, God should multiply it, protect me from diseases and give me strength. When I pray for healing, God should heal because He’s the healer. If God is real, why doesn’t he answer my prayers, why doesn’t he make complete sense to me? False wisdom is false! It is not rooted in reality.  If you try to live according to your desires, your happiness, your glory, then it will lead to bitterness, jealousy, selfish ambition, and disorder.

Proverbs 22:6
Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.
Of course we know children are often in that state of mind, thinking about self. But some of us never grow out of that. Some people continue to live in false wisdom.

Let’s read our passage for today.
James chapter 4, verses 1-12

Amen. These are challenging 12 verses. James, or the Holy Spirit, is cutting right to the heart of the matter. I don’t know about you, but to me these words seem very strong, even harsh. Let’s try to unwrap why James is getting all fired up here. Now, does your bible group these 12 verses together into one section? What does your bible call this section heading? “Warring against worldliness”; “Pride promotes strife” and “Humility Cures Worldliness”

We might cover a lot today but the main point for today’s message is that:
God wants to take our quarrels, envy, pride, jealousy and heal us from all that until we come to that place of humility where God can use us to create unity in covenantal community.

Now, if we look at verse 1 (what causes quarrels and what causes fights among you?) and verse 12 (who are you to judge your neighbor?), we can create a frame in which to read these verses, basically that James is addressing our relationship with others. Although this whole passage could be considered a cluster of individual proverbs, in the light of the true wisdom versus false wisdom discussion proceeding this, we see these verses as an application of that wisdom. Here are examples of how true wisdom and false wisdom plays out in our interpersonal relationships.
So, let’s jump right in and start unpacking each verse. Are you having quarrels and fights among you? Do you have some problem, some unforgiveness or a recurring argument with another brother or sister? Remember James is addressing the diaspora, the scattered Jews among the nations. So when he says “among you”, he means among the church. Of course, all of us have conflicts from time to time! You might not be in a conflict with another church member right now, but stick around long enough and you will. I grew up attending church since I was in my mother’s womb and I’ve seen the church war against each other for many reasons; some valid, some plain stupid.  I’ve seen the church quarrel about how to perform communion, some people wanted to use ONE cup to represent the unity of God’s ONE body, others wanted multiple small cups to maintain proper hygiene. I’ve seen the church war on whether it is ok to play drums during worship or whether hymns accompanied by an organ was the appropriate way. I’ve lived through church quarrels about whether we should have home groups or not. If you are committed to God and the church, you will likely find yourself in a quarrel one day because the church is full of imperfect people. Welcome to the sinners club. But God is making us one body, connecting us together into one building. So although we are imperfect people, we should not continue to allow quarrels and fights among us as God continues to change us.
 James minces no words in verse 1: what causes these quarrels and fights? Your internal struggles! Your passions, your unfulfilled desires. The problem is not circumstantial, it’s not the other person’s fault, it is you. The root of the problem is inside of you. This is the fruit of that false wisdom, the earthly wisdom, the pursuit of YOUR happiness at the expense of others. Looking out for #1.
 You desire and do not have, so you murder. Whoa, pump your brakes, you’re probably thinking, I haven’t murdered anyone. But remember what Jesus said in Matthew 5: I say to you that everyone who is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment. Have you been angry with your brother or sister? Guilty! When life is all about you and your rights, you’re entitled to get angry when somebody wrongs you. This anger can easily lead to hatred and a death in your relationship with that other brother or sister. Again, fruit of false wisdom.
You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. When life is all about you and your happiness, you want things that you don’t have and that leads to strife. This envy can show up as struggle for power in the church, it can show up as jealousy that God is blessing your brother or sister in a certain way that you are not experiencing. Churches should be cooperating with each other to influence the community around them but our envy and jealousy against other churches paralyze us from working with others. How come they get a nice new building, how come they have a great preaching and teaching pastor and all we get is, well…this guy.  The false wisdom of this world not only affects your mind and your heart to lust, covet, and jealousy, but it actually causes problems in your relationship with God’s church. It leads to fights, murder, and wars. That misplaced faith leads to bad works.

You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. In context, this once again shows the selfishness and the pride of the worldly man. Too proud to even ask God for help. But when he does ask, it is done selfishly. Sound like anybody you know? Yea yea those Pharisees in the bible praying proud and selfish prayers right? or sounds like that brother or sister who wronged you, they really need to be humbled by God and repent.
No, James says it’s you. “You adulterous people!” You promise-breakers! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.
Now, we can probably all agree that we are promise breakers when it comes to our love for God. We’ve broken plenty of promises that we’ve made to God. “God if you do this for me then I will do this.” “God, help me through this and I will never commit that sin again.” God has proclaimed life and love to us by judging his own Son with our punishment of sin. The death penalty that we deserved, God delivered on Jesus, so that we could be pardoned. So that we could have life. We can now be in right standing with God. We can know God. That’s what God calls us to: forgiveness, eternal life, walking every day with the Holy Spirit inside of us. And we say YES, I DO want this. I DO want to follow you Jesus. I have decided to follow Jesus. No turning back! No turning back! But then we hear, we see, and feel the temptations of the world: buy this new tech gadget, buy these new clothes, this new car, a new house. Desires of the eyes, desires of our sinful flesh and we entertain their ideas. We were a people rescued, our ransom was paid, we were cleaned and placed in a place of honor. But we decide to go back to the prison of sin we were taken from. We befriend the world for temporary satisfactions and we give up on our eternal love. We are the adulterers.

Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”? God is jealous for us. Not a jealousy born out of envy, or selfishness, but rather for what is good and right. It is right for a husband or wife to be jealous for their spouse. They belong to each other and are not free to pursue substitute relationships. In the same way, Christians belong to God and are not free to pursue worldliness as a substitute. 1 John 2:15 Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.
C’mon church. Is this you? Maybe you never thought of yourself in a love relationship with God, so you couldn’t possibly be cheating on God right? Let’s use this instead as our litmus test. Think for a moment about your prayers this past week. What did you ask for? What are your priorities when you pray? Are they marked by selfishness, filled with your desires, asking for things to satisfy yourself? Do they reflect friendship with the world? Or are you seeking the glory and will of God? We cannot fool God, let’s not fool ourselves. If you have been pursuing worldliness, you are committing adultery in your relationship with God. God is jealous for you!
Thank God there is hope. If you have been pursuing worldliness, there is still hope for you. This is the good news: But he gives more grace.
Isn’t this such a beautiful and hopeful verse? What is God’s response to us when we say “God, you are not good enough. I’m going to your enemies because they will take better care of me?”
But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble”.
Whatever the volume of sin in your life, God’s grace is more. He gives more grace. God gives that much more. Romans 5:20 “but where sin increased, grace abounded all the more”. Grace abounds all the more! Grace abounds means grace wins by so much more than sin.
Did you all see that US swimmer Katie Ledecky swim the 800m freestyle last week? She blew the competition out of the water. She swam it in 8 minutes and 4.79 seconds, which was a new world record and new Olympic record. She touches the wall, (1…2….3…) removes her swim cap and goggles (4…5…6…), takes a few deep breaths and smiles (7…8…9…). Her family is cheering in the stands and she is just waiting in the pool (10…11…). Finally, here comes 2nd place, Great Britain’s Jazz Carlin finishes with a time of 8 minutes and 16.17 seconds. That’s more than 11 seconds behind Ledecky. 11 seconds. The entire men’s 100m dash began and ended in the amount of time Ledecky was waiting for the rest of the pool to finish.
That’s how grace abounds all the more where sin increased. It’s not even close. God gives all the more grace.

So what should our response be?
Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Submit. Let go. Trust God. This is the meekness of true wisdom. Realizing that we were wrong, we were adulterers, and in this humility then trusting and committing ourselves to God.
How do we submit to God? James gives us 3 ways here:
Resist the devil.
1 Corinthians 10:13 No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.
Another promise of hope that God can help you to overcome temptation. Our focus is to endure, to resist, to stand firm.
Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you.
Draw near to God through the bible you get to know God. Don’t just read your bible, study it and allow God to speak to you through it.
Draw near to God through the community of God’s people. In community we grow in our love for God and have the space to apply his truth into our lives. God uses people, their problems, their encouragements, their experiences to help us along in our own journey.
Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.
Be serious about sin. Clean up the outward conduct, cleanse your hands. But also clean up your inward attitude, purify your hearts. This is how true repentance looks. Godly sorrow that causes us to mourn and weep. We need to be sober about what we have become in our adulterous, unholy state. Then bring that to the cross of Jesus Christ and plead the blood of Jesus to wash us completely clean.
So there are 3 ways to submit ourselves to God. This is the meekness of wisdom. The submission and patient waiting of wisdom.
Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.
“Here I am, in that old place again, down on my face again.” Those lyrics express that place we need to be where we can experience the grace that abounds so much more. When we submit ourselves to God, in all of our sin and shamefulness, God draws near. Our humble king responds. Our humble king covers us with his grace and his love. Our humble God can then use us.

And our final two verses for today, Do not speak evil against one another, brothers. The one who speaks against a brother or judges his brother, speaks evil against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. There is only one lawgiver and judge, he who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?

These verses are warning us against slander. Our world often incorrectly applies Matthew 7:1 Judge not, that you be not judged. 5 verses later Jesus says ‘do not give dogs what is holy, and do not throw your pearls before pigs’. Jesus didn’t want us to throw discernment out the window. Judging someone does not mean we should not be discerning with regard to someone’s character or teaching. Throughout the epistles, the apostles named false teachers and called out, reasoned against false teachings. Judging someone does not mean you can’t speak to them about their sin. The bible has plenty of guidelines about how we should deal with sin in our own life, and sin in another person’s life. Judging someone does not mean you can’t evaluate their spiritual maturity and doctrinal views. In searching for a pastor, evaluating anyone for leadership, even inviting guest speakers, we must make judgements about a person’s character and doctrinal views.
So what does judging others wrongly mean? James says it is speaking evil against another, criticizing someone from selfish motives. Even if what you are saying is true, if the motive is to make yourself look good, out of jealousy or bitterness, then you are judging wrongly.
Judging others wrongly is when you judge according to human standards compared to God’s word. When we start to add commandments. In the bible, Paul had to address people that were judging others because they ate meat. Or how certain people celebrated certain days as holy and judged those that did not. Keep the Sabbath holy. I knew a guy who wanted to keep the Sabbath holy so he wanted to rest on Sundays. He expected other Christians to rest on the Sabbath as well. So after Sunday service we would go to jack-in-the-box or to the grocery store to buy groceries for the rest of the week and he began to get angry at us because by doing so, we are making other people work on Sundays. Judging according to human standards. Last week I had a discussion with my coworker, Is it a sin to burn incense at home? Some members of her church told her it was a sin to burn incense, but she enjoys the smell. What do you think? Now what if she’s Chinese and she has a shrine at home and burns incense there? Burning incense in itself is not a sin. But bowing down to idols, worshipping other gods is.
Sometimes as Christians we get focused on following commands and cleaning up the outward appearance; God wants us to cleanse our hands AND purify our hearts.

When we come in meekness of wisdom, we come in humility and in submission. We remember that we have experienced God’s abounding grace, we have mourned and repented, we have been picked up by the Son of God. From that perspective we won’t need to speak evil against a brother. We don’t need to break them down in order to exalt ourselves. We don’t need to criticize others to cover for our own insecurities and jealousies. Instead we thank God for what He is doing in their lives and speak life into them.

God wants to take our quarrels, envy, pride, jealousy and heal us from it all. In humility and submission to God, he can then use us to bless others, to love our neighbors, to speak life into this church, this covenantal community.

In closing today, let’s spend a few moments of reflection and prayer.
Where do we need to confess today? Where do we need to own our sin?
Do we need to apologize to a brother or sister? Where have we not spoken life into others but actually actively torn others down?
Where have we refused to celebrate the victories of others? Where have we reveled in the defeat of others?
These are not the marks of someone who has experienced the grace of God. Who are you to judge your neighbor?

Let’s pray,
Heavenly Father, thank you for this challenging passage. We know you desire to create a loving people who care deeply for one another and share that love with others who don’t yet know you. Lord we come humbly today, we come in submission to you. Holy Spirit, continue to stir in our hearts and reveal to us our pride, our envy, our jealousy that is getting in the way. Let your truth wash over us, to perfectly cleanse us from our worldliness. If we have become friends with the world through selfishness and jealousy and covetousness, lead us to seek out forgiveness and peace. Lord we hold on to your abounding grace. We submit to you God. Use us according to your plans. In Jesus precious name I pray, Amen.