PRACTICAL CHRISTIANITY-JAMES CHAPTER FOUR

PRACTICAL CHRISTIANITY

JAMES CHAPTER 4

The church was once strong.  Its members loved God and loved each other.  Their numbers reflected it. The new converts projected it.  The community knew it.  But somehow, someway, selfishness wiggled its slimy little self into the church. Friends who once talked often, shared meals together, laughed together, prayed together and worshiped together now seemed to sense a wedge pushing them apart. 

The numbers dropped. New converts waned.  The Spirit of God could seldom be felt in the services. Soon came that old Saturday night tongue that we talked about last week.  Things were said that couldn’t be taken back. Feelings were hurt.  Blame was placed, and the church split. 

That was the case in some of the churches that James was writing to in his letter.  And that has been the case in many churches since that time.  There have even been churches on the North and South Alabama District of our denomination that have experienced the very same situation as the churches in James day and time.

Behaving like the good, strong leader that he was, reacting in a practical manner like he did, James In chapter four wanted to address this problem.  So he begins by asking these churches a question, “Where do these “wars and fightings” come from that are among you”?

James knew the answer but his question was meant to help his listeners realize and admit the problems themselves.  Isn’t that a common thing with us?  We know the problem but often we simply refuse to admit it. 

Throughout the next few verses James points out some major issues with those churches and ours. 

Look at his list:

·         Lust

·         Wrong motives

·         Adultery

·         Lack of effort

·         Judging

·         Omission

It would take a very long time to adequately address all of these conditions.  But let’s briefly look at each just to bring some points to light.  Perhaps you can go back over the list later and do some intense study on each item. 

1.  LUST:  (Passionate personal desires).  What are some things that you are passionate about?  Well, perhaps we should first define the word “passionate”.  Some synonyms for passionate are:  Fanatical, avid, zealous, and ardent.  Do any of these words describe the way you feel about anything?

Usually, when the word lust is used people in our day think of it as a sinful, usually sexual thing.  But one can experience lust and it have no sexual connotation at all. In James’ use of the word he seems to mean more like “strong, passionate, personal desire”. 

He tells his readers that the reason “wars and fightings” occur is because of the “lust” that war in your members (church members). Understand that James is not talking about wars between kingdoms and nations, although they will occur from the same type of feelings, he was writing to Christian churches that were being torn apart by “wars” (indicating long lasting hostile, hard feelings) and “fightings”( indicating sharp outburst, skirmishes, snapping back and forth). 

James says all of this “ruckus” in the church is caused by your selfishness.  “Your lust” that war in “your members”.  Lust for power, prestige, “I want it MY way”.  Oh, it doesn’t have to be “spiritual wars” about beliefs or doctrines.  I have known pastors who have had to fight tremendous battles with their church boards, battles that caused hard feelings and fussing because of the choice of the paint color in a Sunday school room. 

You lust, you kill, you desire to have, me, me, me,-my, my, my-I,I,I.  Elvis sang a song that was heralded as a great “hit”, it was called “I did it my way”.  I’ve heard it played at funerals.  What a sad, lonely, dangerous statement to get to the end of your life and claim “I did it my way”. 

Selfishness, lust, passion “it’s my way or the highway” will tare up churches, families, lives and relationships with God Himself. 

2.  WRONG MOTIVES:  I guess this is my wife’s favorite Bible verse; at least it’s the one I hear her quote most often.  “You have not because you ask not”.  I remember teaching a lesson once entitled “What do you want”?   I’m not sure we could even list the things we really WANT.  Oh, we’d like to have a new house and a new car and new cloths and a boat or some kind of material thing, but is that what we really want?  James tells us if you “want” it “ask for it”.  You don’t have it because you don’t ask for it. 

I know it’s a man thing.  But at Christmas and birthdays and anniversaries, I always ask my wife, “What do you want”?  And usually she doesn’t tell me.  If she would tell me, I’d get it for her.  If she would just say, “Bill, I’d like to have a new chain saw”, I’d rush up to the chain saw store and buy her a really nice one.  But she won’t do that.  She will just leave it up to me to think of something.

I wonder what you really want.  Have you asked God for it? 

James knew he was talking to some pretty selfish people, he had already established that.  So he qualifies his statement by saying “You ask and have not because you ask amiss”.  You are asking out of a selfish heart.  That might be a good scale to weigh our request on.  We need a “selfish-0-meter” that calculates the” why”.  Why am I praying this prayer?  Why am I asking God for this or that?  Are my motives for His glory or mine? 

3.  ADULTERY:  Here we find James referring to a topic we have discussed a lot in our Wednesday night Bible study.  We have talked at length about the fact that Christians should be different.  Christians should come apart and be separate.  Christians should not be like the world.  If we are going to be “married to Christ” then we must live like we are “married to Christ”.  If we don’t, James says we are guilty of committing adultery. 

If when I decided to ask Keva to marry me, I got down on one knee, presented her with a ring and asked her “To make me the happiest man alive by marrying me”, we stood before the preacher and said our vows and then I went off to live with another woman, enjoy her company, take her out to eat, spend time with her, what would the world call me?  (No, not dead) My actions would be called adultery and rightly so.

When we stand before God and men and claim to be a Christian and then go and live like the world, James says we should be called the same, adulterers and adulteresses. He reasons that I can’t be married to one and live with or like the other.  If I’m going to be a “friend” to the world, I will be an “enemy” to God. 

A few verses on down in this chapter James calls this condition being “double minded, Christians with mud on their hands and trash in their hearts.  He cautions us to have clean hands and a pure heart.

(Verse 5 is a little puzzling.  In all the reading and studying I have done I can not find the verse that James quotes here.  Nowhere can I find in the scriptures the verse or anything like the verse “The Spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy”.  That would be a good homework assignment for you if you have nothing else to do this week.)

 4.  LACK OF EFFORT:  We already know from our study of the last 3 chapters of James that James was a man of action.  He believed in Practical Christianity.  He believed in DOING something.  In verse 7 he instructs us to RESIST and DRAW NIGH both are ACTION WORDS. 

The word resist means desire, but NOT JUST DESIRE, it means doing something about your desire.  “Oh, I don’t want to do wrong”.  Then make an effort! 

If a “bad guy” came up to me and wanted to take my money, I wouldn’t want him to steal my money, it wouldn’t be my desire for him to steal my money, but he WOULD steal my money if I didn’t RESIST. 

When Satan comes to us and tempts us to do wrong, when he puts bad thoughts in our minds or bad things before our eyes, we don’t “want” to do wrong, but we fail to RESIST.  We fail to DO SOMETHING.  Paul told Timothy to FLEE, run, get out’a there.  Make an effort. 

If you are hungry, work, grow something.  If you are thirsty, find some water.  If you are cold wrap up in something, if you are tempted and are being beat up by the devil RESIST. 

And the opposite is true.  If we want to get closer to God we must also make an effort.  It is not by our efforts that we are made righteous and holy but when we make and effort God honors that effort and “draws near” to us. 

One would have to question your “wants” if all you did was “want” and didn’t make an effort to accomplish those wants.  If I want to get closer to you I must make and effort to get there.   I can’t just stand here and say I wish I were standing over there close to you, I have to make an effort.

5. JUDGING:  “I don’t judge, I just form opinions”.  “I’m not a judge; I’m just a fruit inspector”.  Call it what you will.  James says you are putting yourself in God’s place and isn’t that what got Satan in trouble in the first place?

The thing about judging is that we like to use two different sets of rules when we judge. I want to judge you by your actions.  But I want you to judge me by my intentions.  

If I do something wrong I justify it by saying “Well, that’s not what I meant to do”.  But if you do something wrong I am not concerned with your intents I only want to criticize you and punish you and talk about you because of WHAT you did, not WHY you did it. 

Two sets of rules, no matter how you look at it, that’s not very fair judgment.  How just would it be for us both to stand before a judge for a wrong-doing and he use one set of standards for me and another for you.  But that’s exactly what you and I do when we judge each other.  Don’t know about you but that makes my toes hurt.

6.  OMISSION:  “To him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin”

We have used John Wesley’s definition of sin in the past, “A willful transgression against the known will of God”.  That means knowing that something is wrong and making the choice to do it anyway.

But James goes further. He says knowing that something is right and choosing NOT to do it is sin.  In “Christian-ease” we call that the sin of omission. 

I believe that James did a pretty good job of answering the question, “where do the wars and fightings come from among you”?  Like most all of our problems they come from US.  It’s our fault and it will take our trust in God’s mercy and grace and some effort on our part to overcome them.  It seems to me that makes sense.  It seems to me that is Practical Christianity.