If you would, please take your scriptures, if you have them with you, and turn to the letter of James, the epistle of James, right after the Pauline epistles, and then the letter to the Hebrews comes the epistle of James, right before 1 and 2 Peter. We continue our look at James, again the first chapter, as we notice there is a lot here. But he's really finished out the first part of this introduction to the letter in verse 11, but verse 12 kind of transitions into the next section. Again, considering the idea of trials and enduring through trials, and then he moves into the subject of temptation. And he begins this passage with a beatitude. Blessed is the man and goes on. Well, before we come to the reading and preaching of God's word, let us go once again to the Lord in prayer that we would trust and depend and place our faith in him. in all things, especially in His opening up His Word, that He would reveal it to our hearts and minds and give us understanding of who we are in the depths of our being, in our responses to trials, and in our relationship with Him. Let us pray. Our gracious and heavenly Father, we thank You for truth. that you are the God of truth, and that you reveal truth to your people. In a world where there is so much error and falsehood that is bandied about, there is deception, which is wicked, because it leads men astray. You call us to be renewed in our minds according to Your Word and Your will, which You provide here in this revelation, in this letter and epistle to James, that we might again have a new perspective, Your perspective, the heavenly perspective, that we might think Your thoughts after You, O Lord, that we may see the world, see You, and see us, again, ourselves, in your perspective, which is truth, that we would not be given into error, that we would not be deceived, but that we would be honest and open and understand the realities that are revealed to us, and that we would receive them and accept them and submit to them in our lives, that we might grow again in the knowledge of you. We pray, Father, that You would bless us now in the name, the holy and sacred and blessed name of Jesus, we pray. Amen. Well, brothers and sisters, if you're willing and able, please stand for the reading of God's Holy Word that comes to us from James 1. I'll be reading beginning in verse 12 down through 18, but we'll focus on verses 12-16 this morning. Again, Knox Orthodox Presbyterian Church. This is the Word of your God. Blessed is the man who endures temptation, for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord has promised to those who love him. Let no one say when he is tempted, I am tempted by God. For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he himself tempt anyone. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires and enticed. Then when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and sin, when it is full grown, brings forth death. Do not be deceived, my beloved brethren. Every good and every perfect gift is from above and comes down from the father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning of his own will. He brought us forth by the word of truth that we might be a kind of first fruits of his creatures. The grass withers, the flower fades, but the word of our God remains forever. Please be seated. Struggles, difficulties, trouble evoke a response from us, and our response demonstrates who we truly are. So often we make the mistake of thinking that the trouble is out there, when most of the time the problem lies within ourselves. James, from the beginning of the letter, is talking about enduring trials, trouble, difficulty in our lives. And it's very easy to assume that the trials that James is talking about are outward circumstances and they may be external difficulties, those troubles that originate outside of us. But remember, James begins in verse 2 saying, My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials of all kinds and differing sorts, which would include internal struggles. Especially since he goes on in verse 3 to say, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patient endurance. The test of faith is by definition an internal one. Outward circumstances are merely the catalyst for demonstrating who and what and why we are on the inside. Remember that James is digging deep within our soul. If we are to truly endure, persevere and have victory over trials, then we must be honest about where the trouble truly lies. And that is within us, in the very depths of our own hearts. And so this is where Brother James brings us today. And like with most journeys, there are two pathways, one leading to life and blessing and the other one leading to deception and death. And so you must choose which pathway to follow. But in order to choose the good and avoid the bad, you must have them both clearly revealed and distinguished. And this is what God the Holy Spirit does here in James. We must not only see the goal and the end of our faith, the victory, the finale, the consummation, the perfection, the completion of our life, which is maturity, as James explains in verse four. But we must also understand ourselves. Not just the road, but ourselves, and that there is often an internal struggle There are appropriate responses to trials and inappropriate responses in our relation and response to the Lord in them is the dividing line between the two. And James sets both before us in our passage today, which brings us to our purpose statement, which is actually a question that I want to put before you. that James would be implying that he is asking you in these things. And that is, is there is the trial, is your trial that you're presently in, whatever it is, is the trial drawing you closer to God or leading you away from him? That's the question as you ponder about the trials that you engage in, you're currently in. Is the trial drawing you closer to God or leading you away from Him? And we'll consider our passage in question under three points this morning. And our first point is the reward for enduring trials. the reward for enduring trials. This is where James begins in verse 12. But there is a clear connection between verse 12 here and what came before where he started in verses 2 through 4. There in verses 2 through 4, trials test your faith in which true saving faith produces endurance, which leads to perfect maturity. And as we said before, it means being conformed into the likeness of Christ, being Christ-like, becoming like God. This is the end goal and finale of the Christian's journey of life, your journey and mine, as confessing Christians. But here in verse 12, although still looking to the end, the goal, the finale, James connects the end of endurance with having passed the test, taking us all the way to the end in which a reward is offered, coming through the ordeal, being approved by the Lord and being rewarded by the Lord with the crown of life. This doesn't in any way imply that the trial, the test was at all easy. No, actually just the reverse, that it wasn't an intense trial, just the reverse. It may have been excruciatingly difficult. But the point is you endured to the very end. How often does Jesus say he who endures to the end, shall be saved. And therefore the one who endures to the end is therefore truly blessed. And that's where James begins. Blessed is the man who endures these trials. We can be sure that Abraham struggled deeply within himself when God commanded him, Abraham, take now your son, your only son, Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah and offer him up as a burnt offering. We are told, now it came to pass that God tested Abraham. And what was he testing? He was testing his faith. Although Abraham went through many trials throughout his lifetime, this was the chief and ultimate one, the climax, and he endured and he was approved when he heard these words from the angel. Now, I know that you fear God since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me. And we can read of all the saints who endured through trials. We read of trials of mockings, of scourgings, yes, of chains, of imprisonment. They were stoned. They were sawn in two. They were tested by being slain with the sword. They wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins being destitute, afflicted, and tormented. The author of Hebrews tells us in chapter 11, of whom the world was not worthy. They wandered in deserts and mountains and dens and caves of the earth. James, when he comes to the final chapter, says, we count those blessed who endure. And then he immediately refers to the perseverance of Job. It reminds us of Job. Remember, Job said, though the Lord slay me, Yet I will trust him. I will continue to trust him. And James is key behind the faithful, obedient, blessed endurance that is approved of and rewarded here. We see, and what is the motivation? At the end of verse 12, what is it that motivates you to endure the trial, the trouble, the difficulty, the hardship? What is it? It's love. It is love for God. The blessed one who endures temptation and trial is approved and receives the crown of life which the Lord promises, loves the Lord. Here's the key, brothers and sisters. It is the great commandment to love God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength. The key truth for all of life It is in the trial, in the test, in the trouble that the Lord is asking you, do you love me? Do you love me even more as you endure the trial? Do you love me more today than you did yesterday? What is it that God wants from you, beloved? It's your love. He wants your heart. Why are you here? To love Him. It's the answer for everything, isn't it? Why does He have you where He has you? To love Him where you are, what you're going through presently. Why does He put you through trials and tests? To love Him all the more. Your journey through life, your progress toward complete maturity and to finish the race to receive the crown of life is achieved not by the power of your endurance, but by the reality of the depth of your love for Him. It is your love for Him that drives you to endure, to persevere, to continue steadfast in your faith. No matter what's going on around you or even inside of you, you live by what you love. Is that not the case? The shape of your lives is determined by the joys and love of your heart. Your love for God is the key motivating you to endure your trials. So as you go through your particular trial, is it drawing you closer to your God, to loving Him more, trusting Him more, depending upon Him more, relying on Him more? If so, then you are truly blessed. For here is life, life eternal. How do you endure? By lovingly drawing closer to Him. Here then is a reward for enduring trials. But then James once again appears to change direction, as he often does. For the very same trials, which are on the one hand opportunities for us to move forward and draw closer to our God, may become temptations to move away, to move back, leading away from him. This brings us to our second point, the temptation to blame God. The temptation to blame God. Perhaps you this is you. Perhaps you are blaming God. Perhaps you have blamed God. Perhaps you know someone who has stopped walking with the Lord because of the pressure of trouble and tragedy. Many blame God for their trouble, for their trials, and rather than drawing closer to Him in faith, trust, and dependence, they forsake Him. They abandon Him. They even blame Him for it. Didn't Adam initially blame God for his temptation and even fall into sin? When questioned by the Lord, have you eaten of the tree of which I commanded you not to eat? How does Adam respond? He does not simply and honestly respond, yes, does he? Instead, he says, the woman whom you have given to me, she gave to me and I ate. Implicit in that, is blaming God. It was the woman you gave me, Lord." Adam lays this temptation at God's feet as if he tempted Adam to eat the fruit and sin. So did God tempt Adam to sin? Of course not. Of course not. So what is Adam doing? And what do we often do when we fail the test? When we fail to endure the trial? Give up trying to persevere? We instantly try to justify our failure by seeking someone else to blame, and God becomes an easy target, does He not? since James tells us that he is the one that sends the trials to us, the trouble, the difficulty, the test. But the moment we accuse God of desiring our failure, do we not sin in twisting His motives and tarnishing His character? Here, James states unequivocally, God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he himself tempt anyone. James goes down this road of questioning God's motives and intentions because that's what we do when we turn away from seeking to endure in the faith and give up, give in, let go. If God is absolutely sovereign and ordains everything that comes to pass, then isn't He really at fault? Didn't He put me here? Was it not His will that I be found cornered by this temptation which proved too strong for me to resist? In reply, James declares these two truths. God cannot be tempted by evil. To tempt someone else toward evil is by definition evil. This is why Satan is called the tempter. God is holy. In fact, He is holy, holy, holy. There is no inclining of evil nor evil intent in the thrice holy God." James says this truth is undeniably uncontroversial. Second, he himself tempts no one. James says that God indeed tests us. but emphatically denies that He does so with an evil intent or motive to leave men into sin. He does not try to seduce His people to act wickedly. There is never an ulterior motive in all of this, for His holiness offers no resting place or lodging place or hiding place for evil within His nature. Neither is there the least impulse to trip us up, to push us down, to cause us to fall for His goodness forbids that He should seek our destruction. When He tests, it is so that we may pass the test and inherit the blessing. When the reverse happens, the blame lies elsewhere than in the God of all grace and goodness. This accords with what the Apostle Paul states in 1 Corinthians 10, verse 13, where he says, no temptation has overtaken you except such as is common to man. You always think that you're going through the worst more than everybody else. And Paul says, no, you're not. This test, this trial, this temptation is common to man. But God is forever faithful and He will not let you be tempted beyond your ability. But with the temptation, He will also provide the way of escape that you may be able to what? Endure it. God sends trials in order to test your faith with the purpose that you would respond positively in greater endurance to pass the test and grow in your faith, trust, and maturity to grow closer to Him. But when the call to endure and mature is abandoned in favor of the suggestion to just give up, it's too hard. The trial becomes a temptation to fail to endure and thus give up, give in, pull away from God. For every trial has the potential to become a temptation. James begins by seeing the joy in your trials because trials are actually blessings by God. which help you to grow and to mature, and that they are meant by God to lead you forward to complete maturity and to the ground of life. But they do not do this by some inherent power on their own, but rather it depends on your response and the way you see and use your opportunity in the trial. James is too down to earth not to make us face a flaw within ourselves. A flaw where in time of trial, it's much easier to slip back than to step forward. Trial becomes temptation and finds an ally within us. Every circumstance we meet, therefore, requires a decision. Will we persevere and draw close to God, trust Him, depend on Him, go on with Him? Or will we listen to that little voice which suggests the easy way of disobedience and disloyalty? But where does that voice come from? James teaches us where the blame for temptation does not lie here in verse 13. It does not come from God. But moves on, he goes on to answer where it does come from in verses 14 and 15, which brings us to our third and final point. Where does temptation originate? Where does temptation originate? And that is the enemy within, from the enemy within. The blame, in fact, lies in ourselves. The tempting voice is the voice of our own sinful nature, inclinations, Having affirmed that God is not the source of our temptation, James turns to the true source. Temptation comes from within us. You see, the upward path that James has set forth for us is demanding. It is. It's not easy. It consists of a trial, a test, and the proper response of endurance and persistence results in maturity. But it is demanding. In fact, it's impossible. That's why you need to be strengthened by God. Why you must love God. Why you must draw near to God. Trust in Him and what He provides for you. It is demanding, but it's end. is the fullness of life. The end is the fullness of life. By contrast, the downward path is easy. Desire arises within us. It gives birth to sin and sin produces death. Unlike the divine nature with its transparent goodness and holiness, human nature from its core is sinful. so that what emerges as a desire proves to be an avenue into sin and death. The word desire in and of itself is not necessarily bad. God has desires. God's not bad. Those desires aren't bad in God. But our desires arise out of our heart, which again is sinful. But here James uses it to refer again this idea of desire as an intense longing for something that gets in the way of the upward path. It's an obstacle and it distracts us from our pursuit of drawing closer to God. Let's think about these desires for a moment within the life of the church. What one person finds as intense temptation, another person may never experience even a faint hint of enticement and vice versa. People are different, right? And it's important for us to consider as we seek to love and minister and serve and encourage one another. You see, temptations are tailored to the individual. Temptations are tailored to the individual. And so we as believers must never belittle a brother or sister for struggling with something that we think is very easy to overcome, because it doesn't entice us at all. Have you experienced that? Like, why is this person you're puzzled, why are they struggling with this particular temptation? But instead, we must realize that each of us has very specific and particular battles nuanced specifically for us. And we need to give both grace and exhortation to one another to stand firm in times of testing. Conversely, we must always flee temptation. Think of Joseph, right? His love for God, and through that love, love and respect for his master, He fled, but he still fled. He didn't sit there and take it on. He fled. Regardless of how little they may seem. For James says, these inner longings busily work to pull us away from our Lord. They wear you down in order to wear you out that you may give up and give in to them. James forces us to take an honest look at the desires and thoughts that we foster and allow to grow within ourselves, tugging at us and alluring us. Many sinful actions begin as casual thoughts, but dwelling on them can turn minor temptations into major transgressions. Even if we do not actively court temptations, we are, as James says, drawn away and enticed by them. This language James uses comes from fishing and hunting practices of being baited. Something that at first appears harmless. The deer comes up, sees the bait, it's good, it smells good, it looks good. looks harmless, perhaps good, even good, is used to draw us away, and actually the word is to drag us away. It expresses the magnetism of our desire, the hypnotic attraction of bait for a hungry animal. Desire longs to be satisfied, And basically you find out what happens is there's no cost. Any cost is expendable that your desire may be satisfied. The truth of the matter is that there is no way in which we can trust our own natures. There is within us a deep well of dominating and alluring desires. There is within us the fatal weakness which guarantees that we will fall short of God's glorious intentions for us. James describes the result, or rather, he says, the child of desire this way in verse 15. What is the child of desire? It's sin. In the Greek, this is the word harmartia. It's the most general New Testament word for sin, and it means failing to hit the mark. to live up to the intention, the target that God has for you. And this is the way Paul defines it in Romans 3.23, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. That's sin. Failing to, again, meet the goal, the end, the glory of God. Our ability to produce deceptive desires is thus linked with our inability to live for the highest and to achieve the best that God intends for us as His image bearers and His people. No wonder that the process thus begun and continued ends in death. So in verse 15, James sets forth what has been called the life cycle of sin. But it's really not the life cycle, is it? It's the death cycle. The death cycle of sin. Here is what James wants you to know and to understand. The next step as the temptations within us start to drag us away. Those desires, again, lead us away, drag us away. Having been enticed by our own inner craving, the desire leads to sinful action. Meanwhile, sin, when we allow it free reign, results in death. When fully grown, results in death, which is the antithesis to verse 12. the crown of life. James again agrees with Paul here in Romans 6 when he says the wages of sin is death. He says that again the child of our desires as they drag us away from the Lord and His intention and His purposes is, again, sin, which leads to death. James actually uses the vivid metaphor of reproduction, which process is difficult to stop once it begins. There are clear sexual connotations to James's language. So we can envision three generations here, desire as the parent, sin as the child, and death as the grandchild. This is the family tree. The metaphors of growth and reproduction remind us that James is not only thinking of the major crises or blatant temptations that assault us, but also of those countless little peccadillas, those little decisions, those little sins we make on a daily basis over a lifetime that mold and shape us into the people that we ultimately become. It's interesting that James, as the most succinct of New Testament writers, offers no definition of death here. The Bible explains death in many different ways. It's broad. Is he referring to physical death, spiritual death, eternal death here, or death in all its forms? To help here, let us consider its opposite, specifically in James's own context of thought. Twice over, he has presented us with a chain, has he not? In verses two through four, trials and testing produces endurance and perseverance, which leads to complete maturity. In verse 12, testing and trial produces endurance, perseverance, leading to life. But here in verses 14 and 15, he introduces a sinister link. or sequence. Desire produces sin, leading to death. In verse four, there is one sort of maturity that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. In verse 12, there is the crowning experience of life. But in verse 15, there is the conclusion of death. This parallel shows that the indulgence of desire produces sin, which triggers the forces of death in our experience now, not simply in the future. So James reminds us that we are not immune from these realities and thus warns us of them. There is a diminishing of life experience which is less than the wholeness that God has intended in purpose for you. Less than completeness. Less than the glorious life that God has in store. This then is the disintegrating force to which we expose ourselves when we allow desires to take hold. They give birth to sin and sin to give birth to death. The push here and the problem here is that once this process is set into motion, there is an inevitability about it. The end is implicit in the beginning. Let us merely entertain the desire. Think about it. Dwell on it. What happens? It conceives. It conceives and brings forth sin. And already we have, in the sense, invited death into our lives. that which disintegrates life enters into our experience. Through endurance and perseverance we come to the wholeness of life that is ours in Christ. And yet through desire, that is that fleshly desire that Paul and the other apostles talk about, and sin, we forfeit that wholeness and instead embrace death." It is at this very point that James sounds the alarm, does he not? The warning. The warning. Verse 16. Do not be deceived. Do not be deceived. Notice that James, in talking about testing and temptation, nowhere here introduces the devil, does he? He doesn't even mention the devil. There is no reference to this arch enemy. Neither does Jane's analysis of the human condition introduce external factors here, such as someone's upbringing. their parentage, their heritage, their culture, or society. No circumstantial factors. James says nothing of these things here. There is no need to introduce Satan here as an explanation. Neither is there any excuse arising from one's own personal background, struggles, specific situation. What's the point? Do you see James' point? Were there no devil, no tempter, there would still be evil and wickedness. Were every prospect pleasing, perfect as in the paradise of God. Human nature moves this way. It's sinful. And James' ultimate point is that not only is there the enemy is in the camp, But the enemy is in the depths of our core, which is our heart. And in fact, the enemy is the heart of man itself. Within himself is his own enemy. And that's exactly what the prophet Jeremiah echoes. As Elder Oldacre read earlier, the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. And actually that word in the Hebrew conveys the idea of being incurable. Incurably wicked. And that's one of the reasons why David, a man after God's own heart, prays and pleads with God, create in me a new heart, O God. Create in me a new heart and renew a new spirit within me. You see, the problem lies within. Present within is the great inescapable foe of progress with God. the subtle and insinuating power of our fallen, sinful nature, which Paul calls the flesh. And yet, as bad news as this is, there is hope. There is hope. For notice what James ends his warning with. Who is it addressed to? My beloved brethren. The rich love which was the key to blessing and victorious endurance in verse 12 bookends this passage following the warning. These ones to whom James first wrote, but not just them, but to you and me, brothers and sisters, This is the love letter of God coming to us that we be not deceived, that we understand that we see behind the veil. And understand fully. You, too, are beloved. James doesn't merely use this concern for your welfare both now and into eternity. But again, he does so that your eyes may be open to think properly concerning your own weaknesses and with trials within and the enemy within. Again, He's seeking to communicate love to you, my beloved brethren. But He also uses it to introduce the glorious reality of our new birth, because that's where He goes next in verse 17. Our new birth by the Father of lights, who has given every good and perfect gift from above. not only beloved by the brethren, but beloved by the Father. Beloved by a Father who sends trials into your life to draw you closer to Himself, who sends tests to confirm your faith and cause you to grow and mature and make you more like Christ, who desires to see you endure, that He may bless you and crown your life with glory. So take every opportunity, beloved, when going through trials, and what is your aim, what is your goal? To draw closer to your God. Whether external or internal, whether tests or temptations, look to Him love him, for he is your life. Amen. Our gracious and heavenly Father, we thank you for your word, which is truth, which is life. We thank you for the word of truth, We thank you for your son, Jesus Christ, and the power of your spirit within us. We pray that your word would ignite again this reality of love, that if we have left our first love, that we would repent, and we would seek to love our God with our thought, mind, heart, and strength. We thank you and praise you, Father, for this word. We pray that you bless it, too, in Christ's name. Amen.