This weeks lesson covers some straight forward instructions about living our lives out wherever we are. James tells us that God does not change, and that he loves us so much that he gave us his good news (word of truth) making us the First Fruits of his creatures! Good News! (James 1:16-18)
Loving God when Tempted
12 Blessed is the man who endures
temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life
which the Lord has promised to those who love Him. 13 Let no one say when he is
tempted, "I am tempted by God"; for God cannot be tempted by evil,
nor does He Himself tempt anyone. 14 But each one is tempted when he is drawn
away by his own desires and enticed. 15 Then, when desire has conceived, it
gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, brings forth death.
16 Do not be deceived, my beloved
brethren. 17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes
down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of
turning. 18 Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of truth, that we
might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures.
During our study in the first part of James chapter 1, we
have encountered several hard sayings, so to speak. In verses 2-4 James commands
believers to count it all joy when we encounter various trials in our lives. We
are to endure in the face of trials and to allow endurance to mature us as
believers. In verses 5-9 James tells us to ask God for wisdom but to do so in a
manner that is not double-minded. We should believe not only that God will give
us wisdom but also that what God calls us to do is wise. We are not, to look
ahead a bit, simply to be hearers of God’s word, but doers also, to emulate father
Abraham, who, when God called upon him to sacrifice his son, his only son
Isaac, whom he loved, rose up early the next morning and moved forward in
faith, “concluding that God was able to raise him [Isaac] up, even from the dead, from which he also received him
in a figurative sense. ”
In verses 9-11 James calls us to look upon our earthly situation from a
spiritual perspective, neither despairing in our poverty nor rejoicing in our
riches, but trusting in spiritual riches. Finally, in verses 12-15 James clarifies
for us that we should blame ourselves, and not God, when we are tempted to do
evil. Such temptation is not from God, because God never tempts anyone for evil
purposes. Instead that sort of temptation originates in our own desires and
lusts.
As I said at the outset, these are hard sayings, and just like the
disciples of Jesus who heard Him teach that they must eat His flesh and drink
His blood to have eternal life,
our reaction often is “How can anyone receive or accept such things?” When we
have lost someone near and dear to us, when we have lost our job, our home, our
savings, our marriage, or our health, it is truly difficult to rejoice and
praise the Lord. Thankfully, our God in His grace and mercy understands our
weakness and our struggles and always makes a way for us. Our passage tonight,
James 1:16-18, is one of many intended to encourage us. And the point of our
passage is I believe that every good and perfect gift comes down from God, who
is the one constant in our lives. Furthermore, I would assert that our passage
tonight implies not only that every good and perfect gift comes from God, but
also that everything that God gives us, or allows to happen to us, is good and
perfect for us.
With that briefest of introductions, let us turn our
attention to our passage tonight and notice first how it opens. James begins by
warning us in love, calling us beloved brethren, not be deceived. Interestingly
James does not specify what it is that we might being deceived about. In such
cases, the simplest answer often comes from the surrounding context. Our
passage tonight occurs immediately after James’ discussion of the origin of
temptation, and right before his admonition to be doers not just hearers of the
word. My belief is that the deception to which James is referring here is
deception about the nature of temptation and the character of God. James has
told us that all temptation to do evil has its origin in our own desires and
not in God. The Lord does indeed test our characters at times but His intent when
doing so is always good, helping us to learn more about ourselves and
conforming us to the image of His Son.
Even though the trials that God brings about or allows to
happen in our lives often seem, when we are in the midst of them, like the
discipline of God, and at times that may be exactly what God is doing, the
truth is that this testing and disciple is, when seen from a spiritual
perspective, a good thing. In fact the chastening of God is, the writer of
Hebrews tells us, a sign that we are His adopted sons and daughters and not
illegitimate, which produces the “peaceable fruit of righteousness”:
"My son, do not despise the chastening
of the Lord,
Nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him;
6 For whom the Lord loves He chastens,
And scourges every son whom He receives."
Nor be discouraged when you are rebuked by Him;
6 For whom the Lord loves He chastens,
And scourges every son whom He receives."
7 If you endure chastening, God deals with
you as with sons; for what son is there whom a father does not chasten? 8 But
if you are without chastening, of which all have become partakers, then you are
illegitimate and not sons. 9 Furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected
us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much more readily be in subjection
to the Father of spirits and live? 10 For they indeed for a few days chastened
us as seemed best to them, but He for our profit, that we may be partakers of
His holiness. 11 Now no chastening seems to be joyful for the present, but
painful; nevertheless, afterward it yields the peaceable fruit of righteousness
to those who have been trained by it.
Seen from a spiritual perspective, the testing and chastening
that come from God are good things. In point of fact everything that comes from
God is both good for us and perfect; it is exactly what we need. The gifts that
God gives us are consistent with His nature and with His feelings toward us. It
is out of the abundance of the heart that the mouth speaks and I would add
gifts are given. God desires us to understand His ways and how much He loves us
and gives us many scriptures to that effect, including our passage tonight.
Notice how in verse 17 James describes God as the “Father of
Lights.” While this term for God occurs only in James, light and fire are
frequently associated with God in scripture. The Lord appears as a burning bush
to Moses[ .
God “covers His hands with lightening and commands it to
strike. ”
Of Jesus it is said that “In Him was life, and the life was
the light of men. ”
And Jesus calls Himself the “light of the world ,”
such that those who follow Him will not walk in darkness but have the light of
life. As a general rule, light is associated with life, truth, and all that is
good, while darkness is associated with death, falsehood, and what is evil.
James here uses Greek astronomical language to describe
God’s character. As the Father of Lights, God has no variation or shadow of
turning. In contrast to the heavenly bodies He created, which appear from an
earthly perspective to shift positions in the sky, being sometimes visible and
other times obscured, God’s orbit is has no variation, is always visible, and
is never darkened or eclipsed by other heavenly bodies. This language is just
James’ way of expressing the constancy of our God. In “For I am the Lord, I do not change;” God proclaims in Malachi 3:6, “Therefore you are not
consumed, O sons of Jacob.” And Jesus Christ, Hebrews
13:8 tells us, “is the same yesterday,
today, and forever.”
Because God is faithful and unchanging, we can safely place
our faith in the promises of His word. God’s word has power and speaking it accomplishes
what it was sent out to do .
God said,
“Let there be light,” and there was light . Hebrews 6:17-18 speaks to us of God’s
desire to communicate both the immutability of His counsel and His faithfulness
to His word to Abraham:
17
Thus God, determining to show more abundantly to the heirs of promise the
immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath, 18 that by two immutable
things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we might have strong
consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us.
God, who scripture tells us cannot lie , further guaranteed His promise to Abraham
by an oath, for the benefit of believers in every generation, so that we would have
strong encouragement to have faith and hope in His word.
But not only is the Father of lights constant, true, and
good, He also cares deeply for His creations, and especially those made in His
own image. For example, in Jeremiah 29:11-14, God tells the Children of Israel
taken into captivity by Babylon:
11 For I know the thoughts that I
think toward you, says the Lord, thoughts of peace and not of evil, to give you
a future and a hope. 12 Then you will call upon Me and go and pray to Me, and I
will listen to you. 13 And you will seek Me and find Me, when you search for Me
with all your heart.
And again, during the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus reassures
His disciples and the crowds who had gathered to hear Him that their Father in
heaven will give them good things:
John 3:16-17 tells us that “God
so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in
Him should not perish but have everlasting life. 17 For God did not send His Son into the
world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.”
And building on this thought, the Apostle Paul, writing in Romans 8:31-33,
which chapter I encouraged you to read through the last time we were together,
reminds us that “If God is for us, who can be
against us? 32 He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us
all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things?”
The Lord understands exactly who and what were are, our
weaknesses, our unfaithfulness, the wickedness of our hearts. This is why He
sent His Son to live a life of perfect obedience to His will and to die on the
cross as an atoning sacrifice for us – because He understood that we were only
dust. And this is why He gives us the gift of His Holy Spirit, who enables us
to understand the things of God, helps us in our weakness , reminds us of the teachings of Jesus , intercedes for us in prayer , and convicts us of sin . On our own we can never hope to be good,
much less perfect, but with God, all things are possible . It is, I believe, because of the good and
perfect equipping given to us by the Lord that James encourages us to “let patience have its perfect work, that you may be
perfect and complete, lacking nothing .”
In fact James tells us in verse 18 that God, “Of His own will He brought us forth by the word of
truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures.” The
generation that Paul was writing to was indeed the “firstfruits” of the new
creations that the Lord was rebirthing through the “word of truth.” And this
“word of truth” which James refers to could be either the good news of the
Gospel or Jesus Himself, who is both the Word and the Truth. And it is the same
for us today. By our faith and belief in the good news of the Gospel, we are born
again, of the Holy Spirit, able to see and enter the kingdom of God.
In closing, we need to always be mindful of the teaching of
Romans 8:28, that all things work together for good for those who love God, to
those who are called according to His purpose. Our Father in heaven, the Father
of lights, is ever-faithful and loves us deeply. We can trust in His promises and
be assured that His will for us is good and perfect. God is sovereign and
seated on the throne of heaven. Not even one sparrow falls to the ground apart
from His will . Since we are of more value to Him than
many sparrows let us rest assured that everything that comes our way has passed
through His hands and will work together for our good.
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