trials

HOW TO OBTAIN WISDOM – James 1:5-8

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INTRODUCTION: Someone has said that knowledge is the ability to take things apart, while wisdom is the ability to put them together and make sense of them.  The people to whom James wrote this letter had problems with their praying.  When we are going through difficulties, what should we pray about?  James gives the answer:  ask God for wisdom.

I.  ASK FOR WISDOM (verse 5)

Why do we need wisdom when we are going through trials?  Why not ask for strength, or grace, or even deliverance?  We should pray for wisdom for this reason:  we need wisdom so that we will not waste the opportunities God is giving us to mature in our Christian lives.  Wisdom helps us understand how to use these difficult circumstances for our good and for God’s glory.  This kind of wisdom comes from God.  It is a gift from God.  God’s wisdom enables a person to make decisions as God would make them, and solve problems the way God would solve them. In his search of the source of true wisdom, Job cries out, “But where can wisdom be found?”  His answer is that wisdom is not found among the living on this earth;  it is not found in the depths of the sea;  and it cannot be purchased with precious stones.  Finally Job declares, “Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom.”  True wisdom has its source in the true and living God. We all have a natural tendency to be selfish in our prayers.  Some of us recall how we were tempted to ask God for special help when facing a difficult examination during our school days, but in our hearts we knew He would not bring to our minds material which we had not studied.  Prayer is not a magical formula enabling believers to escape self-discipline and hard work.  However, it isn’t selfish to pray for spiritual wisdom – the ability to meet life’s problems and to make decisions that will please God.  King Solomon, with all his knowledge, realized that unless the Lord gave him spiritual wisdom to direct his actions, all his human skill and learning would be of littlevalue. President Abraham Lincoln was impressed with this truth during America’s Civil War.  A personal friend of his once wrote, “I had been spending three weeks at the White House as the guest of the President.  One night – it was just before the Battle of Bull Run, I was restless and could not sleep.  From Lincoln’s bedroom I heard the low tones of his voice.  Looking in the door that was slightly ajar, I saw a sight which I have never forgotten.  The tall Chief Executive was kneeling before an open Bible.  He did not know that I could overhear his agonizing prayers as he pleaded, ‘O Thou great God that heard Solomon in the night when he prayed and cried for wisdom, hear me.  I cannot lead these people.  I cannot guide the affairs of this country without Thy help.  O Lord, hear me and save this nation.’ ”  The answer he received is now history, for the Union was preserved.  Lincoln found that James 1:5 was not an idle promise.

II.  ASK IN FAITH (verses 6-8)

James not only explained what to ask for, but he also described how to ask.  We are to ask in faith.  The greatest enemy to answered prayer is unbelief.  The story is told of a small town in which there were no liquor stores.  Eventually, however, a nightclub was built right on Main Street.  Members of one of the churches in the area were so disturbed that they conducted several all-night prayer meetings, and asked the Lord to burn down that den of iniquity.  Lightning struck the tavern a short time later, and it was completely destroyed by fire.  The owner, knowing how the church people had prayed, sued them for the damages.  His attorney claimed that their prayers had caused the loss.  The congregation, on the other hand, hired a lawyer and fought the charges.  After much deliberation, the judge declared, “It’s the opinion of this court that wherever the guilt may lie, the tavern keeper is the one who really believes in prayer, while the church members do not!”  We smile at this story, but it suggests how faithless we sometimes are when we offer our prayers to God. Even the first-century Christians were guilty of such unbelief.  Acts 12 tells us that after Peter escaped from prison, he went to the house of Mary, where many were praying for his release.  When he knocked, Rhoda came to the door.  Hearing his voice, she ran back to the “prayer meeting crowd” and announced that the apostle Peter was outside.  “You are out of you mind!”, they said.  But when she insisted, they kept saying, “It is his angel”.  Well, Peter kept on knocking at the door, and when they finally let him in, “they were astonished” at the way God had answered their request. May our attitude be different when we pray!  Let’s believe God and expect the answer!  God loves to honor the prayers of those who earnestly seek His wisdom and want His will for their lives. Verse 8 talks about a double-minded person.  A double-minded person is a person who has a civil war going on inside him continually.  Two heads may be better than one, but a double-minded person is no good at all.  There is a smooth, shiny lizard called a skink.  This little animal wouldn’t attract any crowds at a zoo, but if one of these lizards showed up with two heads, one on each end of its body, that would be quite a spectacle.  A newspaper had a picture and a story about the two-headed skink I just described to you.  It was found by a homeowner in Jacksonville, Florida, and it was an illustration of absolute frustration.  When it tried to run, its two legs moved in opposite directions.  It was running like mad but going nowhere!  That’s the fate of a Christian who is trying to go his own way, and trying to serve the Lord at the same time. This is also true of the Christian who is more concerned about pleasing others than he is about standing up for the truth.  There was once a preacher who was approached by some members of his congregation concerning a disagreement in the church.  After stating their grievances, they said some vicious things about the people they disagreed with.  Responding to their complaints, the preacher said, “You’re right;  you’re absolutely right!”  The next day, the other group came to his home and told their side of the story.  The preacher listened quietly, and when they had finished, said, “You’re right;  you’re absolutely right!”  His wife, working in the kitchen, overheard everything.  As soon as the parishioners left, she rushed into the living room and said, “You’re just about the most wishy-washy individual I’ve ever seen.”  To that he immediately replied, “You’re right;  you’re absolutely right!” There are so many Christians who are unwilling to take a stand on issues.  Some are afraid;  others just don’t like to make decisions.  But God wants us to know His Word, to pray for His wisdom, and to take a stand for what we believe.  Then we’ll feel secure in the Lord’s strength, and then our prayers will not be hindered.  But when we do take a stand for what we believe, let’s do it with the wisdom and love of our Lord Jesus Christ.

REJOICING IN TROUBLES – James 1:1-4

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INTRODUCTION:

Did you know that in the early days of baseball, the batter signaled the pitcher where to throw the ball?  That’s right, he actually told him where he wanted it!  He held out his bat  and showed him.  As the sport of baseball progressed, however, the batter had more and more obstacles to overcome – for example, the curve ball!  As pitching the ball became more complicated, hitting the ball became more difficult.  This illustration points us to a modern-day problem.  Many people believe that they can determine what they want life to give them.  But the believer in the Lord Jesus Christ who expects his or her Christian life to be easy is in for a shock!

I.  THE GREETING (verse 1)

James addresses his letter to the Jews who are living outside the Promised Land because of the persecution of Christians.  He was writing to Christian Jews.  The word “scattered” in verse l is the Greek word “diaspora”, and it carries the idea of “scattering seed”.  When the Jewish believers were scattered at the beginning of the persecution, it was really the sowing of seed in many places;  and much of that seed bore fruit as many gentiles heard the Gospel message and received the Lord Jesus Christ as their personal Savior and Lord.

II.  A JOYFUL ATTITUDE (verse 2)

James tells us in verse 2 to expect trials.  He does not say, “if you fall into various trials”, but “when you encounter various trials”.  We can’t always expect everything to go our way.  Some trials come simply because we are human.  For example, sickness, accidents, disappointments, even tragedies are the lot of the human race.  Other trials come because we are Christians.  Satan fights against us and the world opposes us, and this makes for a life of battles.  The trials of life are not all alike.  They are like the multicolored yarn that a weaver uses to make a beautiful oriental rug.  God arranges the colors and experiences of life.  The final product is a beautiful thing for His glory.  Have you ever looked at the underside of an oriental rug?  The patterns are unclear and there are loose ends of yarn dangling.  We are looking at the wrong side of life!  Only God sees the finished pattern!  Let’s not judge God or His work based on what we see today.  His work isn’t finished yet!

We are to “consider it all joy”, knowing that God is doing what is best for us.  Just before the Second World War, two refugees from Germany had just arrived in the United States by ship.  Though they were  Christians by faith, they were Jewish by birth.  They arrived  here without friends, without money, and without the youth and the strength to start a new life.  One of them said to an American pastor, “We sometimes think we ought to thank God for Hitler.”  “Why?”, the pastor asked in amazement.  And the answer came:  “Because he has taught us that we need nothing but God.  Hitler has taken from us everything else, and now we know that God is enough.”  In the Old Testament scriptures, Job demonstrated his confidence in God when he said in Job 23:10, “But He knoweth the way that I take;  when He hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold”.

A lady named Ida Clark was overcome with grief as she approached the church on the Sunday morning after her mother had died.  Just outside the church a 7-year-old boy met her.  He stopped, planted his feet solidly on the path in front of her, and with tearful eyes looked up at her.  “I prayed for your mother”, he said, “but she died.”  For a moment the  sorrowing woman wanted to scoop him up in her arms and cry with him, but she could see he was seriously disturbed because he thought his prayers had not been answered.  So she quickly and quietly lifted her heart to God in a silent prayer.  “O Lord, give me the right answer!”  Then she said to the boy very solemnly, “You wanted God to do His best for my mother, didn’t you?”  He nodded slowly.  “Son, He answered your prayer.  His best for her was to take her home to live with Him.”  The lad’s eyes lighted up as he replied, “That’s right, He did.”  Then off he ran to meet his friends, content that God had taken her to heaven.

Do the events in your life go against everything you think is good?  Is it hard to understand why circumstances haven’t fallen into place like you prayed they would?  Don’t be dismayed.  Trust God and ask Him to help you learn the difficult but rewarding lesson of being satisfied with His best.  There is a poem that goes like this:

He knows why we must suffer;                                                                                                     He knows why we must grieve;                                                                                                      He knows why days are lonely;                                                                                                      He says only, “Believe!                                                                                                                    Believe that I your Father                                                                                                          send each and every test;                                                                                                           Dear child, there is a reason,                                                                                                          For I know what is best.”

III.  AN UNDERSTANDING MIND (verse 3)

What is it that Christians know that makes it easier to face trials and benefit from them?  They know that God always tests us to bring out the best in us.  Peter says in I Peter 1:6-7, “In this you greatly rejoice, even though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been distressed by various trials, that the proof of your faith being more precious than gold which is perishable, even though tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ”.

A gold prospector brings his ore sample into the inspector’s office to be tested.  The sample itself may not be worth more than a few dollars, but the approval, the official statement about the ore, may be worth millions!  It assures the prospector that he has a gold mine.  God’s approval of our faith is also precious because it assures us that our faith is genuine.

Verse 3 tells us that the testing of our faith produces endurance or patience.  God wants to make us patient because that is the key to every other blessing.  The person who does not learn patience will not learn much of anything else.  We live in an “instant society” today.  We have instant cash, instant food and drink.  We have the ten-minute oil change, one-hour photo processing, and same-day dry cleaning.  You would think that waiting must be one of life’s most trying experiences.  We’ve created for ourselves instant lifestyles.  If things don’t happen right now, we tend to explode inside ourselves, and often we explode on the outside also.  As Christians we tend to direct our impatience toward God, especially when we are undergoing a trial.  If God can create something out of nothing in an instant, why doesn’t He act?  Yet He seems to take His time.  Look how long He delayed before sending Jesus into the world.  Yet in Galatians 4:4 it says, “In the fullness of time God sent His Son.”  And there is a “right time” for God to bring us to maturity and a strong faith.

When the believer in Jesus Christ learns to wait on the Lord, then God can do great things for him or her.  Immature people are always impatient;  mature people are patient and persistent.  A nurse in a servicemen’s hospital complained to the chaplain that she had been rudely treated by some of the patients.  He answered, “Thank God for that!”  “What do you mean”, she asked in astonishment.  “Well”, he explained, “if you are holding a glass and someone knocks against you, you can only spill out what is inside!”  When people misjudge and persecute us, we soon reveal what is in our hearts.  If we are Christ-filled and controlled by the Holy Spirit, we will manifest the gentleness and patience of our Savior.  In fact, God often allows us to be pushed around and mistreated so that unsaved men and women around us might be amazed by God’s grace as we overflow with love and patience.  People who have studied the life of John Bunyan, the author of the book, “Pilgrim’s Progress”, tell us that he was such a devoted Christian that he actually asked the Lord to send severe trials into his life so that he might have new occasions to show his love for Jesus.

The only way the Lord can develop patience and character in our lives is through trials.  Knowing this, we can face trials joyfully.  We know what trials will do in us and for us, and we know that the end result will bring glory to God.  Just like the athlete disciplines himself, and goes through the agony of training, in order to win.

IV.  THE RESULT (verse 4)

The result, in verse 4, is “that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.”  In this age of “instant lifestyles”, we need to continually remind ourselves that God has a right time for everything.  Dr. Niles tells about a service being held in a cathedral in Norway.  Worshipers had noticed that the ceiling was low in proportion to the rest of the building.  During the sermon, Bishop Bergraav told the congregation that the ceiling which they see was not the true ceiling.  It was a working floor built for the artists who were painting the life of our Lord on the true ceiling.  Some day the working floor would be taken down, and they would see what the artists had been doing.

As we look up and try to see what God is doing in the world, we are tempted to feel disappointed.  We are looking for soaring arches and a high ceiling that reminds us of infinity and of heaven.  But one day our working floor will be taken away, and then we will see what the Great Artist has been doing in our lives.

How are you handling your difficulties?  Self-pity, murmuring, and rebellion will hinder your growth; but praise, submission to God and a deep faith in God’s loving purpose will produce in you a growing likeness to Jesus Christ.  God is never in a hurry.  Are we?