As I recall, I was in my late 20s when it happened. I was about to board a plane, and as I approached the gate, I was delighted to discover that a man I knew named Mr. White was going to be on the same flight. We made arrangements to sit together, and I was very pleased with that. This is a man I'd met before. He was a spiritual leader, a senior citizen in the kingdom of God. He was a man that I knew that had walked with the Lord for years and years and years. and I looked at it as an opportunity for perhaps I could learn from spiritual things from him. So I remember saying to him at one point, what would you say is the most valuable spiritual lesson you've learned in your life? I'm not sure what I expected him to say, but I remember being struck by what he said, so much so that I've never forgotten it. He simply said to me, Mike, my troubles have been my greatest teachers. Interesting thought. Your troubles have been your greatest teachers? Now, all of us experience problems and trials and troubles in life. But would you say they taught you something and that that was your greatest teacher? Well, I think we might struggle with that, but I think James would concur with that. That book of James in the New Testament deals with trials. As a matter of fact, I think it's the subject of the whole book. James begins talking about that in the first 12 verses. And according to him, It could very well be, especially spiritually, your greatest asset. It's not your personality. It's not your potential. It's not your possessions. Your greatest asset is your problems, if you learn from them. You see, God allows trials to come into our life. As a matter of fact, the scripture calls it, from his point of view, a test to teach us spiritual things. Now, the question becomes, how do you learn from your trials? Would you like to know the answer to that? Are you going through a trial right now? haven't, you probably just, if you aren't, you probably just came out of one or you're about to go into one and you just don't know it yet. So I think it would be important if you could learn how to gain from the trial. Well, James tells us that in James chapter one. Will you turn with me to James one and I'm going to read beginning at verse 19. James says, so then, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath, for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God. These two verses tell us how we should respond in order to learn, Verse 19 is telling us about the response. Verse 20 is giving us the result. And as we shall see, the result is what we gain from the trial if we respond properly to it. So it would behoove us to look at these two verses very carefully. Let's do that. Look at the opening two words, so, then. The Greek word translated then in this translation is actually the word therefore. Either way, this is a conclusion of what has been said. Now, there is a little bit of a discussion as to what this relates to. There are a couple of problems with that first word then or therefore. For example, if you've got a translation other than the one I'm reading from, you might notice the word's not even there. I'm reading from the New King James Translation, and it's there. But in some modern translations, it's not there. Now, some of us have been discussing this issue, so I would not normally mention this kind of a problem, but since some of us have been discussing it, I think I'll toss it out. The truth is that it's missing in just a couple of Greek manuscripts. For that reason, they leave it out, but it's in the vast majority of manuscripts that we have of James, so I think it is proper to consider it there. Matter of fact, it indicates that these two verses simply relate to what has been said, and that's the second problem with this word. What does it relate to? Well, some say that verse 19 is the result of verse 18. Matter of fact, one commentator says, James has already spoken of the new birth, that's in verse 18, and now he proposes to show that that experience should be evident itself in conduct. end of quote. In other words, since we have been begotten through the Word of God, we should then hear the Word of God. So one option is that therefore is only related to verse 18. The second possibility, and frankly the one I prefer, is that it refers to just about everything that's been said. And if you understand his flow of thought, that makes perfect sense. Let me explain. In verses 2 to 12, James has talked about trials. In verse 13 to verse 18, he's talked about temptation. It is very important that you understand that that's the introduction to the book. In other words, he seems to be saying, when there's a trial, there'll be an accompanying temptation. So, what do you do? Well, in that first paragraph, two to 12, he says, count it all joy. How can you do that, knowing that the trying of your faith produces endurance? And by the way, he says endure, so that Matter of fact, if you've got your Bible open, look back at verse four. Let patience, that's the word endure, have its perfect work, that you may be perfect, and in the New Testament that means mature, that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing. So he's saying, if you are trusting the Lord, then this could lead to spiritual maturity. So he says, if you don't know what you need to learn, in verse five, he says, ask for wisdom. And then he says, and if you don't ask in faith, that you could be unsettled, unanswered, and unstable in all your ways. Then he concludes in verse 12 by saying, and by the way, you're blessed if you do this because if you trust the Lord and you love him to the point that you obey him, you'll receive a crown of life. So that first paragraph is dealing with trials and saying, trust the Lord and learn from them so that you can become spiritually mature. And the second paragraph, as I just mentioned, is talking about temptation. And he's saying, don't blame God. God allows trials, but he does not tempt you. That comes from you, not the Lord. Now, the point I'm making today is that verse 19 says, therefore, And I think he's saying, in light of the fact that trials are for your training, trials are to teach you, and you should not blame God for the temptation, therefore, this is what you need to do. And he gives us three things. Number one, be swift to hear. Number two, be slow to speak. Number three, be slow to rap. That's the way you should respond to this trial and perhaps this temptation that has come into your life. So let's look at these things carefully. Be swift to hear. Now, I had a discussion even recently with a pastor friend of mine, and we were talking about this verse, and he said, is that everyday conversation? And I said, no, no, not a bad idea in everyday conversation, but that's not the context of what James is talking about. He is talking here about trials. So in this passage, he is saying that you ought to be swift to hear in a trial. The next question is, hear who? Well, keep reading. I just read verses 19 and 20, but look at verse 21. Lay aside all filthiness and overflow of wickedness, and receive with meekness the implanted Word, which is able to save your souls. But be doers of the Word and not hearers only." Now, you need to connect hearers in verse 19 with hearers in verse 22. and it becomes very clear that when he says, be swift to hear, in verse 19, he's talking about hearing the Word of God. In the midst of a trial, you need to be swift to hear. You need to be swift to hear the Word of God or the counsel other people give you based on the Word of God. So, this is not talking about everyday conversation. It's talking about being swift to hear. And he goes on to say, don't just hear it, but do it. It's being swift to hear and to heed the Word of God. So James is saying you need to be quick to hear, and you need to be quick to heed. In other words, obey. He says hear, but he clearly means obey. It's sort of like a little child and the mother tells the kid to do something and the child doesn't do it and the mother says, did you hear me? Now, what does she mean? Did you do it? She isn't saying, did you hear the words or did you get the message? She means by that, did you do what I said? And of course the kid says, no. Now, so when James says here in verse 19, he makes it very clear in verse 22 that he means you are to do what the word says. Now that presupposes you understand what the word says. So when you have a trial, if you really want to grow through it, then the first thing you need to ask is where does the scripture speak about that? Matter of fact, go back to earlier in the chapter and look at verse five. If you lack wisdom, let him ask of God who gives liberally and without reproach, and he will give it to you. So he says in verse 5 up front, what you need when you're facing a trial is you need wisdom. So ask. Now, where do you get the wisdom? That's verse 19 and verse 22. You get it from the Word of God. You know, I think the occupational hazard of attending a church that teaches the Bible is that you hear it. and forget it. Matter of fact, I suspect you forget my sermons by the time you get the end of lunch. Sometimes I do. Or worse yet, you read the Bible and you really don't understand it. So I think one of the finest pieces of advice I could give you if you're going through a trial Ask, what does the scripture say I should do in this situation? And if you don't know, ask me or ask some knowledgeable Christian. As a matter of fact, the book of Psalms It just talks about being in one kind of a situation right after another, so much so that when I taught the book, I titled every Psalm, when, when somebody lies about you, when you're facing death, when, when, when, 150 times. Matter of fact, in Psalm 119, there's 22 paragraphs and each one of those is a different when. So you need to ask when this happens, what do I do? because you cannot understand. You think you hear it and you don't understand it. You got to understand it so you can know how to do it. An army general was inspecting the military base and he asked to see the bugler privately. Can you play fire call? He inquired. When the bugler assured him he could, the general requested that he meet him at five o'clock in the morning the next day. The post commander, nervous about the general's visit, quizzed the bugler. When the commander found out that the bugler had been asked by the general to play fire call, He went to the fire station and said to the fireman, we got to get this place in top-notch shape and I just want to give you heads up at five o'clock in the morning, the bugler is going to sound and it's going to be the fire call. The following day, the bugler reported to the general and he ordered him, play church call. But sir, he objected, yesterday you wanted me to play fire call. He said, yes son, I know. But today I want you to play the church call. As the first notes came out of that bugle of the church call and it pierced the morning stillness, the fire station doors flew open and the fire trucks came roaring out. They heard, they didn't understand. and therefore they didn't obey the right message. Now, you've got to be swift to hear, but that implies you understand and it necessitates that you obey. Now, that's the first thing you need to do when there's a trial. Go find out what God says about it. The second thing is, be slow to speak. I'm not sure I would have anticipated him saying that. Slow to speak? What's that got to do with it? Notice he doesn't say don't speak. He just says be slow to speak. You know? Maybe he has something here. I mean, when people have problems and they get under pressure, what do they do? They spout off at the mouth. You show me a man who's undergoing a heavy trial and I will show you a man who's talking. Or a woman. Don't we do that? We complain and murmur. Now, I don't think there's anything wrong with talking about it by itself. As a matter of fact, he doesn't say don't do it at all. It's just You need to be slow. Think about what you say. You know, when you speak in anger, you make the worst speech you will forever regret. So just be slow to speak. That's his point. We'll get to anger in a minute. You see, I think he says be slow to speak because it's impossible to listen and talk at the same time. So the first thing he says, in essence, is listen, be swift to hear, listen, and don't be so quick to talk. Listen first, and then maybe you can talk. Be slow to speak. You cannot learn while you are talking. There's an old proverb that says, when going through deep water, it is necessary to keep mouth closed. That's good stuff. Or someone has pointed out, God has given you two ears and one mouth. Does that mean he wants us to hear more than we speak? Be slow to speak. A talkative young man once came to Socrates to study oratory. When the philosopher told him that the price was double what he usually charged, the young man objected. But Socrates said, well, I have to teach you two things. First, I have to teach you how to hold your tongue. And secondly, I have to teach you how to speak. So we need to learn to be slow to speak. Now, as I've pointed out, I think this is in the context of trials because God wants you to hear what he has to say before you start talking. If you talk too quick, what are you gonna do? Complain, murmur. When I went through the book of Numbers, one of the things that struck me is that God delivered the children of Israel out of Egypt, miraculously, part of the Red Sea. They get into the wilderness, and they start complaining, and the word the Bible uses is murmuring. And I remember going through that book and being struck with the fact, God does not like complaining. I mean, he makes a big issue out of that in the book of Numbers. In contrast to that, the Bible makes a big issue out of the fact that we ought to be content. And I think the opposite of complaining is just being content. If you're really trusting the Lord, which is the first point he makes back up in verse two and three, is that you ought to be content. If God is in control and all things work together for good to those who love the Lord and are called according to his purpose, Romans 8, 28. All right, Lord, I'm going to let you handle this. And I'm just going to be content. I'll be satisfied with whatever you do. Now that's why you need to be slow to speak. Because if you speak too quick, you're liable to start saying the wrong thing and regret it. So James says part of the way that you handle a trial is be slow to speak. And that's because he wants you to be swift to hear and not say something you shouldn't or that you will regret later. All right. So far so good? Got it? Got a trial? Three things to do. Number one, swift to hear. Number two, shut up. Slow to speak. What's number three? Well, verse 19 says, be slow to wrath. Now the Greek text says, be slow to anger. In English, we don't make a lot of difference between wrath and anger. In the Greek New Testament, there is a difference. Wrath is an explosion of anger, and anger is a settled feeling of hatred. Now technically, James is not talking about a display of anger, an outburst of anger, but a persistent dislike, a hostility, a bitterness, a resentment. And he's saying, be slow to get angry. Now notice, he doesn't say don't be angry at all. There's some trials that make you angry. Doesn't say don't be angry, he just says be slow to anger. Matter of fact, Paul says, you are commanded to be angry. It's in Ephesians chapter four, verse 26. He says, be angry, and then he quickly adds, and sin not, and don't let the sun go down on your wrath. So Paul says it's okay to be angry, just look out for the sun to go down. and deal with it by that time. And James says, be slow. Don't be slow to get angry. I think it is the natural tendency that when you're going through trouble, you get angry. Isn't that true? One of the most common reactions to difficulty is anger. James says in the middle of the trial, be slow to get angry. Thomas Jefferson said, when angry, count to 100. If you did that, you'd be slow to get angry. And sometimes you need to count to 200. That is excellent advice because you'll make the best speech you'll regret when you are angry, as I said a moment ago. Temper, someone has said, is the weapon that we hold by the blade. It hurts you more than somebody else. For example, it has been said by doctors that frequent episodes of anger can bring about disease in the body such as migraine headaches, digestive disorders like ulcers, hardening of the arteries, blood pressure, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, muscular tightness, back pain, and on and on it goes. Now, I'm not suggesting that every one of those diseases is caused by anger. I am suggesting that some doctors say that anger can cause that, and it can certainly aggravate it. I think the simplest one to see is blood pressure. When you get angry, what happens to your blood pressure? It goes straight up. The point I'm making is that when you get angry, it hurts you. It's like that person said, it's like anger is a weapon and you hold it by the blades, the blades cut you. So he says, be slow to anger. Now, these are related to trials. When a trial comes and we get angry, then we spout off at the mouth and then we don't learn from trials. Do you see what I just did? I reversed the verse. The verse says, be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath. Flip it. Chronologically what happens? The trial comes and we get angry, spout off at the mouth, and don't listen. Isn't that what happens? So James says, Be swift to hear. And don't let these other things interrupt that. In the midst of difficulty, don't be controlled by the anger. Be controlled by the word of God. All right, I've given you three things to do. Got them? I'm going to pass out paper and pen. You're going to have to write them down. That's your ticket to get out of here. You remember them? Swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath. Got it? Why should I do that? Well, let me give you the result of that response. Look at verse 20. He says in verse 20, for the wrath of man does not produce the righteousness of God. Now, first thing I want you to notice about verse 20 is that it says four. Did you see that little word four? Now those of you who've listened to me for a long time have heard me say this before. When you see the word four at the beginning of a sentence in the Bible, that's the author's way of saying I'm about to give you a reason or an illustration of what I just said. This is very important. The commands of verse 19 result in verse 20. This is the reason, this is the result of what will happen if you do what is in verse 19. Now, it's stated negatively in the sense that it says the anger of man does not produce the righteousness of God. Now, we need to talk about that for a minute. That's a problem. Righteousness of God. I want you to put your finger in James, because we're coming back, and I want you to turn to the book of Romans. Romans chapter 5. Romans chapter 5, and look at verse 1. It says, therefore, having been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. You see the word justified? That word means declared righteous. The Greek word justified means declared righteous. And here's what's going on. When you hear. I'm a sinner. The penalty's death. Jesus died in my place to pay for my sin and rose from the dead. And I trust him to be my savior. That minute, God declares me righteous. I stand before God righteous. Amen. Incredible. Jesus gets my sin and I get his righteousness. Wow. Matter of fact, there's a verse that says that. Second Corinthians 521, he who knew no sin became sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in him. There's an old illustration someone gave me years ago. It goes like this. This handkerchief that I'm holding in my right hand represents the righteousness of Jesus Christ. My cell phone, which has a dark case on it, represents sin in my left hand. Let me quote the verse. He who knew no sin, the righteousness of Jesus, became sin. My sin is put on him. I put my phone on top of his righteousness. And then we become the righteousness of God in him. We get his righteousness. He gets our sin. Second Corinthians 521. And we get his righteousness. That's called justification. And it justification is by faith. You trust Christ You're justified, you're born again, you're saved, you're given eternal life, and you'll never perish. Now, if you're still in Romans 5, I want you to drop down and look at verse 16. Romans 5, 16. And the gift is not like that which comes from one who sins, for the judgment which comes from the offender results in condemnation, but the free gift which comes from many offenses results in justification." All right? You're justified. That's clear. By the way, I'm reading Romans 5. I'm sorry, I should be in Romans 6. Romans 5 talks about justification. I want Romans 6, 16. Do you not know to whom you present yourselves slaves to obey? Now, stop. In chapter 5, you got justified. So in chapter 6, he's talking to people who have trusted Christ, all right? Now, he says, but as a believer, as one who's trusted Christ, in verse 16, you can present yourselves Whomever you present yourselves, you become a slave to that person. You are that one slave whom you obey, whether it is sin unto death, so you could obey sin. Even though you're a Christian, you can still sin. And you're sitting there saying, tell me something I don't know. You knew that, all right. Ready? All right. So you can, as a Christian, sin. Then he says, or obedience leading to righteousness. Did you see that? So in chapter five, verse one, if you have faith, you are given righteousness, the righteousness of Christ. But in chapter six, he says if you obey, you get righteousness. Now, which is it? Answer, both. Now, theologians grapple with this and they say the righteousness of chapter five is called imputed righteousness. God imputes it to you. God gives it to you. The righteousness of chapter six is practical righteousness. So I'm made righteous in Christ, now I've got to practice that righteousness. So there's a difference between justification, being declared righteous, and practical righteousness, being obedient. There's a righteousness by faith, and there's a righteousness by obedience. Now go back to the book of James. And I want you to look at James chapter 2. And look at verse 23. And the scripture was fulfilled which said, Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness. You see that? He had faith and he got what? Righteousness. I go back to chapter 1 and look at verse 20. If you are swift to hear, which he explains in verse 22 is swift to obey, what happens? Then you get the righteousness of God. That's the point. And if you get angry, you won't get the righteousness of God because you're so angry you're not listening to God. You won't get the practical righteousness of God. Now, have I made that clear? There is a righteousness that comes by faith. By the way, have you trusted Christ? Do you know for sure you're going to heaven? If you don't, you need to trust Christ. All right, there's a righteousness that God gives you. It's a gift. And there's a righteousness that you practice. So being declared righteous means you should start practicing righteousness. The righteousness that God gives is by faith and the righteousness that you earn is by practicing obedience and you become righteous by simply doing what the Word of God says. So, you need to understand that James 1.20 is talking about practical righteousness and chapter 2 verse 23 is talking about imputed righteousness. So, James is saying it is imperative that you respond to a trial by obeying whatever God says to do in that trial so that the practical righteousness of God can be produced in your life. Now, you can always get angry and you can prevent learning righteousness. No matter how bad the situation, you can always get angry and make it worse. Or you can say, I'm going to trust the Lord, and I'm going to obey what he says in this situation, and then you will not only be declared righteous, you will be producing the righteousness of God in your life. The Jewish rabbis used to say, thrice Moses got angry, and thrice he failed to produce the mind of God. Moses got angry and as a result, disobeyed God and wasn't allowed to enter the promised land. Went to be with the Lord instead of going into the promised land. So, that's all negative. If you're angry, it'll not produce the righteousness of God, but turn it around. Positively, if you're not angry and listening, which means heeding, you'll do what? produce the righteousness of God. Now that's another way of saying you will grow to spiritual maturity. Remember, look at James chapter 1 and he says, count it all joy, verse 2. You'll be mature, verse four. Complete, verse four. Lacking nothing, verse four. Getting wisdom, verse five. And then he says it's righteous in verse 20. So if you respond properly to trials, you will receive maturity, endurance, wisdom, joy. And if you don't, you'll just walk around being angry. Got it? All right. Let me sum it up and make a couple of observations. What I'm saying very simply is this. The way to respond to trials is to learn from them. by being swift to hear what God says in that situation and not preventing that process by what you say and by getting angry. Now, I think these two verses The way we are to learn from trials. He's talking about responding. This is a way to learn from trials. Be obedient to the Word of God. I think, and I'm not alone in this, that verse 19 is the outline for the rest of the book. that what he does next is he talks about being swift to hear. That begins in verse 21 and goes all the way to the end of chapter 2, which is verse 26. Then, all of a sudden, he talks about speaking. In chapter 3, verse 1, to the end of that chapter, which is verse 18. Then in chapter 4, he doesn't use the word anger, but he talks about conflicts with one another, and judging one another, and leaving God out of your business venture. And that starts in chapter 4, verse 1, and goes all the way to chapter 5, verse 12, and then There's a conclusion beginning in 5.13. So I think that verse 19 is the outline of the rest of the book, and we're going to go through those three parts of the book very slowly and learn how to respond to trials so that we gain from it. The other thing I would say is this. I want you to look carefully at verse 19. It says, be swift to hear, and verse 22 says that means heed, obey. That has to do with your actions. Then he says, be slow to speak. That has to do with your words. And then he says, be slow to anger. That has to do with your attitude. So another way to look at verse 19 is to say that when you're in the midst of a trial, then you need to watch your attitude, words, and actions. And if you do, you will learn, you will mature, you'll gain practical righteousness that God approves of. And if you don't, you'll short circuit the process and the practical righteousness of God. will not be produced in your life. Years ago, I had the privilege of teaching at a seminary for a while. And as a professor, I quickly discovered that not all students learned from my lessons. The students who learned the most, I quickly discovered, were those who came to class with an eager attitude. Some wanted to learn the subject I was teaching, which happened to be evangelism. And they asked questions and they took notes. Right attitude, words, actions. They were my best students. There were a number of students who came to class with a bad attitude because the class I taught was required and they had to take it and they didn't want to. And they came with a bad attitude and they didn't learn a thing. Now that's when I was teaching in a seminary. As a pastor, I've learned the same thing. Some come with an eager attitude. I want to know what the scripture says. And they ask questions. And some of you I never hear from. I don't know how you learn anything without asking questions. You can't learn anything without asking questions if you're going to really learn it. or you're just doing it, not thinking about developing your skill in it. So, simply put, if you're swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to get angry, the result will be you will produce the righteousness of God. Now, let me say this whole thing a whole nother way. What's the one thing this verse 19 says you need to do? Be swift to hear. So as I thought about that, I thought, you need big ears. Some have little ears. And then I read an article that said, desert jackrabbits have huge ears as compared to other rabbits. I didn't know that. This article went on to say that these big ears improves the animal's hearing and serves as a radiator to regulate the rabbit's body temperature. Interesting. The desert jackrabbit has to rely on this unique cooling system because it doesn't take in enough water in the desert that gets evaporated and cools the body. So, those big ears operate as radiators, however that works. May I suggest you need radiator ears? It keeps you from overheating emotionally. Rather than getting all steamed up over what we hear, we need ears to hear what God says. so that we can do it. An angry man opens his mouth and shuts his ears. You need to open your ears and shut your mouth, or at least be slow to speak. So let me end with a poem. The wise old bird sat on an oak. The more he saw, the less he spoke. The less he spoke, the more he learned. Lord, make me like that wise old bird. You need to have ears like a desert jackrabbit, and you need to have sight like that wise old owl. Lord, give us that kind of wisdom. And through your grace, teach us your word so that we grow, so that we grow to spiritual maturity, so that we live a life of joy and not complaining, a life of maturity instead of immaturity. Lord, teach us. In Jesus' name, amen.