Here's chapter 5. We come now to a new section. in the book of James, in which James is now shifting gears. And while he is nonetheless severe in his denunciations, they are not directed now at the believer, but at the unbeliever. And to the believer, he extends great encouragement and great comfort. Previously, he has been rebuking the believers for their sins. And now he is attempting to comfort them in their situations and in their difficulties. Follow along with me, if you would, as I read James chapter 5, verses 1 through 11. James chapter 5, verses 1 through 11. Go to now, you rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. Your riches are corrupted and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and silver is cankered, and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. You have heaped together treasure for the last days. Behold, the hire of the labors who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, cries. And the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth. You have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton. You have nourished your hearts as in a day of slaughter. You have condemned and killed the just, and he doth not resist you. Be patient, therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and has long patience for it until he receive the early and the latter rain. Be ye also patient, establish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord draws near. Grudge not one against another, brethren, lest you be condemned. Behold, the judge stands before the door. Take, my brethren, the prophets which have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering, affliction, and impatience. Behold, we count them happy which endure. You have heard of the patience of Job and have seen the end of the Lord. that the Lord is very pitiful and full of tender mercy. It is often hard for the Christian to reconcile his experience with what he believes regarding God's justice. He knows and believes that God is just and that good will therefore be rewarded and evil will be punished. And yet, at the same time as he looks about him and sees the evil prospering, while those who sincerely serve God are suffering affliction and experiencing adversity, all of this can be very disheartening and very confusing. And so he asks, where is God in all of this? And especially he asks, where is His justice? Now, it is to this issue that James now turns his attention in the section before us. Here he offers comfort and hope to distressed Christians who are apparently beginning to lose patience and to wonder if there is any reason to go on serving the Lord when it seems that serving the Lord is a life of adversity, a life of affliction and a life of injustice. Now, this comfort that he offers to them is given to them in two ways. First of all, he denounces those who are wicked and prosperous by declaring their coming misery, their coming judgment, the worthlessness of their possessions, and indeed the self-destructive nature of those possessions. Their apparent prosperity is actually their curse and their destruction. And so, rather than being envied, they are, in fact, to be pitied. They are not, in spite of their apparent outward prosperity and success, better off than believers. They are, in fact, worse off. So, as the believers look at the wicked and see their apparent prosperity, lest that be a source of discouragement to them, he says, that's not really prosperity. In fact, they will bitterly regret the day when they possessed such, quote, prosperity, unquote. And then secondly, he reminds the believers that the coming of the Lord is drawing near, and then there will be a reward for faithfulness, and there will be a more than adequate compensation for the adversities and the injustices which they have endured, especially at the hand of those apparently blessed people, the wicked rich. Therefore, the primary need of these believers is patience. Five times James uses the word patience in five verses, in verses seven through eleven. Be patient, therefore, brethren, for the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husband waits for the precious fruit of the earth and has long patience for it until he received the early and the latter rains. Be also patient Establish your heart for the coming of the Lord draws near. Verse 10. Take my brethren, the prophets who have spoken in the name of the Lord for an example of suffering, affliction and of patience. Behold, we count them happy, which endure. You have heard of the patience of Joe. Well, after all that, you kind of get the idea. He's talking about patience. and about the need to possess patience and to exercise patience in the face of the apparent injustices that exist in this life. And what he is saying to them is justice will prevail in due time, but we need to be patient and waiting for it. If, after the day of judgment, injustice still remains, then by all means complain. But of course, it cannot and it will not remain after the day of judgment. But until then, we have to be patient because it is God's purpose to delay the implementation of justice until the final day of judgment. Now is the day of patience, not the day of judgment, in which God is delaying the implementation of his justice, not abrogating it, simply delaying the implementation of his justice in order that men might have time and opportunity to repent. Were justice immediately implemented, Adam and Eve would have been immediately put to death on the spot And there would have never been a human race. If he had implemented his justice in its fullness right now, the day of salvation would immediately cease and the final judgment would be ushered in and would commence. And there would be no more opportunity for salvation for anybody. And so this delay of the implementation of justice, which is oftentimes so distressing and disturbing to the Christian as he sees the wicked prospering, God apparently doing nothing about it. has a very rational explanation, and the explanation is that God is delaying the implementation of his justice in order to allow time for the outworking of his saving purposes. And so, since now is the day of patience, then we must possess our souls in patience and not grow either disillusioned or discouraged at the injustices that now prevail that are unaddressed. We must, as 2 Peter 3.15 tells us, account that the long-suffering of our Lord is salvation. That is, His patience is providing opportunity and time for the salvation of people. And so the Lord is not slack concerning His promise to bring justice, as some men count slackness, but is patient towards us, not willing that any of His elect should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord, the day of justice will come. And perfect justice will then be fully implemented, and it will be immediately implemented. And this is the encouragement and the exhortation that he is offering to the believers. Well, then let's consider this comfort and exhortation given to these afflicted believers in more detail. Now, I must tell you right at the outset, we're only going to get through half the message tonight. We'll be considering together this evening, first of all, the condemnation of the wicked rich and the next Lord's Day evening. God willing, we will consider together the comfort of the patient Christian. So first of all, the condemnation of the wicked rich, which is in verses one through six, and then the comfort of the patient Christian, which is in verses seven through eleven. So let us consider together this evening, then, the condemnation of the wicked rich. Now, injustice in the present day is observable in many situations, but nowhere is it more visible and more observable than in the prosperity of the wicked. And James, therefore, selects the wicked rich as an example of those who are both evil And at the same time, not only do not suffer for that evil, but in fact, appear to receive great advantages and blessings precisely because of that evil. And so justice, in the case of the wicked rich, seems to be turned on its head. The more evil someone is, the better situation it appears that they obtain. Now clearly, it is not being rich. That is what is condemned. It is the way in which those riches were obtained, the attitude with which they are viewed and the method with which they are used that is being condemned. Being poor will not get you into heaven and being rich will not keep you out. Both poor and rich are in heaven. and both poor and rich are in hell. Poor Lazarus sits in rich Abraham's bosom in heaven, while poor Judas and rich King Ahab both are burning in hell. Now, consider together then, first of all, the nature of their misery, the nature of their misery. Now, these wicked rich who appear to be so prosperous and have such a good condition are actually in a state of misery. Now, outwardly, we don't see that. We see all the wealth. We see the advantage. We see the privilege and the status that they are able to enjoy. And yet, with the eye of faith, we must see these people, these wicked rich as miserable people. noticed in the nature of their misery. These miseries that are to come upon them are great and grievous because they are proportionate to the greatness and grievousness of their evil in the way in which they have acquired and in the way in which they have used their wealth, as we shall shortly see. Notice verse one. He says, Go to now, you rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you. And so he is telling them that their impending miseries are such that should cause them to weep and cry in grief and sorrow at their contemplation in spite of the comfortable situation they find themselves in at the present moment. These miseries that are coming upon them that should cause them such anguish at their contemplation are miseries which are both temporal and eternal. Now historically, in this context, with reference to these people to whom James is writing, their coming miseries were temporal. In that, Jerusalem and Israel were both soon to be destroyed by the Romans. which, of course, was accomplished in 70 A.D. and which Jesus clearly prophesied in Matthew 24, as well as in other passages. In a very few years after the writing of this epistle, their homes, their fortunes, their families, their city, their nation and their lives are going to be absolutely destroyed by the Romans. And Josephus and others record this event and the horror of it. And the question is, is what good would their wealth gotten through evil means do them in that day of calamity? What good does it do if you've got all of this wealth and you know that just in a couple of years, it's all going to be destroyed because your nation is going to be destroyed. I mean, what good would it do you if you were a multimillionaire? And yet you knew that in six months, America was going to be destroyed in a nuclear war. Even though we were, at this point in time, very comfortable, yet we would weep and howl for the miseries that would come upon us. But not only are these coming miseries temporal, the coming miseries are also eternal, in that They will be eternally tormented in the flames of hell, as depicted by the rich man in Luke 16 and verse 24, where it says that in hell he cried out and said, Father Abraham, send Lazarus to dip the tip of his finger in water and touch the tip of my tongue for I am tormented in this flame. And so in hell, there will be weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth. darkness, the worm that dies not, the fire that is not quenched, and the contemplation of such an end should cause anyone, no matter the pleasantness of their condition right now, to weep and howl for the miseries that shall come upon them. And so these people face impending miseries, both temporal and eternal, and these things should cause them to weep and to howl. But not only do they face impending misery, furthermore, the things in which they repose their confidence are both decaying and temporary. The things in which they repose their confidence are both decaying and temporary. Notice verse 2. In the first part of verse 3, he says, Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten, Your gold and silver is cankered." What he is saying is all this stuff that they've got that appears to be so valuable and such a blessing to them is not only temporary, but it's going down in value. Now, when he says here, your riches are corrupted, what he is speaking about here is things like grain and oil and wine, things that constituted riches in that day, and those things he said, are decaying and breaking down and losing value over time. Your garments are moth-eaten. Garments, of course, were a valuable commodity. They were a store of wealth, and oftentimes wealthy people would have dozens and dozens and dozens, perhaps hundreds of garments stored up. And these things could be sold as valuable items at any time they needed a cash flow. And these things, he said, are being eaten by the moths. And then he says your gold and silver is cankered. And this is speaking of how that inflation and famine can rob them of value. He's saying, in essence, their values eroding away just as though they were rusting. Of course, gold and silver don't rust. We're well aware of that. and James was aware of that as well, but the rust that he is speaking of here is not literal as much as it is figurative in that the value of gold and silver is something which can easily erode away and does erode away with changing military and political situations. And so, the point that he's making is that only a fool would place his confidence in things which are so frail, things which are so perishing, and things which are so transient in value and in nature as these things are. It's kind of like building a house on a block of ice in the wintertime. Come the summer, And all collapses in a ruin as the warm air arose this seemingly firm foundation. And so it is with wealth. It is decaying. It is temporary. It will do no good whatsoever when troubles come and when judgment looms. Indeed, it is actually a detriment. Notice verse three. He says, not only are these things decaying and temporary, they're a detriment. They're going to be harmful. It says the rest of them shall be a witness against you and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. These things are a detriment in that they would be a witness against those who possessed them. Oftentimes, we think of our wealth as our friend. But when it stands up, as it were, and witnesses against us, no longer is it something that we desire to have around, it's something we wish we'd never seen. This wealth will be a witness to the fact that it was gotten by sinful means, that it was used for sinful purposes, and it was never employed for the glory of its rightful owner, who is God himself. You see, riches are a stewardship that must be given account for. And the more you've got, the more you have to give account for. And when our wealth itself testifies on the day of judgment against us, then it will be seen as a mortal enemy. not as that darling friend and that great precious treasure to be laid up and to be fawned over. But not only will they be a witness against those who possess them, they will be a detriment in that they will be a cause of punishment to those who possess them. He goes on to say, they shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Far from being a blessing, wealth will become a reason for increased punishment in hell, a reason for increased burnings and torments. And so, what appear to be these present delights will actually be a cause of future torments. And so, they are a detriment in that they are a witness against those who possess them, They will be a cause of punishment to those who possess them, and they will ultimately prove to be an exercise in futility. He goes on to say here, you have heaped together treasures for the last days. Now, against all of the prophecies and all of the political events that clearly predicted the ultimate destruction of Israel and Jerusalem by the Romans, these people are storing up wealth as though somehow it's going to shield them from the coming calamity. And this is a false security at best, and it is a terrible liability at worst, because it was precisely the wealthy and those high in political and social status that were especially singled out for destruction by the Romans and for plundering by their own desperate countrymen. They had heaped together treasure. Against these last days, only to find out that that treasure would be that which would be the source of their destruction and make them objects of being plundered and ruined by others. And so this, then, is the nature of their misery that is to come upon them. They have reason to weep and to howl for the temporal and eternal miseries that will come upon them, because they are reposing their confidence in things that are both decaying and things that are temporary and that will be to their detriment in that It will be a witness against them in the day of judgment. It will be a cause of increased punishment, and it will be a liability to them in the future time of national destruction. Clearly, their position and their possessions are not something to be envied. They are something to be withdrawn from, and for those who possess them to be greatly pitied. Well, in considering together the condemnation of the wicked rich, we have seen the nature of their misery. Now you might be saying to yourself, why would riches cause this degree and intensity of misery? We come to the answer, our second major point, having seen the nature of their misery, notice together, secondly, the reason for their misery, the reason for their misery. Now, the reason for their misery is not far to seek. They are not going to become miserable simply because they're wealthy. Wealth in and of itself is not a cause of misery. In fact, wealth can be a means of great blessing. But the reason for their misery is the unrighteous way in which they obtain their wealth and the ungodly way in which they used their wealth. These are the two great dangers in relationship to wealth, dangers in its acquisition and dangers in its use. And if we can avoid dangers in these two areas, we can avoid being pierced through with many sorrows in relationship to wealth. First of all, then, notice the unrighteous way in which they obtained their wealth. Verse four says, Behold, the hire of the laborers who have reaped down your fields, which is kept back of you by fraud cries and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of Sabbath. Now, the unrighteous way in which they obtain their wealth was simply that they obtained it through theft. They accumulated wealth by stealing, in this case, from their employees. Those who they had employed were either not paid for all the hours they worked or else they were paid less than what was agreed upon. In any way, in any event, there was fraud involved in which what was rightly owed was not justly paid. And so these wealthy men increased their wealth by stealing wages from those that they employed. Now, this, of course, is not the only unrighteous way in which men may acquire wealth. Men may acquire wealth unrighteously by running a business that profits from the promotion of sin. They may do so by working on the Sabbath day. They may do so by working excessive hours to the neglect of their families in the service of God. Sure, they get rich by working on the Sabbath day and working to the neglect of their families. But that's an unrighteous acquisition of wealth. They may do so by not fulfilling all the duties promised in their contracts. They cheat the customer out of some of what they promised, either in terms of quality or in terms of quantity or in terms of process. And as a result, they profit at the expense of violating their word to their customer. They may do so by means of gambling and playing the lottery. They may do so by taking advantage of the poor, or the needy, or of the widow. There are many ways to unrighteously acquire wealth, and I could not begin to list them all. But the Bible is very clear that there are just and unjust ways to acquire wealth, and when we violate biblical principle in the acquisition of wealth, then that wealth is not an advantage to us. It is that which is a source of misery to us. Turn in your Bibles, please, to the book of Amos, chapter 8, and we'll consider verses 4 through 10. Amos, chapter 8, verses 4 through 10. God says through his prophet Amos in chapter 8 verse 4, Hear this, O ye that swallow up the needy, even to make the poor of the land to fail, saying, When will the new moon be gone, that we may sell corn, and the Sabbath that we may set forth wheat, making the ephah which is a measure, small, and the shekel, great, and falsifying the balances by deceit, that we may buy the poor for silver and the needy for a pair of shoes, yea, and sell the refuse of the wheat. The Lord is sworn by the excellency of Jacob. Surely I will never forget any of their works. shall not the land tremble for this, and everyone mourn that dwells therein, and it shall rise up wholly as a flood. It shall be cast out and drowned as by the flood of Egypt. And so what God is doing in this passage through Amos is he is denouncing the unrighteous way in which these people are acquiring wealth. They are people who are swallowing up the needy and the poor of the land. There are people who are irritated that they can't do business on the Sabbath day and they just can't wait for Sunday to get past so they can get back to work. And indeed, they would work on the Sabbath if they had a chance. And they want to use false balances and false measures of shekels and ethos They want to take advantage of the poor and the needy, and they want to sell the refuse of the wheat as wheat, and thus cheat the customer. The Lord has sworn by the excellency of Jacob, I won't forget this. God takes the unrighteous acquisition of wealth through whatever means it's unrighteously acquired very seriously. And so if we take advantage of the poor or the needy or the widow, or we acquire wealth in an unjust way, any form of unjust acquisition of wealth makes that wealth a source of misery, a source of judgment, a source of destruction, not a blessing and advantage. And so if you have some wealth, and all of us have some, you had better be mighty sure that you acquired it in a just way. And as you are acquiring wealth, even now, make sure that the method by which you are acquiring it is just. And you are not acquiring it in violation of any biblical principle. And so, God tells us the reason for their misery is the unrighteous way in which they obtained wealth. Secondly, the reason for their misery is also the ungodly way in which they used wealth, the ungodly way in which they used wealth. Now, once they got this money, how did they use it? Well, they did not use it for God's purposes. They did not use it to achieve God's glory, and they certainly did not use it in obedience to God's word. Instead, they used it, notice, first of all, for self indulgence upon themselves. Verse five, he says, You have lived in pleasure on the earth and been wanton. You have nourished your hearts as in a day of slaughter. How did they use their wealth for self-indulgence upon themselves? Here were people who would give nothing to the poor and the needy. They would give nothing to the Lord's work, but they were lavish with themselves to the point of luxury and decadence. That's what it means to be wanton. They are like the rich man in Luke 16 in verse 19. who was clothed in purple and fine linen and fared sumptuously every day but could not spare either a rag or a crumb for poor Lazarus who laid at his gate full of sores. And so their whole thought and purpose is, how may I enjoy myself? How may I indulge myself with the money that I have got? It is not, how would God have me to use this stewardship of wealth that he has entrusted to me and for which I must give account to him. What would he want me to do with his money that he's entrusted to me? And so instead of going to God and consulting him about how we would have them use their wealth, they go to their own lusts and they consult their own lusts and ask, how would my own pleasures want this wealth to be used. They believe that wealth is given to them to be used exclusively for them, rather than to recognize that wealth is given to them to be used for God. And they have forgotten who the true owner of their wealth is, and therefore, who the one is who has the right to determine how it will be spent. In Hosea chapter 13 and in verse 6, Hosea has this to say with reference to the use of wealth. In Hosea 13 verse 6, it says, According to their pasture, so were they filled. They were filled and their heart was exalted. and therefore have they forgotten me." And so, these people who became rich used that wealth to fuel their own pride, to fuel their own independence, and to fuel an attitude of indifference towards God. And they began to have contempt upon the ordinary, And they must have more and more and never satisfied. See, it says according to their pasture, so were they filled. Now, if you're an animal and you have available to you 20 square feet of pasture, well, eat it all up. You need that much to live. And then let's say your pasture doubles and you have a 40 square feet of pasture. Well, boy, we're Got a little more abundance here, so we eat that all up." Well, then you just keep expanding it. And it never gets to the point where they say, well, you know, I have enough, and this here that's left over, this can be used for other people and other purposes. What he's saying here is, according to their pastures, so were they filled. And no matter how much they made, and no matter how much they had, they still used it all for themselves. And it was never anything for anyone else. Or for the Lord's work. And so they begin to have contempt upon the ordinary and must have more and more and bigger and bigger and larger and larger and better and better until they are never satisfied. And so in the use of their wealth, they used it for self indulgence upon themselves. But secondly, in the ungodly way in which they use their wealth, they not only used it for self indulgence, excuse me, Not only do they use it for self-indulgence upon themselves, but they also used it for the oppression of others, for the oppression of others. Now, notice, if you will, James chapter four and verse six. In this context, he says to them, you have condemned and killed the just and he does not resist you. They use their wealth for the oppression of other people. Now, one of the things that we know is that wealth buys judges and wealth buys verdicts. And these people with this wealth not only used it for sensual self-indulgence, but they also used it to rid themselves of those who are righteous and who would expose their fraudulent activities. And so under the pretense of law and using and manipulating the means of the law. They wind up committing theft and murder against righteous people. Judas was bought for 30 pieces of silver. And Christ was manipulated through legal means into death by the wicked rich. You remember what James said back in chapter 2, verses 6 and 7. He says, you have despised the poor. Do not rich men oppress you and draw you before the judgment seats? Do not they blaspheme that worthy name by which you recall? And you can see the self-sufficiency, the independence, the pride, the arrogance, the oppression that the wealthy bring upon the poor by using their wealth to manipulate the legal system in order to employ it to their unjust ends. And so this is the reason then for the misery that comes upon them because of the unrighteous way in which they acquire their wealth and the unrighteous way in which they utilize their wealth. And so when the Christian then looks at this very wealthy person, and begins to get a little envious, and begins to get a little jealous, and begins to get a little resentful, and begins to wonder why God hasn't blessed him in that fashion. He needs to pause and to realize that the wealth that this person has is going to be the biggest curse that has ever come into his life. It is going to eat his flesh as fire in hell, and he'll wish he had never acquired this stuff. And he'll wish he'd never had it. And you'll be glad you never did. And so don't be coveting after it now. Because these people have acquired it unrighteously, they have used it ungodly, and because of unrighteous acquisition and ungodly use, that wealth will turn against them in the day of judgment, will witness against them, and will be the means and the vehicle for their increased punishment and damnation. Don't be envious of the wicked rich. Rather, pity them. And be sure that as God increases your level of riches, that they have been acquired righteously, not at the expense of your family and not at the expense of morals and ethics and godly business practices. And then be sure, once you have acquired them, that you use them in the way in which the true owner would direct you. And that is to use them for the blessing and benefit of others, for the blessing and progress of the Lord's work, and for the glory and goodness of God. And some of that involves certainly spending money on yourself. You need food, you need clothing, and you need shelter. He is not saying here that we must never spend any money on any pleasures of any kind upon ourselves. But what he is saying is that should not be the exclusive use, or the focal use, or even the major use of harmony. Lay not up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust doth corrupt, and thieves break through and steal. But rather lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, and thieves do not break through and steal. For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. And so this, then, is the comfort and hope he gives to these distressed Christians. And it is simply this, the apparent prosperity of the wicked is actually a source of misery, not a means of blessing, and rather than to be envied, they are to be pitied. And so understanding that helps us to see that justice will be served. Chafe not against their apparent advantage in evil now. Be patient. In due time, the reality will become apparent. So having seen, then, this evening, the condemnation of the wicked wretch, next week we will consider together the comfort of the patient Christian. Let us pray together. Forgive us for the times that we become envious of the men of the world who advance in the things of the world. And yet who either acquire their riches unrighteously. Or utilize them in an ungodly way. Father, I pray that you might help us not to be envious. And not to think hard thoughts of you because we struggle in the moderate lifestyles and sometimes even the pinched lifestyles that our income affords us. Lord, I pray that you might help us to realize that better is the little with righteousness than great revenues without right. Father, I pray that we might acquire our wealth in a godly way, not at the neglect of our families and not at the neglect of your worship and not at the neglect of honesty and not at the neglect of compassion on the poor and needy. But help us, Father, to acquire it by way of honest labor. and by way of fair value, and by way of moderation and principle. We read in the scriptures that they who will to be rich pierce themselves through with many sorrows. Father, I pray that we might be free from that. The scriptures tell us that we are to let our life be without covetousness, And be content with such things as we have, for the Lord has said, I will never leave thee and forsake thee. And if we have the Lord, we have the treasure that is beyond price. Father, I pray that we might also utilize the wealth that you have given to us in a godly fashion. Help us not just to use it on selfish self-indulgence, But utilize it as wise stewards. Father, I pray that we might never use it for the oppression of others, but rather for their blessing. Thank you, Father, for this perspective. Help us, Lord, to remember it when those tinges of covetousness and jealousy rise up in us. Oh, Father, thank you for delivering us from the miseries that would cause the wicked rich to weep in hell. Thank you, Father, that in that great day we will sing in praise, and because you have delivered us from these sins. In Jesus' name, Amen.