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Category Archives: James “The Litmus Test for life”


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58 Watchful Warriors – Part 1

1 Peter 5:6-14

“So humble yourselves under the mighty power of God, and at the right time he will lift you up in honor. 7 Give all your worries and cares to God, for he cares about you. 8 Stay alert! Watch out for your great enemy, the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour. 9 Stand firm against him, and be strong in your faith. Remember that your family of believers all over the world is going through the same kind of suffering you are. 10 In his kindness God called you to share in his eternal glory by means of Christ Jesus. So after you have suffered a little while, he will restore, support, and strengthen you, and he will place you on a firm foundation. 11 All power to him forever! Amen. 12 I have written and sent this short letter to you with the help of Silas, whom I commend to you as a faithful brother. My purpose in writing is to encourage you and assure you that what you are experiencing is truly part of God’s grace for you. Stand firm in this grace. 13 Your sister church here in Babylon sends you greetings, and so does my son Mark. 14 Greet each other with a kiss of love. Peace be with all of you who are in Christ.”

As Peter gets ready to close his letter to the church he transitions from pastors feeding and leading to practical living. Peter calls us to be watchful warriors, to be on guard to not only recognize the enemy but to resist the enemy. After calling us to be servants who submit to Godly leadership he now calls us to be Soldiers

In this passage Peter presents us with four enemies that want to engage and eliminate us.

  1. Pride – Attitude of Arrogance – Vs 6

Pride produces an attitude of arrogance and if you don’t recognize pride it will slowly and silently slip in and poison your life. Pride promises us fame but delivers failure. Instead of living a faithful life we end up living a foolish one. Life becomes about self-effort instead of the Savior. It becomes about my work instead His. Pride puts us on a never ending path of performance. Instead of resting in the finished work of redemption we end up running on the never ending treadmill of trying. And no matter how much we achieve it’s never enough. Pride was the poison that Satan used in the garden of Eden to taint Eves thinking, Genesis 3:4 “The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die! 5″For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God” Pride causes us to compete with God instead of communing with Him. Instead of an exciting life we live an exhausted one. Are you tired of the treadmill of trying, do you recognize pride in your life, are you ready to resist it? If you want to succeed then you need to stop trying and start trusting. We protect against pride by positioning ourselves under the powerful hand of God. The key to success is submission to the Savior. We need to remember that Christ is the commander and he calls the shots. The antidote to arrogance is admitting that we need the Almighty, it takes a humble heart to hide under God’s mighty hand. The humble find protection but the prideful find hardship. When it comes to humility C.S. Lewis offers us some great insight: “Humility is not thinking less of yourself but thinking of yourself less.” When we put ourselves in our rightful place, God lifts us up at the right time. The second enemy that Peter prepares us to face is:

  1. Panic – Anxiety – Vs 7

The Greek word translated “cares” comes from a word meaning to divide. Anxiety divides and distracts our minds so that we can’t focus on anything else. Panic positions us to live in the prison of worry instead of living out our position as a warrior. We end up filtering life through fear instead of God the Father, fear clouds our focus and derails our faith. It takes center stage consuming our lives to the point where they revolve around worry instead of worship. While worship energizes us worry saps our strength, worry drains where worship sustains. So how do we protect against panic, prayer. Prayer positions us into the presence of God, instead of focusing on the problems we focus on His power.  We war against worry with worship, worry consumes us worship connects us, worry robs us but worship restores. But there are two critical parts to the process. We are to cast “all” of our care, not just some of it. The Almighty is eager to accept all our anxiety. Second the verb tense here tells us that this is a one-time deal. We are to case all our care once and for all. Our problem is that we caste part of our cares and try to carry the rest, or we cast them to Christ but we never actually let go and so it’s not long before we end up reeling them back in.


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79 Test 13: The Correction Test – Part 5

James series – “The Litmus Test for life”

James 5:19-20

My brothers and sisters, if one of you should wander from the truth and someone should bring that person back, 20 remember this: Whoever turns a sinner from the error of their way will save them from death and cover over a multitude of sins.

When we engage in remediation James reminds us of the

3. Rewards for giving remediation

James reminds us of the serious of our calling. Sadly, we don’t see the seriousness of our calling, we have reduced church to something that’s here just to meet our needs. But church isn’t a place to just go and hang out. It isn’t just a place to go and get your batteries recharged. Or where your toes get stepped on. It is a place where life and death hang in the balance. It is a place where the Word of God is preached in order to see people saved and to motivate saved people to serve so that they share Jesus with a dying world. Either eternal life in the glorious presence of God, or eternal condemnation, forever separated from God in suffering. Its serious business, business with eternal consequences. And that is the business we’re about, as a church we are called to convert sinners from the error of their ways. Is that you this morning? The simple answer is yes, it is. 1 John 1:8 says, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.” Romans 3:23 says, “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.” All—that’s you, that’s me, that’s all of us. If you’ve been honest with yourself these past few months, that’s what all these tests have shown you. They’ve shown you how far you fall short of the glory of God. The question is what have you done with that sin? Have you ignored it? Have you made excuses for it? Have you tried to hide it? Have you justified it by comparing it to the sin of your neighbor?  If so it’s time to face your sin. If the results of these tests have shown you that you have never trusted Jesus as your Lord and Savior today is the day to cry out to Jesus and ask Him to save you from your sin. But what if you know that Jesus has saved you? What have you done with your sin? Just because you’re saved doesn’t mean that you will no longer sin. It just means that you will hate the presence of sin in your life. You will hate the fact that you fail these tests, 

and what will that hatred cause you to do? It will cause you to seek the other kind of conversion James talks about. The kind that hides a multitude of sins. The kind that John talks about in 1 John 1:9. “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” If you know Jesus as your Lord and Savior this morning, confess your failed tests to Him. Don’t give up. Don’t be discouraged. Confess your sins and shortcomings to Jesus and He will forgive you. Satan wants to see you wallowing in defeat and despair don’t let Him. Confess your sins and claim Christ’s victory.