Luke 15:11-20

Psalm 108

I want to begin with a story about David. David was the greatest king in Israel’s ancient history. He was called the man after God’s own heart. With such accolades, you might be inclined to think that his life was easy. For those of you who are familiar with his story, you know that wasn’t the case. David’s life was filled with struggle. And when I say filled with struggle, I mean real, life-threatening, gut-wrenching, despair-producing struggle.

We are introduced to David when he is a teenager, perhaps 15. That’s when the prophet Samuel anoints him to be the future king of Israel. If you put yoursel in that story, such an event would invite all kinds of dreams of a bright future. And they did begin that way. In the next chapter David kills Goliath, the giant who had sparked fear into the Israeli army. It was a shocking event and rallied Israel to a great victory over the Philistines. David was recruited into Saul’s service and found great success in his military campaigns as a commander in Saul’s army. But Saul grew jealous and David was eventually forced to flee for his life, hiding in caves for a time and eventually taking refuge with the Philistines themselves. What had been promised in his anointing was far from being fulfilled.

But things go from bad to worse. When the Philistines come together to face Israel in battle, David and his men are sent back only to discover that their homes had been burned with fire and their women and children taken.

And David was greatly distressed, for the people spoke of stoning him, because all the people were bitter in soul, each for his sons and daughters… (1 Samuel 30:6)

This was a low point in David’s life. How could there be such a gap between what God had promised and the fulfillment of that promise? And how do you endure in such a time? That’s a dilemma that we all face at some time or another.

Some of you are here this morning reeling in setbacks to your own past sinful patterns. You may remember the sense of hope that comes with the promise of eternal life when you first found your faith in God. The Kingdom of God is a great promise! But now, you feel defeated by your sin. There is a gap between the promise and the fulfillment.

Some of you are here this morning struggling over your children. You remember their baptism, the promise of God of the blessings of the New Covenant and the pouring out of the Spirit. While your children, when young, enjoyed the Bible Stories, the catechism chants, and fellowship of the church, now they are teenagers or grown and seem so far from the reality of those promises. There is a gap between the promise and the fulfillment.

Some of you are here this morning struggling over ministry. You remember the excitement and energy that you once had meeting new people, and training and equipping, but now things seem stagnant or even declining. There is a gap between the promise and the fulfillment. How do you get through it? This is where David’s story helps. Let me read the rest of that verse:

And David was greatly distressed, for the people spoke of stoning him, because all the people were bitter in soul, each for his sons and daughters. But David strengthened himself in the Lord his God. (1 Samuel 30:6)

How do you strengthen yourself in the Lord? I think this is exactly what Psalm 108 is showing us how to do. At the core of this prayer is a reflection on who God is, and the result of that reflection is renewed confidence: with God, we move forward valiantly! Because the Lord is our God, we shall do valiantly!

James 5:13-20

We’ve got one more sermon from the book of James and it has to do with prayer. If we put that in the context of the question we’ve been asking in James: what does saving faith, that is, genuine faith, look like? We can say that genuine faith leads a person to a life of prayer.

Let’s be honest. Prayer is a challenge. Either we don’t know what to pray or we are skeptical of the effectiveness of our prayers. James helps us in both of these areas in this passage. He shows us a picture of what our prayer life is to be.

Zechariah 14:1-21

Easter is a pivotal day in history. It is arguably the most significant day of the Christian calendar. We hear that and believe it, but I’m convinced most of us don’t really understand it. That’s not to say we don’t value the resurrection. We think of the resurrection as God’s victory over death, which it certainly shows. We think of the resurrection as foreshadowing of our own, which it certainly is. But the resurrection was an event far greater in scope and purpose than just this, and this chapter in Zecharaiah helps us put that in perspective.

For God’s people were in despair. God had done to bring about his great purpose: “I will be your God and you will be my people,” but to no avail. They were still not there. God had shown them that no amount of human effort; not through mighty or wise kings; could this happen. It would take God himself. That’s what the prophets prepare his people to look for. How would they know when he came? Zechariah prophesies that he would come humbly, riding on a donkey. When Jesus did this on Palm Sunday, the people cheered. But their hopes were soon dashed as Jesus was arrested, tried, convicted, and crucified.

Zechariah shows us that this is not the end of the story. Yes, he came in humility on the donkey, and so, in a way, we should not be surprised by his humiliation on the cross. But Zechariah goes on to show something powerful in this chapter. God would not only come humbly. He will also come with great power, and his resurrection was the announcement to the world and the cosmic universe that it was time.

How do we see the power of the king?

Zechariah 14

Easter is a pivotal day in history. It is arguably the most significant day of the Christian calendar. We hear that and believe it, but I’m convinced most of us don’t really understand it. That’s not to say we don’t value the resurrection. We think of the resurrection as God’s victory over death, which it certainly shows. We think of the resurrection as foreshadowing of our own, which it certainly is. But the resurrection was an event far greater in scope and purpose than just this, and this chapter in Zecharaiah helps us put that in perspective.

For God’s people were in despair. God had done to bring about his great purpose: “I will be your God and you will be my people,” but to no avail. They were still not there. God had shown them that no amount of human effort; not through mighty or wise kings; could this happen. It would take God himself. That’s what the prophets prepare his people to look for. How would they know when he came? Zechariah prophesies that he would come humbly, riding on a donkey. When Jesus did this on Palm Sunday, the people cheered. But their hopes were soon dashed as Jesus was arrested, tried, convicted, and crucified.

Zechariah shows us that this is not the end of the story. Yes, he came in humility on the donkey, and so, in a way, we should not be surprised by his humiliation on the cross. But Zechariah goes on to show something powerful in this chapter. God would not only come humbly. He will also come with great power, and his resurrection was the announcement to the world and the cosmic universe that it was time.

How do we see the power of the king?

Zechariah 12:10-13:9

Let’s jump in with a story; a story that begins in a place of darkness. It begins in ancient Jerusalem. Israel had left Egypt with grand hopes and a bright future. God would fulfill his promises to Abraham and make them into a great nation in a land full of “milk and honey.” He would made them the envy of all the world. And while there were moments in which that seemed possible, that dream was shattered with the exile. The Babylonians, a ruthless and wicked people, conquered them as a people, killing many and carrying many others into captivity. The prophets had spoken of this because the people deserved it. They had broken their covenant with God and he had send them into exile. For those who listened to the prophets, hope was not lost as they also spoke of an end to the exile, when they would return around a new Jerusalem.

That happened in 538 BC. The Persians defeated the Babylonians and a decree was issued to send back the Jews to rebuild Jerusalem and the temple. Hope was restored! But the work was far more difficult than first imagined and it stalled. There was great opposition in the surrounding area and things grew dark. This once great city was in shambles and the few who returned were insignificant compared to the nations and cities around them. It seemed more and more headed toward utter despair, and hopelessness. That was the state of Israel when Zechariah was written. The exile was supposed to be over. Things were supposed to be better. But they weren’t. What would it take to overcome this darkness?

It would take a King. What would that king do? He would prepare them for glory. And that is the story of holy week. Just as it is the story of Zechariah.

James 5:7-12

Last week James forced us to wrestle with a very uncomfortable question:  Where do you really find your security?

Is it in what you can build, such as your career or your family?

James shows us the danger of building our assurance on the things of this world. Not because work, planning, or saving are wrong — Scripture commends diligence and wisdom. But because they make terrible saviors.

And the danger is subtle, because these things feel secure. You can see your bank account. You can track your investments. You can plan your career. You can build toward retirement. You can create a vision of the life you want. And these things can begin to quietly shape what drives you. Not necessarily greed, but security.

Ultimately, we want to know that our future will be okay. We want to know that our future life is secure. This is not a bad desire. It’s a good desire. And our problem isn’t planning in light of it. Our problem is basing our assurance on what we can plan for ourselves. Because in the end, we are not in control. And we know how true that is. In just the past couple of decades we have seen markets collapse, wars begin unexpectedly, pandemics shut down the world, hurricanes wipe out communities overnight. Things people thought were stable disappeared almost instantly.

Building our assurance and what we can produce is not only dangerous because we’re not in control, but because of how it can shape us. We saw how it can lead to moral blindness. It is easy to get so caught up in what you have to do, that you overlook the needs of others all around you. You justify passing them by. You can become less generous. Less patient. Less compassionate. We can start seeing people as obstacles instead of neighbors.

That is what James exposed in the passage before this one. But now James turns the coin over. And this is where verse 7 begins with that very important word: "Therefore…" Meaning: If your security is not to be found in what you build here, if your assurance is not in worldly wealth, if your future is not defined by what you can control—then what does it look like to actually live that way? What kind of life does that produce?

If your hope is truly in Christ's kingdom, you will have to live between the promise and the fulfillment. Between what God has guaranteed and what you do not yet see. And that requires patience. We must live by faith in what we cannot yet see, instead of by sight in what we can.

James 4:13-5:6

Each week we’ve approached James with this simple question: what does saving faith actually look like? How do we discern saving faith from false faith? For it is a frightening thing to build a life on something that, in the end, will fail us.

As many of you know, I grew up going to a little lake in Michigan. It was a beautiful and magical place. But there is a dark reality to it, that would wake me in the night with nightmares. On the far side of the lake there are sand dunes. On the other side of the sand dunes lies Lake Michigan. The wind can be fierce blowing from the West with nothing to stop it as it blows over the water. As a result, sand constantly blows into the lake. As the story goes, in a century the lake would be filled in because of it. In my dreams I would awake to find only small puddles where the lake once was.

What’s even more frightening is the living examples of it. There is a nice cabin next to the dunes that gets partially buried each winter. If you get there in May and early June you will find a large excavator moving sand off and away from the cabin, filling any vehicle with free sand willing to carry it away. It is a losing battle. There are already countless cabins buried to its west.

Someone invested a lot of money into that cabin, probably many decades ago. And soon it will disappear, never to be seen again.

What caused such a disaster? They built on the sand. It didn’t seem unstable when they built. There was a forest where the dunes were. But the timber industry, after the great fire in Chicago in 1871 triggered a high demand for lumber and the Eastern shore of Lake Michigan was an easy target. So they cut down the trees and the roots that held the sand in place slowly decayed and the sand began to drift.

This story highlights what James warns us against. Don’t build your life on things of this world. They may look stable but they are not. And when you do, whether you realize it or not, out of a desire to stabelize your own future, you risk destroying that of others.

You may recall a parable of Jesus that drives this point home:

“Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock. 25 And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house, but it did not fall, because it had been founded on the rock. 26 And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. 27 And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.” (Matthew 7:24–27)

Saving faith builds a life on covenant faithfulness rather than visible securities. As the prophets put it, we are to live by faith (in the invisible kingdom) and not by sight (of the worldly kingdoms).

James 3:18=4:12

Last week we ended with James statement:

a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace. (James 3:18)

James is talking about life within a community. Sowing peace is a powerful thing and is a product of saving faith. As we continue our series in James looking at the characteristics of saving faith, this would be the one we see in this passage. Saving faith sows peace in the community, specifically the church community.

By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:35)

Here he describes a single attribute, love, that will identify the church apart from the world. The church living out saving faith stands apart as a community. The peace that permeates it proves a genuine love between the members.

When I say community, I’m talking about more than a loosely connected group. I’m talking about a group that has learned to share each other’s burdens and joys, share their assets when needed, gently correct and quickly forgive. This is the kind of community the apostolic writers directed for the church. This is the environment in which we mature into Christlikeness. Apart from this community, in fact, we cannot expect to grow as God intended. As Paul puts it in Ephesians 4:15-16

speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.

This level of community is assumed by James. So the first thing we must encourage is to be involved in the church to this degree, which can’t happen with a casual connection. If you’re only time to interact with others is Sunday morning where you might have 5 minutes before or after worship, it is extremely unlikely. Which is why we cultivate small groups, whether Bible studies, men’s prayer, TWC, etc. So involvement is assumed. Without involvement, conflicts won’t happen, that’s the good news, but niether will any of the development. We know James community was involved with each other because there were conflicts. That’s the positive aspect of James’ rebuke.

What happens in a community when peace is not sown? When saving faith is not at work? This is what James launches into with this passage out of chapter 4.

The good news for us is that James shows us the path out of it. To get there, we must understand the cause of conflict, the catalyst of conflict, and the cure for conflict.

James 3:13-18

We’ve been looking at James who gives us a clear look at what genuine saving faith looks like. I fear there are far too many people in the church today that believe they are Christians, but are not. Remember Jesus’ words,

“Enter by the narrow gate. For the gate is wide and the way is easy that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. 14 For the gate is narrow and the way is hard that leads to life, and those who find it are few. (Matthew 7:13–14)

Real saving faith is found by few, not many. Most, without realizing it, fit better the proverb,

There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death. (Proverbs 14:12)

James gives us tools for self-examination: Is my faith saving faith or something else?

“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. 16 You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 17 So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. 18 A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. 19 Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. 20 Thus you will recognize them by their fruits. (Matthew 7:15–20)

This is what James is doing. He’s examining faith by looking at its fruit and goes into detail about that that fruit looks like. For the hard reality is this:

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. 22 On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ 23 And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’ (Matthew 7:21–23)

Many engaged in ministry but still did not have saving faith. Ministry itself is not a litmus test for saving faith. So if this is the case, what does saving faith look like? What fruit does it produce?

As James opened his letter, we saw that saving faith perseveres. It doesn’t fade away when it is challenged. Then he helped us see that faith always leads to action. It is not merely something we profess, as though some intellectual agreement is enough. He showed us that saving faith does not show partiality when it comes to the way we treat people. We don’t show favor to those who can favor us back at the expense of those who can’t. We saw how the way you speak reflects what is truly in the heart. Does your love for God prevail over your frustation with people and life or vice-versa?

That brings us to this morning’s passage and he gives us another litmus test: wisdom.

In this passage we find two contrasting sources of wisdom. One is from above and the other is from below. In fact, James is blunt enough to say that one is “demonic.” He doesn’t pull any punches and he doesn’t leave room for anything in between. One of these sources of wisdom will guide your life. One of these sources is born out of genuine, saving faith, and the other is not. Which guides you? The wisdom which guides your life reveals the true nature of your faith. James puts it this way: Who is wise and understanding among you?

Before we jump into comparing and contrasting godly wisdom from worldly, or demonic, wisdom, let’s take a moment to talk about what James means by wisdom. Is verse 13 he asks who is “wise and understanding.” Wise comes from the Greek σοφὸς which can mean wisdom, as is translated, but it carries the nuance of practicality. He isn’t asking who is intelligent, but who is skilled in living.

And then he adds, ἐπιστήμων, which is translated “understanding” which carries the nuance of having deep understanding or mastery.