James Part 7: The War Within
If I were to provide a theme statement for this sermon, it would simply be "Conflict Within, Conflict Without," or the simple question, "Who's on the throne?" I kind of went with the second one. That's the question I'm going to ask repeatedly as we go through this passage. The question I want us to ask ourselves is simply that: Who is on the throne? I don't mean the cosmic throne of the universe; we know the answer to that. We have the church answer for that, right? Jesus is on the throne. What I'm talking about is something different.
As we look at the Book of James, James is repeatedly asking us this question in different ways. As Luke covered all of chapter 3 in one Sunday last week, he gave us this idea that what's inside of you is going to come out. At the beginning of the Book of James, we mentioned that James is kind of like the Proverbs of the New Testament—this is wisdom literature. James is asking us questions hoping to elicit an honest response. Far too often, we just want to say, "Yes, I have faith, I have faith, I have faith," without ever truly examining our faith according to the Word of God. As we discussed a couple of weeks ago, we talked about the laser temperature measure that they use when people go down big mountains to test their brakes. That's what the Book of James is doing—it's trying to test our brakes so that we don't crash and burn. But we often don't want to honestly look at our faith and examine it. Instead, we say, "I have faith, I have faith, I have faith. Don't look at this part of my life; it's off-limits. I'm here, I'm at church, I have faith; we're all good."
James is asking us to look a little bit deeper. He's asking us to ask the tough questions. So that's the question we're asking today: Who is on the throne? Who's calling the shots?
We haven't talked about this very much during this series, but James just so happens to be Jesus' little brother. Remember that? As we're talking about this idea of conflict, I thought it would be appropriate to ask the question: How many here have brothers or sisters? Yeah, pretty much everybody. How do I ask this? I've asked the question before, "What would it take to convince your brothers and sisters that you were God?"—probably coming back from the dead. But here's another question: Growing up, Jesus was the oldest; He had brothers and sisters that came after Him. We know Jesus was sinless, so how frustrating would it be to have the perfect older brother or sister who was actually perfect? Frustrating, right?
We've all had a relationship with someone—whether it was a sibling, a friend, or somebody at church—who was just genuinely good. They had a dynamic faith, an intimate relationship with Jesus, and it caused them to walk in a holiness that makes us uncomfortable. We can find ourselves actually criticizing or resenting them because of what their holiness points out in our hearts. I think we all, if we're honest, have experienced that to some degree.
What's happening there is a little bit of what's happening in the Book of James. James is really poking—in uncomfortable ways—at the lack of holiness in our lives or maybe the lack of faith. He's simply inviting us to see that what's coming to the surface, what's coming out of our mouths, and what are the things that are obvious in our lives, and what they point to. I'm getting off my notes already, and I haven't even started the intro.
Two questions we're going to ask: Number one, how do we deal with conflict? Number two, where does conflict come from? That's kind of how James opens this, doesn't he? Here's how he starts: "What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you?" There's a conflict going on in here that causes conflict out here. Yes, I think we would all recognize that conflict in here causes conflict out here. "You desire and do not have, so you murder. You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly to spend it on your passions."
So this is the first question we're asking: What causes conflict? The word that's translated as "passions" is the Greek word "hedon," which is where we get the word "hedonism." Hedonism is a philosophy, a way of life, that, if you look around our culture, you see that's basically the way our culture operates. It's a philosophy that views our pleasures or our self-gratification as the chief goal in life. Many of the things we see in our culture can be traced back to this philosophy. The acronym "YOLO"—You Only Live Once—is about this mindset: "I'm going to get mine; I only live once." The algorithm of social media is designed to feed this thing in you: "Give them what they want, give them what they want," and we just keep coming back.
Friday, my oldest son Isaac got done with school at 2:00. We jumped in the car, drove to Eastern Oregon in time to hunt elk Friday night, and then we got home at midnight last night. We were hunting on a ranch, and the ranch owner told us that he had found four elk in their alfalfa fields, dead because they ate themselves to death. My dad grew up and ran a dairy farm as a young man, and he said, "Yeah, this happened with cows all the time. If we didn't control that feed intake specifically because it's so rich, their stomachs would bloat because they would eat so much, and they would die."
This is us. This is our culture. I'm not talking physically; we eat our souls to death living in a culture that literally—I know I say "literally" a lot—literally gives us everything that we ask for constantly, and it's at our fingertips wherever we turn. Hedonism. Your desires, or as James says, your passions are on the throne. That's what causes the conflict among you; your passions are at war within you. Literally, your desires are at war within you, and what it causes is conflict between you and your husband, you and your wife, you and your parents, you and your kids, you and your coworkers, you and your boss—you and maybe even your pastor. I don't know. This is what causes the conflicts among us.
What if you told your family, "I will never put your needs before my own"? I don't think any of us would say that, but how many of us—this was the most convicting thing to me about this week as I studied this passage—how many of our lives reveal that to be true? We wouldn't say it out loud because we're good Christians, but do our lives preach that to be the truth, that really my needs come first?
James says there are two areas of our life where our selfish desires cause destruction and devastation: community and prayer. Selfish desires cause us to have murderous hearts, right? "You do not have, so you murder." Remember what Jesus said in Matthew 5: "You have heard it said, 'You shall not murder,' but I tell you, if you are angry with your brother in your heart, you've already committed murder." This is what James is referencing. Your selfish desires cause you to have murderous, angry hearts toward other people, and it destroys relationships. It destroys relationships.
Last week, in chapter 3, Luke talked about bitter jealousy and selfish ambition causing us to speak in certain ways. Now James is saying it causes us to act in certain ways as well—it causes conflict. What's inside you will come out of you. "Me issues" become "we issues." We are designed to live in community, and if we are harboring these things in our hearts, it's going to cause problems in our community.
This is the wisdom of God, however. Let's look at this from the other angle. If what is being planted in us every day are the promises of God, if what we are receiving in ourselves every day are the riches of His grace through His Word and through His people, then what will be produced as the fruit in our lives will be the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, and so on. There’s this irrefutable biblical truth that what goes into us determines what comes out of us.
And then our prayer, which is essentially this—I said there are two areas: community and prayer—but it's essentially the same thing: relationships. Our selfish desires, our hedonistic way of running our lives, cause a breakdown in our relationships here and cause a breakdown with our relationship with God because our prayer life becomes about what? "Give me what I want." You ask and do not receive. Why? Because you ask so that you can spend it on your passions.
Our greatest issue is not that we have conflict with others. Our greatest issue is that we have conflict between ourselves and God. Our greatest issue is that we are trying to sit in a seat that doesn't belong to us.
When I was a kid—I don't know if some of you had this, but my dad had a chair, a brown leather recliner—it was Dad's chair. Anybody? Yeah. So you could sit in the chair all you wanted, but when Dad walked into the room, you'd better get out, and he’d better not have to ask you. And oh my goodness, he’d better not have to ask you twice, right? When Dad comes in, we scatter, and he would walk over and sit in Dad's chair.
That's kind of how I think about this. But the problem is that we think there are times when God's not in the room, that the chair is empty, and it's mine for the taking.
The Old Testament prophets spoke bluntly about holy behavior that was rotten underneath. God says, "I don't want it." He does not want that; He wants our hearts. So, we know what the conflict is, but how do we deal with it? Verse six says, after all of that, what does He say? "But He gives more grace." I mean, that's a dark five verses, and then verse six says, "But He gives more grace." Therefore, it says, "God is opposed to the proud"—everything that He just described in the first five verses—but gives grace to the humble. So, He gives an avenue for grace right after all of this. He just destroyed our world and then gives us an open door into a right relationship with God and a right relationship with each other. What is that door? That door, quite simply, is humility.
Humility, humility. Again, Tim Keller, I heard him say this one time: "Humility is not thinking lowly of yourself; it's thinking accurately of yourself." Okay, we think like—I was raised in a way of thinking that humility was like always taking the back seat, putting yourself in the lowly position, thinking lowly of yourself. And I love that idea that it's not necessarily just thinking lowly of yourself; it's seeing yourself accurately, seeing yourself in the light of truth.
Now, what is that light of truth? Verse 7: "Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you." Think about that for just a second. James just said that the most powerful evil being ever created—the devil—will flee from us if we resist him. Have we ever stopped and thought about that? Are we seeing ourselves accurately? "Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you."
The goal of our lives—and this, like, again, I don't know if some of you need to hear this, I needed to hear this this week—the goal of our lives is not to rid them of all conflict. Okay, Jesus was very blunt: "In this world, you will have trouble." He wasn't just talking about persecution. We will have conflict; we will have trouble. But take heart. Why do we take heart in the midst of trouble in our lives? Because He has overcome the world.
Are we seeing ourselves accurately? Do we have godly humility? We know what the conflict is, right? The conflict is the war. How do we deal with it? We see ourselves accurately. So, four indicators that God is on the throne and that we can see ourselves accurately.
Number one: Are we submitting to God? Are we submitting to God? Okay, think. There are lots of cultural ways that you could apply this. A few: "Do not get drunk with wine." Are we submitting to that, or are we like, "Yeah, but that's for a certain kind of, you know, that doesn't really apply to me, or I'm just hanging out"? We have all kinds of ways of rationalizing not submitting to God. That's just one. Okay, we could go through the Ten Commandments. We could go through, right? We could go through the entire New Testament and find hundreds of areas of our life where God says, "Don't do this," commands, "Don't do this, do this." Are we seeing ourselves accurately, submitting ourselves to the Word of God, or are we rationalizing our own behavior? Why? Because it's what we want.
"Do I really have to apologize?" Who's on the throne? "Do I really have to forgive them?" Have you been forgiven? See, like, this is—this could be a question that we ask ourselves a hundred times a day. That's right. Listen, listen. I like this, it's like, as we're saying this, all of these things, what can happen is that we can start to see ourselves inaccurately. Okay, because you have a redex of all the ways in your life in which you have not submitted to God, you have failed, and it's starting to become this condemning voice.
Is there one who has submitted perfectly? Yes. Is there one who sees himself accurately? Yes. Is there one who humbled himself in the garden as he begged God and sweat blood, "Let this cup pass from me, but not my will, Yours be done"? Is there one? Yes. And that's why we are here. We are here not to just simply be reminded of how terrible we are. We are here to look at ourselves accurately and then come again to the throne of grace—the throne that He sits on always—to humble ourselves, to submit ourselves, and receive all that He has to give because He won it by doing what we couldn't do.
I'm way ahead of myself. Number two. Okay, number one, submit to God. Number two, resist the devil, right? There it is, right in there: "Resist the devil, and what will happen? He will flee from you." The problem is that we don't really resist, okay, in the way that James is inviting us to resist. What do we do? We clench our, right, we try really hard, we white-knuckle it. We have an example. Again, we have an example. There are specific times through Jesus's physical life and His physical ministry when He is directly confronted with Satan, and He resists him. How? With the Word of God. He resists him with the Word of God. He resists the lie with the truth. He does the very thing that Adam and Eve failed to do. Do we understand that that's what's happening there? That's exactly what's happening. He's being tempted in the same ways that Adam and Eve were tempted, and He succeeds where they failed. And He is showing us a blueprint: resist the devil. When the lies start to—the forked tongue starts to tickle your ear, and it is dripping with honey and we want it—what is the truth? We can't resist the devil with the truth if we don't know the truth, right? Did Jesus whip out His ESV Study Bible in the wilderness? No. Why not? Because it was here. He knew it. He read it. He studied it. He memorized it. He knew the Word of God so that when the lies came, He was like, "No, I'm not having that."
So, when we are invited to resist the devil, there are implications there. We are able—Jesus did it; you can do it. He has filled you with His Spirit. Do you see yourself accurately? Instead of like, "Oh yeah, Sam, I'm the worst, I stink," no! You are a child of God. You have received the grace of God. You've been adopted into His family. You've been sealed with the Holy Spirit. See yourself as He sees you. That's what humility is. It's not groveling; it's not navel-gazing.
Number three: Worship. "Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you." Does your heart desire, and do you actively move in His direction? The promise is that He will meet us there. He will meet us there.
Number four: Repentance. Repentance. Paul says very clearly, "It's God's kindness that leads us to repentance." He is not an angry father waiting to whip us. He is a loving father who has already paid for the failure that you just committed and is just waiting for you to come back. Why? Because He gives more grace. But we, in our pride, right—He is opposed to the proud but gives grace to the humble—we simply, stubbornly oppose Him. "But I want this, but I want this." I don't know what it is; maybe it's five things. I don't know what it is for you. He is asking us to get out of His chair, not so that He can be the man in the room, but because He knows He already is. And when we understand that, our joy increases exponentially, our peace increases exponentially. "Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you."
Adam and Eve had everything—everything—but Satan asked them, "Do you think that chair might fit you? I think it might." And their response was, "I think you're right. I think that chair might fit me. Let's try it out." And we have been trying out the chair ever since. We've been trying out the chair ever since. The essential question that James continues to ask us again and again and again and again centers around the word faith. Do we really believe? Do we really believe that Jesus is who He says He is, that He does what He says He does, and that He will continue to do what He says He will continue to do? Do we believe Him? And it's very easy to say yes. He's asking us to back up and examine our lives for the areas where the answer might be no. And if that causes your heart rate to go up a little bit, He gives more grace. The desire for these hard questions is to deepen our relationship with Him, to draw us deeper into this, not to reject us. Do we understand that?
I want to read a passage to you because I think it speaks to this. 2 Corinthians chapter 3, starting verse 12, Paul's talking to the Corinthian Church about this idea that we are sealed with the Holy Spirit, that we have the Holy Spirit with us, and he uses an Old Testament example of the glory of God. When Moses would go up on Mount Sinai and meet with God, it says that when he would come down, his face would glow, and it freaked the people out. Then, he would put a veil over his face, and then over time, it would fade. So, he's talking about the glory of God existing through the law given to Moses being something that fades, it goes away. But we, as Christians who are sealed with the Holy Spirit, who have received the gift of the Holy Spirit, have a glory that does not fade.
So, he says this: Since I already just paraphrased it, since we have such a hope, we are very bold. Do we see ourselves accurately? Why are we cowering? Do we not believe? Not like Moses, who would put a veil over his face so the Israelites might not gaze at the outcome of what was being brought to an end—the law. But their minds were hardened. For to this day, when they read the Old Covenant, that same veil remains unlifted because only through Christ is it taken away. Do we see ourselves accurately? Do we see ourselves as those whose veil has been taken away? Yes, to this day, whenever Moses is read, a veil lies over their hearts. But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed. Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. Do we see ourselves accurately? We are in bondage because we choose it, not because He is unable. We, believers in Christ, have been given freedom through the Holy Spirit, and yet we continually turn to our own desires. And James is saying, "Humble yourself before the Lord. Repent. Stop trying to sit in His seat."
"And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of God, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord, who is the Spirit." Do we believe this? The most convicting thing about this week actually didn't come from James; it came from this: Do I believe this? Where's the boldness in my faith? And if the boldness in my faith is missing, why? It's because I'm struggling to believe the promises of God and saying, "No, I have a better way. I'm going to live this way because maybe it's more comfortable, because maybe I think it'll gain me this thing that I want, or maybe because doing it this way hurt too much." And His invitation, His invitation in those moments is to say, "I'm here. I'm not going anywhere. I know it hurts because it hurt Me too. Let Me sit on this throne. Let Me sit on the throne. Come on in a little closer, and let's do this thing."
Do we see ourselves that way? Have we received His humility? And James asks some hard questions. My prayer for us today—my prayer for us not just today but each day this week, each day this month, each day this year—is that we will grow in the humility of God. We would see ourselves accurately. Listen, you've been set free. We see ourselves as sinners in the sense that we still struggle with sin, but you are a daughter or a son of the King if you have placed your faith in Him. And your flesh—Paul talks about this, doesn't he? "The very thing that I want to do, I don't do. The very thing that I don't do, I do." He's just laying this out the same way, just like James is. He's laying it out for us that this is the struggle within us, and it causes the problems out here. So, we have to address this, and the problem is the war within us.