Now we've been working with James five and before we look at versus seven through nine. I want to clarify a few things about versus one through six. And the first thing I want to say I did not intend and I hope that you did not get the impression that you should cheat on your income taxes or anything like that. Just because the federal government withholds and although that is stealing does not mean that we are there to police the federal government. As Christians, we're called to obey the laws of our country unless they contradict the law of God. So they are stealing. Federal withholding is a crime and you can fight whether it should be legal or not in our court system. But until something has changed, we just have to suffer under the injustice. And that's sort of what James gets to next in verses 7 through 11 about how to endure suffering. Second thing, I've come down pretty hard on chasing after wealth. in verses one through six. And I don't want to leave you with the impression that wealth is wrong. Wealth is not wrong. Investing is not wrong. Saving is not wrong. Enjoying wealth is not wrong. Having a nice home. Having a nice meal. Going on trips. None of this. There's nothing wrong with any of that. We can and should enjoy all that God has provided. The thing that is wrong is when we have the wrong perspective on wealth. And that perspective is thinking that wealth can provide true inner happiness. and can solve our problems. That's where we go wrong. Well can't do those things. The only thing that can provide inner happiness and solve your problems is Bible doctrine. So that's what James is getting at. He says you may you may be suffering but don't think that money can solve it. Obviously if this passage is in James 5 1 through 6 is a portrait of the future tribulation and the destruction of all human wealth. Having all that human wealth in the latter days isn't going to help anybody get out of the destruction that's going to happen. So wealth cannot solve our problems. The problem of man, we would say, can't be reduced to economic factors. Think about it. That's what communism does. Communism says that basically man's problem is an economic one. And if we get everyone on the same economic plane, then man's problems will go away and we'll have a happier world. The 20th century was a pretty good reputation of that argument. But man's problem is not economic. It's sin. It's rebellion against God. And yet communism shows us that they know there's a problem, but in trying to find a solution, but they want to reject God's answer. So they come up with something else. And this is what Marx did. And this didn't solve the problem. Human gimmicks never solve man's problem. The only solution you have for your problems is the Word of God. And if we reject the Word of God, then we're saying God hasn't given us enough. He hasn't given us what is sufficient for every thing that we need. And quite frankly, when we depart from the Word of God as the only solution, what we're saying is that we don't want a solution. We're running from the only possible option that will help us. So there aren't hundreds of solutions out there. There's only one solution and there's about 10,503 gimmicks that pawn themselves off as solutions. But the answer is not economic. The answer is not psychological. The answer is the word of God. The answer is Bible doctrine. Now, let me say a few more things about Chapter five versus one through six. This is a hard section. OK, this is a very difficult section of Scripture and particularly because it begins this way. Come now, you rich. And if you've been reading these words, throughout James, you and your these pronouns. Obviously, up to this point, they've been referring to believers. And what I did is I said, well, I think now he's jumping and doing something different. And when he says, come now, you rich, he's referring to these people who live in the latter days during the tribulation period of time and they're unbelievers. And that's an oddity to make that jump from my side. Why did come now, you who say in verse 13 of chapter four, refer to believers and now you say in chapter five verse one come now you rich refers to unbelievers. Well it's difficult because as you read verses one through six in chapter five you read all this very harsh tribulation toned words and it gets very difficult to see how that could be referring to believers. Verse three talks about the consuming of your flesh like fire. It talks about the last days, talks about the Lord of Armies or Lord of Samael. It talks about weeping and howling for the miseries which are coming upon you. And the only other alternative to going the way I did and saying, no, this is tribulation on. He's using it as an apologetic device that we should not walk like the world. The only other way to go is to say that this is written to believers. And these are these are phrases of divine discipline. And I've listened to a pastor teacher approach the text that way is a divine discipline text written directly to us. But when he got to verses four and four or five and six, he kind of when he talked about a day of slaughter, he didn't say anything about that. So I don't know what that would refer to these terms, how they could possibly refer to divine discipline, because I don't know what the day of slaughter would be for a Christian. I don't know what why he would call himself the Lord of Armies. I don't know why he'd say that the weeping and the howling, which again are tribulational terms. So it's very hard for me to buy into the idea that this is for the present age, for church age believers. I mean, it's for us, but it's not to us. To me, he's presenting an argument like an Old Testament prophet would, and he's saying now, if Israel was getting in idolatry and all this, then he may start talking about Babylon or Assyria and saying, here's what happens when you go after other gods. And obviously, I'm very displeased with Babylon and Assyria, so you ought not to do the same things they do. And that tends to be the kind of tone that he brings in the chapter five verses one through six. That if he's so displeased with the world's wealth, they have got this perspective that it can solve all their problems and it can provide inner happiness and all this. If he's so displeased with that, that he's going to destroy them all, then why should we as believers do what they're doing? And that seems to be the force of his his argument. Now, as he shifts gears here in chapter five versus seven through nine, he gives another apologetic. And here he's talking about the return of the Lord. Now, this is another apologetic for godly living. Not only should we not follow the world, we're going to be destroyed down in the end of the tribulation and all the wealth and all that. But because Christ's coming can happen at any moment, we ought to live in light of that. So let's pick up in verse seven. Therefore, be patient, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. The farmer waits for the precious produce of the soil, being patient about it until it gets the early and late rains. You to be patient, strengthen your hearts for the coming of the Lord is near. Do not complain, brethren, against one another so that you yourselves may not be judged. Behold, the judge is standing right at the door. And in verses ten and eleven, which we'll look at next week, he gives two examples of suffering and enduring such suffering. So let's pick up with the word that therefore, in verse seven, it's a key word. It's the word it's in what we call an inferential conjunction. Now, there's been only one other inferential conjunction in all of James. And what I'm going to point out here is very important. If you look at James one twenty one. You'll see the first inferential conjunction, and it's also translated, therefore, And if you're really keen, you'll be noticing where this takes place in the text of James James one twenty one. Therefore, putting aside all filthiness and all that remains above above above. Verse twenty one is the very first verse in the body of the letter, isn't it? We've looked at the outline of James now and we'll look at this in a second. Chapter five or seven is the is he's done with the body. He's just concluded the body. So he brings in another inferential conjunction. In other words, these two inferential conjunctions bracket. Let me get this up here. They bracket the body of the letter. If the body starts in 121 and goes to five, six, and then we have another one at the beginning of the epilogue, so it just brackets that body there. This is pretty remarkable, because what it's showing you is that the way I've outlined the letter for you just like this is exactly what James intended. His use of this inferential conjunction shows us that that I haven't imposed, in other words, an outline on the text. I'm just showing you exactly what the text is saying, because there's been like hundreds of different outlines of James and nobody can agree. So I'm trying to show you an evidence for why we've outlined it this way. So we begin with the prologue in chapter one, verses one through 20. At the end of that prologue we have the thematic statement in verses 19 and 20. Then we move into the body of letter where it expands on that thematic statement in James 1 21 through 5 6. We should cultivate divine viewpoint responses to trials by being first quick to hear slow to speak slow to anger. And now we have an epilogue which we start today where we continue with the theme of persevering in trials to the very end. So by now, you ought to be able to write this outline in your sleep if you've been here consistently and you've been applying yourself. So the word, therefore, signals an inference or a conclusion to the letter, which began in one twenty one and the body ends in five six. So now we're going to put into practice what we've learned is what he's saying. We're going to put into practice being quick to hear, being slow to speak and slow to anger. The main application of it to this. is when you face trials and sufferings, you are to be patient and you are to endure. Hang in there, trusting the Lord, trusting that he has a plan. He has a purpose and he's working this out for the good. So there's no reason to blow up. There's no reason to get angry at everybody and go on a rampage when we get in a jam. God knows exactly what he's doing, whether you know what you're doing or not. God never said when we became Christians that life was going to be peachy. And we wouldn't have any problems that it's just going to be a piece of cake. Jesus is not aspirin, although a lot of people present him like aspirin. You take all your blues away or something like that. He never said that. What he says is this, that you're my children and I want you to grow up from childhood to adulthood in the Christian life. And I don't want all these baby believers running around naively. I want spiritually mature adults. And to get you there, he says, I've given you everything that you need for a life of godliness to advance spiritually. I've given you my Holy Spirit. I've given you my word. I've given you prayer. I've given you a mind to think. I've given you pastor teachers to teach you. I've given you everything you need to grow spiritually. So there's no excuses, period. No excuses. Sometimes I hear. Oh, it's just it's too hard, all the details, I just can't get it all. I'm just a simple minded Christian and. Really. That to say that you're simple minded, I think, is to deprecate God and I think it's to mock him. He created us as the only creatures in this world made his image and to drag him down and say, I'm simple minded and not a very complex creature made in his image with given a mind. to think his thoughts after him. I think to say that we're simple minded is to deprecate not only us but him. We are not simple minded at all. That is more of an excuse of laziness to put in the time and effort that God wants us to put in to come to know him and what he's up to. So further it doesn't have anything to do with our own intellectual prowess. It has to do with a person who genuinely wants to know truth. If someone wants to know the truth, he will give them the truth. He will show them if, for example, we want more. We think that we have a church that teaches the truth and which we think that we do here. We think that we're a light to this community. We think that if we weren't here, there wouldn't be a lot of Bible teaching going on. If people want to hear the truth. They'll come. OK, God will direct them here. So that may give you a perspective that you may not like when you think about other people and whether they want the truth or not. But quite frankly, I've been in a lot of these churches. I've been in Pentecostal churches. I've been in charismatic churches. I've been in Baptist churches. I've been in all sorts of churches. And until I really wanted the truth. I wasn't going to go anywhere, I said, just church up to all these different kinds of churches, and that was the bottom line. When I finally started realizing what the truth was and wanting it before you knew it, I was into it. It was not hard to make a decision what church to go to. It was simple. All I had to do was go to one where the teacher just taught line by line, verse by verse. And he was serious about the word of God. He wasn't bringing all this tradition and relics and everything else into the equation. It was just what does God have to say? And let's find out. And if a person wants that, God will take them to where they can get that. Otherwise, the bottom line is, before that, I didn't want it. And everybody else out there, they don't want it either. Okay? And that's the truth. That is the truth. Because if a person wants truth, God will bring them to a place that teaches truth. Even if they have to move their family and their home 2,000 miles to find it. God can do that. He is sovereign. He is providential to ruin the universe. So, there's none of this stuff about, you know, You know, I just can't understand all this. The bottom line is people are lazy. And if I had a nickel for every lazy Christian in this world, I'd be one of the wealthiest people in the world. And that's the bottom line. That's why books are being written right now about Christians throwing their mind out the window in today's society, because they don't want to think they don't want to put the time in. But it does take work. It does take time. We're not simple minded. We're called to study the word of God. What did Paul say in Acts 1711? These were more noble minded, searching the scriptures to see whether these things were so. It is a mental activity. And you say, well, I've got all these other things I've got to get done. Well, I'm sorry, that's just an excuse until you say this is number one and I'm going to do this, then I'm sorry, you're going to have sufferings and trials and you're going to get frustrated and you're going to go crazy because you think you know better than God. And you don't know better than God. I don't know better than God. We have to come to his word and submit to what he has said. If we want to enjoy inner happiness and be victorious over the trials and be able to solve problems, the divine viewpoint way, which is the only way. So none of these excuses are going to work at the judgment seat of Christ. And don't say I didn't warn you. OK, because when you get there, he's going to say, OK, I gave you every opportunity. I gave you a mind. I created you to think, and you didn't want to, and you threw it out the window. So, sorry. And you'll just be a baby all your life as a Christian. So, when we talk about James and we talk about the trials that we will face, the sufferings that we will face, one of the key elements to understanding this is this idea. You learn doctrine, then a trial comes. What matters is what you do with that trial, how you face it. If you apply the doctrine, then that means you step forward in the Christian life. You advance spiritually. This is a lot like sports and sports. You can learn a skill, but when you begin to execute the skill in a game, then you've taken your game up a level. You understand? We all know that. That is the same way in the Christian life. You don't really advance and take that step until you take what you learn the doctrine and apply it in the circumstance. And we have two beautiful examples of that in James. So far, Rahab and Abraham, both of these people got in tremendous jams. And when the heat was on, they applied the doctrine and they lived. They enjoyed life. They stepped forward. They advanced in Christian in the Christian life. of their life, which wasn't Christian, but their their their relationship with God. So therefore, here in verse seven is conclude a conclusion of the letter. And he's saying now it's time to put into practice all that we learned. So the first thing is a command. Be patient. Therefore, be patient. It's an aorist active imperative. The aorist tense denotes an urgency. In other words, don't put it off this being patient thing, but put it on right now. Start being patient when you face trials. So the idea is to remain tranquil while waiting to be long suffering toward these things. You know, it's very difficult when we get in a jam to be patient. That is the last thing on our mind is to be patient. We want this thing to be solved immediately. And but we have to be patient because it could take hours. It could take days. It could take weeks, months, years. And if you're if you're not patient, you're just going to be frustrated. And what he's calling us here to do is to be patient, to trust the Lord that he knows what he's doing and not get all frazzled about this thing. And it's directed here toward brethren, of course. Be patient, brethren. The brethren in James's letter always refer to believers beginning in chapter one, verse two. So he's not giving a test here to see whether a person's a believer or not, but giving a test to believers to see whether they will apply doctrine or not, whether they will trust the Lord and be patient. How long are we to be patient or to remain patient, according to verse seven, it says, until the coming of the Lord. This is the Parousia. There's no time that a Christian should be impatient, period. Just have a relaxed mental attitude that we probably will get impatient, but there's no time when we have an excuse to do so. That's what the text is saying. We should have a relaxed mental attitude because God works all things for the good. Hmm. Easier said than done. Obviously, true. Now, when is the coming of the Lord? The coming, the parousia, this is what we call the parousia from the Greek word for coming, the word that means the presence or arrival of a king or something like that. It can refer either to the second coming of Christ or it can refer to the rapture, which I see as two distinct events. Here, it is the pre-tribulational rapture. because it's presented in verses eight and nine as being imminent. His coming is at hand. He is near standing right at the door. OK, those are expressions of a doctrine called imminency, which we'll talk about in a second. But I see the rapture. And the revelation or second coming of Christ as two distinct events. So here's the cross of Christ, let's say, in 33 A.D., and everything in this box is what's occurring on Earth. Once we go up here, this is what occurs in heaven. And this is what occurs under the earth in Sheol, Hades, which we're not talking about this today. But here we are. Christ died on the cross and began to build his church. Now, you, if you're a believer in Christ, are part of that church, having been baptized by the spirit into the body of Christ. That is the church, Paul said. And we are somewhere along this line. Now, at some unknown time, the church will be removed from the world. And we call that the rapture. It's a Latin word from Raptura. But it comes from the Greek word harpozzo, which means to snatch, to take away. And so we, for example, Philip on the road to Azotus and in the book of Acts, he was harpozzo. He was taken out as he was witnessing to the guy on the chariot and he was taken to another city. That's an example of a rapture. But here the rapture is not to Azotus or anything, but it's to heaven where we go to the judgment seat of Christ. And while we're here at the judgment seat of Christ, On Earth, there will be the tribulation period of time. You've often heard about that, the end time scenario, the seven years of tribulation from Daniel 9, 24 to 27. And then after that, then there will be the revelation, what we sometimes call the second coming of Christ. But it's properly known in the Bible as the Revelation, thus the book of Revelation. First word, Apocalypse. OK, so then we'll return to Earth and God's plan. The 75 days of setting up the kingdom and everything, and then he will have a thousand year kingdom on Earth. So this text is talking about when it talks about the coming of the Lord, I believe it's talking about the rapture of the church. This is what we call an imminent event. It means that means it can occur at any moment. The doctrine of imminency has two aspects, certainty and uncertainty. You say, wait, hold on, how can something both be certain and uncertain? Well, the rapture is certain in that it will occur. It's uncertain as to when it will occur. Certain to occur uncertain when. And another element of this eminence is the fact that no prophesied events must happen before the rapture. No prophesied events must happen. I didn't say they. OK, so that means some prophesied events could happen before the rapture, but they don't have to. There are certain events that we're not totally a hundred percent sure when they will take place in the prophetic scheme. And one of those that scholars point out a lot is what's called the Battle of Gog and Magog from Ezekiel thirty eight and thirty nine. This is where you have a group probably from the north mainly the Russian area or at least they settled in those regions and they will come down and attack Israel from the north. And some scholars think that that could have could happen before the rapture. But it doesn't have to. And that's the point about imminency is that nothing has to happen before this takes place. It could happen today. It could happen in the next five minutes. It could happen in this minute. OK. It is an imminent event. It's like hanging over our head and it could fall at any moment, so to speak. So. The tribulation, the rapture is pre-tribulational, it's imminent, and that means it's different from the second coming. The second coming is not an imminent event. It cannot happen at any moment. It's certain to occur, but we know that it will occur after other prophesied events take place. In other words, the Antichrist has to come and he has to sign a deal with Israel and all this has to all happen before the second coming can happen. So it's not an imminent event. Only the rapture is an imminent event. And if you place the rapture anywhere else than before the tribulation, then you get into a problem with passages that teach eminence. Because once you do that and you put it in the tribulation at the midpoint or at the end or anything like that, then you don't have eminence in any anymore, because certain events must happen before that can happen. So we could sit there and say, well, you know, the Lord can't come today because the Antichrist hasn't signed a pact with Israel. And until he does that, we don't have to worry about the rapture happening. But that's not what scriptures teach, the scriptures teach that it can happen at any moment, and we have two of those expressions in the next two verses. But let's look at The illustration of patience with the farmer in verse eight or seven behold the farmer in here were given in this illustration a proper what I call a twofold perspective of the rapture. Two things that we ought to be constantly keeping in balance. And that is this the proper perspective on the rapture is a patient expectancy patience and expectancy. This is the farmer. OK. This is what the who the farmer is like, and he gives us a great example of this. We are to be patiently waiting for the Lord, but also to expect the Lord just as the farmer waits expectantly for the precious fruit of the earth. Now, the word for wait here, Ekdekamai, means to look for something, to wait for something. It's this idea that the farmer has planted his seed and he's looking forward to the precious produce, the fruit that comes from the ground. So the fruit is called precious here because it has exceptional value. It sustains our physical life. Most of us rely on food three or more times a day. And without it, we would die physically. So it's a precious thing to me on a very precious item. And despite its high value, the farmer is patient about it because he knows that when I plant a seed in the soil, there are certain things that have to take place. There's a process of that seed getting established. growing into a plant that is mature and can produce fruit. So we have right here a parallel to the word of God in the believer's heart is what we have. If you go back to James 1 21 the therefore there. No it says putting aside all filthiness and all that remains of wickedness and humility receive the word implanted which is able to save your souls. Now the word has already been implanted. OK, when a person has faith in Christ, the word, so to speak, is implanted within them. The question is, then, will it grow to produce fruit or not? Now, that's a portrait of of what we should all be looking at as Christians. Yes, I have trusted Christ and yes, his word has been implanted in my heart. Now, is the word going to grow to dominate my life so that I can mature and bear fruit or not? That's the parallel. So the farming illustration may hint at the normal spiritual birth, spiritual growth and spiritual fruit of a believer. But let's stick to the illustration. There are two vital things here that have to happen in the land of Israel to get the precious fruit. Remember, this was written by James in the land of Israel to Jews living outside of the land of Israel. So they'd be very familiar with the agricultural norms in the land of Israel. And he says there's two things that have to happen to get this precious fruit. First, you gotta have the early rain and then you gotta have the late rain. In Israel, the growing season is actually during the winter. That is when they receive their rain. So what you do is you plant in October, early October, and you pray for an early rain, an October-November rain. Okay? And that rain is essential to getting the seed established in the soil. Then you have the main rains, and the main rains occur during the winter season. And then you pray for a ladder rain, because it's the ladder rain that makes that plant hit its final stages into maturity where it can bear fruit. So all of these are important, but the first and the last, the early and the late, are very, very important. Turn to Deuteronomy 11, 14. These were the two rains that they always were looking for. Deuteronomy 11, 14. Incidentally, you know, this phrase, as I said, is pointing to the fact that this is very Jewish in its orientation. This is Jewish agricultural in the land of Israel. Deuteronomy 11, 14. That he will give you the rain for your land and its season, the early and the late rain that you may gather in your grain and your new wine and your oil. What the text is hinting at here is the importance of that early and late rain. It was very critical to get the early and the late rain because without the early your seeds never got established and they just sat there and never made anything without the light. You never got the fruit. So they were critical. And we find as we read the Old Testament of Israel disobeyed God then rains were withheld and we'll get to a rain passage in James 5 when we talk about Elijah praying for rain and then praying not for rain and how being a righteous man God responded to those prayers. But if Israel obeyed they would get the rain if they disobeyed they would not get rain. So in the land of Israel and the nation of Israel if they were spiritually obedient that would result in physical blessing for them. Also turn over to Hosea 6 verse 3. Now that will be hard to find. It's near the end of your Old Testament in those 12 little bitty tiny books. We call the book of the twelve, some people call the minor prophets, Hosea six, verse three. It's after Daniel. OK, just after Daniel. So let us know, let us press on to know the Lord, to know Yahweh, his going forth is as certain as the dawn. And he will come to us like the rain, like the spring rain watering the earth. I just I just wanted to show you this verse, because what it does is it draws a connection between the agriculture and the Lord's coming, just like in James. It just shows the familiarity that a Jew like James had with the Old Testament. So the believer is to patiently expect the rapture, like a farmer patiently expects the precious fruit from the earth. So let's go back to James five verse eight. He says, you to be patient, that is, just as the farmer is patient, patient, you be patient. This is a good the farmer is a great example to follow here. Anytime you get in a jam, just think of the farmer. He's got to wait. He's got to wait. He's got to wait here. Another command. Be patient. And again, it's another heiress denoting urgency. Patience does not need to be put off. Now, in the meantime, as we are waiting for the Lord, what should we be doing? The New American Standard says we should be strengthening your hearts, strengthen your hearts. It's the Greek word for strengthens. There is, though, it's another arist tense denoting urgency, something not to be put off, but to now be put into effect by believers. We should not put it off. What does it mean to strengthen? It means to establish, to cause, to be inwardly firm. So what he means is to get established in doctrine. While we wait for the Lord, we get firm in doctrine, we grow spiritually, we advance to maturity. We don't sit there and do nothing. So the analogy with the farmer is that the word of God is planted within the believer, a regeneration. And as he waits for the Lord to come, he studies doctrine and applies what he's learning. There's a planting, there's a growing and there is a harvesting. It's not just planting. It's not just I just go to heaven and that's it. OK. You don't get saved just to go to heaven. God doesn't save children so that they are infants so they can remain infants. He saves us so that we'll grow into spiritual adulthood. When you plant, you don't plant so you can just stick it in the ground and hope nothing happens. You plant it hoping that you're going to get a product out of it. And that's why God plants the word of God in our hearts at regeneration, hoping that he'll get a product out of us as we follow him as we walk by faith. That's what God wants from believers. He wants us to be firmly rooted in God's word so that we can grow and advance to spiritual maturity and fruit bearing. Every believer will be evaluated at the judgment seat of Christ and every believer will be either rewarded or they will suffer loss. It's very important that we grow from little bitty seedlings to fruit bearing plants because it will affect our position of authority in the millennial kingdom and our eternal position before God in the new heaven and new earth. Some people say that they don't care about that very much. I'm just going to be glad to be there. And honestly, that's a sad thing, because God wants us to be faithful now so that he can reward us later. Many people fail also to recognize that the rewards are not there totally for your benefit in the new heaven and new earth or millennium. They're not totally there for your benefit. Whatever rewards you receive will be like an abundance out of which you can bring more glory to God there. So it's not just about, well, I'm going to get to have all this stuff. That's not rewards. That's not the sole emphasis of rewards. The emphasis is also on the fact that they will then be used to bring more glory to him. So while we patiently expect the Lord, we should be learning Bible doctrine and we should be applying Bible doctrine, as James says. For the coming of the Lord is near. In other words, this is why we ought to be patient and strengthen our hearts now, because he is coming is near. Now, the verb is near, and it's a perfect tense. A lot of people read this and I think, well, if this was written in about 40 A.D. and James said the coming of the Lord is near, it's been 2000 years. What do you mean it was near? How can 2000 years be near? But the word means not so much nearness in time as nearness in the sense that it could happen at any moment. We don't know when, but it will. It's this eminence idea. Now, it's also in the perfect tense, and this is a very perfect, very important tense. The perfect tense means this, that you completed an action or something in the past, and it has ongoing results. We don't get that a lot, unfortunately, because when we clean up the garage two days later, it's all messed up. But this would be the idea that I clean my garage and it stayed clean for the rest of your life. That'd be great. Now, the idea here is that the Lord is near. That is, he came to be near with the effect that he remains near until he's here. OK, until he returns. So the way you diagram this grammatically is you draw a point and that he came near. With the effect of a line coming out of that, he remains near all along the corridors of time until it happens. So this is pointing to eminence. Eminence is a doctrine that we said that relates to the rapture, that says that Jesus Christ can come at any moment. And Jesus, or James, is saying to his readers in about 40, 42 A.D., that this has been true for you, he's saying to his readers, and it remains true for you. Jesus Christ died on the cross, we would say, in 33 A.D. OK? Go back to this diagram. And then he was resurrected three days later. And after several more days, he ascended to heaven and sat down at the right hand of the Father. Right? Then he sent the Spirit on the day of Pentecost in Acts 2 and started the church. From that day forward, Christ could have come at any moment. That's what the perfect tense is saying in James. He has come near. He is drawn near with the effect that he remains near so that no you can't put a date on the rapture. I don't care if you're Hal Lindsey. You can't put a date on it. OK. All that stuff got started with the millennialists back in the 1800s. We can put a date and they got out on a hill and they stood there and waited you know and nothing happened. And you can't date the rapture. OK, nobody can. It happens at any moment, no human being can possibly know when it could happen. This was just as true in 42 A.D. James and his readers, as it is for us living today in 2007. So we could translate it this way for the coming of the Lord has drawn near and it remains near. And that's what we mean by eminence. The second coming, on the other hand, is not imminent. There are definite prophecies that must happen before the second coming can take place. But that is not true with the rapture. There are no prophesied events that must take place before the rapture takes place. But what I want you to see is that this is the reason given for why we should strengthen our hearts. This is the reason given why we should undergo doctrinal training. We should do that because the Lord can return at any moment. And if he can return at any moment, then we need to be prepared for that coming. And the only way to be prepared for that day is to be in the fruit bearing stage of Christianity. That is, to advance to spiritual maturity, to advance into what I call true discipleship. Well, Jesus said it, too. He said, if you are truly my disciples, if you obey my word, he didn't say you're truly believers, if you obey my word, he said truly disciples. In that context, disciple is something more than being just a believer. It's being a dedicated Christian who dedicates his mind and body to following the Lord wherever he goes. But getting a relationship with God is just faith alone in Christ. So Jesus said his true disciples would bear much fruit. He said some 30, some 60, some 100 fold. Remember those passages? Those are talking about fruit bearing. That's not talking about whether you're really a believer or not. That's talking about moving into a fruit bearing stage of Christianity as you advance to maturity and put it into work. You know, loving others and using your spiritual gifts to encourage and exhort and give and minister to others. So there's a stage of Christianity that I call the fruit bearing stage, and that's when a believer reaches doctrinal maturity and uses it in his life. He lives that way. Now, this fits, of course, very well with the agricultural metaphor that we've been looking at, because we all know that unless a plant reaches maturity, you don't get any fruit, do you? Or you don't get much. Last year we had a real dry year and I didn't get any, I don't think I got a single pecan last year and I have four big pecan trees. Well this year I got a tremendous amount of rain and so much that some of the fruit was, you know, spoiled. You know, fungus and things like that. But I've got a million pecans in my yard. So it's very important to advance to maturity so we can bear fruit. Verse nine James five nine do not complain. Now where it is better something like grumble or mutter under one's breath. You know this is when I sit around and I've got to talk about every other believer. I've got to move you know what do they think they're doing here. They're not good enough to be here. What gives them the right to sit in that pew over there. And we've all done this. You know I looked out because we know something that person has done or is doing and we're sitting there going well what gives them the right. And here James says look don't complain. Don't mutter about other believers under your breath. This is just another sin of the tongue where we whisper about everybody else. Now we're not called to complain against one another. We're called as Christians to love one another. This is the L.A. loan doctrine or the one another doctrine. The first and greatest commandment is love God and the second is like it to love one another. Following these two commands cover a multitude of sins loving God and loving others. John 1334. Listen to what Jesus said. I knew a new commandment. I give to you that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another. Verse 35. By this, all men will know that you are my disciples. If you have love for one another. In other words, nobody can detect if you are a genuine disciple of Christ. If you're not loving other people, how could they ever detect it? And there again, the cycle is something more than a genuine believer. Verse 12, this is my commandment that you love one another just as I have loved you. Chapter 15, verse 17, this I command you that you love one another. Romans 12, 10, be devoted to one another and brotherly love. Give preference to one another in honor. First Thessalonians 3, 12. And may the Lord cause you to increase and abound in love for one another and for all people, just as we also do for you. First Thessalonians 4, 9. Now, as to the love of the brethren, you have no need for anyone to write to you, for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another. First Peter one twenty two. Since you have an obedience to the truth, purified your souls for a sincere love of the brethren, fervently love one another from the heart. First Peter four eight. Above all, keep fervent in your love for one another because love covers a multitude of sins. First John three eleven. First John could well be known as the love epistle. For this is the message which you have heard from the beginning that we should love one another. First John three twenty three. This is his commandment that we believe in the name of his son Jesus Christ and love one another just as he commanded us. First John four seven beloved. Let us love one another for love is from God and everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. First John four eleven beloved. If God so loved us we also ought to love one another. First John four twelve. No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us. And Second John, verse five. Now, I ask you, lady, not as though I were writing to you a new commandment, but the one which you have had from the beginning that we love one another. We are not called to complain against one another. We are called to love one another and to do it fervently from the heart. The New Testament overwhelmingly commands this over and over and over and over and over and over and over as if it takes a while to get in our thick skulls. I think God knew what he was doing here. It does take a while because we're so selfish. We're so bitter. We look out at everybody else and we just want to play the comparison game. And that means we're not going to love anybody comparing ourselves with everybody else. So how many times do we love each other versus how many times do we grumble and complain about somebody? Well, what does James tell us about why we should not grumble against them? He says you shouldn't do it so that you yourself may not be judged. In other words, there's a judgment coming for the Christian. This isn't this is not a temporal judgment now in time. This is the judgment seat of Christ, as we see clearly from the next. Phrase. Behold, in other words, pay serious attention here. Every time the Greek uses that word to do it means, hey, you need to perk up right here and really pay attention. That's the emphasis. He says the judge is standing right at the door. But you say, well, I thought Jesus was sitting at the father's right hand, how can it be standing right at the door? Well, he is. This is a metaphor of eminence again. In other words, he's right there waiting to come. This can happen at any moment. When Jesus returns at the rapture of the church, the next event is the judgment seat of Christ. The judge is obviously Jesus Christ, because John 522 and John 527 say it says the father judges no one but has given all judgment to the son. So Jesus Christ is the judge. He's the one who all stand before as believers. He's standing right at the door. That verb standing to stand at the door is, again, a perfect voice, remarkably, and the perfect voice means he's been standing there and remain standing there in the sense that this is an imminent event. The moment Christ ascended and established the church on Earth and Pentecost and Acts two, he was standing right at the door. And the next thing he's been standing there ever since. And the next thing that's going to happen in his calendar is I'm coming to get the church. And we're going to the judgment seat. It could happen any moment, it could happen in James Day, it could happen today, this afternoon. And this is a sobering moment because we'll all go to the judgment seat of Christ and we'll all have to have our deeds evaluated. So in light of all that we have learned about how to handle trials and sufferings, we are now called to patiently expect the Lord's coming as the farmer patiently expects the fruit of the earth. In the meantime, we are to be strengthening our hearts by studying and applying Bible doctrine in the growth process, because the coming of the Lord is near, at which point we will directly go to the judgment seat of Christ to have our fruit evaluated. Finally, then we should not complain against one another, but rather love one another so that when we reach the judgment seat of Christ, we will not be judged for grumbling against them. Behold, this is an imminent event. He says it can happen at any moment. It has been imminent since the Lord Jesus ascended to heaven and started the church. So so we should be continually readying ourselves by studying the scriptures, studying the Bible doctrine that he has for us. It means this means facing trials that come into all of our lives, facing trouble, troubles, facing sufferings, pain, strife, all that with doctrine. With doctrinal orientation, with grace orientation, Demonstrating that we trust God in all the details of our lives. That's what James is calling us to. Now, so that is the story about the conclusion of this letter and how it begins. Next week, we'll look at these two examples, the prophets and Job, men who endured suffering to the end. And the conclusion was that God was compassionate and merciful and that there was a meaning and purpose for all the suffering we have here. So let's close with a word of prayer, and then I want to ask the deacons to come forward so we can partake of the supper together where we remember that this is all based on what Christ has done.