Moments in the life of a Pastor

James series – “The Litmus Test for life”

James 4:1-5

What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? ² You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. ³ When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures. ⁴ You adulterous people, don’t you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. ⁵ Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us?

It’s here in chapter 4 that James takes us through the eighth test “The Pride Test.” As we look at part 1 we will see that Pride is not just a problem it is a poison that not only ruins our hearts but hurts all of our relationships, from friends and family to our relationship with our heavenly Father.  My prayer as we go through the Pride test is that we would identify and recognize the areas in our lives where we harbor selfish pride. In a few weeks we will celebrate memorial. A day to remember those who fought for our freedom. When we think of the military we think of fighting and war, it’s what soldiers sometimes have to do. But what about the rest of us? Do we have to fight and quarrel with people on a daily basis? No, we don’t but many do. Sadly some have a militant marriage, instead of caring they are combative. Our text today is about fighting and quarreling. Sometimes it just seems like people like to fight. They fight at home. They fight at work. They fight with relatives. They fight with neighbors. And they fight at church. I bet that if you locked some people in a room all by themselves, they’d fight with themselves. Now, the church at Jerusalem where James pastored experienced conflict. James reveals not only the symptoms and the source of their conflict but also the solution. We need to understand that the passage we’re looking at this morning is part of a larger section that runs all the way through 5:6. This eight test of faith, the pride test, tests us at the very core of our sinful nature, our pride. As you recall, he is in the middle of giving us 9 tests to determine whether or not our faith is real. He has already given us the Identity test, The Poverty and Prosperity Test, Bible Test, the Preference Test, the Works Test, the Tongue Test and the Wisdom Test. The test of pride is such a big issue for James, that he divides it into three sections, selfish pride, presumptive pride, and greedy pride. In today’s passage, James asks his readers where their continual desire to fight amongst themselves comes from. And his answer is surprising. Rather than point his finger at an outward cause of their strife, he tells them it is because of each of their individual selfishness. Selfishness that is rooted in their pride. He doesn’t address it as a problem with the church body as a whole. It’s not a problem with the group. It’s not a problem with other people. He tells them it’s a problem with each of them. And that problem with each of them is causing problems for the body as a whole. I want each of us to identify and recognize the areas in our lives where we harbor selfish pride and as the Holy Spirit shows us those areas, I want us to turn from selfishness to selflessness. 

James series – “The Litmus Test for life”

James 3:13, 17-18

¹³ If you are wise and understand God’s ways, prove it by living an honorable life, doing good works with the humility that comes from wisdom. ¹⁷ But the wisdom from above is first of all pure. It is also peace loving, gentle at all times, and willing to yield to others. It is full of mercy and the fruit of good deeds. It shows no favoritism and is always sincere. ¹⁸ And those who are peacemakers will plant seeds of peace and reap a harvest of righteousness.

Not only does a test-passing wisdom have roots, and attributes but also:

• FRUITS 3:18

Test-passing wisdom produces the good fruit of righteousness. Last week we saw in Galatians 5 the rotten fruit that comes from test-failing wisdom and today as we go back to Galatians 5 to see what the fruit of righteousness looks like in Galatians 5:22-23. I want you to notice something that doesn’t come across very well in English translation. In the original Greek the word fruit is singular, which means its one fruit. Unfortunately because we think of it as the fruits instead of the fruit of the Spirit, we paint the picture that you can have the fruit of love without having the fruit of longsuffering or joy or gentleness. But the fruit of the Spirit is one fruit that manifests itself in all those different ways. When we are full of the Spirit we stop esteeming self and start esteeming the Savior. We produce righteous fruit not rotten fruit. The fruit of righteousness that James talks about and Paul lists in Galatians is the same fruit that Jesus says we are to hunger for in His Sermon on the Mount. In Matthew 5:6, Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. What you hunger for determines what you feed on which results in what fills you. When you are filled with God’s fruit an amazing thing happens. You don’t just produce fruit you plant it. When you bear that fruit of test-passing wisdom you plant it in fields of peace. And what does that do? Instead of it just benefiting the few who look at it or eat it. It benefits multitudes. Righteous fruit is planted in fields of peace which causes it to grow and bear even more righteous fruit. Then that fruit is planted and bears more and more and more and more. James is saying that the fruit of one truly wise person can be the seed for an entire harvest of wisdom. One person with a pure heart. One person who is empty of themselves because they are full of the Spirit. One person whose fruit of righteousness is sown in peace can change their family. Can change their church, their community, their county, their country, can change the world. You don’t think you can do much for the kingdom of God? Try Him. Hunger and thirst for righteousness. Seek God’s wisdom from above like a drowning man seeks air. How do you do that? First you have to have a pure heart. And the only way to have a pure heart is for Jesus to give you a new one. Give Him your old and sinful heart this morning. Turn away from it and take the new heart He died to give you. You have to have a pure heart and you have to have a Spirit-filled heart. Your heart can’t be full of yourself and the Holy Spirit at the same time. Are you full of yourself or full of the Spirit this morning? Jesus wants you to be empty of yourself and will fill you with His Spirit this morning if you ask Him. You have to have a pure heart, you have to be full of the Holy Spirit and you have to sow the righteous fruit He gives you. Are you sowing your fruit in fields of peace this morning? A peacemaker doesn’t just let the fruit hang on the vine, they plant it into other people, it’s called investing. When it comes to peace there are 3 types of people: Peace-breakers, Peace-fakers and Peace-makers 

1. Peace breakers are those who go out of their way to cause conflict. We live in a world of peace-breakers, in fact in all the years of recorded history, the world has only been at peace just 8% of the time. Worldly peace is that glorious moment in history when everyone stops to reload.

• Peace-fakers. Jesus didn’t call us to be peace-keepers, but peace-makers. Some of us are predisposed to have peace at any cost in an effort to avoid conflict with someone. Often this is just pretend peace, as tensions go underground and come back again because they were never dealt with.

• Peace-maker. It’s much easier to either break the peace or fake the peace than it is to make peace in the midst of conflict.

God gives us His fruit for the benefit of the whole field, the whole body, His church. He wants you to plant it in order that there might be a rich and bountiful harvest. What are you doing with it? Why did Solomon want wisdom, because he saw his position as one who was called to serve God’s people, and in order to serve well he needed wisdom. He wanted wisdom not for self but for service. Today we want wisdom so we can profit and be wealthy, but wisdom is not about worldly wealth and riches it’s about being rich relationally. Are you focused on profit or people? Do you desire wisdom for self or for service? The goal is not to benefit self but to bless those we serve and give the glory to God. Going back to the original question, If God granted you one wish, like He did Solomon, what would you ask for? The way we answer that question will tell you a lot about your heart.