is. I don't condone gambling, but the expression gets at something that we're going to look at in our text today. And that's the connection between what we say and what we do. Because what we say, if it's not connected with action, says more to do with our heart than just speech. Put your money where your mouth is. That's an expression like for horse betting. So somebody is maybe betting on a horse, and their friend is there. He's not putting any money in, but he's offering suggestions. Hey, put your money on that one. And you would whisper to him, you put your money where your mouth is. If you're willing to back that horse, then show it in action. And James in our text today is showing the relationship between what we say and do. True religion. What is true religion? That's the question we're asking today. True religion is a matter of the heart and results in action. And James is going to show us in our text that true religion is a bridled tongue, care for the needy, and keeping unstained from the world. And as we look at this text today, we're going to keep that question in mind. What is true religion? And is mine true? So turn with me today as we stand together and read from this portion of God's Word from James 1, verses 26-27. James 1, verses 26-27. Please stand with me. If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue, but deceives his heart, this person's religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the father is this to visit orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained from the world the word of the Lord Let's pray together Father we thank you for this your word and we ask that you would cause it to dwell in our hearts richly and Father, that you would give us ears to hear, open our eyes that we may behold wonders out of your word. For we pray this in Jesus' mighty name, and amen. You may be seated. Kristen, could you please turn the fans on for me? There's a switch back there. James is concerned with true religion. What is true religion? And that's the question we're going to be answering today. Because often when we think of religion, or religious, we think of it in terms of a pejorative term. Right? Often millennials will tell you, no, I'm not religious. I'm spiritual. And that means that they don't have an outward form or expression of worship or actually a particular God. But they do feel inclination towards something spiritual. We all have and express devotion to God or a God in some manner, in some way. It's inescapable, it's built into who we are as creatures. We know this as Christians and often unbelievers deny this, but it's clear in the way that they live their lives and the things that they do. What we find today in our text is that James is addressing the question of what is true religion. Now remember we said a few weeks ago from verse 19 that James had three ethical imperatives that he was going to unpack slowly Over the remainder of the verses of chapter 1 and we said we're going to take some time to look at those over the next three weeks well now James is addressing the the question of being slow to speak that ethical imperative that should mark the community of God is our speech ethics and James in verse 26 says if anyone thinks that Now that word, some translations say supposes, I really like the old King James Version which says, seems to be. If anyone seems to be religious, but does not bridle his tongue, Deceiving his heart. This person's religion is worthless Now James is not using religion or religious in the pejorative way that I just spoke of but in a positive way He is laying out a case for what true religion is not True religion is not Being slow to speak true religion is a bridled tongue. I And James is going to have much more to say about our speech in chapter 3. But as we've seen in chapter 1, he is opening up, it's almost like an extended introduction, where we see a lot of the themes that are going to resurface over and over again, James brings in his introduction. And this is a customary way to write. So, in chapter 3, he's going to give us much more detail about what bridling the tongue is. But for today, he's just outlining for us what does true religion look like. The first thing we find is true religion is a bridled tongue. You see, devotion to God is not what we say, but what we do. but also our actions. That is, our speech must be conformed to a life that demonstrates itself in action. If anyone thinks or supposes or seems to be religious but doesn't bridle his tongue, now the greatest example of this surely is The pharisees and I know we pick on the pharisees a lot and rightly so because in scripture they give us a very clear example of what religion that is man-made or based on tradition or based upon our values or Devotion to God how we think God would like it to be expressed they provide a great picture of that and So, in Matthew 5, verse 11, Jesus I'm sorry, not Matthew 5, verse 11. Jesus is talking on the Sermon on the Mount, and he is outlining what our speech should conform to. And he denounces the Pharisees because they are washing the cups, they're keeping the traditions of men, they're holding to all these practices that supposedly keep them clean, but inside their hearts, they're filthy. They're bringing forth the fruit of their heart in the way that they talk. And so Jesus says it's not about cleansing the cup on the outside, but it's about purifying the heart. And that's exactly what James is saying. He's not saying anything different than Jesus did. Our bridled tongue, our speech must come from a heart that is devoted to God. We've all experienced Christians in the church who claim to be Christians. But their speech does not match the pattern of what true Christianity, what James calls true religion, is. It takes the cooperation of 72 muscles in your face to produce speech. On average, 16,000 words come out of your mouth every day. That adds up to a whopping 860.3 million words in the average American lifetime. What do all the nouns, verbs, and adjectives, and sentences say about your life and the condition of your heart? It is a scary, scary thing. Indeed, we've all encountered Christians who claim to be Christian, but their speech is not bridled. Their tongue is not bridled. These are the people who you would never tell anything to unless you wanted the entire church to know. They're the ones who are always willing and ready to offer you advice on how you should live unsolicited. They can pray very eloquent and pious prayers, but behind closed doors their speech is filled with hatred and animosity and bitterness and anger. They are exempt from what Scripture calls as slander because They're just truth tellers. They're just telling the truth. They're just saying it how it is. They're just truth tellers. So slander, it's not really slander for them. We've all encountered these kinds of people, and in many ways, we model them because we use our words to murder somebody's reputation when we gossip or we slander them. And it sows discord among the brothers because we don't bridle our tongue. You see, words are powerful. God created the universe by speaking it into existence. And then he sent his son, the divine word of God, to create new life out of death. And then he sent his spirit to inspire the words of scripture. And we could understand and see and God could reveal himself to us through them. And that's how God uses words. God uses words to shape, to create, to give new life. God speaks and we listen. But how do we use our words? I would often quote to my children, when they were younger especially, from Proverbs 10, verse 19. In the multitude of words, sin is not lacking, but he who restrains his lips are wise. You see, it's easy for us to allow ourselves to be governed by our tongue. And our speech goes on before us without even thinking because we have failed to bridle it. Now that term, bridle, that I've been using is like the bit in a horse. And James, we're going to look at this as he has a lot of analogies as he compares the tongue. But one of them that he uses is a horse and being bridled. Now, it's just put a bit in a horse's mouth piece of metal and you can steer that giant animal with just reins, just bridling it. It's a powerful animal. It has way more powerful than we do as men or women. And we can control that power by bridling it. Well, the same James says is true of our tongue. When we are slow to speak, when we learn to bridle our tongue, when we learn to use our words to build up and not to tear down, that is what James is talking is true religion. often when my children grow up and the world becomes alluring to them. The first thing that becomes alluring is swearing. There's something exciting about cursing. Something exciting about speaking in a way that you know you shouldn't. But I'll often take them aside and say, We are Christians, and we don't speak that way. We use intelligent speech. Why? Why because of what Colossians 3, verse 16 through 17 says. Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do in word or deed, Do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him. Paul says that our speech is to be characterized by having the words of Christ dwell in us richly. I tell my children, use intelligent speech because you have been given the words of eternal life. How can you speak in this way when you have this dwelling in you? How can we slander a brother made in the image of God when we have the words of Christ dwelling in us richly? How can we use our words to hurt others when we have the word of Christ dwelling in us? And no one is more susceptible to this than me. A preacher makes his living by speaking. There will be sin. There will be sin in the way we speak. We will have that meeting at work and explode and say things that we'll regret. We will say that harsh and unkind thing to our spouse because we're frustrated and angry. We will use our words instead of building up to tear others down. We are constantly to strive towards holiness and having a bridal tongue. But when we don't know that the grace of God is there to meet you, it's called repentance. It's called going to that boss or that fellow coworker and saying, I blew it in that meeting and I said things that I regret deeply. And I'm a Christian and I cannot use my speech in this way. I'm so sorry, honey, for treating you this way by saying these harsh and unkind things. Or son, or daughter, please forgive me for the way that I've used my speech to tear you down. That's the Christian life, is modeling repentance. That is a constant turning from sin to God. And that's what James is saying is true religion, a bridled tongue. But not just a bridled tongue, because if it was just a bridled tongue, the quietest among us would be the most devoted to God. And we know that's not the case all the time, although they have much to model for us. But James says true religion is also action. It also results in something. Look with me at verse 27. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this, to visit orphans and widows in their affliction and to keep oneself unstained from the world. So James says true religion is a bridled tongue But it's also a life that results in action. It's also visiting orphans and widows in their affliction and keeping unstained from the world. So we're going to look at those two aspects of what are positive traits that James says are true religion. That is true devotion to God from a heart that loves Him. Well, true religion is care for the needy. true religion is care for the needy. Now we have here two positive examples, but that in James simplifying the gospel, in James simplifying the Christian life, he's not excluding other aspects. He's not saying orthodoxy, true doctrine, is not important, or the worship of God is not important, or other aspects of the Christian life that we know are vital and true. But James is highlighting needs that this particular community has. And in fact, we find they're so general that we all need to hear them. What james is saying is that true religion? That results in a bridal tongue and action and that action Always it comes from outward expressions visiting orphans and widows that are motivated by inward piety When you separate those two that's where you get off course because you can have great agencies that care for the poor They do mercy ministry well, but it's not motivated by true devotion to God. And its result is like liberalism. It's not the true gospel. It's a social gospel, and it's devoid of holiness. But at the same time, you can have a pietism that is so inwardly focused, so what they call heavenly-minded, that it's no earthly good. James is saying we must always have these things wed together. Outward expressions, inward piety. They can never be divorced because you will have error. You will not have true religion. care for the needy. Visiting is the term that is used there for orphans and widows. Now, as we've been going through the Psalms of Lament on Wednesday evening, we've noticed that these terms get coupled together quite often. And what we've found is that when the Bible speaks about widows and orphans, sometimes adding sojourners and those who are foreign, when it couples all those things together, it's talking about the most vulnerable, the most needy in our midst, those who have the least amount of power, who are subject to those who have more power and can do something about them. They are dependent. is the point on other people's care and need. Now let me try to paint a picture for you of what life was like in the first century because, brothers and sisters in Christ, we don't live in first century Palestine. We live in privilege, great privilege, especially those who are white. And we take that for granted. We don't recognize the great poverty and the gap that exists between our culture and many cultures of the world still today, but especially that first century culture. You see, a widow in the first century did not have welfare to care for her. She did not have a state that was going to look after her. She had struggles her life long because she was not afforded the same opportunities to work. She had to find menial labor, tasks that were fitting for a woman according to the culture that she lived in. So she always was scraping by, always struggling to make ends meet. It wasn't as if she had the same opportunity to climb the corporate ladder, or she might have even been empowered for being a single mother. No, her life was hard, and her children's life was even harder. They had no one to give them an apprenticeship, to give them a vocation, to lead them to the next phase in their life. Widows were very seldom landowners. Their life was a constant struggle. And into the midst of that situation, the Christians came. They came with the good news of the gospel. And the gospel wasn't just propositions that they said, but the gospel was bandages that they put on their wounds. The gospel was the bread that they fed them. The gospel was caring for their needs. Julian, the apostate, has some telling words to say around the third century, said this, these impious Galileans, Christians, not only feed their own but ours also. welcoming them with their agape. They attract them as children are attracted with cakes. Whilst the pagan priests neglect the poor, the hated Galileans devote themselves to work of charity, and by display of false compassion, have established and given effect to their pernicious errors. Such practice is common among them and causes contempt for our gods. You see, this last pagan emperor is lamenting the fact that the Christians show charity even to the poor Romans. The Romans were exposing their children on the hillside if they wanted to abort them. That was their way of doing it. They would leave them out on the hillside and the Christians would come behind and take them into their homes and raise them. They would care for their sick and poor. Where the plague was, they went with the gospel to minister to that community, caring little for their life. And this emperor was so moved by their charity that he was commanding his pagan priests to do the same. Because the apologetic of their charity was so winsome that people were being drawn to Christianity in droves. Does our mercy ministry, does our charity, does our visiting of widows and orphans and their affliction say that about the church? I am amazed and overwhelmed at the love and the care that this church has shown to my family. We have been blessed exceedingly by your love and your care, feeding us, providing for us. And I have no doubt that that same charity exists amongst all of you. that you would willingly give to one another and care for each other. And also, I've heard the many stories of adoption in our families, how you've opened your home to bring somebody into it and love them and raise them as your children and raise them up in the faith. What a testimony to the gospel. What a testimony of how God works in our lives. and how we also as a church care for the unborn through organizations like Options, showing young girls that they have an option, that it doesn't have to end in abortion, by caring for them, by counseling them, by encouraging them, by showing them the heartbeat of their child. And I'm encouraged by all of those things. There are many more ways that we can serve and meet the needs of our community. If God has given you a passion to serve, please reach out to your deacons. They would love to walk alongside you to figure out how best we can, as a church, meet the needs of our community. How can we, as Hope Church, reach out and visit widows and orphans in their affliction? How can we visit those most needy? And I'm thinking especially of our African and American brothers and sisters in our city who are mourning and grieving over these atrocities that seem to keep happening. And there's such tension between us. We must reach out and show the love of Christ to show that only in the gospel are those distinctions done away with? If you have desires to serve, don't think about money. Don't think about, we can't afford to help, we can't do that. I am always amazed at how God comes in and meets the needs of His people when they trust Him, when they step out in faith. God supplies our needs and will richly bless our endeavors to meet our widows and orphans in their affliction. It's not money. It's vision. We lack vision. We lack an idea of this city transformed by the gospel. It's not money. Don't let money be the thing that keeps you from stepping out in faith. which is why we need to pray. We need to pray. We need to pray for the needs of our community. Pray for the widows and orphans, those who are most needy, who need our care the most. But as we said, our action must always be motivated by our inward piety, by a desire for holiness. We cannot divorce these things. The Gospel must move out in tangible ways, but it must be motivated by hearts that have been transformed. It must be motivated by our holiness, our desire for holiness. So James says true religion is care for the needy, but true religion is also keeping unstained from the world. We must couple action with inward piety. So what does James mean by the world? He says at the end of verse 27, and to keep oneself unstained from the world." Now what does James mean by world? Often the New Testament writers use this word world in many different ways. Sometimes just to refer to the creation. Sometimes to all mankind under that creation. Sometimes to wicked world systems that are in opposition to God and His kingdom. And that's what James is talking about. He's talking about a system or a worldview that is opposed to the gospel. Now we're accustomed to think about worldview in terms of the questions that we ask about the world. Everyone has a worldview. That is, in a way that they approach the world or look out at the world and interpret the things that they see. Usually, it's by answering such basic questions as, who are we? Where do we come from? What is wrong? What is the solution? These are four basic questions that everyone asks in some way. They may not state it explicitly like that, but implicitly, they're asking and answering it and it manifests itself in the way they view the world. So, for example, a materialist worldview. They believe that what we see is what there is. There is no spiritual realm. There is no God or creator. Everything happened by random chance. It came spontaneously into being. That is their foundational story. Stories are important because they help us make sense of the world. So that foundational story helps them, a materialist, make sense of the world around them. Well, if you were to take that story to its logical conclusion, you would have utter chaos. You would have the dominant species always vying for dominance. Fortunately, none of us, none of us is consistent in applying our worldview. And many unbelieving worldviews borrow from the Christian worldview to make sense of the world. They have to. Because Christianity is the only one that can answer the questions of who we are, where we come from, what is wrong, and what is the solution in a consistent manner. In a way that makes sense of the reality of the world that we see around us. There was a story told, and I don't know exactly who's told it first, but there were two young fish swimming and an older fish swam by them. And the older fish said to the younger fish, hey boys, how's the water? And the two younger fish swam on. And then one looks at the other one and said, what the heck is water? It illustrates really well the fact that we take for granted that we're swimming in a world. We are swimming in a world that is in opposition to the kingdom of God. But we take it for granted. We don't realize what is water. And this shifts and changes with the times, with the season, with what's called the zeitgeist, what our cultural standard is. For that moment, it's not always the same. The materialist worldview that I just articulated was very popular in the dominant worldview in the 19th and 20th century. But now with postmodernism, it's not the worldview. Now secularism is reigning supreme. And the idea of expressive individualism, that the greatest good is for me to be, to self-actualize, to become the greatest person that I was intended to be. And so you have relativism, moral relativism, where everything is just dependent on my desires and what I want and if it makes me feel good. Secularism has run amok in our world. And we are all trying to live life by accomplishing our desires, individuals. Well, you can imagine that doesn't work for societies. It doesn't work for churches. It doesn't work for families, which is why the divorce rate is so high, which is why families are destroyed on the altar of individualism. My own desires. Well, I'm not in love anymore. Families lie in wreckage because of that statement. cities because of corruption and the desire to get ahead. Our own mayor in Scranton, corrupt. We've had corrupt politics for years because no one is thinking about anyone else but only what they can get. We don't realize that we are swimming in that same water. We don't realize that subtly we are being shaped to think that same way by the media and the music and the people that we listen to. They all shape the way that we think about the world. And they do that by playing on our desires, by the things that we love and want. They shape our desires. to conform to what the world says we need. You've all felt that as you've watched a Super Bowl commercial. And you, having no desire for that trinket that they're trying to sell, all of a sudden find that you need to have that to make your life whole. And they're good. That's what they make their living on is your attention. And they vie for it on social media, and they sell it to the highest bidder. Because they know if they can shape your desires, if they can change what you desire, then they can sell it to you. And it's subtle, but it works. Because we don't realize that we're swimming in that water. We say, what the heck is water? Sanctification works the same way, conforming our desires to love the things that God loves and hate the things that God hates. But let me ask you this, does the world outmatch your input of the voice of God? Does the world-shaping desires outmatch God's voice speaking into your life? On average, an American watches two hours of Netflix a day and two hours of social media a day. That's four hours a day. How much time do you spend reading the word in prayer? Of 48% of Bible users in America, only 5% read every day. Of 48%, that's only half, 5% read their Bible every day. Only 36% of evangelicals say they pray every day. The rest may pray once a week, a month, or not at all. Now I'm not saying that to guilt you out. I'm not saying that to make you feel bad for not spending four hours in prayer instead of four hours on Netflix. I do want to caution you about how you use your time and what you're allowing to shape your desires. Because brothers and sisters, if we don't have the word of Christ dwelling in us richly, then we will be like those two young fish. And suddenly the world will have stained us to such an effect that we have no idea that our desires have been shifted and changed. We have no idea that all of a sudden we're calling things that God calls evil, good. We have no idea that all of a sudden we hate the things that God loves. Because we've allowed the culture around us to shape what we love. There is this principle in Scripture. It's throughout. You become like what you worship and you worship what you love. This is why Jesus tells his disciples to seek first the kingdom of God and all of these things will be added unto you. Your heavenly Father knows you have needs and he wants you to enjoy his great creation. It's not I'm not trying to make a divide between material things and spiritual things, because Scripture never speaks in that way. But I'm trying to talk about divided loyalties. You cannot serve God and mammon. You cannot have God as your Father and then use your mouth to slaughter a person made in His image. You cannot have divided loyalties. Christ will be Lord of all or he will not be Lord at all. But you'll find the sweet freedom that comes from giving yourself up to Christ. You gain the whole world. The whole world. You become like what you worship. You worship Netflix stars. subtly your desires are shaped to be conformed to theirs. The music you listen to all day long subtly shapes the way you think about the world. And then that illicit relationship is not illicit anymore because you've been listening to music that has shaped you to think that's totally fine, it's normal. Or the way I treat women, that's normal. I've heard it in every song I've listened to. And you don't realize that you now love the things that God hates, and you hate the things that God loves. Brothers and sisters, true religion is keeping oneself unstained by the world. And that means saturating yourself in the Word of God. You see, worship is designed, we've already spoke about this, it's designed to remind you of who God is and what your place is. And it's designed to remind you of what God loves and what God hates. Prayer, reading scripture, all of the means of grace recalibrate us so that when we go out into the world, we are like Odysseus in Homer's The Odyssey, trying to sail between the islands where the sirens are and they're calling out to us. And the men have to put beeswax in their ears so they don't hear the beautiful message that hides men's bones laid beneath their feet. They have to keep that straight course. Otherwise, they'll be dashed against the rocks of their own desires. And we are called to walk that straight path with our eyes fixed on Christ, and the world behind us. Only then can we express true religion, true devotion to God. Because it doesn't just consist in pious things we say. James is encouraging us to put our money where our mouth is. He will pick up the steam after a brief interlude on showing partiality in two weeks when he outlines for us what true faith looks like. It's not justification by faith alone and then I'm done. It's justification by faith alone and then faith working through love that goes out and visits widows and orphans in their affliction and that keeps oneself unstained by the world and bridles their tongue. James gives us a snapshot of three characteristics of what true religion is. Is your religion true? Can you answer yes? Can you answer yes, but help me Lord, give me more grace so that I too may walk being unstained by the world, visiting widows and orphans in their affliction, and keeping my tongue bridled. That needs to be our prayer today. Join with me in prayer. Father, we need you because apart from the work of your Spirit enabling and strengthening us, we will fall far short We will care only for our own desires. And in the midst of that, we'll stomp and squish and walk on those who are most needy around us. And we will use our tongue to tear down and not to build up. Father, we pray that you would have your perfect work in us so that we may be conformed daily being shaped by your word and by your spirit to love the things you love and hate the things that you hate. We thank you that in Christ we have perfect freedom and we can walk, keeping ourself unstained by the world. But we pray these things in his strong name and amen.