Grace Community

All advancing societies have anti-discrimination laws and yet discrimination is everywhere. This is because laws can't change the heart, they can only regulate the body. God's 'perfect law of love' is better than this. 
In this section in James we see how it is sinful to discriminate against people. The way to deal with discrimination is to get a new set of values. Because Christians value Jesus more than anything, we 'judge' people by God's values. And God is love and commands us to love our neighbour. 
The way we are empowered to love is because we have been shown such incredible mercy by God. Mercy we did not deserve. 
So, those who value Jesus Christ above everything are set free to obey the law of love.
1. Value Jesus above everything
2. Don't discriminate but instead love indiscriminately

Most people will allow that if there is a God, He is powerful, immense, and at least creative. Far fewer will believe that He is good. The brokeness of the world around us calls into question whether He is good... in this talk we think more about this and, as always, when we get to Jesus we see that God is most definitely good - 'gooder' than we can even imagine. 

This talk is the second of these three points that flow out of Genesis 1 1-25

1. God creates order out of chaos - how does Jesus show us this? - so what? Why is this good news? 

2. God is The Good - what is 'good' anyway? Creation gives us glimpses of this even though it is now broken - Jesus incontrovertibly proves God is good - this means that the good we seek and the corresponding enjoyment of it, is all found in God.

3. God seeks relationship

Until we are set free from ourselves, we will never truly be able to love the way our Father has loved us.
God's law of liberty is His command to love our neighbour. Only free people can do this.
Unless we actively obey His law of love, we deceive ourselves into thinking that hearing His word is enough.  James then gives us practical examples of what love looks like.

1. Hearing God's word without obeying is self-deceit

2. Like your Father, speak and reach out in love

Just do it!

'Order' sounds horrible. Like 'regimented' or 'straight jacket'. Actually, 'order' is more like harmony. Blurring distinctions in an attempt to create unity cheapens unity. Unity is beautiful if it is a diverse unity - like God. Unity isn't uniformity.  Chaos hurts. Disorder disrupts and produces disharmony. Perfect order is achieved in Jesus Christ. All these things are considered in this talk...

The first of three points that flow out of Genesis 1 1-25

1. God creates order out of chaos - how does Jesus show us this? - so what? Why is this good news? 

2. God is The Good

3. God seeks relationship

God, the Good Father who gives us everything, implants the Word of truth into our dead souls in order to recreate life - just like when He first created life through His word. BUT, just like planting seeds into soil, only the seeds planted into good soil will produce fruit.

1. God implants the word of truth but only humble listening will produce life

2. So, humbly receive the word of truth

3. And, get rid of angry speech and sin

The way to cultivate a fertile heart is by practicing in our relationships with others. As we learn to listen to others, be slow to speak, not get angry with others etc. so we show we have the right heart for the Word of Truth to produce fruit. Anyone who is quick to speak, slow to listen, angry and defensive, may fool themselves that they are listening to God, but if we can't listen to our fellow people we will not be listening to God either. After all, it is God who commands us to be slow to speak and quick to listen and not get angry etc.

In this talk we considered the third of these three points:

 1. God is self-existent - how does this lead to Jesus - what does this means for us?
2. God wills what is - how does this lead to Jesus - what does this mean for us?
3. God is Tri-Personal - how does this lead to Jesus - what does this mean for us?

Without Jesus we wouldn't know that God is a Triunity. In this talk we see how Jesus does this. And, we see some of the reasons why it is such good news that God is One Being in Three Persons.

Why is evil so attractive? If God didn't want me to do this  or that, why did He make it in the first place? Why doesn't he just get rid of temptation? Maybe the Devil tempts me? 
All these excellent questions are answered as we study the next passage in the book of James.

1. Our own evil desires lure us to death.

2. God only ever gives good things.

3. God became our Father when He gave us new birth through the Word of Truth.

The only way to be cured of slavery to our evil desires is to have a brand new heart with new desires - and this God has done for Christians through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Our desires will consume us and eventually, kill us. Loving God leads to life. 

In this talk we considered the second of these three points:

 1. God is self-existent - how does this lead to Jesus - what does this means for us?
2. God wills what is - how does this lead to Jesus - what does this mean for us?
3. God is Tri-Personal - how does this lead to Jesus - what does this mean for us?

Creation shows us that God wills what is. This means that God is Absolutely Sovereign. Because human beings created in His image also have wills, life on earth is about two wills colliding, our will and His will. We are suspicious of God's will because we're not sure whether He has our best interests at heart. 
But as we follow through and see how God's will is accomplished through His word, we end up at Jesus, the Word made flesh, and we see how God's will is achieved by Jesus. 
It turns out that His will for us is better than we could possibly hope for ourselves. His will for us is nothing less than being united to Him - this is what Jesus achieved: Atonement, At-One-Ment. 
We end up in Revelation 5 seeing how Jesus effects God's will by taking the scroll, and all evil is conquered through His death, and we are reconciled to God in Him.

We derive status and value from outside of ourselves... so let it be from the God who truly values you.

Contrary to modern thinking, human beings were designed to derive their value from outside of themselves. We can only think highly of ourselves when others, whose opinion we value, think highly of us. 
Before sin entered the world, men and women built each other up and above all else, we derived our status as human beings loved and valued by God, made in His image. Since our rebellion against God, and the subsequent breakdown in relationships with others, we still need affirmation from others, but this affirmation is flimsy, unreliable, selfish and never enough.
Money is one way we seek to gain acknowledgement from others and therefore the self-esteem we crave. Society gives people status according to their financial 'worth'. 

In the book of James 1:9-11, God turns this thinking up side down.

1. God exalts the humble
2. God humiliates those who derive status from riches

Humble yourselves before the Lord and He will exalt you. James 4:10

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." So what? Who cares? In this first talk of a series exploring how everything leads to Jesus, we begin by thinking how these words not only make sense, but how they are such good news. Without this truth we are nothing more than ungrounded, minute particles of chaos - in short, we are irrelevant. 

We looked at the first of these three points:

- look not just at things, but along things to where they point
- the origin or source will 'locate' you and explain your context
- and knowing your context/situation/'location' will tell you how to live wisely

1. God is self-existent - how does this lead to Jesus - what does this means for us?
2. God wills what is - how does this lead to Jesus - what does this mean for us?
3. God is Tri-Personal - how does this lead to Jesus - what does this mean for us?